Shal. It is very just. Enter Falstaff. Look, here comes good Sir John. Give me your Fal. I am glad to see you well, good Master Robert Shal. No, Sir John; it is my cousin Silence, in com- Fal. Good Master Silence, it well befits you should be of the peace. Sil. Your good worship is welcome. Fal. Fie! this is hot weather, gentlemen. Have you 100 provided me here half a dozen sufficient men? Shal. Marry, have we, sir. Will you sit? Fal. Let me see them, I beseech you. Shal. Where's the roll? where's the roll? where 's the roll? Let me see, let me see, let me see. So, so, so, so, so, so, so: yea, marry, sir: Ralph Mouldy! Let them appear as I call; let them do so, let them do so. Let me see; where is Mouldy? Moul. Here, an 't please you. Shal. What think you, Sir John? a good-limbed fellow; young, strong, and of good friends. Fal. Is thy name Mouldy? Moul. Yea, an 't please you. Fal. 'Tis the more time thou wert used. Shal. Ha, ha, ha! most excellent, i' faith! things that are mouldy lack use: very singular good! in Fal. Prick him. Moul. I was pricked well enough before, an you 120 could have let me alone: my old dame will be undone now, for one to do her husbandry and her drudgery: you need not to have pricked me; there are other men fitter to go out than I. Fal. Go to: peace, Mouldy; you shall go. Mouldy, it is time you were spent. Moul. Spent! Shal. Peace, fellow, peace; stand aside: know you where you are? For the other, Sir John: let me see: Simon Shadow! Fal. Yea, marry, let me have him to sit under: he's like to be a cold soldier. Shal. Where's Shadow? Shad. Here, sir. Fal. Shadow, whose son art thou? Shad. My mother's son, sir. Fal. Thy mother's son! like enough, and thy father's shadow; so the son of the female is the shadow of the male: it is often so, indeed; but much of the father's substance! Shal. Do you like him, Sir John? Fal. Shadow will serve for summer; prick him, for we have a number of shadows to fill up the muster-book. Shal. Thomas Wart! Fal. Where's he? Wart. Here, sir. Fal. Is thy name Wart? Wart. Yea, sir. Fal. Thou art a very ragged wart. 130 140 Shal. Shall I prick him down, Sir John? Fal. It were superfluous; for his apparel is built Shal. Ha, ha, ha! you can do it, sir; you can do it: Fee. Here, sir. Shal. What trade art thou, Feeble? Fee. A woman's tailor, sir. Shal. Shall I prick him, sir? Fal. You may: but if he had been a man's tailor, he 'ad ha' pricked you. Wilt thou make as many holes in an enemy's battle as thou hast done in a woman's petticoat? Fee. I will do my good will, sir: you can have no more. Fal. Well said, good woman's tailor! well said, 160 courageous Feeble! thou wilt be as valiant as Fee. I would Wart might have gone, sir. Fal. I would thou wert a man's tailor, that thou mightst mend him and make him fit to go. I Fee. It shall suffice, sir. Fal. I am bound to thee, reverend Feeble. Who is next. Shal. Peter Bullcalf o' the green! Fal. Yea, marry, let's see Bullcalf. 180 Bull. Here, sir. Fal. 'Fore God, a likely fellow! Come, prick me Bull. O Lord! good my lord captain, Fal. What, dost thou roar before thou art pricked? Fal. What disease hast thou? Bull. A whoreson cold, sir, a cough, sir, which I 190 caught with ringing in the king's affairs upon his coronation-day, sir. Fal. Come, thou shalt go to the wars in a gown; we will have away thy cold; and I will take such Shal. Here is two more called than your number; Fal. Come, I will go drink with you, but I cannot tarry dinner. I am glad to see you, by my 200 troth, Master Shallow. Shal. O, Sir John, do you remember since we lay all night in the windmill in Saint George's field? Fal. No more of that, Good Master Shallow, no more of that. Shal. Ha! 'twas a merry night. And is Jane Nightwork alive? Fal. She lives, Master Shallow. Shal. She never could away with me. Fal. Never, never; she would always say she could 210 not abide Master Shallow. Shal. By the mass, I could anger her to the heart. She was then a bona-roba. Doth she hold her own well? |