1st Sen. His highness fain would save your lives if you would see it.
Rog. All the law in Venice shall not save me; I will not be saved.
Cla. Fear not, I have a trick to bring us to hanging in spite of the law. 43
Rog. Why, now I see thou lovest me; thou hast confirm’d
Thy friendship for ever to me by these words.
Why, I should never hear lanthorn and candle[266] call’d for
But I should think it was for me and my wife.
I’ll hang for that, forget not thy trick;
Upon ’em with thy trick; I long for sentence.
2d Sen. Will you appeal for mercy to the duke? 50
Cla. Kill not thy justice, duke, to save our lives;
We have deserved death.
Rog. Make not us precedents for after-wrongs;
I will receive punishment for my sins:
It shall be a means to lift me towards heaven.
Cla. Let’s have our desert; we crave no favour.
Duke. Take them asunder; grave justice makes us mirth;
That man is soulless that ne’er smiles[267] on earth.
Signor Rogero,[268] relate the weapon you kill’d him with,
and the manner. 60
Rog. My lord, your lustful kinsman—I can title him no better—came sneaking to my house like a promoter to spy flesh[269] in the Lent. Now I, having a Venetian spirit, watch’d my time, and with my rapier run him through, knowing all pains are but trifles to the horn of a citizen.