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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, Tubal; 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.

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.

I speak too long; but 'tis to peise the 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.

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.

[A 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 ?
Thus ornament is but the guiled shore
To a most dangerous sea; the beauteous scarf
Veiling an Indian beauty; 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 threat'nest than dost promise aught,
Thy plainness moves me more than eloquence,
And here choose I: joy be the consequence !

POR. (Aside). How all the other passions fleet to air.
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!

What find I here ?

BASS.

Fair Portia's counterfeit !

[Opening the leaden casket.

Here's the scroll,

The continent and summary of my fortune.

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.
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
Commits itself to yours to be directed,
As from her lord, her governor, her king.
Myself and what is mine to you and yours
Is now converted; but now I was the lord
Of this fair mansion, master of my servants,
Queen o'er myself; and even now, but now,
This house, these servants, and this same myself
Are yours, my lord. I give them with this ring;
Which when you part from, lose, or give away,
Let it presage the ruin of your love,

And be my vantage to exclaim on you.

BASS. Madam, you have bereft me of all words, Only my blood speaks to you in my veins.

But when this ring

Parts from this finger, then parts life from hence: O! then be bold to say Bassanio's dead.

AS YOU LIKE IT

BY WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

ACT I.

Scene III.-A Room in the Palace.

Enter CELIA and ROSALIND.

CEL. Why, cousin! why, Rosalind! Cupid have mercy! Not a word?

Ros. Not one to throw at a dog.

O, how full of briers is this working-day world!

CEL. They are but burrs, cousin, thrown upon thee in holiday foolery: if we walk not in the trodden paths, our very petticoats will catch them.

Ros. I could shake them off my coat: these burrs are in my heart.

CEL. Hem them away.

Ros. I would try, if I could cry "hem," and have him. CEL. Come, come; wrestle with thy affections.

Ros. O! they take the part of a better wrestler than myself!

CEL. Is it possible, on such a sudden, you should fall into so strong a liking with old Sir Rowland's youngest son ? Ros. The duke my father loved his father dearly.

CEL. Doth it therefore ensue that you should love his son dearly? By this kind of chase, I should hate him, for my father hated his father dearly; yet I hate not Orlando. Ros. No, faith, hate him not, for my sake.

CEL. Why should I not? doth he not deserve well? Ros. Let me love him for that; and do you love him, because I do. Look, here comes the duke.

CEL. With his eyes full of anger.

Enter DUKE FREDERICK, with Lords.

DUKE F. Mistress, dispatch you with your safest haste, And get you from our court.

Ros.

Me, uncle?

DUKE F.

You, cousin :

Within these ten days if that thou be'st found
So near our public court as twenty miles,
Thou diest for it.

Ros.

I do beseech your Grace,

Let me the knowledge of my fault bear with me.
If with myself I hold intelligence,

Or have acquaintance with mine own desires,
If that I do not dream or be not frantic,-
As I do trust I am not,-then, dear uncle,
Never so much as in a thought unborn
Did I offend your highness.

DUKE F.

Thus do all traitors:

If their purgation did consist in words,
They are as innocent as grace itself:
Let it suffice thee that I trust thee not.

Ros. Yet your mistrust cannot make me a traitor:
Tell me whereon the likelihood depends.

DUKE F. Thou art thy father's daughter; there's enough. Ros. So was I when your highness took his dukedom; So was I when your highness banish'd him.

Treason is not inherited, my lord;

Or, if we did derive it from our friends,

What's that to me? my father was no traitor :
Then, good my liege, mistake me not so much
To think my poverty is treacherous.

CEL. Dear sovereign, hear me speak.

DUKE F. Ay, Celia; we stay'd her for your sake; Else had she with her father rang'd along.

CEL. I did not then entreat to have her stay:
It was your pleasure and your own remorse.

I was too young that time to value her;
But now I know her if she be a traitor,
Why so am I; we still have slept together,

Rose at an instant, learn'd, play'd, eat together;

And wheresoe'er we went, like Juno's swans,

Still we went coupled and inseparable.

DUKE F. She is too subtle for thee; and her smoothness, Her very silence and her patience,

Speak to the people, and they pity her.

Thou art a fool: she robs thee of thy name;

And thou wilt show more bright and seem more virtuous When she is gone. Then open not thy lips:

Firm and irrevocable is my doom

Which I have pass'd upon her; she is banish'd.

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