Gra. That will I do. Ner. Sir, I would speak with you. [TO PORTIA.] I'll see if I can get my husband's ring, Which I did make him swear to keep for ever. Por. Thou mayst, I warrant. We shall have old2 swearing That they did give the rings away to men; But we'll outface them, and outswear them too. Away! make haste: thou know'st where I will tarry. Ner. Come, good sir; will you show me to this house? [Exeunt. ACT V. SCENE I.-Belmont. Pleasure-grounds of PORTIA'S House. Enter LORENZO and JESSICA. Lor. The Moon shines bright. In such a night as this, When the sweet wind did gently kiss the trees, And they did make no noise,-in such a night Troilus methinks mounted the Trojan walls, And sigh'd his soul toward the Grecian tents, Where Cressid lay that night.1 Jes. In such a night Did Thisbe fearfully o'ertrip the dew, 2 Old was a frequent intensive in colloquial speech; very much as huge is used now. So in Much Ado, v. 2: "Yonder's old coil at home." And in The Merry Wives, i. 4: "Here will be an old abusing of God's patience and the king's English." 1 The story of Troilus and Cressida is dramatized in Shakespeare's play of that name. Troilus was a Trojan prince, one of King Priam's fifty sons. He fell deeply and most honourably in love with Cressida, who, after being mighty sweet upon him, forsook him for his enemy, Diomedes the Greek; which he took to heart prodigiously. And saw the lion's shadow ere himself,2 And ran dismay'd away. Lor. In such a night Stood Dido with a willow 3 in her hand Upon the wild sea-banks, and waved her love To come again to Carthage. Jes. In such a night Medea gather'd the enchanted herbs That did renew old Æson.4 Lor. In such a night Did Jessica steal from the wealthy Jew, And with an únthrift love did run from Venice Did young Lorenzo swear he loved her well, And ne'er a true one. Lor. And in such a night Did pretty Jessica, like a little shrew, Slander her love, and he forgave it her. Jes. I would out-night you, did nobody come : But, hark, I hear the footing of a man. 2 That is, ere she saw the lion himself. The story of "Pyramus and his love Thisbe" is burlesqued in the interlude of Bottom and company in A Midsummer-Night's Dream. 3 Spenser in like sort makes the willow a symbol of forsaken love. So in The Faerie Queene, i. 1, 9: "The willow, worne of forlorne paramours." 4 Twice before in this play we have had allusions to the story of Jason and his voyage to Colchos in quest of the golden fleece. Medea, daughter to the King of Colchos, fell in love with him, helped him to win the fleece, then stole her father's treasure, and ran away with Jason to Greece. Now Jason's father was very old and decayed; and Medea was a potent enchantress, the most so of all the ancient girls: so, with "the hidden power of herbs and might of magic spell," she made a most plenipotent broth, wherewith she renewed the old man's youth. Ovid has it, that she did this by drawing the blood out of his veins, and filling them with the broth. Enter STEPHANO. Lor. Who comes so fast in silence of the night? Steph. A friend. Lor. A friend! what friend? your name, I pray you, friend? My mistress will before the break of day Lor. Who comes with her? Steph. None but a holy hermit and her maid. I pray you, is my master yet return'd? Lor. He is not, nor we have not heard from him. But go we in, I pray thee, Jessica, And ceremoniously let us prepare Some welcome for the mistress of the house. Enter LAUNCELOT. Laun. Sola, sola! wo, ha, ho! sola, sola! Lor. Who calls? Laun. Sola ! did you see Master Lorenzo and Mistress Lorenzo?-sola, sola! Lor. Leave hollaing, man: here. Laun. Tell him there's a post come from my master, with 5 In this play the name Stephano has the accent on the second syllable. In The Tempest, written some years later, the same name has it, rightly, on the first. 6 In old times crosses were set up at the intersection of roads, and in other places specially associated with saintly or heroic names, to invite the passers-by to devotion. And in those days Christians were much in the habit of remembering in their prayers whatever lay nearest their hearts. The Poet has the same old thought still more sweetly in two other places. his horn full of good news:7 my master will be here ere morning. [Exit. Lor. Sweet soul, let's in, and there expect their coming. Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins: 7 The postman used to carry a horn, and blow it to give notice of his coming, on approaching a place where he had something to deliver. Launcclot has just been imitating the notes of the horn in his exclamations, Sola, &c. - Expect, in the next line, is wait for or await. The Poet has it repeatedly in that sense. And so in Hebrews, x. 13: "From henceforth expecting till his enemies be made his footstool." 8 A small plate, used in the administration of the Eucharist : it was commonly of gold, or silver-gilt. 9 Continually sounding an accompaniment. Of course everybody has heard of "the music of the spheres," an ancient mystery which taught that the heavenly bodies in their revolutions sing together in a concert so loud, various, and sweet, as to exceed all proportion to the human ear. And the greatest souls, from Plato to Wordsworth, have been lifted above themselves, with the idea that the universe was knit together by a principle of which musical harmony is the aptest and clearest expression. Milton touches it with surpassing sweetness in the morning hymn of Adam and Eve, Paradise Lost, v. 177: "And ye five other wandering fires, that move in mystic dance not without song, resound His praise," &c. See, also, Milton's Arcades, and Coleridge's Remorse, Act iii., scene 1, and Wordsworth's great poem On the Power of Sound, stanza xii. 10 So in Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity, v. 38: "Touching musical har But, whilst this muddy vesture of decay Enter Musicians. Come, ho, and wake Diana with a hymn ! [Music. Jes. I'm never merry when I hear sweet music. By the sweet power of music: therefore the poet Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils ; And his affections dark as Erebus: 11 Let no such man be trusted.12 Mark the music. mony, such is the force thereof, and so pleasing effects it hath in that very part of man which is most divine, that some have thereby been induced to think that the soul itself by nature is or hath in it harmony. 11 Erebus was the darkest and gloomiest region of Hades. 12 Upon the general subject of this splendid strain touching music and musical harmony, it seems but just to quote a passage hardly inferior from Sir Thomas Browne, Religio Medici; Part ii., Sect. 9: "There is a music wherever there is harmony, order, or proportion; and thus far we may |