William Shakespeare - The Complete Works of William Shakespeare

SHALLOW

Ay, I think my cousin meant well.

SLENDER

Ay, or else I would I might be hanged, la!

SHALLOW

Here comes fair Mistress Anne.

[Re-enter ANNE PAGE.]

Would I were young for your sake, Mistress Anne!

ANNE

The dinner is on the table; my father desires your worships’ company.

SHALLOW

I will wait on him, fair Mistress Anne!

EVANS

Od’s plessed will! I will not be absence at the grace.

[Exeunt SHALLOW and EVANS.]

ANNE

Will’t please your worship to come in, sir?

SLENDER

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

ANNE

The dinner attends you, sir.

SLENDER

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 beholding to his friend for a man. I keep but three men and a boy yet, till my mother be dead. But what though? Yet I live like a poor gentleman born.

ANNE

I may not go in without your worship: they will not sit till you come.

SLENDER

I’ faith, I’ll eat nothing; I thank you as much as though I did.

ANNE

I pray you, sir, walk in.

SLENDER

I had rather walk here, I thank you. I bruised my shin th’ other day with playing at sword and dagger with a master of fence; three veneys for a dish of stewed prunes — and, by my troth, I cannot abide the smell of hot meat since. Why do your dogs bark so? Be there bears i’ the town?

ANNE

I think there are, sir; I heard them talked of.

SLENDER

I love the sport well; but I shall as soon quarrel at it as any man in England. You are afraid, if you see the bear loose, are you not?

ANNE

Ay, indeed, sir.

SLENDER

That’s meat and drink to me now. I have seen Sackerson loose twenty times, and have taken him by the chain; but I warrant you, the women have so cried and shrieked at it that it passed; but women, indeed, cannot abide ‘em; they are very ill-favoured rough things.

[Re-enter PAGE.]

PAGE

Come, gentle Master Slender, come; we stay for you.

SLENDER

I’ll eat nothing, I thank you, sir.

PAGE

By cock and pie, you shall not choose, sir! come, come.

SLENDER

Nay, pray you lead the way.

PAGE

Come on, sir.

SLENDER

Mistress Anne, yourself shall go first.

ANNE

Not I, sir; pray you keep on.

SLENDER

Truly, I will not go first; truly, la! I will not do you that wrong.

ANNE

I pray you, sir.

SLENDER

I’ll rather be unmannerly than troublesome. You do yourself wrong indeed, la!

[Exeunt.]

SCENE II. The same

[Enter SIR HUGH EVANS and SIMPLE.]

EVANS

Go your ways, and ask of Doctor Caius’ house which is the way; and there dwells one Mistress Quickly, which is in the manner of his nurse, or his dry nurse, or his cook, or his laundry, his washer, and his wringer.

SIMPLE

Well, sir.

EVANS

Nay, it is petter yet. Give her this letter; for it is a ‘oman that altogether’s acquaintance with Mistress Anne Page; and the letter is to desire and require her to solicit your master’s desires to Mistress Anne Page. I pray you be gone: I will make an end of my dinner; there’s pippins and cheese to come.

[Exeunt.]

SCENE III. A room in the Garter Inn

[Enter FALSTAFF, HOST, BARDOLPH, NYM, PISTOL, and ROBIN.]

FALSTAFF

Mine host of the Garter!

HOST

What says my bully rook? Speak scholarly and wisely.

FALSTAFF

Truly, mine host, I must turn away some of my followers.

HOST

Discard, bully Hercules; cashier; let them wag; trot, trot.

FALSTAFF

I sit at ten pounds a week.

HOST

Thou’rt an emperor, Caesar, Keiser, and Pheazar. I will entertain Bardolph; he shall draw, he shall tap; said I well, bully Hector?

FALSTAFF

Do so, good mine host.

HOST

I have spoke; let him follow. [To BARDOLPH] Let me see thee froth and lime. I am at a word; follow.

[Exit HOST.]

FALSTAFF

Bardolph, follow him. A tapster is a good trade; an old cloak makes a new jerkin; a withered servingman a fresh tapster. Go; adieu.

BARDOLPH

It is a life that I have desired; I will thrive.

PISTOL

O base Hungarian wight! Wilt thou the spigot wield?

[Exit BARDOLPH.]

NYM

He was gotten in drink. Is not the humour conceited?

FALSTAFF

I am glad I am so acquit of this tinder-box: his thefts were too open; his filching was like an unskilful singer — he kept not time.

NYM

The good humour is to steal at a minim’s rest.

PISTOL

“Convey” the wise it call. “Steal!” foh! A fico for the phrase!

FALSTAFF

Well, sirs, I am almost out at heels.

PISTOL

Why, then, let kibes ensue.

FALSTAFF

There is no remedy; I must cony-catch; I must shift.

PISTOL

Young ravens must have food.

FALSTAFF

Which of you know Ford of this town?

PISTOL

I ken the wight; he is of substance good.

FALSTAFF

My honest lads, I will tell you what I am about.

PISTOL

Two yards, and more.

FALSTAFF

No quips now, Pistol. Indeed, I am in the waist two yards about; but I am now about no waste; I am about thrift. Briefly, I do mean to make love to Ford’s wife; I spy entertainment in her; she discourses, she carves, she gives the leer of invitation; I can construe the action of her familiar style; and the hardest voice of her behaviour, to be Englished rightly, is “I am Sir John Falstaff’s.”

PISTOL

He hath studied her will, and translated her will out of honesty into English.

NYM

The anchor is deep; will that humour pass?

FALSTAFF

Now, the report goes she has all the rule of her husband’s purse; he hath a legion of angels.

PISTOL

As many devils entertain; and “To her, boy,” say I.

NYM

The humour rises; it is good; humour me the angels.

FALSTAFF

I have writ me here a letter to her; and here another to Page’s wife, who even now gave me good eyes too, examined my parts with most judicious oeillades; sometimes the beam of her view gilded my foot, sometimes my portly belly.

PISTOL

Then did the sun on dunghill shine.

NYM

I thank thee for that humour.

FALSTAFF

O! she did so course o’er my exteriors with such a greedy intention that the appetite of her eye did seem to scorch me up like a burning-glass. Here’s another letter to her: she bears the purse too; she is a region in Guiana, all gold and bounty. I will be cheator to them both, and they shall be exchequers to me; they shall be my East and West Indies, and I will trade to them both. Go, bear thou this letter to Mistress Page; and thou this to Mistress Ford. We will thrive, lads, we will thrive.

PISTOL

Shall I Sir Pandarus of Troy become,

And by my side wear steel? then Lucifer take all!

NYM

I will run no base humour. Here, take the humour-letter; I will keep the haviour of reputation.

FALSTAFF

[To ROBIN] Hold, sirrah; bear you these letters tightly;

Sail like my pinnace to these golden shores.

Rogues, hence, avaunt! vanish like hailstones, go;

Trudge, plod away o’ hoof; seek shelter, pack!

Falstaff will learn the humour of this age;

French thrift, you rogues; myself, and skirted page.

[Exeunt FALSTAFF and ROBIN.]

PISTOL

Let vultures gripe thy guts! for gourd and fullam holds,

And high and low beguile the rich and poor;

Tester I’ll have in pouch when thou shalt lack,

Base Phrygian Turk!

NYM

I have operations in my head which be humours of revenge.

PISTOL

Wilt thou revenge?

NYM