a Jew. The money was borrowed to lend to a friend
named Bassanio, and the Jew, "in merry sport," instead of interest,
agreed to lend the money on these conditions: If Antonio paid it within
three months, he should pay only the principal; if he did not pay it
back within that time, the merchant should forfeit a pound of his own
flesh, from any part of his body the Jew might choose to cut it off. As
Antonio's ships were delayed by contrary winds, he could not pay the
money, and the Jew demanded the forfeiture. On the trial which ensued,
Portia, in the dress of a law doctor, conducted the case, and, when the
Jew was going to take the forfeiture, stopped him by saying that the
bond stated "a pound of flesh," and that, therefore, he was to shed no
drop of blood, and he must cut neither more nor less than an exact
pound, on forfeit of his life. As these conditions were practically
impossible, the Jew was nonsuited and fined for seeking the life of a
citizen.--Shakespeare, _Merchant of Venice_ (1598).

The story is in the _Gesta Romanorum_, the tale of the bond being ch.
xlviii., and that of the caskets ch. xcix.; but Shakespeare took his
plot from a Florentine novelette called _Il Pecorone_, written in the
fourteenth century, but not published till the sixteenth.

There is a ballad on the subject, the date of which has not been
determined. The bargain runs thus:

"No penny for the loan of it,
For one year shall you pay--
You may do me a good turn
Before my dying day;
But we will have a merry jest,
For to be talk[^e]d long;
You shall make me a bond," quoth he,
"That shall be large or strong."

=Merchant's Tale= (_The_), in Chaucer, is substantially the same as the
first Latin metrical tale of Adolphus, and is not unlike a Latin prose
tale given in the appendix of T. Wright's edition of AEsop's fables. The
tale is this:

A girl named May married January, an old Lombard baron, 60 years of
age, but entertained the love of Damyan, a young squire. She was
detected in familiar intercourse with Damyan, but persuaded her
husband that his eyes had deceived him, and he believed
her.--Chaucer, _Canterbury Tales_ (1388).

=Mercian Laws.= (See MARTIAN.)

=Mercilla=, a "maiden queen of great power and majesty, famous through all
the world, and honored far and nigh." Her kingdom was disturbed by a
soldan, her powerful neighbor, stirred up by his wife Adic[)i]a