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"Of all the old commentators there actually appears to be nobody left, but Mr. Boswell, to favor the Indian claim! To such authority his adherents are heartily welcome. But to show the value of his criticism, he says that the word tribe (which, as Malone truly remarks, is in favor of the reading, in the text, as applicable more especially to the Jewish nation) is constantly used, at this day, in speaking of the Indians!' Unluckily, however, it was so used, in his day, as applicable particularly to the North American Indians, who never had any pearls to throw away, and of whom Shakespeare and his contemporaries could have known little or nothing. And we are not aware that the word tribe' had been then, or is now, familiarly applied to the people of the East Indies, to whom the allusion must, of course, have been made, if at all.

"But apart from this weight of testimony from the older commentators, we are of those who think there is quite enough in the expression itself to make it perfectly clear how Shakespeare wrote it. The expression is one of generalization, demanding, as must be the case in all good poetry, the ready sympathy and understanding of the reader. Whether he understand the particular allusion or not, at least, it should be of that character that he might, or ought to have known it; and not drawn from a source so remote as to be out of his reach, or so insignificant as to be beneath his notice. On this ground, we are willing to set up any possible Judean against any Indian that can be imagined.

"But to pursue the question of internal evidence somewhat further, we are of the opinion that there is much in the passage itself to aid us in forming a right conclusion. In the first place, the word tribe, as we remarked above, is one peculiarly appropriate to the Jewish people, so constantly used, in his time, as in ours, and so familiarly applied by Shakespeare; as, for instance, in the mouth of Shylock:

'Cursed be my tribe,

If I forgive him.'

'Jubal, a wealthy Hebrew of my tribe.'

'For sufferance is the badge of all our tribe,' &c.

"The epithet 'base' affords us also a very fair opportunity of speculation on this subject. This term, in the times of Shakespeare and those long antecedent and subsequent, would be held peculiarly descriptive of the Jewish people. The word, in the common understanding, would unquestionably fit any Jew and all Jews. So far from there being any propriety, there would have been a manifest impropriety in using the epithet, as denoting the characteristics, so far as understood, of East Indians in general. Then, as to any special story of an individual Indian throwing a pearl away,' and of such a feat being popularly known, or known at all,-where is it?

"We believe, therefore, that we must come back to the general faith on this point, that the allusion is to the tragic story of Herod and Mariamne. Mr. Steevens objects to this theory, on the ground that it would not constitute a good poetical figure, and would be, in fact, unworthy of Shakespeare, to make Othello compare his own desperate act with another act resembling it in essential particulars. That as, for instance, it would be no figure to say 'crystal resembles crystal'-so, for Othello to liken this his murder of Desdemona to the murder of Mariamne by Herod, would be equally no figure, since it would be comparing transac tions in themselves essentially identical. The mistake of Steevens will be apparent, by considering that Shakespeare makes no comparison in any such sense. He introduces a medius terminus. He makes Othello say, that he, in the one case, as Herod in the other, not-killed his wife,-but, threw a pearl away. And this metaphorical comparison of the two acts, by likening them to a third, which is itself figurative, vindicates, as it constitutes, the propriety of the similitude. As, in the example above cited, the figure would be complete to say,—

Like mine, beneath the sun's diffusive rays,
Your crystal half reflects the diamond's blaze.

"In order, therefore, to give some plausible account of the allusion, Steevens relates, and, as some uncharitably assert, invents a story of a Jew, who, not able being to obtain the price he claimed for a certain precious pearl, hurled it into the sea. But

tion.

a difficulty would here arise as to the propriety of applying the epithet base' to the supposed Jew, on account of this transac The pearl was apparently his own, to dispose of as he saw fit; and, viewing it in one light, the act would seem rather to raise him above the merely mercenary spirit popularly attributed to his race. This conduct might be extravagant and desperate; but no more base than the act of Cleopatra, in swallowing the pearl dissolved at her table; or than the destruction of her books, by the Sibyl, in the presence of Tarquinius Priscus; and we never heard the epithet used in connection with her very extraordinary conduct.

"But we would modestly suggest what may, perhaps, tend to throw light upon this point, and which seems hitherto to have escaped notice,—that the word 'Judean' in reality means something more than Jew. A Judean is, in fact, an inhabitant of Judea; and thus, in correspondence with Shakespeare's common mode of expression, the word might naturally, and with more force would refer to Herod, King of Judea, as the Judean, par excellence, as representing the State."

Thus far Mr. Lunt; and in addition to his remarks I will only point out, what appears to have escaped the observation of all who have written upon this passage, that the very phraseology implies,-absolutely requires, an allusion to a particular story. The words are all particular and definite. Mr. Boswell quotes a passage from Habington, in which "the unskilfull Indian," "mong the waves scatters" bright gems; and another from Howard, in which "Indians" "cast away" a pearl; and these passages the Rev. Mr. Dyce (Remarks, &c. p. 244) thinks “prove decidedly that Othello alludes to no particular story, but to “the Indian, as generally described." To Mr. Boswell's quotations, he adds the following, from Drayton's Legend of Matilda:

"The wretched Indian spurnes the golden Ore."

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But in this, as in the others, not only is the Indian " erally described," but the act. No specific deed is referred to; there is a mere allusion to a characteristic of the Indian. Not so in Othello's speech. In that, a particular person and a particular act must be alluded to, because Othello likens himself not to the Indian who throws a pearl away, but to "the base Júdean" who "threw a pearl away richer than all his tribe." The reference is to some particular story, specific and unmistakable; and as the American Indians, who alone had tribes, had no pearls, and as the story of the base Judean, Herod, who says of Mariamne, in the old play,

"I had but one inestimable jewel—

Yet I in suddaine choler cast it downe
And dasht it all to pieces,"

-as this story had marked affinities with Othello's position, and was well known to Shakespeare's public, can there be a shadow of a doubt that it was the story referred to, and that we should not disturb the reading of the authentic folio?

ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA.

"Alex.

Аст І. SCENE 5.

So he nodded,

And soberly did mount an Arme-gaunt Steede,

Who neigh'd so hye, that what I would haue spoken

Was beastly dumbe by him."

Thus the text of the original folio, with an evident error in "armegaunt." This has been changed to termagaunt, -the most common reading-arm-girt, arrogant, and war-gaunt. Of all these, arm-girt, proposed by Hanmer, seems to me the most suitable word, by far. But is it not possible that the compositor made a transposition of the first two letters, and adding the very easy mistake of g for q, printed "armegaunt" for rampaunt? This sorts well with what Alexis says of the high neighing of the horse.

ACT II. SCENE 2.

"Eno. Her gentlewomen, like the Nereides,
So many mermaids, tended her i' the eyes,
And made their bends adornings: at the helm
A seeming mermaid steers; the silken tackle
Swells with the touches of those flower-soft hands,
That yarely frame the office."

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