Othello, Act I, Scene 3 - Shakespeare

[Wherein I] spoke of most disastrous chances:

Of moving accidents by flood and field;

Of hairbreadth ’scapes i’ th’ imminent deadly breach;

Of being taken by the insolent foe

And sold to slavery, of my redemption thence,

And portance in my traveler’s 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 my process—

And of the cannibals that each other eat,

The Anthropophagi, and men whose heads

Do grow beneath their shoulders.

These things to hearWould Desdemona seriously incline.

But 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 dilate,

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 suffered. 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 wished she had not heard it, yet she wished

That heaven had made her such a man.

She thanked 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 passed,And I loved her that she did pity them.This only is the witchcraft I have used.

Shakespeare.

[Separate fragment at the bottom:]Often did beguile her of her tearsWhen I did speak of some distressful stroke…