Portia's father has insisted that all suitors to her must choose one of the caskets, gold, silver or lead. If they find her picture inside, they get to marry her. If they don't find her picture, they have to leave her alone, never to see her again.
Her father came up with this idea on his deathbed, Nerissa tells us:
Your father was ever virtuous; and holy men at their death have good inspirations; therefore, the lottery that he hath devised in these three chests, of gold, silver, and lead, (whereof who chooses his meaning chooses you) will, no doubt, never be chosen by any rightly, but one who you shall rightly love.
Does it necessarily follow though, that that will be the case! Well, I don't think so. And Portia doesn't think so either - she finds it frustrating and ridiculous that she isn't allowed to make her own choice:
But this reasoning is not in the fashion to
choose me a husband:—O me, the word choose! I may neither choose whom I would, nor refuse whom I dislike; so is the will of a living daughter curbed by the will of a dead father:—Is it not hard, Nerissa, that I cannot choose one, nor refuse none?
Portia doesn't find it easy to cope with her father's control: her will is "curbed" (limited or restried) by what he wants. And she finds it "hard" (difficult to bear) that she cannot make her own choice. I'd feel the same, I think!
Hope it helps!
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