To a most dangerous sea; the beauteous scarf
Veiling an Indian beauty; in a word,

8

The seeming truth which cunning times put on
To entrap the wisest. Therefore, thou gaudy gold,
Hard food for Midas, I will none of thee:

Nor none of thee, thou pale and common drudge
"Tween man and man: but thou, thou meager lead,
Which rather threat'nest, than dost promise aught,
Thy plainness moves me more than eloquence,1
And here choose I; Joy be the consequence!

this instance, as in many others, confounds the participles. Guiled stands for guiling. Steevens.

8

9

Indian beauty;] Sir T. Hanmer reads:

Indian dowdy. Johnson.

-thou pale and common drudge

'Tween man and man:] So, in Chapman's Hymnus in Noctern, 4to. 1594:

"To whom pale day (with whoredome soked quite)

"Is but a drudge." Steevens.

1 Thy plainness moves me more than eloquence,] The old copies read-paleness. Steevens.

Bassanio is displeased at the golden casket for its gaudiness, and the silver one for its paleness; but what! is he charmed with the leaden one for having the very same quality that displeased him in the silver? The poet certainly wrote:

Thy plainness moves me more than eloquence:

This characterizes the lead from the silver, which paleness does not, they being both pale. Besides, there is a beauty in the antithesis between plainness and eloquence; between paleness and eloquence none. So it is said before of the leaden casket:

"This third, dull lead, with warning all is blunt." Warburton. It may be that Dr. Warburton has altered the wrong word, if any alteration be necessary. I would rather give the character

of silver,

66

Thou stale and common drudge ""Tween man and man."

The paleness of lead is for ever alluded to.

"Diane declining, pale as any ledde."

Says Stephen Hawes. In Fairfax's Tasso, we have-
"The lord Tancredie, pale with rage as lead,"

Again, Sackville, in his Legend of the Duke of Buckingham:
"Now pale as lead, now cold as any stone."
And in the old ballad of The King and the Beggar:

66

She blushed scarlet red,

"Then straight again, as pale as lead."

As to the antithesis, Shakspeare has already made it in A Midsummer-Night's Dream:

Por. How all the other passions fleet to air,
As doubtful thoughts, and rash embrac'd-despair,
And shudd'ring fear, and green-ey'd jealousy.
O love be moderate, allay thy ecstasy,
In measure rain thy joy,2 scant this excess;
I feel too much thy blessing, make it less,

"When (says Theseus) I have seen great clerks look pale, "I read as much, as from the rattling tongue

"Of saucy and audacious eloquence." Farmer.

By laying an emphasis on Thy, [Thy paleness moves me, &c.] Dr. W.'s objection is obviated. Though Bassanio might object to silver, that "pale and common drudge," lead, though pale also, yet not being in daily use, might, in his opinion, deserve a preference. I have therefore great doubts concerning Dr. Warburton's emendation. Malone.

2 In measure rain thy joy,] The first quarto edition reads:
In measure range thy joy.

The folio, and one of the quartos:
In measure raine thy joy.

I once believ'd Shakspeare meant:

In measure rein thy joy.

The words rain and rein were not in these times distinguished by regular orthography. There is no difficulty in the present reading, only where the copies vary, some suspicion of error is always raised. Johnson.

Having frequent occasion to make the same observation in the perusal of the first folio, I am also, strongly inclined to the former word; but as the text is intelligible, have made no change. Rein in the second instance quoted below by Mr. Steevens, is spelt in the old copy as it is here;-raine. So, in The Tempest, edit. 1623:

66

do not give dalliance

"Too much the raigne." Malone.

I believe Shakspeare alluded to the well known proverb, It cannot rain, but it pours.

So, in The Laws of Candy, by Beaumont and Fletcher:

66 pour not too fast joys on me,

"But sprinkle them so gently, I may stand them."

The following quotation by Mr. Malone from K. Henry IV, P. I, confirms my sense of the passage:

66 but in short space

"It rain'd down fortune show'ring on thy head,

"And such a flood of greatness fell on you," &c.

Mr. Tollet is of opinion that rein is the true word, as it better agrees with the context; and more especially on account of the following passage in Coriolanus, which approaches very near to the present reading:

- being once chaf'd, he cannot "Be rein'd again to temperance."

For fear I surfeit!
Bass.

What find I here?3

[Opening the leaden casket.

Fair Portia's counterfeit ?4 What demi-god
Hath come so near creation? Move these eyes?
Or whether, riding on the balls of mine,
Seem they in motion? Here are sever'd lips,
Parted with sugar breath; so sweet a bar

Should sunder such sweet friends: Here in her hairs
The painter plays the spider; and hath woven
A golden mesh to entrap the hearts of men,
Faster than gnats in cobwebs: But her eyes,-
How could he see to do them? having made one,
Methinks, it should have power to steal both his,
And leave itself unfurnish'd:5 Yet look, how far

So, in Love's Labour's Lost, Act V, sc. ii: "Rein thy tongue." Steevens.

