my gold again: fourscore ducats at a sitting! fourscore ducats!

Tub. There came divers of Antonio's creditors in my company to Venice, that swear he cannot choose but break.

Shy. I am very glad of it:- I'll plague him; I'll torture him :-I am glad of it.

Tub. One of them showed me a ring that he had of your daughter for a monkey.

Shy. Out upon her! Thou torturest me, Tubal: it was my turquoise; I had it of Leah when I was a bachelor: I would not have given it for a wilderness of monkeys.

Tub. But Antonio is certainly undone.

Shy. Nay, that's true, that's very true. Go, Tubal, fee me an officer; bespeak him a fortnight before. I will have the heart of him, if he forfeit; for, were he out of Venice, I can make what merchandise I will. Go, Tubal, and meet me at our synagogue; go, good Tubal; at our synagogue, Tubal.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II. Belmont. A room in PORTIA's house.

Enter BASSANIO, PORTIA, GRATIANO, NERISSA, and Attendants. Por. I pray you, tarry: pause a day or two Before you hazard; for, in choosing wrong, I lose your company: therefore, forbear awhile. There's something tells me (but it is not love) I would not lose you; and you know yourself, Hate counsels not in such a quality. But lest you should not understand me well (And yet a maiden hath no tongue but thought), I would detain you here some month or two Before you venture for me. I could teach you How to choose right, but then I am forsworn; So will I never be so may you miss me; But if you do, you'll make me wish a sin, That I had been forsworn. Beshrew your eyes, They have o'er-look'd me, and divided me; One half of me is yours, the other half yours,

Mine own, I would
I would say; but if mine, then yours,
And so all yours! O, these naughty times
Put bars between the owners and their rights!
And so, though yours, not yours.-Prove it so,
Let fortune go to hell for it,-not I.

I speak too long; but 'tis to peise (16) the time,
To eke it, and to draw it out in length,
To stay you from election.

Bass.

For, as I am, I live upon the rack.

Let me choose;

Por. Upon the rack, Bassanio! then confess What treason there is mingled with your love.

Bass. None but that ugly treason of mistrust, Which makes me fear the enjoying of my love: There may as well be amity and life

"Tween snow and fire, as treason and my love.

Por. Ay, but I fear you speak upon the rack,
Where men enforced do speak any thing.

Bass. Promise me life, and I'll confess the truth.
Por. Well then, confess, and live.

Bass.

Confess, and love,
Had been the very sum of my confession:
O happy torment, when my torturer
Doth teach me answers for deliverance!
But let me to my fortune and the caskets.

[Curtain drawn from before the caskets.
Por. Away, then! I am lock'd in one of them:
If you do love me, you will find me out.—
Nerissa, and the rest, stand all aloof.—

Let music sound while he doth make his choice;
Then, if he lose, he makes a swan-like end,

Fading in music: that the comparison

May stand more proper, my eye shall be the stream,
And watery death-bed for him. He may win;

And what is music then? then music is
Even as the flourish when true subjects bow
To a new-crownèd monarch: such it is
As are those dulcet sounds in break of day
That creep into the dreaming bridegroom's ear,

And summon him to marriage.-Now he goes,
With no less
presence, but with much more love,
Than young Alcides, when he did redeem
The virgin tribute paid by howling Troy
To the sea-monster: I stand for sacrifice;
The rest aloof are the Dardanian wives,
With bleared visages, come forth to view
The issue of the exploit. Go, Hercules!
Live thou, I live:-with much-much more dismay
I view the fight than thou that mak'st the fray.

Music, and the following SONG, whilst BASSANIO comments on the caskets to himself.

All.

Tell me where is fancy bred,
Or in the heart or in the head?
How begot, how nourished?
Reply, reply.

It is engender'd in the eyes,
With gazing fed; and fancy dies

In the cradle where it lies.

