methinks there should be terrors in him, that he should not come; methinks, his flesh is punished, he shall have no desires. Page. So think I too.

Mrs. Ford. Devise but how you'll use him when he comes,

And let us two devise to bring him thither.

Mrs. Page. There is an old tale goes, that Herne
the hunter,

Sometime a keeper here in Windsor forest,
Doth all the winter time, at still midnight,
Walk round about an oak, with great ragg'd horns;
And there he blasts the tree, and takes the cattle;
And makes milch-kine yield blood, and shakes a chain
In a most hideous and dreadful manner:

You have heard of such a spirit; and well you know,
The superstitious idle-headed eld3

Received, and did deliver to our age,

This tale of Herne the hunter for a truth.

Page. Why, yet there want not many, that do fear In deep of night to walk by this Herne's oak1; But what of this?

2 To take signifies to seize or strike with a disease, to blast. So, in Lear, Act ii. Sc. 4:

'Strike her young bones, ye taking airs, with lameness.' And in Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 1:

"No planets strike,

No fairy takes, no witch has power to charm."

"Of a horse that is taken. A horse that is bereft of his feeling, moving, or stirring, is said to be taken, and in sooth so he is, in that he is arrested by so villainous a disease: yet some farriers, not well understanding the ground of the disease, conster the word taken to be stricken by some planet, or evil spirit, which is false."-C. vii. Markham on Horses, 1595. Thusalso in Horman's Vulgaria, 1519. "He is taken, or benomed. Attonitus est."

3 Old age.

4 The tree which was by tradition shown as Herne's oak; being totally decayed, was cut down by his late majesty's order in 1795.

Mrs. Ford. Marry, this is our device;

That Falstaff at that oak shall meet with us, Disguised like Herne, with huge horns on his head.

Page. Well, let it not be doubted but he'll come, And in this shape: When you have brought him thither,

What shall be done with him? what is your plot? Mrs. Page. That likewise have we thought upon, and thus:

Nan Page my daughter, and my little son,

And three or four more of their growth, we'll dress
Like urchins, ouphes, and fairies, green and white,
With rounds of waxen tapers on their heads,
And rattles in their hands; upon a sudden,
As Falstaff, she, and I, are newly met,

Let them from forth a saw-pit rush at once
With some diffused 6
song; upon their sight,
We two in great amazedness will fly :
Then let them all encircle him about,

And, fairy-like, to-pinch the unclean knight;
And ask him, why, that hour of fairy revel,

In their so sacred paths he dares to tread,

In shape profane.

Mrs. Ford.

5 Elf, hobgoblin.

And till he tell the truth,

6 Some diffused song, appears to mean some obscure strange song. In Cavendish's Life of Wolsey the word occurs in this sense: "speak you Welsh to him: I doubt not but thy speech shall be more diffuse to him, than his French shall be to thee." Cotgrave explains diffused by the French diffus, espars, OBSCURE, and in Cooper's Dictionary, 1584, I find obscurum interpreted obscure, difficult, DIFFUSE, hard to understand.' Skelton uses diffuse several times for strange or obscure; for instance, in the Crown of Laurel :

"Perseus pressed forth with problems diffuse."

7 To-pinch: to has here an augmentative sense, like be has since had: all was generally prefixed, Spenser has all to-torn, all to-rent, &c. and Milton in Comus all to-ruffled.

Let the supposed faires pinch him sound3,
And burn him with their tapers.

Mrs. Page.

The truth being known,

We'll all present ourselves; dis-horn the spirit,
And mock him home to Windsor.

The children must

Ford.
Be practised well to this, or they'll ne'er do't.

Eva. I will teach the children their behaviours; and I will be like a Jack-an-apes also, to burn the knight with my taber.

Ford. That will be excellent. I'll go buy them vizards.

Mrs. Page. My Nan shall be the queen of all the fairies,

Finely attired in a robe of white.

Page. That silk will I go buy ;—and in that time Shall master Slender steal my Nan away, And marry her at Eton. [Aside.] Go, send to Falstaff straight.

Ford. Nay, I'll to him again in name of Brook : He'll tell me all his purpose: Sure, he'll come. Mrs. Page. Fear not you that: Go, get us properties9,

And tricking for our fairies.

Eva. Let us about it: It is admirable pleasures, and fery honest knaveries.

[Exeunt PAGE, FORD, and EVANS.

Mrs. Page. Go, mistress Ford,

Send quickly to Sir John, to know his mind.

[Exit MRS. FORD.

I'll to the doctor; he hath my good will,
And none but he, to marry with Nan Page.
That Slender, though well landed, is an idiot;

8 Sound, for soundly, the adjective used as an adverb. 9 Properties are little incidental necessaries to a theatre: tricking is dress or ornament.

And he my husband best of all affects:

The doctor is well money'd, and his friends
Potent at court; he, none but he, shall have her,
Though twenty thousand worthier come to crave her.
[Exit.

SCENE V. A Room in the Garter Inn.

Enter HOST and SIMPLE.

Host. What would'st thou have, boor? what, thick-skin? speak, breathe, discuss; brief, short, quick, snap.

Sim. Marry, sir, I come to speak with Sir John Falstaff from master Slender.

Host. There's his chamber, his house, his castle, his standing-bed, and truckle-bed1; 'tis painted about with the story of the prodigal, fresh and new: Go, knock and call; he'll speak like an Anthropophaginian2 unto thee: Knock, I say.

Sim. There's an old woman, a fat woman, gone up into his chamber; I'll be so bold as stay, sir, till she come down: I come to speak with her, indeed.

Host. Ha! a fat woman! the knight may be robbed: I'll call.-Bully knight! Bully Sir John! speak from thy lungs military: Art thou there? it is thine host, thine Ephesian, calls.

Fal. [above.] How now, mine host?

Host. Here's a Bohemian-Tartar tarries the coming down of thy fat woman: Let her descend, bully, let her descend; my chambers are honourable: Fye! privacy? fye!

1 The usual furniture of chambers, at that time, was a standingbed, under which was a trochle, truckle, or running bed: from trochlea, a low wheel or castor. In the standing bed lay the master, in the truckle the servant.

2 i. e. a cannibal: mine host uses these fustian words to astonish Simple.

Enter FALSTAFF.

Fal. There was, mine host, an old fat woman even now with me; but she's gone.

Sim. Pray you, sir, was't not the wise woman of Brentford?

Fal. Ay, marry, was it, muscle-shell 3; What would you with her?

Sim. My master, sir, my master Slender, sent to her, seeing her go thorough the streets, to know, sir, whether one Nym, sir, that beguiled him of a chain, had the chain, or no.

Fal. I spake with the old woman about it.
Sim. And what says she, I pray, sir?

Fal. Marry, she says, that the very same man that beguiled master Slender of his chain, cozened him of it.

Sim. I would I could have spoken with the woman herself; I had other things to have spoken with her too, from him.

Fal. What are they? let us know.

Host. Ay, come; quick.

Sim. I may not conceal them, sir.

Fal. Conceal them, or thou diest.

Sim. Why, sir, they were nothing but about mistress Anne Page; to know if it were my master's fortune to have her, or no.

Fal. Tis, 'tis his fortune.

Sim. What, sir?

Fal. To have her,- -or no: Go; say, the woman told me so.

Sim. May I be so bold to say so, sir?

Fal. Ay, Sir Tike; who more bold?

Sim. I thank your worship: I shall make my master glad with these tidings. [Exit SIMPLE.

3 He calls poor Simple muscle-shell, because he stands with his mouth open.