|
|
Her father loved me; oft invited me;
Still question'd me the story of my life,
From year to year: the battles, sieges, fortunes,
That I have past.
I ran it through, even from my boyish days
To the very moment that he bade me tell it.
Wherein I spake of most disastrous chances,
Of moving incidents by flood and field,
Of hair-breadth 'scapes in the imminent deadly
breach,
Of being taken by the insolent foe,
And sold to slavery; of my redemption thence,
And 'portance in my travels' history;
Wherein of antres vast, and deserts idle,
Rough quarries, rocks, and hills whose heads touch
heaven,
It was my hint to speak—such was the
process;
And of the cannibals that each other eat—
The Anthropophagi—and men whose heads
Do grow beneath their shoulders. These things to
bear
Would Desdemona seriously incline:
still the house affairs would draw her thence;
Which ever as she could with haste dispatch,
She'd come again, and with a greedy ear
Devour up my discourse; which I observing,
Took once a pliant hour, and found good means
To draw from her a prayer of earnest heart,
That I would all my pilgrimage relate,
Whereof by parcels she had something heard
But not intentively: I did consent;
And often did beguile her of her tears,
When I did speak of some distressful stroke
That my youth suffer'd. 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 wish'd she had not heard it; yet she
wish'd
That Heaven had made her such a man: she thank'd
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 pass'd,
And I loved her that she did pity them.
This only is the witchcraft I have used:
Here comes the lady; let her witness it.
Shakspeare.
|