“And my poor fool is hanged! No, no, no life!” he wailed in heart-broken accents. “Why should a dog, a horse, a rat, have life, and thou no breath at all? Thou’lt come no more--never, never, never, never, never! Pray, you, undo this button.” He made a choking movement at the cloak at his throat, and someone stepped forward and gently unclasped it for him. “Thank you, sir. Do you see this? Look on her--look, her lips--look there, look there!” and with a strange cry of mingled joy and anguish King Lear fell dead on the body of his dear child Cordelia. And so, with all his faults and follies, which had assuredly wrought out their own bitter retribution, the fiery-hearted King passed into the realm of eternal rest. [Illustration] Othello [Illustration] “Honest Iago” Brave, generous, of a free and open nature, Othello the Moor had won high honour in the state of Venice, for, although dark in colouring and of an alien race, he was one of her most renowned generals, and time after time had carried her arms to victory. When, therefore, alarming news reached Venice that the Turkish hordes were again threatening to invade some of her most valued territories, it was to the Moorish warrior Othello that the Venetian senators turned at once to avert the threatened danger. Othello’s frank, valiant nature had won him many friends, but close at hand, where he little suspected it, was one subtle and dangerous enemy. Iago, one of his under-officers, hated him with a deadly venom. Iago was a brave soldier, but a man of utterly unscrupulous character. He had been with Othello through several campaigns, and when a chance for promotion came had hoped, through high personal influence, to obtain the envied position of Othello’s lieutenant. In his own opinion, Iago thoroughly merited this post, but when suit was made to Othello he evaded the petitioners, and finally put an end to their hopes by saying that he had already chosen his officer. “And what was he?” demanded Iago disdainfully. “Forsooth, a great arithmetician--one Michael Cassio, a Florentine that never set a squadron in the field, nor knows the division of a battle more than a spinster, unless by bookish theory; mere prattle without practice is all his soldiership. But he, in good time, must be his lieutenant, and I--God bless the mark!--his Moorship’s ancient.” Burning for revenge, Iago, instead of declining the inferior position of “ancient,” or ensign-bearer, accepted it, but only to serve his own purpose. “In following Othello, I follow but myself,” he declared. “Heaven is my judge, not for love and duty, but seeming so, for my peculiar end.” For Iago prided himself on the skill with which he could conceal his real feelings, and under a mask of the bluntest honesty he began to work out a scheme of diabolical cunning.