Desdemona's temper is turned against her
by Iago, so that it suddenly strikes Othello in a new point of view, as
the inability to resist temptation; but to us who perceive the character
as a whole, this extreme gentleness of nature is yet delineated with
such exceeding refinement, that the effect never approaches to
feebleness. It is true that _once_ her extreme timidity leads her in a
moment of confusion and terror to prevaricate about the fatal
handkerchief. This handkerchief, in the original story of Cinthio, is
merely one of those embroidered handkerchiefs which were as fashionable
in Shakspeare's time as in our own; but the minute description of it as
"lavorato alla morisco sottilissimamente,"[52] suggested to the poetical
fancy of Shakspeare one of the most exquisite and characteristic
passages in the whole play. Othello makes poor Desdemona believe that
the handkerchief was a talisman.

There's magic in the web of it.
A sibyl, that had numbered in the world
The sun to make two hundred compasses,
In her prophetic fury sew'd the work:
The worms were hallowed that did breed the silk,
And it was dyed in mummy, which the skilful
Conserv'd of maidens' hearts.

DESDEMONA.

Indeed! is't true?

OTHELLO.

Most veritable, therefore look to't well.

DESDEMONA.

Then would to heaven that I had never seen it!

OTHELLO.

Ha! wherefore!

DESDEMONA.

Why do you speak so startingly and rash?

OTHELLO.

Is't lost,--Is't gone? Speak, is it out of the way?

DESDEMONA.

Heavens bless us!

OTHELLO.

Say you?

DESDEMONA.

It is not lost--but what an' if it were?

OTHELLO.

Ha!

DESDEMONA.

I say it is not lost.

OTHELLO.

Fetch it, let me see it.

DESDEMONA.

Why so I can, sir, but I will not now, &c.

Desdemona, whose soft credulity, whose turn for the marvellous, whose
susceptible imagination had first directed her thoughts and affections
to Othello, is precisely the woman to be frightened out of her senses by
such a tale as this, and betrayed by her fears into a momentary
tergiversation. It is most