Enter Mrs. Quickly.

Quick. By your leave; I cry you mercy: give your worship good-morrow.

Fal. Take away these chalices*: go brew me a pottle of sack finely.

Bar. With eggs, sir?

Fal. Simple of itself; I'll no pullet-sperm in my brewage.-[Exit Bardolph.]-How now?

Quick. Marry, sir, I come to your worship from mistress Ford.

Fal. Mistress Ford! I have had ford enough: I was thrown into the ford: I have my belly full of ford.

Quick. Alas the day! good heart, that was not her fault; she does so take on with her men; they mistook their erection.

Fal. So did I mine, to build upon a foolish woman's promise.

Quick. Well, she laments, sir, for it, that it would yearu your heart to see it. Her husband goes this morning a birding; she desires you once more to come to her between eight and nine: I must carry her word quickly: she'll make you amends, I warrant you.

Fal. Well, I will visit her: tell her so; and bid her think, what a man is: let her consider his frailty, and then judge of my merit.

Quick. I will tell her.

Fal. Do so. Between nine and ten, say'st thou! Quick. Eight and nine, sir.

Fal. Well, be gone: I will not miss her.

Quick. Peace be with you, sir!

[Exit.

Fal. I marvel, I hear not of master Brook; he

sent me word to stay within: I like his money well. O, here he comes.

* Cups.

Enter Ford.

Ford. Bless you, sir!

Fal. Now, master Brook; you come to know what hath passed between me and Ford's wife?

Ford. That, indeed, sir John, is my business. Fal. Master Brook, I will not lie to you; I was at her house the hour she appointed me.

Ford, And how speed you, sir?

Fal. Very ill-favouredly, master Brook.

Ford. How so, sir? Did she change her determination?

Fal. No, master Brook; but the peaking cornuto, her husband, master Brook, dwelling in a continual 'larum of jealousy, comes me in the instant of our encounter, after we had embraced, kissed, protested, and, as it were, spoke the prologue of our comedy; and at his heels a rabble of his companions, thither provoked and instigated by his distemper, and, forsooth, to search his house for his wife's love. Ford. What, while you were there?

Fal. While I was there.

Ford. And did he search for you, and could not find you?

Fal. You shall hear. As good luck,would have it, comes in one mistress Page; gives intelligence of Ford's approach; and, by her invention, and Ford's wife's distraction, they conveyed me into a buckbasket.

Ford. A buck-basket!

Ful. By the Lord, a buck-basket: rammed me in with foul shirts and smocks, socks, foul stockings, and greasy napkins; that, master Brook, there was the rankest compound of villainous smell, that ever offended nostril.

Ford. And how long lay you there?

Fal. Nay, you shall hear, master Brook, what I have suffered to bring this woman to evil for your good. Being thus crammed in the basket, a couple

of Ford's knaves, his hinds, were called forth by their mistress, to carry me in the name of foul clothes to Datchet-lane: they took me on their shoulders; met the jealous knave, their master, in the door; who asked them once or twice what they had in their basket: I quaked for fear, lest the lunatic knave would have searched it; but Fate, ordaining he should be a cuckold, held his hand. Well: on went he for a search, and away went I for foul clothes. But mark the sequel, master Brook: I suffered the pangs of three several deaths: first, an intolerable fright, to be detected with a jealous rotten bell-wether: next, to be compassed like a good bilbo*, in the circumference of a peck, hilt to point, heel to head: and then, to be stopped in, like a strong distillation, with stinking clothes that fret. ted in their own grease: think of that,—a man of my kidney, think of that; that am as subject to heat as butter; a man of continual dissolution and thaw; it was a miracle to 'scape suffocation. And in the height of this bath, when I was more than half stewed in grease, like a Dutch dish, to be thrown into the Thames, and cooled, glowing hot, in that surge, like a horse-shoe; think of that;-hissing hot, think of that, master Brook.

Ford. In good sadnesst, sir, I am sorry that for my sake you have suffered all this. My suit then is desperate; you'll undertake her no more.

Fal. Master Brook, I will be thrown into Etna, as I have been into the Thames, ere I will leave her thus. Her husband is this morning gone a birding: I have received from her another embassy of meeting; 'twixt eight and nine is the hour, master Brook. Ford. 'Tis past eight already, sir.

Fal. Is it? I will then address met to my appointCome to me at your convenient leisure, and you shall know how I speed; and the conclusion

ment.

Bilboa, where the best blades are made.

+ Seriousness.

Make myself ready.

shall be crowned with your enjoying her: adieu. You shall have her, master Brook; master Brook, you shall cuckold Ford. [Exit.

Ford. Hum! ha! is this a vision? is this a dream? do I sleep? Master Ford, awake; awake, master Ford; there's a hole made in your best coat, master Ford. This 'tis to be married! this 'tis to have linen, and buck-baskets!-Well, I will proclaim myself what I am: I will now take the lecher; he is at my house: he cannot 'scape me; 'tis impossible he should; he cannot creep into a half-penny purse, nor into a pepper-box: but, lest the devil that guides him should aid him, I will search impossible places. Though what I am I cannot avoid, yet to be what I would not, shall not make me tame: if I have horns to make one mad, let the proverb go with me, I'll be horn mad. [Exit.

ACT IV.

SCENE I. The Street.

Enter Mrs. Page, Mrs. Quickly, and William.

Mrs. Page. Is he at master Ford's already, think'st thou?

Quick. Sure he is by this; or will be presently: but truly, he is very courageons* mad, about his throwing into the water. Mistress Ford desires you to come suddenly.

Mrs. Page. I'll be with her by and by; I'll but bring my young man here to school: look, where his master comes; 'tis a playing-day, I see.

Enter Sir Hugh Evans.

How now, sir Hugh? no school to-day?

Eva. No; master Slender is let the boys leave to play.

* Outrageous.

Quick. Blessing of his heart!

Mrs. Page. Sir Hugh, my husband says, my son profits nothing in the world at his book; I pray you, ask him some questions in his accidence.

Eva. Come hither, William; hold up your head;

come.

Mrs. Page. Come on, sirrah; hold up your head; answer your master, be not afraid.

Eva. William, how many numbers is in nouns ? Will. Two.

Quick. Truly, I thought there had been one number more; because they say, od's nouns.

Eva. Peace your tattlings. What is fair, William? Will. Pulcher.

Quick. Poulcats! there are fairer things than poulcats, sure.

Eva. You are a very simplicity'oman; I pray you, peace. What is lapis, William ?

Will. A stone.

Eva. And what is a stone, William?

Will. A pebble.

Eva. No, it is lapis; I pray you remember in your prain.

Will. Lapis.

Eva. That is good William. What is he, William, that does lend articles?

Will. Articles are borrowed of the pronoun; and be thus declined, Singulariter, nominativo, hic, hæc, hoc.

Eva. Nominativo, hig, hag, hog; pray you, mark: genitivo, hujus: Well, what is your accusative case?

Will. Accusativo, hinc.

Eva. I pray you, have your remembrance, child; Accusativo, hing, hang, hog.

Quick. Hang hog is Latin for bacon, I warrant you. Eva. Leave your prabbles, 'oman. What is the focative case, William?

Will. O-Vocativo, O.

Eva. Remember, William; focative is, caret.