THE MERCHANT OF VENICE. William Shakespeare
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[Exeunt SALARINO and SALANIO.]
GRATIANO.
Was not that letter from fair Jessica?
LORENZO.
I must needs tell thee all. She hath directed
How I shall take her from her father’s house;
What gold and jewels she is furnish’d with;
What page’s suit she hath in readiness.
If e’er the Jew her father come to heaven,
It will be for his gentle daughter’s sake;
And never dare misfortune cross her foot,
Unless she do it under this excuse,
That she is issue to a faithless Jew.
Come, go with me, peruse this as thou goest;
Fair Jessica shall be my torch-bearer.
[Exeunt]
SCENE 5. The same. Before SHYLOCK’S house
[Enter SHYLOCK and LAUNCELOT.]
SHYLOCK.
Well, thou shalt see; thy eyes shall be thy judge,
The difference of old Shylock and Bassanio:—
What, Jessica!—Thou shalt not gormandize,
As thou hast done with me;—What, Jessica!—
And sleep and snore, and rend apparel out—
Why, Jessica, I say!
LAUNCELOT.
Why, Jessica!
SHYLOCK.
Who bids thee call? I do not bid thee call.
LAUNCELOT. Your worship was wont to tell me I could do nothing without bidding.
[Enter JESSICA.]
JESSICA.
Call you? What is your will?
SHYLOCK.
I am bid forth to supper, Jessica:
There are my keys. But wherefore should I go?
I am not bid for love; they flatter me;
But yet I’ll go in hate, to feed upon
The prodigal Christian. Jessica, my girl,
Look to my house. I am right loath to go;
There is some ill a-brewing towards my rest,
For I did dream of money-bags tonight.
LAUNCELOT. I beseech you, sir, go: my young master doth expect your reproach.
SHYLOCK.
So do I his.
LAUNCELOT. And they have conspired together; I will not say you shall see a masque, but if you do, then it was not for nothing that my nose fell a-bleeding on Black Monday last at six o’clock i’ the morning, falling out that year on Ash-Wednesday was four year in the afternoon.
SHYLOCK.
What! are there masques? Hear you me, Jessica:
Lock up my doors, and when you hear the drum,
And the vile squealing of the wry-neck’d fife,
Clamber not you up to the casements then,
Nor thrust your head into the public street
To gaze on Christian fools with varnish’d faces;
But stop my house’s ears-I mean my casements;
Let not the sound of shallow fopp’ry enter
My sober house. By Jacob’s staff, I swear
I have no mind of feasting forth tonight;
But I will go. Go you before me, sirrah;
Say I will come.
LAUNCELOT.
I will go before, sir. Mistress, look out at window for all this;
There will come a Christian by
Will be worth a Jewess’ eye.
[Exit LAUNCELOT.]
SHYLOCK.
What says that fool of Hagar’s offspring, ha?
JESSICA.
His words were ‘Farewell, mistress’; nothing else.
SHYLOCK.
The patch is kind enough, but a huge feeder;
Snail-slow in profit, and he sleeps by day
More than the wild-cat; drones hive not with me,
Therefore I part with him; and part with him
To one that I would have him help to waste
His borrow’d purse. Well, Jessica, go in;
Perhaps I will return immediately:
Do as I bid you, shut doors after you:
‘Fast bind, fast find,’
A proverb never stale in thrifty mind.
[Exit.]
JESSICA.
Farewell; and if my fortune be not crost,
I have a father, you a daughter, lost.
[Exit.]
SCENE 6. The same.
[Enter GRATIANO and SALARINO, masqued.]
GRATIANO.
This is the penthouse under which Lorenzo
Desir’d us to make stand.
SALARINO.
His hour is almost past.
GRATIANO.
And it is marvel he out-dwells his hour,
For lovers ever run before the clock.
SALARINO.
O! ten times faster Venus’ pigeons fly
To seal love’s bonds new made than they are wont
To keep obliged faith unforfeited!
GRATIANO.
That ever holds: who riseth from a feast
With that keen appetite that he sits down?
Where is the horse that doth untread again
His tedious measures with the unbated fire
That he did pace them first? All things that are
Are with more spirit chased than enjoy’d.
How like a younker or a prodigal
The scarfed bark puts from her native bay,
Hugg’d and embraced by the strumpet wind!
How like the prodigal doth she return,
With over-weather’d ribs and ragged sails,
Lean, rent, and beggar’d by the strumpet wind!
SALARINO.
Here comes Lorenzo; more of this hereafter.
[Enter LORENZO.]
LORENZO.
Sweet friends, your patience for my long abode;
Not I, but my affairs, have made you wait:
When you shall please to play the thieves for wives,
I’ll watch as long for you then. Approach;
Here dwells my father Jew. Ho! who’s within?
[Enter JESSICA, above, in boy’s clothes.]