pleasure; if your love do not persuade you to come, let not my letter.”
Por.
O love! dispatch all business and be gone.
Bass.
Since I have your good leave to go away,
I will make haste; but till I come again,
No bed shall e’er be guilty of my stay,
Nor rest be interposer ’twixt us twain.
Exeunt.
¶
[Scene III]
Enter [Shylock] the Jew and [Solanio] and Antonio and the Jailer.
Shy.
Jailer, look to him, tell not me of mercy.
This is the fool that lent out money gratis.
Jailer, look to him.
Ant.
Hear me yet, good Shylock.
Shy.
I’ll have my bond, speak not against my bond,
I have sworn an oath that I will have my bond.
Thou call’dst me dog before thou hadst a cause,
But since I am a dog, beware my fangs.
The Duke shall grant me justice. I do wonder,
Thou naughty jailer, that thou art so fond
To come abroad with him at his request.
Ant.
I pray thee hear me speak.
Shy.
I’ll have my bond; I will not hear thee speak.
I’ll have my bond, and therefore speak no more.
I’ll not be made a soft and dull-ey’d fool
To shake the head, relent, and sigh, and yield
To Christian intercessors. Follow not,
I’ll have no speaking, I will have my bond.
Exit Jew.
Sol.
It is the most impenetrable cur
That ever kept with men.
Ant.
Let him alone,
I’ll follow him no more with bootless prayers.
He seeks my life; his reason well I know:
I oft deliver’d from his forfeitures
Many that have at times made moan to me;
Therefore he hates me.
[Sol.]
I am sure the Duke
Will never grant this forfeiture to hold.
Ant.
The Duke cannot deny the course of law;
For the commodity that strangers have
With us in Venice, if it be denied,
Will much impeach the justice of the state,
Since that the trade and profit of the city
Consisteth of all nations. Therefore go.
These griefs and losses have so bated me
That I shall hardly spare a pound of flesh
To-morrow to my bloody creditor.
Well, jailer, on. Pray God Bassanio come
To see me pay his debt, and then I care not!
Exeunt.
¶
[Scene IV]
Enter Portia, Nerissa, Lorenzo, Jessica, and [Balthazar,] a man of Portia’s.
Lor.
Madam, although I speak it in your presence,
You have a noble and a true conceit
Of godlike amity, which appears most strongly
In bearing thus the absence of your lord.
But if you knew to whom you show this honor,
How true a gentleman you send relief,
How dear a lover of my lord your husband,
I know you would be prouder of the work
Than customary bounty can enforce you.
Por.
I never did repent for doing good,
Nor shall not now: for in companions
That do converse and waste the time together,
Whose souls do bear an egall yoke of love,
There must be needs a like proportion
Of lineaments, of manners, and of spirit;
Which makes me think that this Antonio,
Being the bosom lover of my lord,
Must
