Bard. O joyful day!-I would not take a SCENE V.-A public Place near Westminster knighthood for my fortune. Abbey. Enter two Grooms, strewing rushes. 1 Groom. More rushes, more rushes. 2 Groom. The trumpets have sounded twice. I Groom. It will be two o'clock ere they come from the coronation: despatch, despatch. [Exeunt Grooms. Enter Falstaff, Shallow, Pistol, Bardolph, and Page. Pist. What, I do bring good news? Fal. Carry master Silence to bed.-Master Shallow, my lord Shallow, be what thou wilt; I am fortune's steward. Get on thy boots : we'll ride all night.-O sweet Pistol !-Away, Bardolph!-[Exit Bard.] Come, Pistol, utter more to me; and, withal, devise something to do thyself good. Boot, boot, Master Shallow: I know the young king is sick for me. Let us take any man's horses; the laws of England Fal. Stand here by me, master Robert Shalare at my commandment. Happy are they low; will make the king do you grace: I which have been my friends; and woe unto will leer upon him, as he comes by; and do my lord chief justice! but mark the countenance he will give me. Pist. Let vultures vile seize on his lungs Pist. God bless thy lungs, good knight! also! Fal. Come here, Pistol; stand behind me. "Where is the life that late I led?" say they :-[To Shallow.] O, if I had had time to have Why, here it is;-Welcome these pleasant made new liveries, I would have bestowed the days! [Exeunt. thousand pound I borrowed of you. SCENE IV.-London. A Street. Enter Beadles, dragging in Hostess Quickly and Doll Tear-sheet. Host. No, thou arrant knave; I would to God I might die, that I might have thee hanged; thou hast drawn my shoulder out of joint. 1 Bead. The constables have delivered her over to me; and she shall have whipping-cheer enough, I warrant her: there hath been a man or two lately killed about her. But 'tis no matter; this poor show doth better: this Fal. It shows my earnestness of affection. Fal. As it were, to ride day and night; and not to deliberate, not to remember, not to have patience to shift me. Shal. It is most certain. Fal. But to stand stained with travel, and sweating with desire to see him; thinking of Dol. Nut-hook, nut-hook, you lie. Come nothing else, putting all affairs else in oblivion, on; I'll tell thee what, thou damned tripe-as if there were nothing else to be done but to visaged rascal, an the child I now go with do miscarry, thou hadst better thou hadst struck thy mother, thou paper-faced villain. Host. O the Lord, that Sir John would come! he would make this a bloody day to somebody. But I pray God the fruit of her womb miscarry. 1 Bead. If it do, you shall have a dozen of cushions again; you have but eleven now. Come, I charge you both go with me; for the man is dead, that you and Pistol beat among you. Dol. I'll tell thee what, thou thin man in a censer, I will have you as soundly swinged for this, you blue-bottle rogue! you filthy famished correctioner! if you be not swinged, I'll forswear half-kirtles. 1 Bead. Come, come, you she knight-errant, see him. [est: Pist. 'Tis semper idem, for absque hoc nihil 'Tis all in every part. Shal. 'Tis so, indeed. Pist. My knight, I will inflame thy noble And make thee rage. [liver, By most mechanical and dirty hand :- For Doll is in: Pistol speaks nought but truth. [Shouts within and trumpets sound. Pist. There roar'd the sea, and trumpetclangor sounds. Enter the King and his train, the Chief Fal. God save thy grace, king Hal! my vain man. royal Hal. [most royal imp of fame! Pist. The heavens thee guard and keep, Fal. God save thee, my sweet boy! King. My lord chief justice, speak to that [what 'tis you speak? Ch. Just. Have you your wits? know you Fal. My king! my Jove! I speak to thee, my heart! King. I know thee not, old man How ill white hairs become a fool, [prayers; fall to thy and jester ! I have long dream'd of such a kind of man, gape For thee thrice wider than for other men.- For God doth know, so shall the world per- That I have turn'd away my former self; Shal. Ay, marry, sir John; which I beseech you to let me have home with me. Fal. That can hardly be, master Shallow. Do not you grieve at this; I shall be sent for in private to him: look you, he must seem thus to the world: fear not your advancement: I will be the man yet that shall make you great. Shal. I cannot perceive how; unless you should give me your doublet, and stuff me out with straw. I beseech you, good sir John, let me have five hundred of my thousand. P. John. I like this fair proceeding of the Ch. Just. And so they are. [ment, my lord. P. John. I will lay odds, that, ere this year We bear our civil swords and native fire Come, will you hence? [Exeunt EPILOGUE.-Spoken by a Dancer. First, my fear; then, my court'sy; last, my speech. My fear is, your displeasure; my court'sy, my duty; and my speech, to beg your pardons. If you look for a good speech now, you undo me: :for what I have to say, is of mine own making; and what indeed I should say, will, I doubt, prove mine own marring. But to the purpose, and so to the venture.