SCENE 4. Belmont. A room in PORTIA’s house.

       [Enter PORTIA, NERISSA, LORENZO, JESSICA, and BALTHASAR.]

       LORENZO.

       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 honour,

       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.

       PORTIA.

       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 equal 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 needs be like my lord. If it be so,

       How little is the cost I have bestowed

       In purchasing the semblance of my soul

       From out the state of hellish cruelty!

       This comes too near the praising of myself;

       Therefore, no more of it; hear other things.

       Lorenzo, I commit into your hands

       The husbandry and manage of my house

       Until my lord’s return; for mine own part,

       I have toward heaven breath’d a secret vow

       To live in prayer and contemplation,

       Only attended by Nerissa here,

       Until her husband and my lord’s return.

       There is a monastery two miles off,

       And there we will abide. I do desire you

       Not to deny this imposition,

       The which my love and some necessity

       Now lays upon you.

       LORENZO.

       Madam, with all my heart

       I shall obey you in an fair commands.

       PORTIA.

       My people do already know my mind,

       And will acknowledge you and Jessica

       In place of Lord Bassanio and myself.

       So fare you well till we shall meet again.

       LORENZO.

       Fair thoughts and happy hours attend on you!

       JESSICA.

       I wish your ladyship all heart’s content.

       PORTIA.

       I thank you for your wish, and am well pleas’d

       To wish it back on you. Fare you well, Jessica.

       [Exeunt JESSICA and LORENZO.]

       Now, Balthasar,

       As I have ever found thee honest-true,

       So let me find thee still. Take this same letter,

       And use thou all th’ endeavour of a man

       In speed to Padua; see thou render this

       Into my cousin’s hands, Doctor Bellario;

       And look what notes and garments he doth give thee,

       Bring them, I pray thee, with imagin’d speed

       Unto the traject, to the common ferry

       Which trades to Venice. Waste no time in words,

       But get thee gone; I shall be there before thee.

       BALTHASAR.

       Madam, I go with all convenient speed.

       [Exit.]

       PORTIA.

       Come on, Nerissa, I have work in hand

       That you yet know not of; we’ll see our husbands

       Before they think of us.

       NERISSA.

       Shall they see us?

       PORTIA.

       They shall, Nerissa; but in such a habit

       That they shall think we are accomplished

       With that we lack. I’ll hold thee any wager,

       When we are both accoutred like young men,

       I’ll prove the prettier fellow of the two,

       And wear my dagger with the braver grace,

       And speak between the change of man and boy

       With a reed voice; and turn two mincing steps

       Into a manly stride; and speak of frays

       Like a fine bragging youth; and tell quaint lies,

       How honourable ladies sought my love,

       Which I denying, they fell sick and died;

       I could not do withal. Then I’ll repent,

       And wish for all that, that I had not kill’d them.

       And twenty of these puny lies I’ll tell,

       That men shall swear I have discontinu’d school

       About a