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Fal. Ay, hostess, Bardolph is somewhat blunt: but, as for the king

Quick. Heavens bless him! a sweet young prince he was; and to be sure a gracious king he is. But what of him, Sir John?

Fal. Why, marry, hang him, hostess-treason must out as well as murder.

Quick. I am amazed, Sir John; why, how is this? what a goodness! when-whe

Doll. How is this, good Bardolph?

Fal. Why, I will tell you how it is. That same ungrateful, sneaking, pitiful rascal we were speaking of is turn'd fanatic!

Quick. Fanatic! the king turn'd fanatic! Fal. Ay, fanatic, presbyter, bishop, if you will. Let his crown be his mitre, I care not.

Doll. We don't take your meaning, Sir John. Fal. You must know then, Doll, that after having, in pure love and affection, ridden post day and night fourscore and odd miles, to congratulate him on his accession, and condole with him on his father's death; instead of bidding me welcome to court, he preached me my own funeral sermon.

Quick. A funeral sermon!

Fal. Ay, hostess: for at the end of his discourse he ordered me to be buried alive, at ten miles distance from the court. And to make this unnatural interment the surer, he has appointed my lord chief justice his undertaker, to see to the disposal of my corpse.

Quick. Buried alive, quoth he! what, what is in all this?

Fal. In plain terms, dame Quickly, your gracious king hath banished me the presence; and, till he grows a graceless prince again, I am forbidden to approach his person within ten miles, on penalty of being hanged. Take ye me now? Quick. O Jesu! is it possitable?

Doll. Ah, ha! is it so? sits the wind in that quarter?

Quick. Well, as I am an honest woman, who would have thought it? it is a world to see!

Doll. And so, Sir John is in disgrace; still plain Jack Falstaff, and one of us? ha, ha, ha! poor blown Jack!

Quick. True, Sir John, as you say, to be sure, I shall not be willing to lose it: for the law is open, and I know which way to get my money.

Fal. I am glad thou dost, hostess: as in that case I need not give myself the trouble to pay thee. The law is open, say'st thou? Ay, like a mouse-trap, on the catch for nibbling clients Enter thy action, and I will hold thee a gallon of sack, thy departed husband will get out of pur gatory ere thou out of the hands of thy lawyer.

Quick. Nay, Sir John, you need not twit me upon that. You need not fling my poor husband's soul in my teeth. He has not been gone so long; though for the matter of that he migh have been in Heaven before now, hadn't I lent you the money, Mr Dumb should have had to say masses for him. Yes, Sir John, you have put i to that great belly of your's what should have got my poor husband out of purgatory, and now you reproach me for it. Had he been still alive, you would not have used his disconsolate widow this. You wouldn't, Sir John.

Fal. No, I'll be sworn, I should not.

Quick. Well then, Sir John, out of charity, it were nothing else, you ought to repay money.-Nay, if you don't, I'll pray night and day that you may be haunted by his ghost. Her ven rest his soul! I would he might never sleep quietly in his grave, till he has made you pay me

Fal. Go to, thou art a foolish woman: with good words thou may'st be paid.

Quick. No, Sir John, good words won't do. I must have money, Sir John. The priests won't get a soul out of purgatory without money. Be sides, Sir John, good words are no payment; I can get no body to take them; good words w not do with me.

Fat. Well, well, I say you may be paidQuick. May! Sir John, I must. You have thus shuffled off and on me a good while; but l must, I must be paid, I must

Fal. Heigh! heigh! wilt thou raise the neigh bourhood upon us? If thou art clamorous, I wa have tree duck'd in the Thames for a bawd What a-plague, art thou drunk? On the honour of my knighthood thou shalt be paid. Dost thou doubt mine honour?

