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towards any of these princely suitors that have already come?° 21

—Portia
I pray thee, name them once again;° and as thou namest them, I will describe them, and,
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according to my description, level +a guess, at my affection. {overname them}

—Nerissa
First there is the Neapolitan prince.° 23 / prince from Naples.

—Portia
Ay, there’s a colt° indeed, for he doth nothing but talk of his horse; and he counts it a great
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appropriation to° his own good parts° that he can shoe the horse himself. I am much afeard,
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my lady, that his mother had a good ride upon the blacksmith!
—Neriss
Then there is the Count Palatine.

—Portia
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He does nothing but frown +all day,, as if to say: ‘You would rather not have me choose.’ +He
courts sadness and that is what he finds., He hears a merry tale yet does not smile. I fear he will
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prove +himself to be,° the weeping philosopher when he grows old, being so full of
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unmannerly° sadness in his youth. I would rather be married to a skull with a bone in its mouth

Later, we see, that Portia comes to rightly love Bassanio and thus she wishes that he choses the right
casket—which he does. That side of the story is clear. The reverse position, however, is not so certain: does
Bassanio rightly love Portia, does he selflessly love her—or is his chief aim to win her wealth.
21. ever virtuous: / a man of great virtue nearing death: {at their death}/ on their deathbed
good inspirations: / are well-inspired. lott’ry: / lottery / contest / drawing
chooses the right chest: {chooses his meaning} / chooses the right chest (according to the meaning of its
inscription) already come: / since arrived?
22. {according to my description level at my affection.}
level at: guess at, infer, point to . . . the level of my response will be equal to—and on the same level as—my
affection.
23. Neapolitans, during Shakespeare’s time, were famed for their horsemanship.
24. / he counts it as some great virtue
25. {and he makes it a great appropriation to his own good parts that he can shoe him himself.}
/ and he calls attention to his own good breeding that he can shoe the horse himself
/ and he is quick to endorse (/commend) his own talent in that he can shoe the horse himself
/ and he claims himself worthy of some prize (/commendation) in that he can shoe the horse himself.
26. {his mother played false with a smith}
/ his mother fooled ‘round with a blacksmith / his mother had a long ride on the blacksmith
In this rather bawdy remark, Portia is saying that he loves horses, and is able to shoe his own horse, because his
mother (played false with) slept with a blacksmith behind his father’s back; thus his father was a blacksmith and not
a nobleman.
27. colt: unruly youth good parts: / talent / qualities / virtue
appropriation to: / addition to / endorsement of / a prize of / a trophy to / a testament of / ‘a blue ribbon’ to
28. {He doth nothing but frown, as who should say, ‘And you will not have me choose.’}
/ as if to say, ‘I know you don’t want me to choose.’
29. the weeping philosopher: refers to Heraclitus, who lived about 500 B.C., and was known to weep at the sad
condition of humanity
30. / so besieged by the sadness of his youth / entombed in sadness from his early youth / so inclined to sadness
since his youth.