I owe the most, in money and in love:
And from your love I have a warranty
To unburden all my plots and purposes,
How to get clear of all the debts I owe.

Ant. I pray you, good Bassanio, let me know
it;

And if it stand, as you yourself still do,
Within the eye of honour, be assured,

My purse, my person, my extremest means,

Lie all unlocked to your occasions.

Bass. In my school-days, when I had lost one shaft,

I shot his fellow of the self-same flight
The self-same way, with more advised watch,
To find the other forth; and, by advent'ring both,
I oft found both. I urge this childhood proof,
Fecause what follows is pure innocence.
I owe you much; and, like a wilful youth,
That which I owe is lost: but if you please
To shoot another arrow that self way
Which you did shoot the first, I do not doubt,
As I will watch the aim, or to find both,
Or bring your latter hazard back again,
And thankfully rest debtor for the first.

Ant. You know me well; and herein spend but time

To wind about my love with circumstance:
And, out of doubt, you do me now more wrong
In making question of my uttermost,
Than if you had made waste of all I have:
Then do but say to me what I should do,
That in your knowledge may by me be done,
And I am prest unto it: therefore speak.

Bass. In Belmont is a lady richly left,
And she is fair, and, fairer than that word,
Of wondrous virtues: sometimes from her eyes
I did receive fair speechless messages:
Her name is Portia; nothing undervalued
To Cato's daughter, Brutus' Portia.
Nor is the wide world ignorant of her worth;
For the four winds blow in from every coast
Renowned suitors: and her sunny locks
Hang on her temples like a golden fleece;
Which makes her seat of Belmont, Colchos' strand,
And many Jasons come in quest of her.
O, my Antonio, had I but the means
To hold a rival place with one of them,
I have a mind presages me such thrift,
That I should questionless be fortunate.

Ant. Thou know'st that all my fortunes are at

sea;

Nor have I money, nor commodity
To raise a present sum: therefore go forth,
Try what my credit can in Venice do;
That shall be racked, even to the uttermost
To furnish thee to Belmont, to fair Portia.
Go, presently inquire, and so will I,

Where money is; and I no question make
To have it of my trust, or for my sake. [Exeunt.

SCENE II.-Belmont. A Room in PORTIA'S House.

Enter PORTIA and NERISSA.

Por. By my troth, Nerissa, my little body is aweary of this great world.

Ner. You would be, sweet madam, if your miseries were in the same abundance as your good fortunes are. And yet, for aught I see, they are as sick that surfeit with too much, as they that starve with nothing. It is no mean happiness, therefore, to be seated in the mean: superfluity comes sooner by white hairs, but competency lives longer.

Por. Good sentences, and well pronounced. Ner. They would be better, if well followed. Por. If to do were as easy as to know what were good to do, chapels had been churches, and poor men's cottages princes' palaces. It is a good divine that follows his own instructions: I can easier teach twenty what were good to be done, than be one of the twenty to follow mine own teaching. The brain may devise laws for the blood, but a hot temper leaps over a cold decree: such a hare is madness-the youth, to skip o'er the meshes of good counsel the cripple. But this reasoning is not in the fashion to choose me a husband:-O me, the word choose! I may neither choose whom I would, nor refuse whom I dislike; so is the will of a living daughter curbed by the will of a dead father. Is it not hard, Nerissa, that I cannot choose one, nor refuse none?

Ner. Your father was ever virtuous; and holy men, at their death, have good inspirations; therefore, the lottery that he hath devised in these three chests, of gold, silver, and lead (whereof who chooses his meaning, chooses you), will, no doubt, never be chosen by any rightly, but one who you shall rightly love. But what warmth is there in your affection towards any of these princely suitors that are already come?

Por. I pray thee over-name them, and as thou namest them I will describe them; and according to my description, level at my affection.

Ner. First, there is the Neapolitan prince. Por. Ay, that's a colt indeed, for he doth nothing but talk of his horse; and he makes it a great appropriation to his own good parts that he can shoe him himself. I am much afraid my lady his mother played false with a smith. Ner. Then is there the County Palatine.