Quick. A sad disappointment, indeed, Sir John! but in good faith, things fall out so odd, and the Quick. Why, Sir John, to be sure, nobody world goes so wrong, and the times are so hard, that would scruple to confide in your honour's bohere, there, why, no longer ago now than yester- nour: but then, you know, Sir John, (nobody day, was I obliged to pay the lord knows-what- better) what honour is.—It will buy neither coals all away for one thing or other; and then my nor candles; nor will my landlord take it for misfortune to-day; an angel to the constables; rent, nor the merchant for sack or sherry. But and besides, this comes the day after to-morrow, would you give me only half the money, and leave when I must make up a sum for the wine-mer- the rest to honour; so that a body might keep chant; wherefore, if your honour would but dis-open house, Sir John; that would be doing charge your score in Eastcheap; because as why, your honour knows

Fal. How's this, dame Quickly? Quick. Because I say as why, your honour knows, seventy odd pounds is a great deal of money for a poor widow woman to lose.

Fal. What talk you of losing, hostess !

some

thing. Fal. Nay, if thou wilt be advised, I will do more for thee.-Bardolph! forget not to go (when I send thee) to the cashier, with whom I left a thousand pound this morning, and tell him to s tisfy Mrs Quickly forthwith.

Quick. A thousand pound!

1

Fal. The times are not so bad, hostess, (thanks | to our friend Shallow) but we may have a merry bout in Eastcheap.-How says my Doll?

Doll. Nay, you know, sweet Jack, I was always at your pleasure there.

Quick. That I will say for her, and a sweeternatured, better-hearted creature, never lay by the side of a true man. But goodness heart! why do we tarry here, when Sir John complained of his being fatigued, and was looking for a house of civil entertainment? I will shew you the way incontinently, Sir John.

Fal. I thank thee, hostess; I am now somewhat recruited, and will endeavour to reach Eastcheap.-And yet a cup of sack by the way, I think, would not be amiss. [Exeunt.

SCENE II.-A Tavern in East cheap.

Enter PISTOL and NYM.

Pis. Hang Pistol up with line of hempen string, Ere he in rabbit-hutch be close immuredSeize the stiff cramp upon the fangs of justice. Nym. Marry-trap, we shew'd his myrmidons a light pair of heels though.-I wonder what is become of Sir John.-They have certainly nailed his fat paunch.-We must not venture to the Fleet to see they'll nab us there; and, for the matter of that, I suppose they'll be running the humour upon us here too. I will incontinently go and shut myself up.-The storm may blow over when we are found uninventible.

Pis. Pistol disdains to skulk. Nolens 'tis fate: But who would volens be incarcerate? Nym, we must eat, and money have we none.

Nym. True, nolus colus, as you say, we must eat. I like to starve, like a rat, behind the arras, as little as another man.-But what shall we do if Sir John be in limbo?

Pis. Or in or out; his follower I no more. Invention's mother is Necessity, And Pistol's demon is an imp of wit, Merc'ry suggests, and Pallas doth approve. The great Ponjardo del Stiletto's dead, Professor of the art of self-defence. His broken foils, his daggers, belts, and blades, The stock in trade, I'll purchase upon tick; My face, disguised with an usurped beard, These jutting eye-brows, turn'd from black to red,

Shall screen from knowledge. Thou shalt too

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oblivion-The trick of it pleases.-But, here comes Quickly and Doll.

Enter Mrs QUICKLY and DOLL Tearsheet. Quick. So, gentlemen! you are got home be-fore Sir John, I see.

Pis. How fares the knight? Is he in durance vile?

Quick. No, by my truly; he returns forthwith; but in a woeful plight.-Francis! What, Francis! bring the great chair for Sir John. Fran. [Within.] Anon, anon, sir.

Doll. [To NYM.] Sirrah, Nym, hath Falstaff got money by him?

Nym. Yes, a thousand pounds; he borrowed it of Justice Shallow but we shall be little the better for that; for the knight will certainly be in limbo.

matter.

Doll. May be no; and may be yes.-It is no [DOLL and QUICKLY confer apart. Nym. [To PISTOL, who stands musing.] Does the humour hold? Or shall we wait the coming of the knight?

