"Fourteen years Sir Walter spent in the Tower, of whom Prince Henry would say that no King but his father would keep such a bird in a cage." But freedom followed and the scholar turned into the soldier again. Ultimately Spain had her way with her scourge and terror. James ministered to her revenge and Ralegh perished; "the only man left alive, of note, that had helped to beat the Spaniard in the year 1588." The favour of the axe was his last, and being asked which way he would dispose himself upon the block, he answered, "So the heart be right, it is no matter which way the head lieth." "Authors," adds old Prince," are perplexed under what topick to place him, whether of statesman, seaman, soldier, chymist, or chronologer; for in all these he did excel. He could make everything he read or heard his own, and his own he would easily improve to the greatest advantage. He seemed to be born to that only which he went about, so dextrous was he in all his undertakings, in court, camp, by sea, by land, with sword, with pen. And no wonder, for he slept but five hours; four he spent in reading and mastering the best authors; two in a select conversation and an inquisitive discourse; the rest in business." We may say of him that not only did he write The History of the World,' but he helped to make it; we may hold of all Devon's mighty sons, this man the mightiest. Good works have been inspired by his existence, but I ever regret that Gibbon, who designed a life of Ralegh, relinquished the idea before the immensity of his greater accomplishment. In the western meadow without the boundary of Hayes Barton there lies a great pool, where a cup has been hollowed to hold the brook. Here, under oak trees, one may sit, mark a clean reflection of the farm house upon the water and regard the window of the birth chamber opening on the western gable of the homestead. Thence the august infant's eyes first drew light, his lungs the air. He has told us that dear to memory was that snug nook, and many times, while he roamed the world and wrote his name upon the golden scroll, we may guess that the hero tuned his thought to these happy valleys and closed his eyes to mirror this haunt of peace. Hayes, England. "YOUR NAPKIN IS TOO LITTLE: LET IT ALONE” (A Freudean Commentary) BY SAMUEL A. TANNENBAUM, M. D. The scene in which Desdemona loses the precious handkerchief that is to testify so fatally against her is thus given in the Folio: (Oth.) If she be false, Heauen mock'd it selfe: We have quoted these verses exactly as they stand in the Folio, our best text of Othello, to show the utter absence in them of any stagedirections, except the Exit at 1. 336. The Quarto (1622) text differs slightly from the above here and there, but not in the matter of stage-directions. The absence of any hint as to the stage business intended by the poet at 1. 335 is as "deplorable," and as grievous in consequences, as the corresponding omission in the much discussed interview between Hamlet and Ophelia (Act III, sc. 2), when Polonius and Claudius, lawful espials, are concealed behind the arras. Here, as there, commentators and actors have failed to agree on the poet's meaning and have given us various interpretations and varying "business." From 1. 338 ("I am glad I have found this Napkin") and from what follows here and elsewhere in the play, it is evident that the "napkin" with which Desdemona had offered to bind Othello's forehead had fallen or been thrown to the floor somehow. But it is a matter of vital significance, not only to the contrivance of appropriate "business" at this point, but also to an understanding of the Poet's art and philosophy, to determine the just how of this apparently trivial detail. It involves no less fundamental a question than the rôle that Shakespere assigns to "accident" in the motivation of this tragedy; for the action of the drama after this scene turns very largely around the loss of the handkerchief. Emilia, who witnessed the incident, tells Iago that Desdemona "let it drop by negligence." Her statement, despite the fact that it is vague, misleading and evasive, has been accepted by some actors and commentators as a veracious report of what actually transpired. Rowe, who has been followed by a large number of editors, inserted after 1. 335 the stage direction "She drops her handkerchief." A manuscript note, "in a handwriting of the time," in the Duke of Devonshire's Q,, reads, "Lets fall her Napkin." Dyce expressed a preference for the more modern stage direction: "He puts the handkerchief from him, and it drops.” Collier, in his second edition, deserted the Devonshire Quarto and adopted the non-committal suggestion of his Ms. Corrector: "The napkin falls to the ground." From Furness we learn that Fechter's Othello threw the handkerchief down in a rage, but that Booth ("with finer insight," says Furness) let Othello gently push the handkerchief aside and Desdemona drop it. Tommaso Salvini's rendering has been thus described (The Othello of Tommaso Salvini, by E. T. Mason, 1890, p. 48): "He refuses the handkerchief offered by Desdemona and shows [!] her that it is too small to go round his head. He returns it to her, as he says 'Let it alone,' and Desdemona, thinking that she has replaced the handkerchief in a satchel which hangs at her side, lets it drop to the floor." Professor Ransome's