eases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is ? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us,

, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die ? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that. If a Jew wrong a Christian, what is his humility ? revenge. If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by Christian example ? why, revenge. The villany you teach me, I will execute; and it shall go hard, but I will better the instruction.

Enter a Servant. Serv. Gentlemen, my master Antonio is at his house, and desires to speak with you both. Salar. We have been up and down to seek him.

Enter TUBAL. Salan. Here comes another of the tribe; a third cannot be matched, unless the devil himself turn Jew.

[Exeunt SALAN., SALAR. and Servant. Shy. How now, Tubal, what news from Genoa ? Hast thou found my daughter ?

Tub. I often came where I did hear of her, but cannot find her.

Shy. Why there, there, there, there! A diamond gone, cost me two thousand ducats in Frankfort! The curse never fell upon our nation till now ; I never felt it till now.-Two thousand ducats in that; and other precious, precious jewels.— I would my daughter were dead at my foot, and the jewels in her ear! 'Would she were hearsed at my foot, and the ducats in her coffin! No news of them ?_Why, so ;—and I know not what's spent in the search. Why, thou loss upon loss! the thief gone with so much, and so much to find the thief; and no satisfaction, no revenge; nor no ill luck stirring but what lights o' my shoulders; no sighs, but o'my breathing ; no tears, but o' my shedding.

Tub. Yes, other men have ill luck too. Antonio, as I heard in Genoa,

27

VOL. II.

Shy. What, what, what? Ill luck, ill luck ?

Tüb. -hath an argosy cast away, coming from Tripolis.

Shy. I thank God, I thank God!—Is it true? is it true ?

Tub. I spoke with some of the sailors that escaped the wreck.

Shy. I thank thee, good Tubal.-Good news, good news! Ha! ha!-Where? In Genoa ?

Tub. Your daughter spent in Genoa, as I heard, one night, fourscore ducats.

Shy. Thou stickest a dagger in me.--I shall never see 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, go, Tubal, and meet me at our synagogue; go, good Tubal ; at our synagogue, Tubal. [Exeunt.

1 The turquoise is a well-known precious stone found in the veins of the mountains on the confines of Persia to the east. In old times, its value was much enhanced by the magic properties attributed to it in common with other precious stones, one of which was, that it faded or brightened its hue as the health of the wearer increased or grew less.

SCENE II. Belmont.

A Room in Portia's House.

Enter BASSANIO, Portia, GRATIANO, NERISSA, and At

tendants. The Caskets are set out.

Por. I pray you tarry; pause a day or two,
Before you hazard; for, in choosing wrong,
I lose your company; therefore, forbear a while.
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'erlooked me, and divided me ;
One half of me is yours, the other half yours,—-
Mine own, 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 peizethe time ;
To eke it, and to draw it out in length,
To stay you from election.
Bass.

Let me choose,
For as I am, I live upon the rack.

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. .

1 To be o'erlooked, forelooked, or eye-bitten, was a term for being bewitched by an evil eye.

2 To pieze is from peser (Fr.), to weigh or balance.

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.

Por. Away then ; I'm locked 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-crowned 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, whilst BASSANO comments on the Caskets to

himself.

I i. e dignity of mien.

SONG.

1. Tell me, where is fancy' bred,

Or in the heart, or in the head ?
How begot, how nourished?

Reply, reply.
2. It is engendered 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.

All. Ding, dong, bell.
Bass. So may the outward shows be least them-

selves :
The world is still deceived with ornament.2
In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt,
But, being seasoned 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 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 searched, have livers white as milk !
And these assume but valor's excrement,
To render them redoubted. Look on beauty,
And you shall see 'tis purchased by the weight;
Which therein works a miracle in nature,
Making them lightest that wear most of it.
So are those crisped, snaky, golden locks,

4

1 Love.

2 Bassanio begins abruptly, the first part of the argument having passed in his mind.

3 i. e. justify it.
4 That is, what a little higher is called the beard of Hercules.