This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
THE MODERN DESDEMONA
179

water-colour black paint could make him. That his hair was fair almost to whiteness and his eyes very blue, were unalterable facts which militated against the general Moorishness of his get up.

Although welcoming with ardour the President's fiat that he must be blacked all over for the part, he had flatly and finally refused to wear a turban when his senior had remarked that a puggri would hide his hair and a pair of black glare-glasses his eyes. The puggri idea having to be abandoned, the President had decided that the black glare-glasses were not a success as part of an Othello make-up, as, if anything, they accentuated the unfortunate fairness of the hair. . . .

As he advanced to make some colourable demonstration of a hymeneal nature, Desdemona waved him off.

"Don't you touch me while we get married," she commanded, "nor yet afterwards. You come off against everything. Look at that stool!"

And indeed it was evident that Othello had