Let us all ring fancy's knell;

I'll begin it,-Ding, dong, bell.
Ding, dong, bell.

Bass. So may the outward shows be least themselves: The world is still deceiv'd with ornament.

In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt,
But, being season'd with a gracious voice,
Obscures the show of evil? In religion,
What damned error, but some sober brow
Will bless it, and approve it with a text,
Hiding the grossness with fair ornament?
There is no vice (17) so simple, but assumes
Some mark of virtue on his outward parts:
How many cowards, whose hearts are all as false
As stairs of sand, wear yet upon their chins
The beards of Hercules and frowning Mars;
Who, inward search'd, have livers white as milk;
And these assume but valour's excrement
To render them redoubted! Look on beauty,

And you shall see 'tis purchas'd by the weight;
Which therein works a miracle in nature,
Making them lightest that wear most of it:
So are those crispèd snaky golden locks,
Which make such wanton gambols with the wind,
Upon supposed fairness, often known

To be the dowry of a second head,

The skull that bred them in the sepulchre.
Thus ornament is but the guilèd shore

To a most dangerous sea; the beauteous scarf
Veiling an Indian beauty; (18) in a word,
The seeming truth which cunning times put on
To entrap the wisest. Therefore, thou gaudy gold,
Hard food for Midas, I will none of thee;

Nor none of thee, thou pale and common drudge
'Tween man and man: but thou, thou meagre lead,
Which rather threatenest than dost promise aught,
Thy plainness (19) moves me more than eloquence;
And here choose I:-joy be the consequence!

Por. How all the other passions fleet to air,—
As doubtful thoughts, and rash-embrac'd despair,
And shuddering fear, and green-ey'd jealousy!
O love, be moderate; allay thy ecstasy;
In measure rain thy joy; scant this excess!
I feel too much thy blessing: make it less,
For fear I surfeit!

Bass.

What find I here?

[Opening the leaden casket.

Fair Portia's counterfeit! What demi-god

Hath come so near creation? Move these eyes?

Or whether, riding on the balls of mine,

Seem they in motion? Here are sever'd lips,
Parted with sugar breath: so sweet a bar

Should sunder such sweet friends. Here in her hairs
The painter plays the spider; and hath woven
A golden mesh to entrap the hearts of men,
Faster than gnats in cobwebs: but her eyes,-
How could he see to do them? having made one,
Methinks it should have power to steal both his,

And leave itself unfurnish'd.(19) Yet look, how far
The substance of my praise doth wrong this shadow
In underprizing it, so far this shadow

Doth limp behind the substance.-Here's the scroll,
The continent and summary of my fortune.

[Reads.] "You that choose not by the view,

Chance as fair, and choose as true!

Since this fortune falls to you,

Be content, and seek no new.

If you be well pleas'd with this,

And hold your fortune for your bliss,
Turn you where your lady is,

And claim her with a loving kiss.”

A gentle scroll.-Fair lady, by your leave;
I come by note, to give and to receive.

Like one of two contending in a prize,

That thinks he hath done well in people's eyes,
Hearing applause and universal shout,

Giddy in spirit, still gazing, in a doubt
Whether those peals of praise be his or no;
So, thrice-fair lady, stand I, even so;

As doubtful whether what I see be true,
Until confirm'd, sign'd, ratified by you.

[Kissing her.

Por. You see me, Lord Bassanio, where I stand,
Such as I am though for myself alone

I would not be ambitious in my wish,
To wish myself much better; yet, for you
I would be trebled twenty times myself;

A thousand times more fair, ten thousand times
More rich;

That only to stand high in your account,
I might in virtues, beauties, livings, friends,
Exceed account: but the full sum of me
Is sum of nothing; which, to term in gross,
Is an unlesson'd girl, unschool'd, unpractis'd:
Happy in this, she is not yet so old
But she may learn; happier than this,
She is not bred so dull but she can learn ;
Happiest of all, is, that her gentle spirit