Pis. And share his fate in base incarceration!

Shall Don Anticho del Pistolo prove
A vile hunt-counter? No-we'll thrive alone.
Hostess, farewell; we may return-or not.

Nym. Bye, Doll. [Exeunt PISTOL and NYM. Quick. 'Tis certainly so; Sir John hath got the money.

Doll. I know not that; but if he has, he'll probably carry it to jail with him.-Here comes Bardolph; ask him.

Enter BARDOLPH.

Quick. Is Sir John at hand, Bardolph?

Bar. He will be here incontinently, hostess; I only stept before, to let you know he was acoming.

Quick. But is it veritably true, Bardolph, that Sir John has got a thousand pounds by him? Doll. Ay, is that true, Bardolph ?

Bar. True, upon honour: he had it of Justice Shallow, of Gloucestershire; and it lies now in Master Jingle-cash, the banker's hands.-But Sir John will be here momentably. Is every thing ready?

Quick. In a minute we are all clear. Run, good Doll, and receive the knight at the door. Francis! what, Francis!

Fran. [Without.] Anon, anon, sir.

Quick. Light up candles in the passage. A bottle of sherris, Francis! quick, you sleeping knave. Always upon a snail's gallop! O, that ever woman should be plagued with such creeping varlets!

Doll. O, here is Sir John, himself.

Enter Sir JOHN FALSTAFF. Quick. Jaded to death, I warrant!-An easy chair, good Bardolph. Please to depose yourself, Sir John.

Fal. Soh! now have I taken up my sitting again, in my old quarters.-A glass of sherris, Francis!

Doll. And how do you find yourself, my sweet knight?

Fal. Tolerable thirsty. [Drinks.] I can drink, and that is all the bodily functions I am capable of.-I am as stiff, every part about me, as a walking tailor, or Don Diego on a sign-post.

Doll. Nay, Sir John, if that be the case, it is not over with you yet.-Give me a buss.

Fal. Go, Doll, you are riggish-get you gone, you water-wag-tail, you; I am not merrily disposed.

Doll. But, will you give me a new kirtle at Bartholomew-fair?

Fal. I will, Doll.-Nay, I cannot bear you on my knee.

Doll. Why, how came you so terribly mauled, my leman?

Fal. Did I not tell ye?

Quick. No indeed, Sir John, your honour spoke of fatigue; but did not descend to particles.

dough they were kneading to make dumplings of and to expostulate with the villains would have been preaching to the winds.

Doll. Why did not you exert your courage, Sir John? draw upon them?

Fal. Draw, say'st thou? I could not come at my rapier to be master of a kingdom. And as for good words, in return for the few I gave them, they let fly their jests so thick at me, and pepper. ed me so plaguily with small wit, that I was dumfounded.

Doll. I thought you could never have beea overmatched that way, Sir John.

Fal. Yet so it was, Doll. They were holiday. wits, and came laden with choke-pears; but, isdeed, I was overpowered by numbers. Two to one, Doll, you know-They pelted me from all quarters.-Will you hear? I will give you a spice of their sarcasms; a sample of the jibing pellets they threw at me. As I was thus stemming the tide, and crying out for the Lord's sake, a dried Fal. Well then, I will tell ye now. Give me eel's-skin of a fishmonger ask'd me how I could first a glass of sherris. [Drinks.] You must know complain of the crowd?" Is a porpoise ill at case," that, after the king (hang him for a sheep-steal- said he, " amidst a glut of sprats and herrings?" ing cur!) gave me that rebuff I told you of, he I had not time to answer the smelt, before a bar stalk'd majestically away, and left me to the mer- ber-surgeon, the very model of the skeleton in his cy of the multitude; when, as I stood parlying glass-case, offered to tap me for the dropsy, and with mine ancient, mine arms a-kimbo thus; a to make us all elbow-room by letting out a pun knot of elbowing carls bore me down before them, cheon of canary at my girdle. "Right," cries a with the impetuosity of a torrent. Lo! there third, at the word canary, "I'll be hang'd if any was I, jamm'd fast in the midst of a vile group of thing be in the doublet of that fat rogue but a mechanics, as if we had grown together in a body-hog's-skin of Spanish wine;" and incontinently corporate and in this jeopardy was I carried along: sometimes bolstered up on all sides, at the confluence of several turnings, like a May-pole; and at others, wire-drawn between two stone walls, as if they meant to make chitterlings of me: now, this fair round belly taking the form of a Christmas-pye, and by and by press'd as flat as a pancake. It is a miracle I did not burst in the midst of them. Had it not been for the sufficiency of my buff doublet, I should have certainly burst.

