Fal. But not kissed your keeper's daughter. Shal. Tut, a pin! this shall be answered. Fal. I will answer it straight :-I have done all this.-That is now answered.

Shal. The council shall know this.

Fal. 'Twere better for you if it were known in counsel; you'll be laughed at.

Eva. Pauca verba, sir John, goot worts.

Fal. Good worts! good cabbage.—Slender, I broke your head; what matter have you against me?

Slen. Marry, sir, I have matter in my head against you; and against your coney-catching rascals, Bardolph, Nym, and Pistol. They carried me to the tavern and made me drunk, and afterwards picked my pocket.

Bard. You Banbury cheese!

Slen. Ay, it is no matter.

Pist. How now, Mephostophilus ?

Slen. Ay, it is no matter.

Nym. Slice, I say! pauca, pauca: slice! that's my humour.

Slen. Where's Simple, my man?—can you tell, cousin?

Eva. Peace: I pray you! Now let us understand: there is three umpires in this matter, as I understand that is-master Page, fidelicet, master Page; and there is myself, fidelicet, myself; and the three party is, lastly and finally, mine host of the Garter.

Page. We three, to hear it, and end it between them.

Eva. Fery goot: I will make a prief of it in my note-book; and we will afterwards 'ork upon the cause, with as great discreetly as we can. Fal. Pistol

Pist. He hears with ears.

Eva. The tevil and his tam ! what phrase is this, He hears with ear? Why, it is affectations. Fal. Pistol, did you pick master Slender's purse?

Slen. Ay, by these gloves, did he, (or I would I might never come in mine own great chamber again else,) of seven groats in mill-sixpences, and two Edward shovel-boards, that cost me two shilling and two pence a-piece of Yead Miller, by these gloves.

Fal. Is this true, Pistol?

Eva. No; it is false, if it is a pick-purse.
Pist. Ha, thou mountain-foreigner!—Sir John
and master mine,

I combat challenge of this latten bilbo :
Word of denial in thy labras here;

Word of denial: froth and scum, thou liest !
Slen. By these gloves, then 'twas he.

Nym. Be avised, sir, and pass good humours; I will say, marry trap, with you, if you run the nuthook's humour on me: that is the very note of it.

Slen. By this hat, then, he in the red face had it for though I cannot remember what I did when you made me drunk, yet I am not altogether an ass.

Fal. What say you, Scarlet and John?

Bard. Why, sir, for my part, I say, the gentleman had drunk himself out of his five

sentences.

Eva. It is his five senses: fie, what the ignorance is !

Bard. And being fap, sir, was, as they say, cashiered: and so conclusions passed the careires. Slen. Ay, you spake in Latin then too; but

'tis no matter: I'll ne'er be drunk whilst I live again, but in honest, civil, godly company, for this trick if I be drunk, I'll be drunk with those that have the fear of God, and not with drunken knaves.

Eva. So Got 'udge me, that is a virtuous mind. Fal. You hear all these matters denied, gentlemen; you hear it.

Enter Mistress ANNE PAGE with wine; Mistress FORD and Mistress PAGE following.

Page. Nay, daughter, carry the wine in ; drink within.

we'll

[Exit ANNE PAGE, Slen. O heaven! this is mistress Anne Page. Page. How now, mistress Ford?

Fal. Mistress Ford, by my troth, you are very well met by your leave, good mistress.

[Kissing her. Page. Wife, bid these gentlemen welcome : come, we have a hot venison pasty to dinner; come, gentlemen, I hope we shall drink down all unkindness.

[Exeunt all but SHALLOW, SLENDER, and EVANS. Slen. I had rather than forty shillings I had my Book of Songs and Sonnets here :

Enter SIMPLE.

How now, Simple! Where have you been? I must wait on myself, must I? You have not The Book of Riddles about you, have you?

Sim. Book of Riddles! why, did you not lend it to Alice Shortcake upon Allhallowmas last, a fortnight afore Michaelmas ?

Shal. Come, coz; come, coz; we stay for you. A word with you, coz: marry, this, coz; there is, as't were, a tender, a kind of tender, made

afar off by sir Hugh here:-
:-do you
me?

understand

Slen. Ay, sir, you shall find me reasonable; if it be so, I shall do that that is reason. Shal. Nay, but understand me.

Slen. So I do, sir.

Eva. Give ear to his motions, master Slender: I will description the matter to you, if you be capacity of it.

Slen. Nay, I will do as my cousin Shallow says: I pray you, pardon me; he's a justice of peace in his country, simple though I stand here. Eva. But that is not the question; the question is concerning your marriage.

Shal. Ay, there's the point, sir.

Eva. Marry, is it; the very point of it; to mistress Anne Page.

Slen. Why, if it be so, I will marry her, upon any reasonable demands.

Eva. But can you affection the 'oman? Let us command to know that of your mouth, or of your lips; for divers philosophers hold, that the lips is parcel of the mouth :—therefore, precisely, can you carry your good will to the maid?

Shal. Cousin Abraham Slender, can you love her?

Slen. I hope, sir,-I will do, as it shall become one that would do reason.

Eva. Nay, Got's lords and his ladies, you must speak possitable, if you can carry her your desires towards her.

Shal. That you must: will you, upon good dowry, marry her?

Slen. I will do a greater thing than that, upon your request, cousin, in any reason.

Shal. Nay, conceive me, conceive me, sweet

coz; what I do, is to pleasure you, coz: can you love the maid?

Slen. I will marry her, sir, at your request; but if there be no great love in the beginning, yet heaven may decrease it upon better acquaintance, when we are married, and have more occasion to know one another: I hope, upon familiarity will grow more contempt; but if you say, marry her, I will marry her, that I am freely dissolved, and dissolutely.

Eva. It is a fery discretion answer; save, the faul' is in the 'ort dissolutely: the 'ort is, according to our meaning, resolutely;-his meaning is goot.

Shal. Ay, I think my cousin meant well.

Slen. Ay, or else I would I might be hanged, la.

Re-enter Mistress ANNE PAGE.

Shal. Here comes fair mistress Anne.-Would I were young for your sake, mistress Anne! Anne. The dinner is on the table; my father desires your worship's company.

Shal. I will wait on him, fair mistress Anne. Eva. Od's plessed will! I will not be absence at the grace.

[Exeunt SHALLOW and Sir HUGH EVANS. Anne. Will't please your worship to come in, sir?

Slen. No, I thank you, forsooth, heartily; I am very well.

Anne. The dinner attends you, sir.

Slen. I am not a-hungry, I thank you, forsooth. Go, sirrah, for all you are my man, go, wait upon my cousin Shallow. [Exit SIMPLE.] A.justice of peace sometime may be beholden to his friend for a man:-I keep but three men