3 What find I here?] The latter word is here employed as a dissyllable. Malone.

Some monosyllable appears to have been omitted. There is no example of-here, used as a dissyllable; and even with such assistance, the verse, to the ear at least, would be defective. Perhaps our author designed Portia to say:

"For fear I surfeit me." Steevens.

4 Fair Portia's counterfeit?] Counterfeit, which is at present used only in a bad sense, anciently signified a likeness, a resemblance, without comprehending any idea of fraud. So, in The Wit of a Woman, 1604: "I will see if I can agree with this stranger, for the drawing of my daughter's counterfeit."

Again, (as Mr. M. Mason observes) Hamlet calls the pictures he shows to his mother:

"The counterfeit presentment of two brothers." Steevens.

5 Methinks, it should have power to steal both his,
And leave itself unfurnish'd:] Perhaps it might be:

And leave himself unfurnish'd. Johnson.

If this be the right reading, unfurnished must mean "unfurnished with a companion or fellow." I am confirmed in this explanation, by the following passage in Fletcher's Lover's Progress, where Alcidon says to Clarangé, on delivering Lidian's challenge, which Clarangé accepts

you are a noble gentleman,

"Will 't please you bring a friend; we are two of us, "And pity, either of us should be unfurnish'd.” M. Mason, Dr. Johnson's emendation would altogether subvert the poet's meaning. If the artist, in painting one of Portia's eyes, should

The substance of my praise doth wrong this shadow
In underprizing it, so far this shadow

Doth limp behind the substance.6-Here's the scroll,
The continent and summary of my fortune.
You that choose not by the view,
Chance as fair, and choose as true!
Since this fortune falls to you,
Be content, and seek no new.
If you be well pleas'd with this,
And hold your fortune for your bliss,
Turn you where your lady is,

And claim her with a loving kiss.

A gentle scroll;—Fair lady, by your leave; [Kissing her.
I come by note, to give, and to receive.
Like one of two contending in a prize,
That thinks he hath done well in people's eyes,
Hearing applause, and universal shout,

Giddy in spirit, still gazing, in a doubt

lose both his own, that eye which he had painted, must necessarily be left unfurnished, or destitute of its fellow. Henley.

i. e.

And leave itself unfurnish'd:] i. e. and leave itself incomplete; unaccompanied with the other usual component parts of a portrait, viz. another eye, &c. The various features of the face our author seems to have considered as the furniture of a picture. So, in As you Like it: "-he was furnish'd like a huntsman;" had all the appendages belonging to a huntsman. Malone. The hint for this passage appears to have been taken from Greene's History of Faire Bellora; afterwards published under the title of A Paire of Turtle Doves, or the Tragicall History of Bellora and Fidelio, bl. 1: "If Apelles had beene tasked to have drawne her counterfeit, her two bright-burning lampes would have so dazled his quicke-seeing sences, that quite dispairing to expresse with his cunning pensill so admirable a worke of nature, he had been inforced to have staid his hand, and left this earthly Venus unfinished."

A preceding passage in Bassanio's speech might have been suggested by the same novel.

A golden mesh to entrap the hearts of men: "What are our curled and crisped lockes, but snares and nets to catch and entangle the hearts of gazers," &c. Steevens.

Doth limp behind the substance.] So, in The Tempest:

66

she will outstrip all praise,

"And make it halt behind her." Steevens.

Whether those peals of praise" be his or no;
So, thrice fair lady, stand I, even so;
As doubtful whether what I see be true,
Until confirm'd, sign'd, ratified by you.

Por. You see me, lord Bassanio, where I stand,
Such as I am: though, for myself alone,
I would not be ambitious in my wish,
To wish myself much better; yet, for you,
I would be trebled twenty times myself;

A thousand times more fair, ten thousand times
More rich;

That only to stand high in your account,

I might in virtues, beauties, livings, friends,
Exceed account: but the full sum of me

Is sum of something; which, to term in gross,
Is an unlesson'd girl, unschool'd, unpractis'd:
Happy in this, she is not yet so old

But she may learn; and happier than this,
She is not bred so dull but she can learn;
Happiest of all, is, that her gentle spirit

7 peals of praise-] The second quarto reads-pearles of praise. Johnson.

This reading may be the true one. So, in Whetstone's Arbour of Virtue, 1576:

"The pearles of praise that deck a noble name."

Again, in R. C.'s verses in praise of the same author's Rock of Regard:

"But that that bears the pearle of praise away." Steevens. 8 Is sum of something;] We should read-some of something, i. e. only a piece, or part only of an imperfect account; which she explains in the following line. Warburton.

Thus one of the quartos. The folio reads:

Is sum of nothing.

The purport of the reading in the text seems to be this:

"the full sum of me

Is sum of something, i. e. is not entirely ideal, but amounts to as much as can be found in-an unlesson'd girl, &c. Steevens. I should prefer the reading of the folio, as it is Portia's intention, in this speech, to undervalue herself. M. Mason.

9 But she may learn;] The latter word is here used as a dissyllable. Malone.

Till the reader has reconciled his ear to this dissyllabical pronunciation of the word learn, I beg his acceptance of--and, a harmless monosyllable which I have ventured to introduce for the sake of obvious metre. Steevens.