Enter FALSTAFF, singing.

Fal.

When Arthur first in court

Empty the jordan.—

And was a worthy king:

[Exit Drawer.] How now, mistress Doll? Host. Sick of a calm; yea, good sooth.

Fal. So is all her sect; if they be once in a calm, they are sick.

Doll. You muddy rascal, is that all the comfort you give me?

Fal. You make fat rascals, mistress Doll.

Doll. I make them! gluttony and diseases make them; I make them not.

Fal. If the cook help to make the gluttony, you help to make the diseases, Doll: we catch of you, Doll, we catch of you; grant that, my poor virtue, grant that. Doll. Ay, marry; our chains and our jewels.

Fal.

Your brooches, pearls, and owches:

-for to serve bravely is to come halting off, you know : To come off the breach with his pike bent bravely, and to surgery bravely; to venture upon the charged chambers bravely :

[Doll. Hang yourself, you muddy conger, hang yourself!]

Host. By my troth, this is the old fashion; you two never meet, but you fall to some discord: you are both, in good troth, as rheumatic as two dry toasts; you cannot one bear with another's confirmities. What the good-year! one must bear, and that must be you: [to DOLL] you are the weaker vessel, as they say, the emptier vessel.

Doll. Can a weak empty vessel bear such a huge full a Calm. The Hostess means qualm.

hogshead? there's a whole merchant's venture of Bordeaux stuff in him; you have not seen a hulk better stuffed in the hold.-Come, I 'll be friends with thee, Jack-thou art going to the wars: and whether I shall ever see thee again, or no, there is nobody cares.

Re-enter Drawer.

Draw. Sir, ancient a Pistol 's below, and would speak with you.

Doll. Hang him, swaggering rascal! let him not come hither it is the foul-mouth'dst rogue in England.

Host. If he swagger, let him not come here: no, by my faith; I must live amongst my neighbours; I'll no swaggerers: I am in good name and fame with the very best:--Shut the door;-there comes no swaggerers here; I have not lived all this while, to have swaggering now: -shut the door, I pray you.

Fal. Dost thou hear, hostess?

Host. Pray you, pacify yourself, sir John; here comes no swaggerers here.

Fal. Dost thou hear? it is mine ancient.

Host. Tilly-fally, sir John, never tell me; your ancient swaggerer comes not in my doors. I was before master Tisick, the deputy, the other day; and, as he said to me, it was no longer ago than Wednesday last, -"Neighbour Quickly," says he ;-master Dumb, our minister, was by then ;-" Neighbour Quickly," says he, "receive those that are civil; for," saith he, "you are in an ill name;" '—now he said so, I can tell whereupon; for," says he, " you are an honest woman, and well thought on; therefore take heed what guests you receive: Receive," says he, "no swaggering companions."

66

a Ancient. The ancient is the standard, the ensign; and so the bearer of the ensign is also the ancient.

b Tilly-fally-supposed to have been an old French hunting cry.

-There comes none here;-you would bless you to hear what he said :-no, I 'll no swaggerers.

Fal. He's no swaggerer, hostess; a tame cheater,a he; you may stroke him as gently as a puppy greyhound: he will not swagger with a Barbary hen, if her feathers turn back in any show of resistance.-Call him up, drawer.

Host. Cheater, call you him? I will bar no honest man my house, nor no cheater: But I do not love swaggering; by my troth, I am the worse when one says— swagger: feel, masters, how I shake; look you, I warrant you.

Doll. So you do, hostess.

Host. Do I? yea, in very truth, do I, an 't were an aspen-leaf: I cannot abide swaggerers.

Enter PISTOL, BARDOLPH, and Page.

Pist. Save you, sir John!

Fal. Welcome, ancient Pistol. Here, Pistol, I charge you with a cup of sack: do you discharge upon mine hostess.

Pist. I will discharge upon her, sir John, with two bullets.

Fal. She is pistol-proof, sir; you shall hardly offend her.

Host. Come, I'll drink no proofs, nor no bullets; I'll drink no more than will do me good, for no man's pleasure, I.

Pist. Then to you, mistress Dorothy; I will charge

you.

Doll. Charge me? I scorn you, scurvy companion. What! you poor, base, rascally, cheating, lack-linen

a Cheater. The officers that manage the escheats of the crown were escheators; and from the oppression and extortion which they too commonly exercised in the discharge of their offices came the word to cheat.

mate! Away, you mouldy rogue, away! I am meat for your master.

Pist. I know you, mistress Dorothy.

Doll. Away, you cutpurse rascal! you filthy bung, away! by this wine, I'll thrust my knife in your mouldy chaps, if you play the saucy cuttle with me. Away, you bottle-ale rascal! you basket-hilt stale juggler, you!--Since when, I pray you, sir?-What, with two points on your shoulder? much! a

Pist. I will murther your ruff for this.

[Fal. No more, Pistol; I would not have you go off here: discharge yourself of our company, Pistol.] Host. No, good captain Pistol; not here, sweet captain.

Doll. Captain! thou abominable damned cheater, are thou not ashamed to be called captain? If captains were of my mind, they would truncheon you out, for taking their names upon you before you have earned them. You a captain, you slave! for what? for tearing a poor whore's ruff in a bawdyhouse?—He a captain! Hang him, rogue! He lives upon mouldy stewed prunes and dried cakes. A captain! these

villains will make the word as odious as the word occupy; which was an excellent good word before it was ill sorted: therefore captains had need look to it. Bard. Pray thee, go down, good ancient.

Fal. Hark thee hither, mistress Doll.

:

Pist. Not I tell thee what, corporal Bardolph ;—I could tear her :-I 'll be revenged on her.

Page. Pray thee, go down.

Pist. I'll see her damned first ;-to Pluto's damned lake, to the infernal deep, with Erebus and tortures vile also. Hold hook and line, say I. Down! down, dogs! down, faitors! Have we not Hiren here?

Host. Good captain Peesel, be quiet; it is very late. I beseek you now, aggravate your choler.

a Much-an expression of contempt.

Pist. These be good humours, indeed! Shall packhorses,

And hollow pamper'd jades of Asia,

Which cannot go but thirty miles a day,
Compare with Cæsars and with Cannibals,
And Trojan Greeks?

Nay, rather damn them with king Cerberus ;
And let the welkin roar.

Shall we fall foul for toys?

Host. By my troth, captain, these are very bitter words.

Bard. Be gone, good ancient; this will grow to a brawl anon.

Pist. Die men, like dogs; give crowns like pins; Have we not Hiren here?

Host. On my word, captain, there 's none such here. What the good-year! do you think I would deny her. I pray be quiet.

Pist. Then, feed and be fat, my fair Calipolis: Come, give me some sack.

"Si fortuna me tormenta, sperato me contenta.”— Fear we broadsides? no, let the fiend give fire: Give me some sack;-and, sweetheart, lie thou there. [Laying down his sword. Come we to full points here; and are et cetera's no

thing?

Fal. Pistol, I would be quiet.

Pist. Sweet knight, I kiss thy nief:b What! we have seen the seven stars.

Doll. Thrust him down stairs; I cannot endure such a fustian rascal.

Pist. Thrust him down stairs! know we not Galloway nags ?

Fal. Quoit him down, Bardolph, like a shove-groat

a Cannibals. Pistol, whose learning is upon a par with Dame Quickly's, means Hannibals.

b Nief-fist.