what cunning match have you made with this jest of the drawer? come, what's the issue?

P. Hen. I am now of all humours that have showed themselves humours, since the old days of goodman Adam, to the pupil age of this present twelve o'clock at midnight. [Re-enter FRANCIS with wine.] What's o'clock, Francis ? Fran. Anon, anon, sir.

[Exit.

P. Hen. That ever this fellow should have fewer words than a parrot, and yet the son of a woman !—His industry is-up-stairs, and down-stairs; his eloquence, the parcel of a reckoning. I am not yet of Percy's mind, the Hotspur of the north; he that kills me some six or seven dozen of Scots at a breakfast, washes his hands, and says to his wife-Fie upon this quiet life! I want work. O my sweet Harry, says she, how many hast thou killed to-day? Give my roan horse a drench, says he; and answers, Some fourteen, an hour after, a trifle, a trifle. I prithee, call in Falstaff; I'll play Percy, and that damned brawn1 shall play dame Mortimer his wife. Rivo, says the drunkard. Call in ribs, call in tallow.

3

Enter FALSTAFF, GADSHILL, BARDOLPH, and PETO. Poins. Welcome, Jack; where hast thou been? Fal. A plague of all cowards, I say, and a vengeance too! marry, and amen!-Give me a cup of sack, boy. -Ere I lead this life long, I'll sew nether-stocks, and mend them, and foot them too. A plague of all cowards! -Give me a cup of sack, rogue. [Re-enter FRANCIS with wine.] Is there no virtue extant? [He drinks. P. Hen. Didst thou never see Titan 4 kiss a dish of

1 Brawn.] Falstaff.

2 Rivo.] This was a common Bacchanalian shout.

3 Nether-stocks.] Stockings. Breeches were called upper-stocks.

butter? pitiful-hearted Titan,' that melted at the sweet tale of the sun! if thou didst, then behold that compound.

A bad

Fal. You rogue, here's lime in this sack too: there is nothing but roguery to be found in villainous man: yet a coward is worse than a cup of sack with lime in it; a villainous coward.-Go thy ways, old Jack, die when thou wilt; if manhood, good manhood, be not forgot upon the face of the earth, then am I a shotten herring.2 There lives not three good men unhanged in England; and one of them is fat, and grows old: God help the while! world, I say! I would I were a weaver; I could sing psalms or anything.3 A plague of all cowards, I say still! P. Hen. How now, wool-sack? what mutter you? Fal. A king's son ! If I do not beat thee out of thy kingdom with a dagger of lath, and drive all thy subjects afore thee like a flock of wild geese, I'll never wear hair on my face more. You Prince of Wales!

4

P. Hen. Why, you whoreson round man! what's the matter?

Fal. Are not you a coward? answer me to that; and Poins there?

Poins. 'Zounds, ye fat paunch, an ye call me coward, by the Lord, I'll stab thee.

1 Pitiful-hearted Titan.] We agree with Theobald in supposing that Titan is here the compositor's mistake for butter.

2 A shotten herring.] A herring gutted and dried.

3 I wish I were a weaver, &c.] Weavers and tailors were much addicted to the practice of singing at their work. In the Midsummer Night's Dream, iv. 1, Bottom the weaver says, 'I have a reasonable good ear in music;' and in Twelfth Night, ii. 3, Sir Toby says, 'Shall we rouse the night-owl in a catch that will draw three souls out of one weaver.' See p. 77, note 3.

A dagger of lath.] This was the weapon of the buffoon who was called the Vice in the ancient comedies. See the Editor's Twelfth Night, p. 85, note 2.

Fal. I call thee coward! I'll see thee damned ere I call thee coward but I would give a thousand pound I could run as fast as thou canst. You are straight enough in the shoulders, you care not who sees your back call you that backing of your friends? A plague upon such backing! give me them that will face me.— -Give me a cup of sack: -I am a rogue if I drunk to-day.

