Ch. Just. I am sure, he is, to the hearing of any Enter Sir John Falstaff, with his Page bearing his thing good.-Go, pluck him by the elbow; I must

Fal. An't please your lordship, I hear, his a dry hand? a yellow cheek? a white beard? a demajesty is returned with some discomfort from creasing leg? an increasing belly? Is not your voice broken? your wind short? your chin double? your wit single? and every part about you blasted with antiquity? and will you yet call yourself young? Fye, fye, fye, sir John!

Ch. Just. But since all is well, keep it so: wake-A man can no more separate age and covetousnot a sleeping wolf.

Fal. I can get no remedy against this consumption of the purse: borrowing only lingers and lingers it out, but the disease is incurable.-Go bear this letter to my lord of Lancaster; this to the prince; this to the earl of Westmoreland; and this to old Fal. Not so, my lord; your ill angel is light; mistress Ursula, whom I have weekly sworn to but, I hope, he that looks upon me, will take me marry since I perceived the first white hair on my without weighing and yet, in some respects. I chin: About it; you know where to find me. [Exit grant, I cannot go, I cannot tell: Virtue is of so Page.] A pox of this gout! or, a gout of this pox! little regard in these coster-monger times, that true for the one, or the other, plays the rogue with my valour is turned bear-herd: Pregnancy is made a great toe. It is no matter, if I do halt; I have the tapster, and hath his quick wit wasted in giving wars for my colour, and my pension shall seem the reckonings: all the other gifts appertinent to man, more reasonable: A good wit will make use of any as the malice of this age shapes them, are not worth thing; I will turn diseases to commodity. [Exit. a gooseberry. You, that are old, consider not the capacities of us that are young you measure the SCENE III.-York. A Room in the Archbishop's heat of our livers with the bitterness of your galls: and we that are in the vaward of our youth, I must Enter the Archbishop of York, the Lords Hastings, confess, are wags too.

And, my most noble friends, I pray you all,
Speak plainly your opinions of our hopes :-
And first, lord marshal, what say you to it?

Momb. I well allow the occasion of our arms;
But gladly would be better satisfied,
How, in our means, we should advance ourselves
To look with forehead bold and big enough
Upon the power and puissance of the king.

Hast. Our present musters grow upon the file
To five and twenty thousand men of choice;
And our supplies live largely in the hope
Of great Northumberland, whose bosom burns
With an incensed fire of injuries.

Bard. The question then, lord Hastings, stand-
eth thus ;

Whether our present five and twenty thousand
May hold up head without Northumberland.
Hast. With him, we may.
Bard.
Ay, marry, there's the point;
But if without him we be thought too feeble,
My judgment is, we should not step too far
Till we had his assistance by the hand:
For, in a theme so bloody-fac'd as this,
Conjecture, expectation, and surmise

Of aids uncertain, should not be admitted.

And publish the occasion of our arms.
The commonwealth is sick of their own choice,
Their over-greedy love hath surfeited:-
An habitation giddy and unsure

Hath he, that buildeth on the vulgar heart.
O thou fond many! with what loud applause
Didst thou beat heaven with blessing Bolingbroke,
Before he was what thou would'st have him be?
And being now trimm'd in thine own desires,

Arch. 'Tis very true, lord Bardolph; for, in- Thou, beastly feeder, art so full of him,
deed,

It was young Hotspur's case at Shrewsbury.
Bard. It was, my lord; who lin'd himself with
hope,

Eating the air on promise of supply,
Flattering himself with project of a power
Much smaller than the smallest of his thoughts:
And so, with great imagination,
Proper to madmen, led his powers to death,
And, winking, leap'd into destruction.

Hust. But, by your leave, it never yet did hurt,
To lay down likelihoods, and forms of hope.

