sed to be roused at the sight of troops, and banners, and
battle-array, and would stir and leap at the sound of a drum, or a
trumpet, or a neighing war-horse, seemed to have lost all that pride
and ambition, which are a soldier's virtue; and his military ardour
and all his old joys forsook him. Sometimes he thought his wife
honest, and at times he thought her not so; sometimes he thought Iago
just, and at times he thought him not so; then he would wish that he
had never known of it; he was not the worse for her loving Cassio,
so long as he knew it not: torn in pieces with these distracting
thoughts, he once laid hold on Iago's throat, and demanded proof of
Desdemona's guilt, or threatened instant death for his having belied
her. Iago, feigning indignation that his honesty should be taken for
a vice, asked Othello, if he had not sometimes seen a handkerchief
spotted with strawberries in his wife's hand. Othello answered, that
he had given her such a one, and that it was his first gift. "That
same handkerchief," said Iago, "did I see Michael Cassio this day wipe
his face with." "If it be as you say," said Othello, "I will not rest
till a wide revenge swallow them up: and first, for a token of your
fidelity, I expect that Cassio shall be put to death within three
days; and for that fair devil [meaning his lady], I will withdraw and
devise some swift means of death for her."

Trifles, light as air, are to the jealous proofs as strong as holy
writ. A handkerchief of his wife's seen in Cassio's hand, was motive
enough to the deluded Othello to pass sentence of death upon them
both, without once enquiring how Cassio came by it. Desdemona had
never given such a present to Cassio, nor would this constant lady
have wronged her lord with doing so naughty a thing, as giving his
presents to another man; both Cassio and Desdemona were innocent of
any offence against Othello: but the wicked Iago, whose spirits never
slept in contrivance of villainy, had made his wife (a good, but a
weak woman) steal this handkerchief from Desdemona, under pretence of
getting the work copied, but in reality to drop it in Cassio's way,
where he might find it, and give a handle to Iago's suggestion that it
was Desdemona's present.

Othello, soon after meeting his wife, pretended that he had a head-ach
(as he might indeed with truth), and desired her to lend him her
handkerchief to hold to his temples. She did so. "Not this," said
Othello, "but that han