P. Hen. O villain! thy lips are scarce wiped since thou drunk'st last.

say

Fal. All's one for that. A plague of all cowards, still

I.

P. Hen. What's the matter?

[He drinks.

Fal. What's the matter! there be four of us here have ta'en a thousand pound this day morning.

P. Hen. Where is it, Jack? where is it?

Fal. Where is it? taken from us it is: a hundred upon poor four of us.

P. Hen. What, a hundred, man ?

Fal. I am a rogue if I were not at half-sword1 with a dozen of them two hours together. I have 'scaped by miracle. I am eight times thrust through the doublet; four, through the hose; 2 my buckler cut through and through; my sword hacked like a handsaw, ecce signum. I never dealt better since I was a man: all would not do. A plague of all cowards !--Let them speak: if they speak more or less than truth, they are villains, and the sons of darkness.

P. Hen. Speak, sirs; how was it?

Gads. We four set upon some dozen-
Fal. Sixteen, at least, my lord.

1 At half-sword.] Fighting at half-sword distance; in close fight.

2 Hose.] Breeches.

Gads. And bound them--

Peto. No, no, they were not bound.

Fal. You rogue, they were bound, every man of them; or I am a Jew else, an Ebrew Jew.

Gads. As we were sharing, some six or seven fresh men set upon us

Fal. And unbound the rest, and then come in the other.

P. Hen. What, fought ye with them all?

Fal. All? I know not what ye call, all; but if I fought not with fifty of them, I am a bunch of radish if there were not two or three and fifty upon poor old Jack, then am I no two-legged creature.

P. Hen. Pray God you have not murdered some of them.

Fal. Nay, that's past praying for; I have peppered two of them two, I am sure, I have paid; two rogues in buckram suits. I tell thee what, Hal-if I tell thee a lie, spit in my face, call me horse1-thou knowest my old ward: 2-here I lay, and thus I bore my point. Four rogues in buckram let drive at me

P. Hen. What, four? thou saidst but two, even now. Fal. Four, Hal; I told thee four.

Poins. Ay, ay, he said four,

Fal. These four came all a-front, and mainly thrust at me. I made me no more ado, but took all their seven points in my target, thus,

P. Hen. Seven? why there were but four, even now.

1 Call me horse.] So in Twelfth Night, ii. 3, ‘If thou hast her not i' the end, call me Cut;' where Cut is supposed to mean a curtal or docked horse. In the present play, ii. 1, one of the carriers' horses is called Cut.

2 Ward.] Fencing guard.

Fal. In buckram?

Poins. Ay, four in buckram suits.

Fal. Seven, by these hilts,1 or I am a villain else.

P. Hen. Prithee, let him alone; we shall have more

anon.

Fal. Dost thou hear me, Hal.

P. Hen. Ay, and mark thee too, Jack.

Fal. Do so, for it is worth the listening to. These nine in buckram, that I told thee of

P. Hen. So, two more already.

Fal. Their points being broken-
Poins. Down fell their hose.2

Fal. Began to give me ground: but I followed me close,3 came in foot and hand; and, with a thought, seven of the eleven I paid.

P. Hen. O monstrous! eleven buckram men grown out of two!

4

Fal. But, as the devil would have it, three misbegotten knaves, in Kendal green, came at my back, and let drive at me;—for it was so dark, Hal, that thou could'st not see thy hand.

P. Hen. These lies are like the father that begets them; gross as a mountain, open, palpable. Why, thou clay

Hilts.] This plural form was often used for hilt.

2 Down fell their hose.] This banter refers to the points or tagged laces that held the breeches. So in Twelfth Night, i. 5, when the Clown says 'I am resolved on two points,' Maria replies ‘That, if one break, the other will hold; or, if both break, your gaskins fall.'

3 I followed me close.] This expletive use of the word me gives a quaint turn to the expression. It occurs very frequently in this play. 4 In Kendal green] Kendal was in old times noted for the making and dyeing of cloths. The dress of Robin Hood and his merry foresters was Kendal green.