We cannot all be masters, nor all masters
Cannot be truly follow'd. You shall mark
Many a duteous and knee-crooking knave,
That, doting on his own obsequious bondage,
Wears out his time, much like his master's ass,
For nought but provender; and, when he's old,
cashier'd ;

Whip me such honest knaves 12: Others there are,
Who, trimm'd in forms and visages of duty,
Keep yet their hearts attending on themselves;
And, throwing but shows of service on their lords,
Do well thrive by them, and, when they have lin'd
their coats,

Do themselves homage: these fellows have some soul;
And such a one do I profess myself.

For, sir,

It is as sure as you are Roderigo,

Were I the Moor, I would not be Iago:

In following him, I follow but myself:
Heaven is my judge, not I for love and duty,
But seeming so, for my peculiar end :

For when my outward action doth demonstrate
The native act and figure of my heart

13

In complement extern 13, 'tis not long after
But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve
For daws 14 to peck at: I am not what I am.

Rod. What a full fortune 15 does the thick-lips owe,

If he can carry't thus !

12 Knave is here used for servant, but with a sly mixture of contempt.

13 In complement extern, i. e. In outward completeness.

14 This is the reading of the folio. The first quarto reads doves. 15 The folio misprints fall for full. Full fortune is complete good fortune: to owe is to possess. So in Antony and Cleopatra:"Not the imperious show

Of the full-fortun'd Cæsar.”

And in Cymbeline :-
:-

"Our pleasure his full fortune doth confine."

Iago.

Call up her father,

Rouse him make after him, poison his delight,
Proclaim him in the streets; incense her kinsmen,
And, though he in a fertile climate dwell,

Plague him with flies: though that his joy be joy,
Yet throw such changes 16 of vexation on't,
As it may lose some colour.

Rod. Here is her father's house; I'll call aloud. Iago. Do; with like timorous accent, and dire yell, As when (by 17 night and negligence) the fire Is spied in populous cities.

Rod. What ho! Brabantio! signior Brabantio, ho! Iago. Awake! what ho! Brabantio! thieves! thieves! thieves!

Look to your house, your daughter, and your bags! Thieves thieves!

BRABANTIO, above, at a Window.

Bra. What is the reason of this terrible summons? What is the matter there?

Rod. Signior, is all your family within?

Iago. Are your doors lock'd?

Bra.

Why? wherefore ask you this?

Iago. 'Zounds, sir, y'are robb'd; for shame18, put on

your gown:

Your heart is burst, you have lost half
Even now, very now, an old black ram
Is tupping your white ewe.

your

Arise, arise;

soul;

Awake the snorting citizens with the bell,
Or else the devil will make a grandsire of you:

Arise, I say.

Bra.

What, have lost
you

16 The folio has chances.

17 By night and negligence means in the time of night and neghgence. Nothing is more common than this mode of expression: we should not hesitate at "By night and day." Timorous is of course used in the active sense of fearful.

18 i. e. for decency put on your gown.

Rod. Most reverend signior, do
Bra. Not I; What are you?
Rod. My name is-Roderigo.
Bra.

you know my voice?

The worser welcome:

I have charg'd thee, not to haunt about my doors: In honest plainness thou hast heard me say,

My daughter is not for thee; and now, in madness, Being full of supper, and distemp'ring draughts, Upon malicious bravery 19, dost thou come

To start my quiet.

Rod. Sir, sir, sir,

Bra.

My spirit, and my place, have in them power
To make this bitter to thee.

Rod.

But thou must needs be sure,

Patience, good sir.

Bra. What tell'st thou me of robbing? this is

Venice;

My house is not a grange 20.

Rod.

Most grave Brabantio, In simple and pure soul I come to you.

Iago. 'Zounds, sir, you are one of those, that will not serve God, if the devil bid you. Because we come to do you service, you think we are ruffians: You'll have your daughter covered with a Barbary horse; you'll have your nephews 21 neigh to you: you'll have coursers for cousins, and gennets for germans 22. Bra. What profane 23 wretch art thou?

