to know how she came to love the swarthy Moor. But perhaps he himself gives us the clue-she pitied him.

"My story being done

She gave me for my pains a world of sighs ;

She swore in faith 'twas strange, 'twas passing strange,

'Twas pitiful, 'twas wondrous pitiful;

She wished she had not heard it, yet she wished
That heaven had made her such a man."

Hers was one of those natures which longed with a passion of self-abnegation to make others happy. Iago rightly described her as 'so free, so apt, so blessed a disposition. She holds it a vice in her goodness not to do more than she is requested.' And 'of her own goodness' he was to 'make the net'

"That shall enmesh them all."

How beautiful is the first picture drawn of her by Othello in his 'round unvarnished tale.' 'Oft invited ' by old Brabantio to the house in Venice, we can picture him charming the old man with his stories of 'moving accidents by flood and field,' 'of being taken by the insolent foe and sold to slavery,' and of the wonders he had seen. And Desdemona 'seriously inclines' to listen to him, but is called away to her household affairs just at the most interesting part, so that she has to make 'a prayer of earnest heart' that all the story may be told her and it beguiles her of her tears.' This was indeed. a hero-this was a man on whom she could lavish all the store of hero-worship, of sympathy, and of pity

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which the wealthy curled darlings of Venice' could never win from her, but which were stored up in her tender heart. As Othello says,

"She thanked me

And bade me if I had a friend that loved her,

I should but teach him how to tell my story

And that would woo her. Upon this hint I spake.
She loved me for the dangers I had passed

And I loved her that she did pity them."

But having once lavished her wealth of love and pity upon the Moor, Desdemona became his own indeed with true devoted loyalty: the 'heart of her husband might have safely trusted in her.'

She cannot stay behind in time of danger. She must follow him to Cyprus. It is impossible to think that Desdemona deceived her father about her feeling for Othello, as Iago says she did. She did naturally shrink from him until divine pity and sympathy overcame her other feelings, and then she loved him and would follow him to the death; for her heart was 'subdued even to the very quality' of her lord.

And so she goes to Cyprus and is welcomed by Cassio, as 'our great captain's captain,' and there is sunshine in her life for a little while. She can laugh with Iago ; she can be friendly with Cassio: she is only thinking of Othello all the time. He comes, and her deep feeling has no words but

"My dear Othello."

She is very happy.

"The heavens forbid

But that our loves and comforts should increase

Even as our days do grow."

Yet all the time Cassio understood Desdemona's real beauty far more than Othello did. Othello speaks of her as a fair woman, a fine woman, a sweet woman,' 'the world hath not a sweeter creature,' but to Cassio she had a touch of another world, to him she was 'the divine Desdemona' she was

"The maid

That paragons description and wild fame;

One that excels the quirks of blazoning pens

And in the essential vesture of creation

Does tire the ingener.”

And Cassio found out this from sympathy, because he too by Iago's confession

“had a daily beauty in his life

which made Iago 'ugly.'

And so Desdemona for a little while is happy, as happy as even her craving woman's heart can desire; but Iago is near, and even now has begun his plot. Cassio is in trouble, and Desdemona is to plead for Cassio with Othello. And this she does, with all her heart; she assures him that 'his solicitor shall rather die than give his cause away.' She is so assured of her own position, so safe in her husband's love, she thinks, that she can afford to be very warm in her friendship, and love has only intensified that power of friendship in her. She is playfully importunate with Othello.

"What! Michael Cassio

That came a wooing with you and so many a time

When I have spoken of you disparagingly

Hath ta'en your part, to have so much to do

To bring him in.”

And Othello will deny her nothing. He shall come. It is Desdemona's last bright hour. That 'Farewell, my Desdemona' is the true good-bye between the Othello she had loved and herself, and as she closes the door he says—

"Perdition catch my soul

But I do love thee, and when I love thee not,
Chaos is come again.”

And now the trouble is at hand; it is the little rift within the lute.' Iago's poison has begun to work. Othello is jealous of Cassio. There is no need to recount that diabolical plot. No impersonation of Satan has ever equalled Iago. And yet the presence of Desdemona seems almost to have won Othello back to her.

"Desdemona comes.

If she be false, O then heaven mocks itself.
I'll not believe it."

How pathetic is the scene in which Desdemona wants to bind the little handkerchief round her husband's head we can almost hear the gentle voice saying 'I am very sorry that you are not well.' And her trust in Othello's nature too, how strong and loyal it is, when she loses the charmed handkerchief.

"And but my noble Moor

Is true of mind and made of no such baseness

As jealous creatures are, it were enough

To put him to ill thinking."

Emilia asks, 'Is he not jealous?' And Desdemona answers with a ring of scorn and pride in her voice, Who? He?'

And then Othello comes to her dissembling: how unconscious she is, though there is wistfulness in her answer when he says her hand is moist

"It yet hath felt no age, nor known no sorrow."

Once she falters a little from the truth. She is terrified at the change in Othello. She says she could fetch the handkerchief, and he knows that she cannot. Yet all the time her chief thoughts are not for herself, but for others. She must help Cassio, even though it may displease her lord

"So help me, every spirit sanctified,

As I have spoken for you all my best

What I can do, I will, and more I will
Than for myself I dare."

Brave loving heart, that is treading its way into the darkness. What has troubled Othello? It must be some state affair. She must not look for too much. Of course husbands could not be expected to be lovers always.

"Nay, we must think men are not gods,
Nor of them look for such observances
As fit the bridal."!!