Doll. If you had, Sir John, you would have went off with a report like a bladder.

Fal. A bladder, ye jade! a demi-culverin at least. I should have died a hero: my exit would

have made some noise in the world.

Quick. Heaven forbid, Sir John, you should ever die a virulent death, I say.

Doll. I hope, indeed, sweet knight, you will never be pressed to death. That must be an odd end, and yet, methinks I could bear much.

Fal. I'll be sworn thou couldst, Doll: but thou art a woman, and made to bear.

Quick. Yes, in good sooth, poor woman is made to bear every thing. She must suffer all a man's ill-humours, let 'em lie never so heavy upon her; and, by my truly, some men are nothing else. But, to be sure, Sir John, you was most inhumanly used. Would nobody take pity

upon you?

Fal. Pity! the most remorseless rascals! they made no more of me than if I had been a lump of

they roared out on all sides, " Tap him there,
tap him, master surgeon." 'Sblood, I was forced
to draw in my horns, and be silent, lest the vi
lains, being thirsty, should force the shaver to
operation. The knave, indeed, was five weavers
off, and so could not well come at me; I might
otherwise have been drank up alive.
Doll. And pray how cam'st thou off at last, Sir
John?

Fal. By mere providence; for, after the berbe rous rascals had squeez'd the breath out of my body, they buffeted me because I could not roar out God save the king.' At length, I know not how, they threw me down in the cloisters, where falling cross-way, and the way being narrow, 1 fairly block'd up the passage; upon which, for they could not straddle over me, they took and ther way (a plague go with them) for fear of losing the show. And thus was I left to take in wind, and gather myself up at leisure.

Doll. And did the mangy villains so play upon thy sackbut? a parcel of sapless twigs! dry elms, fit only for fuel! I would I had the burning of them.

Fal. Would thou fire them, Doll? Ha! art thou touch-wood still, Doll?

Doll. Nay, Sir John, not so. Quick. No, I'll be sworn, Sir John, to my car nal knowledge, if there be truth or faith in medi cine. But, Sir John, what would your please to have for supper? Fal. Another glass of sherris-fill me out, Bar«

honour

dolph. I cannot eat. I have lost my appetite by the way. Put an egg into a quart of mull'd sack, and give it me when I am a-bed. I will to sleep. Doll. Would you have your bed prepared strait, Sir John?

Ful Aye on the instant, good Doll. Hostess ! go thou and see to the brewage of my sack. [Exeunt DOLL and Mrs QUICKLY. PISTOL and NYM enter.

Pis. Sir Knight, I bring thee news; loud fame reports my lord chief justice hath recalled his

warrants.

Fal. I would he were choaked with his warrants ere he had issued them. But I thank thee for the tidings. The serjeants will not disturb my rest, at least, to-night But, what comes here? Pis. From ducking-pond escaped in dripping plight,

The crooked-finger'd cut-purse, Peto hight.

PETO enters leaning upon GADSHILL.
Fal. What's the matter, Peto?

Gad. Matter! Sir Knight, and master of mine! -Matter, i' faith, enough. The mob at Westminster had like to have murdered poor Peto here.

Fal And how so?