Bard. Yes, in this present quality of war ;-
Indeed the instant action, (a cause on foot,)
Lives so in hope, as in an early spring
We see the appearing buds; which, to prove fruit,
Hope gives not so much warrant, as despair,
That frosts will bite them. When we mean to
build,

We first survey the plot, then draw the model;
And when we see the figure of the house,
Then must we rate the cost of the erection :
Which if we find outweighs ability,

What do we then, but draw anew the model

In fewer offices; or, at least, desist

To build at all? Much more, in this great work,
(Which is, almost, to pluck a kingdom down,
And set another up,) should we survey
The plot of situation, and the model;
Consent upon a sure foundation;

Question surveyors; know our own estate,
How able such a work to undergo,

To weigh against his opposite; or else,
We fortify in paper, and in figures,

Using the names of men, instead of men :
Like one, that draws the model of a house
Beyond his power to build it; who, half through,
Gives o'er, and leaves his part-created cost
A naked subject to the weeping clouds,
And waste for churlish winter's tyranny.

Hast. Grant, that our hopes (yet likely of fair
birth,)

Should be still-born, and that we now possess'd
The utmost man of expectation;

I think, we are a body strong enough,
Even as we are, to equal with the king.

Bard. What is the king but five and twenty
thousand?

Hast. To us, no more; nay, not so much, lord
Bardolph.

For his divisions, as the times do brawl,
Are in three heads; one power against the French,
And one against Glendower; perforce, a third
Must take up us: So is the unfirm king
In three divided; and his coffers sound

With hollow poverty and emptiness.

That thou provok'st thyself to cast him up.
So, so, thou common dog, didst thou disgorge
Thy glutton bosom of the royal Richard;
And now thou would'st eat thy dead vomit up,
And howl'st to find it? What trust is in these
times ?

They that, when Richard liv'd, would have him
die,

Are now become enamour'd on his grave:
Thou, that threw'st dust upon his goodly head,
When through proud London he came sighing on
After the admired heels of Bolingbroke,
Cry'st now, O earth, yield us that king again,
And take thou this! O thoughts of men accurst!
Past, and to come, seem best; things present,

worst.

Monb. Shall we go draw our numbers, and set

on ?

Hast. We are time's subjects, and time bids be
gone.
[Exeunt.

ACT II.

SCENE I.-London. A Street.

Enter Hostess; Fang, and his Boy, with her; and

Snare following.

Host. Master Fang, have you entered the action?
Fang. It is entered.

Host. Where is your yeoman? Is it a lusty yeo.

man? Will a' stand to't?

Fang. Sirrah, where's Snare?

Host. O lord, ay: good master Snare.

Snare. Here, here.

Fang. Snare, we must arrest sir John Falstaff. Host. Yea, good master Snare; I have entered him and all.

Snare. It may chance cost some of us our lives, for he will stab.

Host. Alas the day! take heed of him; he stabbed me in mine own house, and that most beastly: in good faith, a' cares not what mischief he doth, if his weapon be out: he will foin like any devil: he will spare neither man, woman, nor child.

Fang. If I can close with him, I care not for his thrust.

Host. No, nor I neither: I'll be at your elbow. Fang. An I but fist him once; an a' come but within my vice ;

Host. I am undone by his going; I warrant you, he's an infinitive thing upon my score:-Good master Fang, hold him sure;-good master Snare, let him not 'scape. He comes continuantly to Piecorner, (saving your manhoqds,) to buy a saddle; and he's indited to dinner to the lubbar's head in

Lumbert-street, to master Smooth's the silkman: I pray ye, since my exion is entered, and my case so openly known to the world, let him be brought in to his answer. A hundred mark is a long loan for a poor lone woman to bear: and I have borne, and borne, and borne; and have been fubbed off, and fubbed off, and fubbed off, from this day to that day, that it is a shame to be thought on. There is no honesty in such dealing; unless a woman should be made an ass, and a beast, to bear every knave's wrong.

Enter Sir John Falstaff, Page, and Bardolph. Yonder he comes; and that arrant malmsey-nose knave, Bardolph, with him. Do your offices, do your offices, master Fang, and master Snare; do me, do me, do me your offices.

was gone down stais, desire me to be no more so familiarity with such poor people; saying, that ere long they should call me madam? And didst thou not kiss me, and bid me fetch thee thirty shillings? I put thee now to thy book-oath; deny it, if thou canst.

