Theobald trifles, as is usual. Accident and chance may admit a subtle distinction; accident may be considered as the act, and chance as the power or agency of fortune; as, It was by chance that this accident befel me.  At least, if we suppose all corrupt that is inaccurate, there will be no end of emendation.

IV.ii.57 (482,1) garner’d up my heart] That is, treasured up; the garner and the fountain are improperly conjoined.

IV.ii.62 (482,2)

  Turn thy complexion there! 
  Patience, thou young and rose-lipp’d cherubim;
  Ay, there, look grim as hell]

At such an object do thou, patience, thyself change colour; at this do thou, even thou, rosy cherub as thou art, look grim as hell.  The old editions and the new have it,

  I here look grim as hell.

I was written for ay, and not since corrected.

IV.ii.109 (484,4) The small’st opinion on my great’st abuse] The old quarto reads [for “least misuse"],

  The small’st opinion on my great’st abuse.

Which I think is better.

IV.ii.140 (486,6) Some base notorious knave] For gross, not in its proper meaning for known.

IV.ii.144 (486,7) Speak within door] Do not clamour so as to be heard beyond the house.

IV.ii.146 (486,8) the seamy side without] That is, inside out.

IV.iii.27 (490,2) and he, she lov’d, prov’d mad,/And did forsake her] I believe that mad only signifies wild, frantick, uncertain.

IV.iii.31 (490,3) I have much to do,/But to go hang my head] I have much ado to do any thing but hang my head.  We might read,

  Not to go hang my head.

This is perhaps the only insertion made in the latter editions which has improved the play.  The rest seem to have been added for the sake of amplification, or of ornament.  When the imagination had subsided, and the mind was no longer agitated by the horror of the action, it became at leisure to look round for specious additians.  This addition is natural.  Desdemona can at first hardly forbear to sing the song; she endeavours to change her train of thoughts, but her imagination at last prevails, and she sings it.

IV.iii.41 (491,4)

  Des. “The poor soul sat singing by a sycamore-tree,
  “Sing all a green willow]

This song, in two parts, is printed in a late collection of old ballads; the lines preserved here differ somewhat from the copy discovered by the ingenious collector.

IV.iii.55 (491,5)

  Des. “I call’d my love false love; but what said
  “he then? 
  “Sing willow, &c.]

This couplet is not in the ballad, which is the complaint, not of a woman forsaken, but of a man rejected.  These lines were probably added when it was accommodated to a woman.