Gad. Why, Sir John, as he was getting upon a cobler's bulk, to see what was become of your honour, a raw-boned swaggering serjeant, coming

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by, whipt hold of him by the leg, and threw him on the people's heads; where they shouldered him about from post to pillar, as they would have done a hedge-hog, or a dead rabbit that had been thrown among them. I'faith, I thought they would have killed him.

Fal. How! was that Peto? I saw the bustle at a distance, but took it for a huge boar-cat the porters and 'prentices had got, to make sport withal. By the Lord, Peto, I have a fellow-feeling for thy sufferings.

Pis. And I. But say, is merit thus repaid? Go, Peto, lay thy head in Parco's lap. Shall Fortune play the jilt with men of mould?

Fal. Good Peto, let me advise thee to go to bed, And lay thy head on a pillow. Bardolph, see to

him.

Pistol and Nym, good night.

Pis. and Nym. Good night, Sir John.
Fal. Francis!

Light me to bed-let Doll bring up the sack,
See to the jorden, and tuck up my back.

[Exit. Pis. Signior Nymwego! Hear'st thou, lad of craft?

Nym. Yea, marry, Don Anticho del Pistoloruns the humour well?

Pis. Well, Nym; and thou and I, o'er cup and

cann,

Will go and schemes of operation plan. [Exeunt.

SCENE I-A Street.

ACT II.

Justice SHALLOW and Master SLENDER enter. Slen. I wonder now, coz, when you know what a desperate kind of a horrible man Sir John is, you should

Shal. Tut, tut-I fear him not; there's ne'er a Sir John Falstaff in the nation shall over-reach

me.

Slen. But what's done cann't be helped, coz; he over-reached you now, as I take it, when you lent him the money.

Shul. Well, cousin of mine; then it is my turn now to over-reach him, and get it again.

Slen. That, indeed, cousin Shallow, to be sure, would be quite right; tit for tat, as we say in the country; but then he is such a bloodyminded caitiff; you know he broke my head once for nothing at all; and if he should get an inkling that you are going to law with him, O Lord, O Lord, I shall never sleep in quiet again.

Shal. Poh, you chit, if he breaks the peace, I shall know what to do with him, I warrant ye.

Slen. Ay, there indeed, cousin, ecod, I did not think of that. If I am in fear of my life, I can answer taking him up with a warrant, and binding him over to his good behaviour. Suppose, VOL. IV.

therefore, coz, we swear the peace against him first, and lay him fast by the heels before we enter the action. And yet I don't know, if I might advise ye, I would wash my hands of him.

Shal. Talk not to me. I tell thee I will spend half my estate, ere the rascally knight shall carry it off so. I had rather the inns of court should share the money among them, than that the gorbellied knave should feast his enormous guts at any free-cost of mine.-I will to counsel immediately; and if the law will not avail me, my sword shall do me justice.

Sen. You know best, cousin Shallow, to be sure; but

Shal. But me no buts, I say, but come along! Your Cousin Shallow puts up no such [Exeunt.

wrong.

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his youth suffered and yet so it would go near to be suspected, if his highness should now act towards them with an ill-timed severity. My lord chief-justice hath therefore retracted his hasty orders for their imprisonment.

Fri. Son, well observed; and I commend his lordship's prudence, in treating their vices as infirmities; and will readily undertake to commune with them on the grievous enormity of their dissolute lives.

Off. His lordship would have you apply first to Sir John Falstaff, the ringleader of this vicious troop. If you can dispose him to good, the rest may follow.

Fri. I will attend these reprobates, and use the

means.

Off. His lordship requires that you would bring Falstaff over to retire to a monastery, if possible; that, being concealed from the eyes of the world, he may not daily remind it of what is past. Farewell, good father, I will see thee again at the Priory. [Exit. Fri. I will go; but I fear my mission will prove as fruitless as that of many other apostles, sent among infidels. As there is no danger of martyrdom, however, I am content. Persuade Sir John Falstaff to turn monk ! Could I work miracles, indeed, and, like St Thomas, turn an Ethiop white, something might be said for it: but, as it is, I despair of converting an old debauchee from two such prevailing heresies as the whore and the bottle.

