Othello
ACT III SCENE I | Before the castle. | |
Enter CASSIO and some Musicians. | ||
CASSIO | Masters, play here; I will content your pains; | |
Something that’s brief; and bid ‘Good morrow, general.’ | ||
Music | ||
Enter Clown. | ||
Clown | Why masters, have your instruments been in Naples, | |
that they speak i’ the nose thus? | 5 | |
First Musician | How, sir, how! | |
Clown | Are these, I pray you, wind-instruments? | |
First Musician | Ay, marry, are they, sir. | |
Clown | O, thereby hangs a tail. | |
First Musician | Whereby hangs a tale, sir? | 10 |
Clown | Marry. sir, by many a wind-instrument that I know. | |
But, masters, here’s money for you: and the general | ||
so likes your music, that he desires you, for love’s | ||
sake, to make no more noise with it. | ||
First Musician | Well, sir, we will not. | 15 |
Clown | If you have any music that may not be heard, to’t | |
again: but, as they say to hear music the general | ||
does not greatly care. | ||
First Musician | We have none such, sir. | |
Clown | Then put up your pipes in your bag, for I’ll away: | 20 |
go; vanish into air; away! | ||
Exeunt Musicians. | ||
CASSIO | Dost thou hear, my honest friend? | |
Clown | No, I hear not your honest friend; I hear you. | |
CASSIO | Prithee, keep up thy quillets. There’s a poor piece | |
of gold for thee: if the gentlewoman that attends | 25 | |
the general’s wife be stirring, tell her there’s | ||
one Cassio entreats her a little favour of speech: | ||
wilt thou do this? | ||
Clown | She is stirring, sir: if she will stir hither, I | |
shall seem to notify unto her. | 30 | |
CASSIO | Do, good my friend. | |
Exit Clown. | ||
Enter IAGO. | ||
In happy time, Iago. | ||
IAGO | You have not been a-bed, then? | |
CASSIO | Why, no; the day had broke | |
Before we parted. I have made bold, Iago, | 35 | |
To send in to your wife: my suit to her | ||
Is, that she will to virtuous Desdemona | ||
Procure me some access. | ||
IAGO | I’ll send her to you presently; | |
And I’ll devise a mean to draw the Moor | 40 | |
Out of the way, that your converse and business | ||
May be more free. | ||
CASSIO | I humbly thank you for’t. | |
Exit IAGO. | ||
I never knew | ||
A Florentine more kind and honest. | 45 | |
Enter EMILIA | ||
EMILIA | Good morrow, good Lieutenant: I am sorry | |
For your displeasure; but all will sure be well. | ||
The general and his wife are talking of it; | ||
And she speaks for you stoutly: the Moor replies, | ||
That he you hurt is of great fame in Cyprus, | 50 | |
And great affinity, and that in wholesome wisdom | ||
He might not but refuse you; but he protests he loves you | ||
And needs no other suitor but his likings | ||
To take the safest occasion by the front | ||
To bring you in again. | 55 | |
CASSIO | Yet, I beseech you, | |
If you think fit, or that it may be done, | ||
Give me advantage of some brief discourse | ||
With Desdemona alone. | ||
EMILIA | Pray you, come in; | 60 |
I will bestow you where you shall have time | ||
To speak your bosom freely. | ||
CASSIO | I am much bound to you. | |
Exeunt |
Othello, Act 3, Scene 2
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Explanatory Notes for Act 3, Scene 1
From Othello. Ed. Brainerd Kellogg. New York: Clark & Maynard.
Abbreviations. — A.-S. = Anglo-Saxon: M.E. = Middle English (from the 13th to the 15th century) ; Fr. = French ; Ger. = German ; Gr. = Greek ; Cf. = compare (Lat. confer) ; Abbott refers to the excellent Shakespearean Grammar of Dr. Abbott; Schmidt, to Dr. Schmidt’s invaluable Shakespeare Lexicon.
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24. Quillets, short for quidlibet, anything; you choose.
45. Iago was a Venetian, and Cassio a Florentine.
{Additional Note: This line has prompted some needless debate over Iago’s place of origin. Iago is identified as Venetian in two separate scenes in Acts 3 and 5. Cassio here is stating that he has never met someone — not even a fellow Florentine — as kind and honest as this Venetian Iago.}
47. Displeasure, the disfavor you are in.
61. Bestow, stow, place in secrecy.
How to cite the explanatory notes:Shakespeare, William. Othello. Ed. Brainerd Kellogg. New York: Clark & Maynard, 1892.