.9 The folio has knavery.

20 That is, 66 we are in a populous city, mine is not a lone house, where a robbery might easily be committed." Grange is, strictly, the farm of a monastery; grangia, Lat. from granum: but, provincially, any lone house or solitary farm is called a grange.

21 Nephews here mean grandchildren. See King Henry VI. Part I. p. 51.

22 i. e. horses for relations. A gennet is a Spanish or Barbary

horse.

23 A profane wretch is one free spoken, coarse, or shameless in speech. Compare the Latin profano.

Iago. I am one, sir, that comes to tell you, your daughter and the Moor are now making the beast with two backs.

Bra. Thou art a villain.

Iago.

You are a senator.

Bra. This thou shalt answer: I know thee, Ro

derigo.

Rod. Sir, I will answer any thing. But I beseech

you,

If't be your pleasure, and most wise consent,
(As partly, I find, it is), that your fair daughter,
At this odd-even 24 and dull watch o' the night,
Transported-with no worse nor better guard,
But with a knave of common hire, a gondolier,-
To the gross clasps of a lascivious Moor,—
If this be known to you, and your allowance,
We then have done you bold and saucy wrongs;
But if you know not this, my manners tell me,
We have your wrong rebuke. Do not believe,
That, from 25 the sense of all civility,

I thus would play and trifle with your reverence:
Your daughter,-if you have not given her leave,—
I say again, hath made a gross revolt;

Tying her duty, beauty, wit, and fortunes,
In an extravagant 26 and wheeling stranger,

24 This odd-even appears to mean the interval between twelve at night and one in the morning. So in Macbeth :

"What is the night?

Lady M. Almost at odds with morning, which is which." A word is wanting to complete the sentence. Capell proposed to read:-"Be transported."

25 That is, in opposition to or departing from the sense of all civility. So in Twelfth Night :

"But this is from my commission."

And in The Mayor of Queenborough, by Middleton, 1661:— "But this is from my business."

26 Extravagant is here again used in its Latin sense, for wandering. Thus in Hamlet :-"The extravagant and erring spirit." Sir Henry Wootton thus uses it:-"These two accidents, pre

Of here and every where: Straight satisfy yourself27: If she be in her chamber, or your house,

Let loose on me the justice of the state

For thus deluding you.

Strike on the tinder, ho!

:

Bra.
Give me a taper ;-call up all my people :-
This accident is not unlike my dream,
Belief of it oppresses me already :—
Light, I say! light!
[Exit, from above.
Iago.
Farewell; for I must leave you :
It seems not meet, nor wholesome to my place 28,
To be produc'd 29 (as, if I stay, I shall),

Against the Moor: For, I do know, the state,—
However this may gall him with some check,-
Cannot with safety cast him; for he's embark'd
With such loud reason to the Cyprus' wars
(Which even now stand in act), that, for their souls,
Another of his fathom they have not,

To lead their business in which regard,
Though I do hate him as I do hells pains 30,
Yet, for necessity of present life,

I must show out a flag and sign of love,
Which is indeed but sign. That you

him,

shall surely find

Lead to the Sagittary 31 the raised search;

And there will I be with him. So, farewell. [Exit.

cisely true, and known to few, I have reported as not altogether extravagant from my purpose."-Parallel, &c. between Buckingham and Essex.-In is here used for on, a common substitution in ancient phraseology. Pope and others, not aware of this, altered it, and read, "To an extravagant," &c.

27 The preceding seventeen lines are not in the quarto. 28 The quarto, 1622, pate.

29 The folio has, producted.

30 The first folio jumbles paines into apines, and the printer of the second, not comprehending it, omits the word altogether.

31 It is said the figure of an archer is still to be seen over the gates of the arsenal at Venice. Yet Cassio's inquiry, "Ancient what makes he here," seems to imply that to Shakespeare the