Fal. My lord, this is a poor mad soul: and she says, up and down the town, that her eldest son is like you: she hath been in good case, and, the truth is, poverty hath distracted her. But for these foolish officers, I beseech you, I may have redress against them.

Ch. Just. Sir John, sir John, I am well acquainted with your manner of wrenching the true cause the false way. It is not a confident brow, nor the throng of words that come with such more than impudent sauciness from you, can thrust me from a level consideration; you have, as it appears to me, practised upon the easy yielding spirit of this woFang. Sir John, I arrest you at the suit of mis-man, and made her serve your uses both in purse and person. tress Quickly.

Fal. How now? whose mare's dead? what's the

matter?

Fal. Away, varlets !-Draw, Bardolph; cut me off the villain's head; throw the quean in the channel.

Host. Yea, in troth, my lord.

Ch. Just. Pr'ythee, peace :-Pay her the debt you owe her, and unpay the villainy you have done with Host. Throw me in the channel? Ill throw thee her; the one you may do with sterling money, and in the chanel. Wilt thou? wilt thou? thou bas-the other with current repentance. tardly rogue !-Murder, murder! O thou honeysuckle villain! wilt thou kill God's officers, and the king's? O thou honey-seed rogue! thou art a honey-seed; a man queller, and a woman queller. Fal. Keep them off, Bardolph. Fang. A rescue! a rescue!

Fal. My lord, I will not undergo this sneap without reply. You call honourable boldness, impudent sauciness: if a man will make court'sy, and say nothing, he is virtuous: No, my lord, my humble duty remembered, I will not be your suitor ; ! say to you, I do desire deliverance from these two.-officers, being upon hasty employment in the king's affairs. Ch. Just. You speak as having power to do wrong: but answer in the effect of your reputa tion, and satisfy the poor woman. Fal. Come hither, hostess.

Host. Good people, bring a rescue or Thou wo't, wo't thou? thou wo't, wo't thou? do, do, thou rogue! do, thou hemp-seed!

Fal. Away, you scullion! you rampallian! you fustilarian! I'll tickle your catastrophe.

Enter the Lord Chief Justice, attended.

Ch. Just. What's the matter? keep the peace here, ho!

Host. Good my lord, be good to me! I beseech you, stand to me!

Ch. Just. How now, sir John? what, are you brawling here?

Doth this become your place, your time, and busi

ness?

Enter Gower.

[Taking her aside.

Ch. Just. Now, master Gower: What news?
Gow. The king, my lord, and Harry prince of
Wales

Are near at hand: the rest the paper tells.
Fal. As I am a gentleman;
Host. Nay, you said so before.

Fal. As I am a gentleman;--Come, no more

You should have been well on your way to York.-words of it.
Stand from him, fellow! Wherefore hang'st thou

on him?

Host. O, my most worshipful lord, an't please your grace, I am a poor widow of Eastcheap, and he is arrested at my suit.

Ch. Just. For what sum?

Host. It is more than for some, my lord; it is for all, all I have: he hath eaten me out of house and home; he hath put all my substance into that fat belly of his but I will have some of it out again, or I'll ride thee o'nights, like the mare.

Fal. I think, I am as like to ride the mare, if I have any vantage of ground to get up.

Ch. Just. How comes this, sir John? Fye! what man of good temper would endure this tempest of exclamation? Are you not ashamed, to enforce a poor widow to so rough a course to come by her own?

