The Merchant Of Venice

1 Enter Solanio and Salarino.
2 SOLANIO.
3 Now, what news on the Rialto?
4 SALARINO.
5 Why, yet it lives there unchecked that Antonio hath a ship of rich
6 lading wrack’d on the narrow seas; the Goodwins, I think they call the
7 place, a very dangerous flat and fatal, where the carcasses of many a
8 tall ship lie buried, as they say, if my gossip Report be an honest
9 woman of her word.
10 SOLANIO.
11 I would she were as lying a gossip in that as ever knapped ginger or
12 made her neighbours believe she wept for the death of a third husband.
13 But it is true, without any slips of prolixity or crossing the plain
14 highway of talk, that the good Antonio, the honest Antonio,—O that I
15 had a title good enough to keep his name company!—
16 SALARINO.
17 Come, the full stop.
18 SOLANIO.
19 Ha, what sayest thou? Why, the end is, he hath lost a ship.
20 SALARINO.
21 I would it might prove the end of his losses.
22 SOLANIO.
23 Let me say “amen” betimes, lest the devil cross my prayer, for here he
24 comes in the likeness of a Jew.
25 Enter Shylock.
26 How now, Shylock, what news among the merchants?
27 SHYLOCK.
28 You knew, none so well, none so well as you, of my daughter’s flight.
29 SALARINO.
30 That’s certain, I, for my part, knew the tailor that made the wings she
31 flew withal.
32 SOLANIO.
33 And Shylock, for his own part, knew the bird was fledged; and then it
34 is the complexion of them all to leave the dam.
35 SHYLOCK.
36 She is damn’d for it.
37 SALARINO.
38 That’s certain, if the devil may be her judge.
39 SHYLOCK.
40 My own flesh and blood to rebel!
41 SOLANIO.
42 Out upon it, old carrion! Rebels it at these years?
43 SHYLOCK.
44 I say my daughter is my flesh and my blood.
45 SALARINO.
46 There is more difference between thy flesh and hers than between jet
47 and ivory, more between your bloods than there is between red wine and
48 Rhenish. But tell us, do you hear whether Antonio have had any loss at
49 sea or no?
50 SHYLOCK.
51 There I have another bad match, a bankrupt, a prodigal, who dare scarce
52 show his head on the Rialto, a beggar that used to come so smug upon
53 the mart; let him look to his bond. He was wont to call me usurer; let
54 him look to his bond: he was wont to lend money for a Christian cur’sy;
55 let him look to his bond.
56 SALARINO.
57 Why, I am sure if he forfeit, thou wilt not take his flesh! What’s that
58 good for?
59 SHYLOCK.
60 To bait fish withal; if it will feed nothing else, it will feed my
61 revenge. He hath disgrac’d me and hind’red me half a million, laugh’d
62 at my losses, mock’d at my gains, scorned my nation, thwarted my
63 bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine enemies. And what’s his
64 reason? I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs,
65 dimensions, senses, affections, passions? Fed with the same food, hurt
66 with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same
67 means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer as a Christian
68 is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not
69 laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we
70 not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in
71 that. If a Jew wrong a Christian, what is his humility? Revenge. If a
72 Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by Christian
73 example? Why, revenge! The villainy you teach me I will execute, and it
74 shall go hard but I will better the instruction.
75 Enter a man from Antonio.
76 SERVANT.
77 Gentlemen, my master Antonio is at his house, and desires to speak with
78 you both.
79 SALARINO.
80 We have been up and down to seek him.
81 Enter Tubal.
82 SOLANIO.
83 Here comes another of the tribe; a third cannot be match’d, unless the
84 devil himself turn Jew.
85 [_Exeunt Solanio, Salarino and the Servant._]
86 SHYLOCK.
87 How now, Tubal, what news from Genoa? Hast thou found my daughter?
88 TUBAL.
89 I often came where I did hear of her, but cannot find her.
90 SHYLOCK.
91 Why there, there, there, there! A diamond gone cost me two thousand
92 ducats in Frankfort! The curse never fell upon our nation till now, I
93 never felt it till now. Two thousand ducats in that, and other
94 precious, precious jewels. I would my daughter were dead at my foot,
95 and the jewels in her ear; would she were hearsed at my foot, and the
96 ducats in her coffin. No news of them? Why so? And I know not what’s
97 spent in the search. Why, thou—loss upon loss! The thief gone with so
98 much, and so much to find the thief, and no satisfaction, no revenge,
99 nor no ill luck stirring but what lights o’ my shoulders, no sighs but
100 o’ my breathing, no tears but o’ my shedding.
101 TUBAL.
102 Yes, other men have ill luck too. Antonio, as I heard in Genoa—
103 SHYLOCK.
104 What, what, what? Ill luck, ill luck?
105 TUBAL.
106 —hath an argosy cast away coming from Tripolis.
107 SHYLOCK.
108 I thank God! I thank God! Is it true, is it true?
109 TUBAL.
110 I spoke with some of the sailors that escaped the wrack.
111 SHYLOCK.
112 I thank thee, good Tubal. Good news, good news! Ha, ha, heard in Genoa?
113 TUBAL.
114 Your daughter spent in Genoa, as I heard, one night, fourscore ducats.
115 SHYLOCK.
116 Thou stick’st a dagger in me. I shall never see my gold again.
117 Fourscore ducats at a sitting! Fourscore ducats!
118 TUBAL.
119 There came divers of Antonio’s creditors in my company to Venice that
120 swear he cannot choose but break.
121 SHYLOCK.
122 I am very glad of it. I’ll plague him, I’ll torture him. I am glad of
123 it.
124 TUBAL.
125 One of them showed me a ring that he had of your daughter for a monkey.
126 SHYLOCK.
127 Out upon her! Thou torturest me, Tubal. It was my turquoise, I had it
128 of Leah when I was a bachelor. I would not have given it for a
129 wilderness of monkeys.
130 TUBAL.
131 But Antonio is certainly undone.
132 SHYLOCK.
133 Nay, that’s true, that’s very true. Go, Tubal, fee me an officer;
134 bespeak him a fortnight before. I will have the heart of him if he
135 forfeit, for were he out of Venice I can make what merchandise I will.
136 Go, Tubal, and meet me at our synagogue. Go, good Tubal, at our
137 synagogue, Tubal.
138 [_Exeunt._]