SCENE III.-Tavern in Eastcheap.

[Exit.

FALSTAFF and BARDOLPH enter. Fal. Two sound naps, of eight hours a-piece, have something recruited me. Bardolph, my morning's whet. Is it prepared?

Bar. 'Tis here, Sir John. [Gives FALSTAFF a tankard.]

Fal. Here's to our better fortune. [Drinks. Bar. Ah, Sir John, I am afear'd our fortune hath been at its highest flood. We have seen our best days.

Fal. So the world goes, Bardolph. Up and down! But is it not hard now? I that havebut that's nothing. I hate boasting. It is, however, well known what pains I have taken to make a man of that Hal. Nay, you yourself are privy to the many good offices I have done him. Before the younker knew me, he could not drink sack; made conscience of going to church on holidays; and blushed like a scarlet cloak at entering a bawdy-house. I instructed him in all the manly exercises. I was content to win his money, to teach him gaming: to get drunk myself to try to make him so. Nay, setting rotten limbs and dignity aside, have I not even pimped for the bashful rogue? Such a Prince of Wales! by my troth, I was ashamed of him. Had it not been for me, the milksop might have been crowned before he had lost his maidenhead.

Bur. And that would have been a pity, Sir John, to be sure.

Fal. It was I first taught him to way-lay the true-man; for I knew him when he durst not cry stand to a turkey-cock; nay, a gander of the ordinary size of a green goose, had it met him on a common, would have made him run for it. I went farther yet; and not only emboldened his actions, but taught him the manly arts of conversation. In the style military, for instance, or swearing— Bar. Sir John, I believe there you forget yourself; the prince wanted no assistance of you in that; for when he was a little crack, he would swear ye like a man six foot high.

Fal. Right, Bardolph, you are right. I remem ber me; swearing indeed he knew: for though but a king's son, he would, as thou sayst, rap out an oath like an emperor. But then for the quintessence of elocution, the hyperbole, vulgarly called lying; there I am a master, Yet what a deal of pains it hath cost me to teach Hal to lie; and all thrown away upon him. He would never do it roundly. He had no genius that way.

Bar. You know, Sir John, the prince never could away with lying. He used to say 'twas beneath a gentleman and a soldier.

Fal. Well, well, he will never shine in the recital of his own exploits, as Xenophon, Cæsar, and I have done.

Bar. Why, Sir John, to be sure, you have done something.

Fal. Something! the services I have done him and his father are out of number. Methinks my behaviour in the ever-memorable action of Shrewsbury should make him blush at his ingratitude. Who killed Hotspur? did not I give him his death's wound in the thigh? was it not I who took prisoner that fiery dragon Coleville? and that even alive! And am I thus requited? Is this the guerdon of my great atchievements? Hang valour, I'll hack my sword no more. Thus has it ever been the fate of merit to be rewarded. Alcibiades and Bellisarius for that!

Bar. Ay, Sir John, they were tall fellows: they were sadly used indeed: I have heard of them. But that was in king John's time, I think.

Fal. They were the Falstaffs of antiquity, Bardolph.

Bar. Like enough, Sir John; they were before my time, to be sure; though Pistol told me, t'other day, that General Bellisarius was his god-father.

Fal. Pistol is an ignorant braggard, an ass: I have injured my dignity by associating with ras cals, not worthy to wait at my heels. What tell'st thou me of Pistol?

Bar. Nay, Sir John, I meant no harm. I do think you deserve to be made a lord of indeed.

Fal. I expected nothing less, I can assure ye. And then, for my well-known economy, to have had the sale management of the exchequer at least.

Bar. And instead of that, to be banished

Fal. I knew not if I heard the word banish. I was forbidden indeed to come near the king's person by ten miles; but I was not at that distance when those injunctions were laid on me. Quere now (it might pose a casuist, let me tell ye) whe

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