And shudd'ring fear and green-ey'd jealousy. Bass. What find I here ?5 [Opening the leaden casket. Fair Portia's counterfeit ?6 What demy-god Hath 4 In measure rain thy joy,-] 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 The following quotation by Mr. Malone from King 66 "It rain'd down fortune showring on thy head, "And such a flood of greatness fell on you." STEEVENS. 5 What find I here?] Some monosyllable appears to have been omitted. Perhaps our author designed Portia to say "For fear I surfeit me." STEEVENS. Mr. Capell has supplied the deficiency by an interjection, "Ha! what find I here?" And Sir T. Hanmer thus "What do I find here?" E. 6 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." 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;7 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 :8 Yet look, how far The Again, (as Mr. M. Mason observes) Hamilet calls the pictures he shows to his mother, "The counterfeit presentment of two brothers." STEEVENS. 7 -with sugar breath? For this word sugar the Oxford Editor has substituted the participle sugar'd. E. 8 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 furnished like a "huntsman ;" i. e. had all the appendages belonging to a huntsman. MALONE. The 1 The substance of my praise doth wrong this shadow In underprizing it, so far this shadow Doth limp behind the substance.--Here's the scroll, The continent and summary of my fortune. You that choose not by the view,9 Since The hint for this passage seems to have been taken from Greene's History of Fair 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 senses, 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." 66 66 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. After all, the thought in Shakspeare is a strange conceit very strangely expressed. The passage in Fair Bellora is by no means equally objectionable. See Appendix. E. 9 You that choose not by the view,] This may be spoken either affirmatively, "You that choose not by the view, chance as fair and choose as true as "those persons who do choose by the view;" or else imperatively; or, to speak perhaps with more pro A gentle scroll;-Fair lady, by your [Kiss I come by note, to give, and to red Like one of two contending in a prize, That thinks he hath done well in eyes, Hearing applause, and universal sho Giddy in spirit, still gazing, in a dou Whether those peals of praise be his of So, thrice fair lady, stand I, even so As doubtful whether what I see be tru Until confirm'd, sign'd, ratified by y priety, optatively" May you chance as f Supposing the latter form to be right, it i probable that, by a whimsical turn of th night be intended to require that a positi should be regulated by a negative standard you that choose not by the view, in the s portion that you forbear to do so, chance "choose truly;" which is like saying words" Be the success equal to the dis E. your choice." 66 66 1 I come by note, &c.] In allusion to notes given for the payment of money. E Por. You see me, lord Bassanio, where I stand,2 Such as I am though, for myself alone, More rich; That only to stand high in your account, Is 2 You see me, lord Bassanio, where I stand, &c.] Many words cannot be necessary to awaken a reader of the least sensibility to a perception of the charming simplicity, tenderness and delicacy manifested in the conduct and sentiments of Portia at this affect ing crisis. E. 3 Is sum of something;] The meaning, I apprehend, is this; "The full sum of me is (to express "myself in gross) the sum of what may be expected "to be found in an unlessoned girl." I must confess, that Shakspeare's expression in this place is justly chargeable with affected perplexity. HEATH. 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, After |