Fal. What is the gross sum that I owe thee? Host. Marry, if thou wert an honest man, thyself, and the money too. Thou didst swear to me upon a parcel-gilt goblet, sitting in my Dolphinchamber, at the round table, by a sea-coal fire, upon Wednesday in Whitsun-week, when the prince broke thy head for liking his father to a singingman of Windsor; thou didst swear to me then, as I was washing thy wound, to marry me, and make me my lady thy wife. Canst thou deny it? Did not good wife Keech, the butcher's wife, come in then, and call me gossip Quickly? coming in to borrow a mess of vinegar; telling us, she had a good dish of prawns; whereby thou didst desire to eat some; whereby I told thee, they were ill for a green wound? And didst thou not, when she

Host. By this heavenly ground I tread on, I must be fain to pawn both my plate, and the tapestry of my dining-chambers.

Fal. Glasses, glasses, is the only drinking; and for thy walls,-a pretty slight drollery, or the story of the prodigal, or the German hunting in waterwork, is worth a thousand of these bed-hangings, and these fly-bitten tapestries. Let it be ten pound if thou canst. Come, an it were not for thy humours, there is not a better wench in England. Go, wash thy face, and draw thy action : Come, thou must not be in this humour with me; dost net know me? Come, come, I know thou wast set on to this.

Host. Pray thee, sir John, let it be but twenty nobles; i'faith I am loath to pawn my plate, in good earnest, la.

Fal. Let it alone; I'll make other shift: you'll be a fool still.

Host. Well, you shall have it, though I pawn my gown. I hope, you'll come to supper: You'll pay me all together?

Fal. Will I live?-Go, with her, with her; [to Bardolph.] hook on, hook on.

Host. Will you have Doll Tear-sheet meet you at supper?

Fal. No more words, let's have her.

[Exeunt Hostess, Bardolph,Officers, and Page
Ch. Just. I have heard better news.
Fal. What's the news, my good lord?
Ch. Just. Where lay the king last night?
Gow. At Basingstoke, my lord.

Fal. I hope, my lord, all's well: What's the news, my lord?

thou art, hath in reason taken from me all ostenta.

Ch. Just. Come all his forces back ?
Gow. No; fifteen hundred foot, five hundred tion of sorrow.
horse,

Are march'd up to my lord of Lancaster,
Against Northumberland, and the archbishop.
Fal. Comes the king back from Wales, my noble
lord?

Ch. Just. You shall have letters of me presently.
Come, go along with me, good master Gower.
Fal. My lord!

Ch. Just. What's the matter?

Fal. Master Gower, shall I entreat you with me to dinner?

Gow. I must wait upon my good lord here: I thank you, good sir John.

Ch. Just. Sir John, you loiter here too long, being you are to take soldiers up in counties as you go.

Fal. Will you sup with me, master Gower ? Ch. Just. What foolish master taught you these manners, sir John ?

Fal. Master Gower, if they become me not, he was a fool that taught them me.-This is the right| fencing grace, my lord; tap for tap, and so part

fair.

Ch. Just. Now the Lord lighten thee! thou art a great fool. [Exeunt.

SCENE II.-The same.

Another Street.

Enter Prince Henry and Poins.

P. Hen. Trust me, I am exceeding weary.

Poins. The reason?

P. Hen. What would'st thou think of me, if I should weep?

Poins. I would think thee a most princely hypocrite.

P. Hen. It would be every man's thought: and thou art a blessed fellow, to think as every man thinks; never a man's thought in the world keeps the road-way better than thine every man would think me an hypocrite indeed. And what accites your most worshipful thought to think so?

Poins. Why, because you have been so lewd, and so much engraffed to Falstaff.

P. Hen. And to thee.

Poins. By this light, I am well spoken of, I can hear it with my own ears: the worst that they can say of me is, that I am a second brother, and that I am a proper fellow of my hands; and those two things, I confess, I cannot help. By the mass, here comes Bardolph.

P. Hen. And the boy that I gave Falstaff: he had him from me christian and look, if the fat villain have not transformed him ape.

Enter Bardolph und Page.

Bard. 'Save your grace!