Othello (Short Studies of Shakespeare's Plots, by C. Ransome, 1898, p. 223) is as gentle as Salvini's for he thus describes the scene: "[Othello's] temples are throbbing. [Desdemona] will bind them with her handkerchief. Alas! it proves too short for the purpose, and Othello recovering his equanimity, they go out together, and the needless handkerchief drops to the floor, unheeded by its owner." Unfortunately Ransome fails to inform his pupils how the "needless handkerchief "-Shakspere and Iago were greatly in need of it-remained suspended in mid-air until Othello and his wife went out (lovingly arm in arm?), and why Othello found it necessary to say, "Let it alone." It is somewhat remarkable, to say the least, that so few editors and commentators have said anything about the significance of the words "Let it alone" that immediately follow Othello's rejection of his wife's offered assistance. The general impression seems to be that the pronoun "it" (1. 336) refers to the handkerchief, and Deighton, a very reliable guide in such matters, definitely says so, thereby implying that but for Othello's brusque injunction ("Let it alone") Desdemona would have picked it up. That such is the generally accepted interpretation of these words is borne out by the "First Folio Shakspere" editors' comment on the situation. In the introduction to their edition of this play, the text of which gives the generally accepted stage direction, Miss Porter says (p. xviii): “. . . if [Othello] did not kneel as he spoke, it is implied, at least, by the action that he bowed his head low, clasping his forehead in his hand to suit his excuse, 'I have a paine vpon my Forehead, heere.' Desdemona, thus, can draw his bowed head upon her breast and seek to binde it hard' with her little embroidered handkerchief, which, being too little,' naturally [!] dropped on the floor. Othello, stung with the ominous double meaning of his chance words, is suddenly irritated enough to command 'Let it alone"." And, in their "literary illustrations" (p. 215) these editors say, "Shakespeare . . . makes Othello himself drop the handkerchief which Desdemona only parted with to bind his aching forehead. When with his abrupt movement it falls, she must have been about to stoop for it, since he says 'Let it alone"." Mr. Morrison, whose scholarly and poetical performance of Othello was a revelation and a delight, seems to have found this short sentence sufficiently troublesome to warrant its omission from his acting version. The manner of Othello's and Desdemona's exit after this incident is a matter which concerns the actor more than the commentator; but inasmuch as it depends upon our interpretation of the characters and of the incident, and even involves the poet's art and intention, it must have our consideration for a little while. To our regret, we find that only very few actors have left any detailed record of their performance of this great rôle and especially of this apparently trivial, but in reality very important, incident. Booth thus instructs "ye Novice, H. H. F(urness)": "Pass her, while on her knees, with forced indifference, but turn lovingly, and holding your arms for her to enter them, say, 'Come, I'll go in with thee.' Then with a long soulful look into her eyes, fold her tenderly to your heart and go slowly off." Salvini's "Othello makes a slight action of reassurance to Desdemona, upon her expression of anxiety about him. After Desdemona's exit, Othello stands for a moment in the doorway looking after her. He then sighs heavily, and follows her at a slow pace, with downcast looks, his head bowed upon his breast." Helen Faucit, describing Macready's performance in this scene, says that his Othello, reassured by Desdemona's "frank innocent demeanor and fond words, took her face in both his hands, looked long into her eyes, and then the old look came into his, and it spoke as plainly as possible, 'My life upon her faith"." Fechter evidently left the stage in a rage.-We see here three wholly different conceptions: in the one (Fechter), Othello is represented as wholly the dupe of Iago's villainy, his jealousy in full blast; in the other (Booth, Macready), he has discarded Iago's insinuations and been restored to full faith in his wife's innocence; in the third (Salvini), he is tormented with doubts not jealous, nor secure-although he had said, "I'll not believe it." Behind these differences of interpretation is, of course, the question of the propriety and naturalness of the poet's portrayal of the evolution of the jealous passion in a man of Othello's temperament and character. To the psychologist, especially to one imbued with the Freudean concepts, the extremely important incident of the loss of Desdemona's handkerchief presents some very interesting problems for solution. If it be true that Desdemona "so loves the token For [Othello] conjured her she should ever keep it That she reserves it evermore about her To kiss and talk to " how comes it that she forgets what has befallen it? that it never crosses her mind that that was the "napkin " which her husband threw from him so impatiently or which she let fall as she was about to "bind it hard" about his forehead? If Othello deliberately shows Desdemona that her napkin is too small to go around his head and returns it to her, as Salvini does, how is it possible |