There where your argosies with portly sail,

Like signors and rich burghers on the flood—

Or as it were the pageants of the sea—

Do overpeer the petty traffickers

That curtsy to them, do them reverence,

As they fly by them with their woven wings.

SOLANIO (to Antonio)

Believe me, sir, had I such venture forth

The better part of my affections would

Be with my hopes abroad. I should be still

Plucking the grass to know where sits the wind,

Peering in maps for ports and piers and roads,

And every object that might make me fear

Misfortune to my ventures out of doubt

Would make me sad.

SALERIO My wind cooling my broth

Would blow me to an ague when I thought

What harm a wind too great might do at sea.

I should not see the sandy hour-glass run

But I should think of shallows and of flats,

And see my wealthy Andrew, decks in sand,

Vailing her hightop lower than her ribs

To kiss her burial. Should I go to church

And see the holy edifice of stone 30

And not bethink me straight of dangerous rocks

Which, touching but my gentle vessel’s side,

Would scatter all her spices on the stream,

Enrobe the roaring waters with my silks,

And, in a word, but even now worth this,

And now worth nothing? Shall I have the thought

To think on this, and shall I lack the thought

That such a thing bechanced would make me sad?

But tell not me. I know Antonio

Is sad to think upon his merchandise.

ANTONIO

Believe me, no. I thank my fortune for it,

My ventures are not in one bottom trusted,

Nor to one place; nor is my whole estate

Upon the fortune of this present year.

Therefore my merchandise makes me not sad.

SOLANIO

Why then, you are in love.

ANTONIOFie, fie.

SOLANIO

Not in love neither? Then let us say you are sad

Because you are not merry, and ’twere as easy

For you to laugh, and leap, and say you are merry

Because you are not sad. Now, by two-headed Janus,

Nature hath framed strange fellows in her time:

Some that will evermore peep through their eyes

And laugh like parrots at a bagpiper,

And other of such vinegar aspect

That they’ll not show their teeth in way of smile

Though Nestor swear the jest be laughable.

Enter Bassanio, Lorenzo, and Graziano

Here comes Bassanio, your most noble kinsman,

Graziano, and Lorenzo. Fare ye well.

We leave you now with better company.

SALERIO

I would have stayed till I had made you merry

If worthier friends had not prevented me.

ANTONIO

Your worth is very dear in my regard.

I take it your own business calls on you,

And you embrace th’occasion to depart.

SALERIO Good morrow, my good lords. 65

BASSANIO

Good signors both, when shall we laugh? Say, when?

You grow exceeding strange. Must it be so?

SALERIO

We’ll make our leisures to attend on yours.

Exeunt Salerio and Solanio

LORENZO

My lord Bassanio, since you have found Antonio,

We two will leave you; but at dinner-time

I pray you have in mind where we must meet.

BASSANIO I will not fail you.

GRAZIANO

You look not well, Signor Antonio.

You have too much respect upon the world.

They lose it that do buy it with much care.

Believe me, you are marvellously changed.

ANTONIO

I hold the world but as the world, Graziano—

A stage where every man must play a part,

And mine a sad one.

GRAZIANO Let me play the fool.

With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come,

And let my liver rather heat with wine

Than my heart cool with mortifying groans.

Why should a man whose blood is warm within

Sit like his grandsire cut in alabaster,

Sleep when he wakes, and creep into the jaundice

By being peevish? I tell thee what, Antonio—

I love thee, and ‘tis my love that speaks—

There are a sort of men whose visages

Do cream and mantle like a standing pond,

And do a wilful stillness entertain

With purpose to be dressed in an opinion

Of wisdom, gravity, profound conceit,

As who should say ‘I am Sir Oracle,

And when I ope my lips, let no dog bark.’

O my Antonio, I do know of these

That therefore only are reputed wise

For saying nothing, when I am very sure,

If they should speak, would almost damn those ears

Which, hearing them, would call their brothers fools.

I’ll tell thee more of this another time.

But fish not with this melancholy bait

For this fool gudgeon, this opinion.—

Come, good Lorenzo.—Fare ye well a while.

I’ll end my exhortation after dinner.

LORENZO (to Antonio and Bassanio)

Well, we will leave you then till dinner-time. 105

I must be one of these same dumb wise men,

For Graziano never lets me speak.

GRAZIANO

Well, keep me company but two years more

Thou shalt not know the sound of thine own tongue.