P. Hen. And yours, most noble Bardolph! Bard. Come, you virtuous ass, [to the Page.] you bashful fool, must you be blushing? wherefore blush you now? What a maidenly man at arms are Poins. Is it come to that? I had thought, weari-you become? Is it such a matter, to get a pottleness durst not have attached one of so high blood.pot's maidenhead ? P. Hen. 'Faith it does me; though it discolours Page. He called me even now, my lord, through the complexion of my greatness to acknowledge it. a red lattice, and I could discern no part of his face Doth it not show vilely in me, to desire small from the window at last, I spied his eyes; and, methought, he had made two holes in the ale-wife's new petticoat, and peeped through.

beer?

Poins. Why, a prince should not be so loosely studied, as to remember so weak a composition.

P. Hen. Hath not the boy profited? Bard. Away, you whoreson upright rabbit, away! Page. Away, you rascally Althea's dream, away! P. Hen. Instruct us, boy: What dream, boy? Page. Marry, my lord, Althea dreamed she was delivered of a fire-brand; and therefore I call him her dream.

P. Hen. A crown's worth of good interpretation. [Gives him money.

Poins. O, that this good blossom could be kept from cankers !-Well, there is sixpence to preserve thee.

P. Hen. Belike then, my appetite was not princely got; for, by my troth, I do now remember the poor creature, small beer. But, indeed, these humble considerations make me out of love with my greatness. What a disgrace is it to me, to remember thy name? or to know thy face to-morrow? or to take note how many pair of silk stockings thou hast; viz. these, and those that were the peach--There it is, boy. colour'd ones? or to bear the inventory of thy shirts; as, one for superfluity, and one other for use?-but that, the tennis court-keeper knows better than I; for it is a low ebb of linen with thee, when thou keepest not racket there; as thou hast not done a great while, because the rest of thy lowcountries have make a shift to eat up thy holland :| and God knows, whether those that bawl out the ruins of thy linen, shall inherit his kingdom: but the midwives say, the children are not in the fault; whereupon the world increases, and kindreds are mightily strengthened.

Bard. An you do not make him be hanged among you, the gallows shall have wrong.

P. Hen. And how doth thy master, Bardolph ? Bard. Well, my lord. He heard of your grace's coming to town; there's a letter for you. Poins. Delivered with good respect.-And how doth the martlemas, your master?

Bard. In bodily health, sir.

Poins. Marry, the immortal part needs a physila-cian: but that moves not him; though that be sick, it dies not.

Poins. How ill it follows, after you have boured so hard, you should talk so idly? Tell me, how many good young princes would do so, their fathers being so sick as yours at this time is ?

P. Hen. Shall I tell thee one thing, Poins? Poins. Yes; and let it be an excellent good thing.

P. Hen. It shall serve among wits of no higher breeding than thine.

P. Hen. I do allow this wen to be as familiar with me as my dog: and he holds his place; for, look you, how he writes.

Poins. [Reads.] John Falstaff, knight,--Every man must know that, as oft as he has occasion to name himself. Even like those that are kin to the king; for they never prick their finger, but they say, There is some of the king's blood spilt: How comes that says he, that takes upon him not to conceive: the answer is as ready as a borrower's cap; I am Ithe king's poor cousin, sir.

Poins. Go to; I stand the push of your one thing that you will tell.

P. Hen. Why, I tell thee, it is not meet that I should be sad, now my father is sick albeit could tell to thee, (as to one it pleases me, for fault of a better, to call my friend,) I could be sad, and sad indeed too.

P. Hen. Nay, they will be kin to us, or they will fetch it from Japhet. But the letter:

Poins. Sir John Falstaff, knight, to the son of the king, nearest his father, Harry prince of Wales, greeting.-Why, this is a certificate.

P. Hen. Peace!

Poins. Very hardly upon such a subject. P. Hen. By this hand, thou think'st me as far in the devil's book, as thou, and Falstaff, for obduracy and persistency: Let the end try the man. Poins. I will imitate the honourable Roman in But I tell thee,-my heart bleeds inwardly, that my brevity :-he sure means brevity in breath; shortfather is so sick and keeping such vile company as winded.-I commend me to thee, I commend thee,