Por. He doth nothing but frown; as who should say, "An you will not have me, choose." He hears merry tales, and smiles not: I fear he will prove the weeping philosopher when he grows old, being so full of unmannerly sadness in his youth. I had rather be married to a death's head with a bone in his mouth, than to either of these. God defend me from these two!

Ner. How say you by the French lord, Monsieur Le Bon?

Por. God made him, and therefore let him pass for a man. In truth, I know it is a sin to be a mocker. But he! why, he hath a horse better than the Neapolitan's; a better bad habit of frowning than the Count Palatine: he is every man in no man: if a throstle sing, he falls straight a capering: he will fence with his own shadow if I should marry him, I should marry twenty husbands. If he would despise me, I would forgive him; for if he love me to madness, I shall never requite him.

Ner. What say you, then, to Faulconbridge, the young baron of England?

Por. You know I say nothing to him; for he understands not me, nor I him: he hath neither Latin, French, nor Italian; and you will come into the court and swear that I have a poor pennyworth in the English. He is a proper man's picture; but, alas! who can converse with a dumb-show? How oddly he is suited! I think he bought his doublet in Italy, his round hose in France, his bonnet in Germany, and his behaviour everywhere

Ner. What think you of the Scottish lord, his neighbour?

Por. That he hath a neighbourly charity in him; for he borrowed a box of the ear of the Englishman, and swore he would pay him again when he was able. I think the Frenchman became his surety, and sealed under for another. Ner. How like you the young German, the Duke of Saxony's nephew?

Por. Very vilely in the morning, when he is sober; and most vilely in the afternoon, when he is drunk when he is best, he is a little worse than a man; and when he is worst, he is little better than a beast: an the worst fall that ever fell, I hope I shall make shift to go without him. Ner. If he should offer to choose, and choose the right casket, you should refuse to perform your father's will, if you should refuse to accept him.

Por. Therefore, for fear of the worst, I pray thee set a deep glass of Rhenish wine on the contrary casket: for if the devil be within, and that temptation without, I know he will choose

it. I will do anything, Nerissa, ere I will be married to a sponge.

Ner. You need not fear, lady, the having any of these lords: they have acquainted me with their determinations; which is, indeed, to return to their home, and to trouble you with no more suit; unless you may be won by some other sort than your father's imposition, depending on the caskets.

Por. If I live to be as old as Sibylla, I will die as chaste as Diana, unless I be obtained by the manner of my father's will. I am glad this parcel of wooers are so reasonable; for there is not one among them but I dote on his very absence, and I pray God grant them a fair departure.

Ner. Do you not remember, lady, in your father's time, a Venetian, a scholar, and a soldier, that came hither in company of the Marquis of Montferrat?

Por. Yes, yes, it was Bassanio; as I think, so was he called.

Ner. True, madam: he, of all the men that ever my foolish eyes looked upon, was the best deserving a fair lady.

Por. I remember him well; and I remember him worthy of thy praise.-How now! what news?

Enter a Servant.

Serv. The four strangers seek for you, madam, to take their leave: and there is a fore-runner come from a fifth, the Prince of Morocco; who brings word the Prince, his master, will be here to-night.

Por. If I could bid the fifth welcome with so good heart as I can bid the other four farewell, I should be glad of his approach: if he have the condition of a saint, and the complexion of a devil, I had rather he should shrive me than wive me. Come, Nerissa.—Sirrah, go before.-Whiles we shut the gate upon one wooer, another knocks at the door. [Exeunt.

SCENE III.-Venice. A public Place.

Enter BASSANIO and SHYLOCK.
Shy. Three thousand ducats; well.
Bass. Ay, sir, for three months.
Shy. For three months; well.

Bass. For the which, as I told you, Antonio shall be bound.

Shy. Antonio shall become bound; well. Bass. May you stead me? Will you pleasure me? Shall I know your answer?

Shy. Three thousand ducats for three months, and Antonio bound.

Bass. Your answer to that.

