Enter a [Serving]man from Antonio.
[Serv.] Gentlemen, my master Antonio is at his house, and desires to speak with you both.
Sal. We have been up and down to seek him.
Enter Tubal.
Sol. Here comes another of the tribe; a third cannot be match’d, unless the devil himself turn Jew.
Exeunt Gentlemen [Solanio and Salerio, with Servingman].
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 Frankford! 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 hears’d 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 a’ my shoulders, no sighs but a’ my breathing, no tears but a’ my shedding.
Tub. Yes, other men have ill luck too. Antonio, as I heard in Genoa—
Shy. What, what, what? ill luck, ill luck?
Tub. 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 escap’d the wrack.
Shy. I thank thee, good Tubal, good news, good news! Ha, ha! [Heard] in Genoa?
Tub. Your daughter spent in Genoa, as I heard, one night fourscore ducats.
Shy. Thou stick’st 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 show’d me a ring that he had of your daughter for a monkey.
Shy. Out upon her! Thou torturest me, Tubal. It was my turkis, 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]
Enter Bassanio, Portia, Gratiano, [Nerissa,] and all their Trains.
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. Beshrow your eyes,
They have o’erlook’d 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
Puts 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 peize the time,
To eche 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 th’ 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.
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 wat’ry 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