The Merchant Of Venice

1 Enter Portia, Nerissa, Lorenzo, Jessica and Balthazar.
2 LORENZO.
3 Madam, although I speak it in your presence,
4 You have a noble and a true conceit
5 Of godlike amity, which appears most strongly
6 In bearing thus the absence of your lord.
7 But if you knew to whom you show this honour,
8 How true a gentleman you send relief,
9 How dear a lover of my lord your husband,
10 I know you would be prouder of the work
11 Than customary bounty can enforce you.
12 PORTIA.
13 I never did repent for doing good,
14 Nor shall not now; for in companions
15 That do converse and waste the time together,
16 Whose souls do bear an equal yoke of love,
17 There must be needs a like proportion
18 Of lineaments, of manners, and of spirit;
19 Which makes me think that this Antonio,
20 Being the bosom lover of my lord,
21 Must needs be like my lord. If it be so,
22 How little is the cost I have bestowed
23 In purchasing the semblance of my soul
24 From out the state of hellish cruelty!
25 This comes too near the praising of myself;
26 Therefore no more of it. Hear other things.
27 Lorenzo, I commit into your hands
28 The husbandry and manage of my house
29 Until my lord’s return. For mine own part,
30 I have toward heaven breath’d a secret vow
31 To live in prayer and contemplation,
32 Only attended by Nerissa here,
33 Until her husband and my lord’s return.
34 There is a monastery two miles off,
35 And there we will abide. I do desire you
36 Not to deny this imposition,
37 The which my love and some necessity
38 Now lays upon you.
39 LORENZO.
40 Madam, with all my heart
41 I shall obey you in all fair commands.
42 PORTIA.
43 My people do already know my mind,
44 And will acknowledge you and Jessica
45 In place of Lord Bassanio and myself.
46 So fare you well till we shall meet again.
47 LORENZO.
48 Fair thoughts and happy hours attend on you!
49 JESSICA.
50 I wish your ladyship all heart’s content.
51 PORTIA.
52 I thank you for your wish, and am well pleas’d
53 To wish it back on you. Fare you well, Jessica.
54 [_Exeunt Jessica and Lorenzo._]
55 Now, Balthazar,
56 As I have ever found thee honest-true,
57 So let me find thee still. Take this same letter,
58 And use thou all th’ endeavour of a man
59 In speed to Padua, see thou render this
60 Into my cousin’s hands, Doctor Bellario;
61 And look what notes and garments he doth give thee,
62 Bring them, I pray thee, with imagin’d speed
63 Unto the traject, to the common ferry
64 Which trades to Venice. Waste no time in words,
65 But get thee gone. I shall be there before thee.
66 BALTHAZAR.
67 Madam, I go with all convenient speed.
68 [_Exit._]
69 PORTIA.
70 Come on, Nerissa, I have work in hand
71 That you yet know not of; we’ll see our husbands
72 Before they think of us.
73 NERISSA.
74 Shall they see us?
75 PORTIA.
76 They shall, Nerissa, but in such a habit
77 That they shall think we are accomplished
78 With that we lack. I’ll hold thee any wager,
79 When we are both accoutered like young men,
80 I’ll prove the prettier fellow of the two,
81 And wear my dagger with the braver grace,
82 And speak between the change of man and boy
83 With a reed voice; and turn two mincing steps
84 Into a manly stride; and speak of frays
85 Like a fine bragging youth; and tell quaint lies
86 How honourable ladies sought my love,
87 Which I denying, they fell sick and died;
88 I could not do withal. Then I’ll repent,
89 And wish for all that, that I had not kill’d them.
90 And twenty of these puny lies I’ll tell,
91 That men shall swear I have discontinued school
92 About a twelvemonth. I have within my mind
93 A thousand raw tricks of these bragging Jacks,
94 Which I will practise.
95 NERISSA.
96 Why, shall we turn to men?
97 PORTIA.
98 Fie, what a question’s that,
99 If thou wert near a lewd interpreter!
100 But come, I’ll tell thee all my whole device
101 When I am in my coach, which stays for us
102 At the park gate; and therefore haste away,
103 For we must measure twenty miles today.
104 [_Exeunt._]