-Be it known to you, (as it is very well, ) I was lately here in the end of a displeasing play, to pray your patience for it, and to promise you a better. I did mean, indeed, to pay you with this: which, if, like an ill venture, it come unluckily home, I break, and you, my gentle creditors, lose. Here, I promised you, I would be, and here I commit my body to your mercies; bate me some, and I will pay you some; and, as most debtors do, promise you infinitely. If my tongue cannot entreat you to acquit me, will you command me to use my legs ? and yet that were but light payment,—to dance out of your debt. But a good conscience will make any possible satisfaction, and so will I. All the gentlewomen here have forgiven me if the gentlemen will not, then the gentlemen do not agree with the gentlewomen, which was never din-seen before in such an assembly. Bar Fal. Sir, I will be as good as my word: this that you heard was but a colour. Shal. A colour, I fear, that you will die in, sir John. Fal. Fear no colours: go with me to ner-come, lieutenant Pistol ;-come, dolph-I shall be sent for soon at night. Re-enter Prince John, the Chief Justice, Officers, &c. Ch. Just. Go, carry sir John Falstaff to the One word more, I beseech you. If you be not too much cloyed with fat meat, our humble author will continue the story, with sir John in it, and make you merry with fair Katharine of France: where, for anything I know, Falstaff shall die of a sweat, unless already he be killed with your hard opinions; for Oldcastle died a martyr, and this is not the man. My tongue is weary; when my legs are too, I will bid you good night and so kneel down before you: but, indeed, to pray for the queen. Admit me chorus to this history; [pray, Chor. O for a muse of fire, that would Who, prologue-like, your humble patience ascend The brightest heaven of invention ! A kingdom for a stage, princes to act, [all, Crouch for employment. But pardon, gentles Gently to hear, kindly to judge, our play. ACT I. SCENE I.-London. An Ante-chamber in the King's Palace. Enter the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of Ely. Cant. My lord, I'll tell you,-that self bill is urg'd, [reign Which in th' eleventh year of the last king's Was like, and had indeed against us pass'd, But that the scambling and unquiet time Did push it out of further question. [now? Ely. But how, my lord, shall we resist it Cant. It must be thought on. If it pass against us, We lose the better half of our possession: For all the temporal lands, which men devout By testament have given to the church, Would they strip from us; being valued thus,As much as would maintain, to the king's honour, Full fifteen earls, and fifteen hundred knights, The breath no sooner left his father's body, But that his wildness, mortified in him, Seem'd to die too; yea, at that very moment, Consideration like an angel came, And whipp'd the offending Adam out of him, To envelop and contain celestial spirits. With such a heady currance scouring faults; So soon did lose his seat, and all at once, Ely. [it, [nettle, Ely. The strawberry grows underneath the And wholesome berries thrive and ripen best, Neighbour'd by fruit of baser quality: And so the prince obscur'd his contemplation Under the veil of wildness; which, no doubt, Grew like the summer grass, fastest by night, Unseen, yet crescive in his faculty. Cant. It must be so; for miracles are ceas'd; And therefore we must needs admit the means, How things are perfected. Ely. But, my good lord, How now for mitigation of this bill Urg'd by the commons? Doth his majesty Incline to it, or no? Cant. The French ambassador upon that Crav'd audience; and the hour, I think, is come, To give him hearing: is it four o'clock? Cant. Then go we in, to know his embassy; Which I could, with a ready guess, declare, Before the Frenchman speak a word of it. Ely. I'll wait upon you; and I long to hear it. [Exeunt. SCENE II.-London. A Room of State in the Palace. [resolv'd, liege? K. Hen. Not yet, my cousin : we would be Before we hear him, of some things of weight, That task our thoughts, concerning us and France. Enter the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of Ely. Cant. God, and his angels, guard your sa- Or nicely charge your understanding soul How you awake the sleeping sword of war: We charge you in the name of God, take heed; For never two such kingdoms did contend, Without much fall of blood; whose guiltless Are every one a woe, a sore complaint, [drops 'Gainst him whose wrongs give edge unto the swords That make such waste in brief mortality. King Pepin's title, and Hugh Capet's claim, Usurp'd from you and your progenitors. K. Hen. May I with right and conscience That owe yourselves, your lives, and services,Than amply to imbar their crooked titles There left behind and settled certain French; Subdued the Saxons, and did seat the French naught,) Convey'd himself as heir to the lady Lingare, Cant. The sin upon my head, dread so- Who on the French ground play'd a tragedy, [dead, Ely. Awake remembrance of these valiant And with your puissant arm renew their feats : You are their heir; you sit upon their throne; The blood and courage, that renowned them, Runs in your veins: and my thrice-puissant Is in the very May-morn of his youth, [liege Ripe for exploits and mighty enterprises. Exe. Your brother kings and monarchs of Do all expect that you should rouse yourself, West. They know your grace hath cause So hath your highness; never king of England And lie pavilion'd in the fields of France. K. Hen. We must not only arm to invade But lay down our proportions to defend Cant. They of those marches, gracious so- |