The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1883-05-12

20 god of love and god Of reason say.
Which of you twain shall L this day obeyf"
As usual, Cupid took the cake" We will
say this much in praise of Desdemona; hay
ing made her choice she stuck to it. She
dld not hesitate to follow her husband over
the sea and into the camp.
We feel inclined to shed a dramatic tear
when she dies, though heaven knows what
use there was for her living any longer, If
the play had six acts or sixty | do not see
how she could ever have lived happily with
that bette noir.
Othello was a Moor. / might here enter
on a learned discussion of the Moors, their
origin, their rise and progress, their prosper
ity, their decline. But | think l can find
material with which to fill out my time with
out this. If not, l will return to it here
after.
He was probably a Mohammedan, and be-
lieyed in Allah-pathic doses of both love
and hate. How he happened to get to Venice
and rise so high i'll the service of the state |
have not the ~faintest idea. Whether he was
really much in a fight l canno say. The
only chance We had of seeing him display
his proves was unhappily destroyed with
the destruction of the Turkish fleet by the
storm. 1t is quite a dramatic marvel that
all the Venetian galleys carrying the vice
dogial party to Cyprus escaped unframed
from the very storm that overwhelmed the
staunch Turkish meu-of-war.
Like Beaconsfield, after him, however,
Othello occupied Cyprus in ''peace with
honor" Instead of stabbing himself Othello
should have written a novel and sold it for
10000. Such a proceeding would have been
calculated to bring him a life of luxury in
stead of death by his W dagger.
Othello was not a blonde. In fact, he was
a decided brunette. If Cassie was almost
damned in a fair wife, Othello was quite so
in a dark skin. Unhappy mani how deeply
l sympathize with him!
He had a nipping and a niger air. His
hair was curly, but not kinky. l know this
because it is so in a picture in my book.
Otheilo was nearly two meters tall and
weighed ninety-two kilogrammes. If we may
believe his story, he had been much "fata
profugus,' in fact was almost an Eneas.
He appeared to have a reputation for brav-
cry, but no one but the veriest coward would
smother a pretty woman with a pillow. He
doubtless loved Desdemona lust enough to
be jealous and not enough to be generous.
1t was a mere low, beastly, selfish kind of
love, a love which hastens Won Begierde zu
Genuss und in Genuss v~erschmacht sic mach
Begierde."
Like most dark-skinned people, Othello
was bilious. He suffered at times from indi-
gestlon. An active outdoor life was neces-
sary to keep such a mind in anything like q
decent trim. But when he was housed up,
as he had been for nine months previous to
the cheerful scenes described in the play,
"Fervet jecur dificile bile" In fact, in the
very beginning OF the play, Othello was all
out of fix. What he needed was not a gamic
~gerrymander, but a good dose of calomel.
Othello is the reputed author of that ia
nous address to the city council beginning,
Most potent, grave and reverend signiors."
l, however, do not think much of this
speech. 1t is overdrawn, distorted and I'M
natural. 1t shows a frightful a%symmetry of
sense in order to secure a synthesis of sound.
Rude am | in my Speech" says he, and
little blessed with the set phrase of peace"
and yet he drops of at once into the refine
ments of quantity, such as, THE very head
and front of my offending" and practices the
allurements of ALTERATION, as in What con-
Duration and what mighty magic | won his
daughter with" Such language is worthy a
dilettante, and little suits the rude and buff
feted waif of hard fortune.
The mayor decided that Othello was en-
titled to his wife. Affairs at Cyprus, how
ever, were in a pressing condition, and it was
decided to send Othello thither. Now fol-
lows the most unlikely and absurd proceed
ing of the whole play. Desdemona asked
and obtained permission to accompany her
husband to Cyprus. Instead, however, OF
going in the same boat with him, she EN-
barked in another vessel with Iago and his
wife. Now, | have the greatest reverence
for Shakespeare, as a poet, but l
a particle of regard for him as a plotter. 1t
is quite too much to ask an unbiased mind,
on the dawn of the twentieth century of
the Christian era, to take any stock in such
an improbable distribution of the bridal
party as the above. 1t is entirely too dia-
phanous. 1t is calculated to make us skepti-
cal concerning all the accounts of the subse-
quent events.
There is only one probability of explaining
this mysterious yet colossal stupidity. The
parties may have had such an exalted
opinion of each other that they could not
aNApr tho nncslhiifu nf GAZING aonh Afhar
seasick.
AS l have already said, a furious storm
saved Othello from the embarrassment of de-
tending Cyprus. There was, therefore, moth
ing left for him to do but fall a victim to the
wiles of his ancient and to his own evil pas
sions.
In fact, the shrewd ensign gained such a
complete control over the iver-surfeited
Saracen that the whilom Venetian rodomon-
tadist became a sniveling Cyprian dupe,
L have been jealous many and many a time.
| can appreciate the feelings of a man in this
unfortunate state. l know that trihes light
as air may become combinations a thousand
times stronger than holy writ. l understand
what that utter and absolute feeling of gone
ness is. l know how one may revel in his
own misery and satiate himself with his
own starvation. l recognize fully what a
perfect, symmetrical, polished and consonant
ass a man can make himself. Therefore l do
not blame Othello for being all these. But
the trouble with this swarthy semi-devil was
that he was naturally a brute. When his
evil passions were once aroused he could
only allay them in a british way. His
killing Desdemona first and himself after
wards was an anastrophe of instinct which
no subsequent gyration of reason could pos
sibly set right. In such a hail of deceit as
Iago rained down on Othello there was need
of a paragrandine of common sense and sound
reason, but these the myopic moor did not
possess.
1t is not my purpose here to tell how a
jealous person should act. Each one of You,
for you are all jealous, must decide that for
himself. My opinion is that the sharp tooth
of time, "tempus edox rerum," is the surest
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