Shy. Antonio is a good man.

Do you desire?-Rest you fair, good Signior;

[TO ANTONIO.

contrary?

Shy. Oh, no, no, no, no :-my meaning in saying he is a good man, is to have you understand me that he is sufficient. Yet his means are in supposition he hath an argosy bound to Tripolis, another to the Indies; I understand moreover, upon the Rialto, he hath a third at Mexico, a fourth for England; and other ventures he hath, squandered abroad. But ships are but boards, sailors but men: there be land-rats and water-rats, water-thieves and land-thieves; I mean, pirates: and then, there is the peril of waters, winds, and rocks. The man is, notwithstanding, sufficient:-three thousand ducats. I think I may take his bond.

Bass. Be assured you may.

Shy. I will be assured I may; and that I may be assured, I will bethink me. May I speak with Antonio?

Bass. If it please you to dine with us.

Shy. Yes, to smell pork; to eat of the habitation which your prophet, the Nazarite, conjured the devil into! I will buy with you, sell with you, talk with you, walk with you, and so following; but I will not eat with you, drink with you, nor pray with you. What news on the Rialto?Who is he comes here!

Enter ANTONIO.

Bass. This is Signior Antonio.

Shy. [aside]. How like a fawning publican he looks!

I hate him for he is a Christian :

But more for that, in low simplicity,
He lends out money gratis, and brings down
The rate of usance here with us in Venice.
If I can catch him once upon the hip,
I will feed fat the ancient grudge I bear him.
He hates our sacred nation; and he rails,

Even there where merchants most do congregate,

On me, my bargains, and my well-won thrift,
Which he calls interest. Curséd be my tribe
If I forgive him!

Bass.

Shylock, do you hear?

Shy. I am debating of my present store;
And, by the near guess of my memory,
I cannot instantly raise up the gross

Of full three thousand ducats. What of that?
Tubal, a wealthy Hebrew of my tribe,
Will furnish me.
But soft how many months

Yet, to supply the ripe wants of my friend, I'll break a custom.-Is he yet possessed How much you would?

Shy.

Ay, ay, three thousand ducats. Ant. And for three months.

Shy. I had forgot;-three months; you told

Directly interest: mark what Jacob did.
When Laban and himself were compromised,
That all the eanlings which were streaked and
pied

Should fall as Jacob's hire; the ewes, being rank,

In the end of autumn turnéd to the rams:
And when the work of generation was
Between these woolly breeders in the act,
The skilful shepherd peeled me certain wands,
And, in the doing of the deed of kind,
He stuck them up before the fulsome ewes;
Who, then conceiving, did in eaning time
Fall party-coloured lambs, and those were Jacob's.
This was a way to thrive, and he was blest;
And thrift is blessing, if men steal it not.

Ant. This was a venture, sir, that Jacob served for;

A thing not in his power to bring to pass,
But swayed and fashioned by the hand of Heaven.
Was this inserted to make interest good?
Or is your gold and silver ewes and rams?
Shy. I cannot tell; I make it breed as fast.-
But note me, signior.

Ant.

Mark you this, Bassanio,
The devil can cite scripture for his purpose.
An evil soul producing holy witness

Is like a villain with a smiling cheek;

A goodly apple rotten at the heart:

O, what a goodly outside falsehood hath !
Shy. Three thousand ducats;—'t is a good round

sum.

Three months from twelve, then let me see the rate. Ant. Well, Shylock, shall we be beholden to you?

Shy. Signior Antonio, many a time and oft,
In the Rialto you have rated me
About my moneys and my usances :
Still have I borne it with a patient shrug;
For sufferance is the badge of all our tribe.
You call me "misbeliever, cut-throat dog,"
And spit upon my Jewish gaberdine;
And all for use of that which is mine own.
Well, then, it now appears you need my help:
Go to, then you come to me, and you say,
"Shylock, we would have moneys." You say so;
You that did void your rheum upon my beard,
And foot me as you spurn a stranger cur
Over your threshold. Moneys is your suit:
What should I say to you? Should I not say,
"Hath a dog money? Is it possible

A cur can lend three thousand ducats?" or
Shall I bend low, and in a bondman's key,
With 'bated breath, and whispering humbleness,
Say this:-

"Fair sir, you spit on me on Wednesday last;
You spurned me such a day; another time
You called me dog: and for these courtesies
I'll lend you thus much moneys?"

