This prologue is divided as to the theatre into two parts:  to left, Sheeloque’s domestic interior,—­to right, a practicable canal.  In the very first line out crops Shylock’s love of good bargains; and I give the reader my word, the little Frenchmen saw that this was characteristic, and applauded vehemently. "Bon,” said I,—­“if they applaud the first line, what will they do with the last act?”

It need not be said that Shylock dabbles in those bills which Venetian swells of the fifteenth century, in common with those of a later age and more western land, will manipulate, in spite of all the political economy from Confucius down to Mr. Mill; and in this particular instance and prologue the names of the improvidents are Leone and Ubaldo, neither of which, if my memory serve me, is Shakspearian.  These gentlemen considerably shake my traditional respect for sixteenth-century Venetian Aristos, for they insult that Jew till I wonder where a count and a duke have learnt such language:  but they serve a purpose; they trot Shylock out, so to speak, and give our author an opportunity of doing his best with A 1.  Shylock’s great speech.  Here is the apostrophe:—­

“But yesterday—­no later past than yesterday—­thou didst bid thy mistress call at me from her balcony; thy servants by thy will did cast mud on me, and thy hounds sped snapping after me,’”—­whereby we may infer they went hunting in Venice, in the fifteenth century.  It must have been rather dangerous running.  Nor could the Venetian nobles of that good old time have been very proper; for Leone and Ubaldo justify themselves by saying they were drunk.

It is after this pretty excuse that Shylock has a soliloquy as long as his beard,—­and I hear really loud opposition to this didacticism in the pit; but, however, this slow work soon meets compensation in violent action.  Shylock won’t renew, and the nobles get indignant; so they propose to pay Shylock with more kicks than halfpence.  Here the action begins; for Shylock protests he will bite a bit out of them; and though one of these long-sleeved swells warns him that all threats by Jews against Christians are an imprisonment manner, Shylock rashly prepares for a defence.  Away fly the lords after Shylock, over go the chairs, down goes the table, and I suppose Shylock does hit “one of them”; for the two lords go off quite triumphantly, with the intimation that he will be in prison in one hour from that.

Then the Jew calls for—­Sarah; and this same comes in on tiptoe, for fear of waking the baby.  This Shylock fils Sarah proceeds to describe as equally beautiful with Abel and Moses, which seems to give Shylock pere great comfort,—­though I am bound to admit the lowly whispered doubt on the part of a pit-neighbor of mine as to Sarah’s capability of judging in the matter.

Shylock is preparing for prison, it seems, and one little necessity is a prayer for said son.  Sarah comes in with a response, Shylock leaves off praying “immediate,” to tell Sarah she is no vulgar servant, which assurance is received in the tearful manner.  And here it comes a little faint whiff of the real play.  In leaving home, Shylock’s French plagiarizes the Jew’s speech to Jessica, even down to the doubt the Jew has about leaving his house at all.