Ant. I am as like to call thee so again,
To spit on thee again, to spurn thee too.
If thou wilt lend this money, lend it not
As to thy friends (for when did friendship take
A breed for barren metal of his friend?),
But lend it rather to thine enemy;

Who, if he break, thou may'st with better face
Exact the penalty.

Shy.
I would be friends with you, and have your love;
Forget the shames that you have stained me with;
Supply your present wants, and take no doit
Ofusance for my moneys; and you'll not hear me :
This is kind I offer.

Why, look you, how you storm!

Ant. This were kindness.

Whose own hard dealings teaches them suspect
The thoughts of others! Pray you, tell me this;
If he should break his day, what should I gain
By the exaction of the forfeiture?

A pound of man's flesh, taken from a man,
Is not so estimable, profitable neither,
As flesh of muttons, beefs, or goats. I say,
To buy his favour, I extend this friendship:
If he will take it, so; if not, adieu :
And, for my love, I pray you wrong me not.

Ant. Yes, Shylock, I will seal unto this bond.
Shy. Then meet me forthwith at the notary's;
Give him direction for this merry bond,
And I will go and purse the ducats straight;
See to my house, left in the fearful guard
Of an unthrifty knave; and presently
I will be with you.

[Exit.

This Hebrew will turn Christian; he grows kind.
Bass. I like not fair terms and a villain's mind.
Ant. Come on; in this there can be no dismay,
My ships come home a month before the day.
[Exeunt.

SCENE I.-Belmont. A Room in PORTIA's House. Flourish of cornets. Enter the PRINCE OF MOROCCO and his Train; PORTIA, NERISSA, and other of her Attendants.

Mor. Mislike me not for my complexion,
The shadowed livery of the burnished sun,
To whom I am a neighbour, and near bred.
Bring me the fairest creature northward born,
Where Phoebus' fire scarce thaws the icicles,
And let us make incision for your love,
Το prove whose blood is reddest, his or mine.
I tell thee, lady, this aspect of mine
Hath feared the valiant: by my love, I swear,
The best-regarded virgins of our clime
Have loved it too. I would not change this hue,
Except to steal your thoughts, my gentle queen.
Por. In terms of choice I am not solely led
By nice direction of a maiden's eyes:
Besides, the lottery of my destiny
Bars me the right of voluntary choosing:
But, if my father had not scanted me,

And hedged me by his wit, to yield myself
His wife who wins me by that means I told you,
Yourself, renowned prince, then stood as fair
As any comer I have looked on yet,

For my affection.

Mor. Even for that I thank you; Therefore, I pray you, lead me to the caskets, To try my fortune. By this scimitar, That slew the Sophi and a Persian prince, That won three fields of Sultan Solyman, I would out-stare the sternest eyes that look, Out-brave the heart most daring on the earth, Pluck the young sucking cubs from the she-bear, Yea, mock the lion when he roars for prey, To win thee, lady. But, alas the while! If Hercules and Lichas play at dice

Enter LAUNCELOT GOBBO.

Laun. Certainly, my conscience will serve me to run from this Jew, my master. The fiend is at mine elbow, and tempts me; saying to me, "Gobbo, Launcelot Gobbo, good Launcelot, or good Gobbo, or good Launcelot Gobbo, use your legs, take the start, run away." My conscience says, "No; take heed, honest Launcelot; take heed, honest Gobbo; or," as aforesaid, "honest Launcelot Gobbo: do not run; scorn running with thy heels." Well, the most courageous fiend bids me pack: "Via!" says the fiend; "away!" says the fiend, "for the heavens; rouse up a brave mind," says the fiend, "and run." Well my conscience, hanging about the neck of my