Enter Mrs. Quickly. Quick. By your leave; I cry you mercy: Give your worship good-morrow. Fal. Take away these chalices: Go brew me a pottle of sack finely. Bard. With eggs, sir? Fal. Simple of itself; I'll no pullet-sperm in my brewage.-Exit Bardolph. T-How now? Quick Marry, sir, I come to your worship from mistress Ford. Fal. Mistress Ford! I have had ford enough; I was thrown into the ford: I have my belly full of ford. Quick. Alas the day! good heart, that was not her fault; she does so take on with her men; they mistook their erection. Fal. So did I mine, to build upon a foolish woman's promise. Quick. Well, she laments, sir, for it, that it would yearn your heart to see it. Her husband goes this morning a birding; she desires you once more to come to her between eight and nine: I must carry her word quickly: she'll make you amends, I warrant you. Fal. Well, I will visit her: Tell her so; and Fal. Do so. Between nine and ten say'st thou Fal. Well, be gone: I will not miss her. Enter Ford. ed it; but Fate, ordaining he should be a cuck Ford. In good sadness, sir, I am sorry that for my sake you have suffered all this. My suit then is desperate: you'll undertake her no more. Fal. Master Brook, will be thrown into Etna, as I have been into the Thames, ere I will leave her thus. Her husband is this morning gone a birding: I have received from her another embassy of meeting; 'twixt eight and nine ? is the hour, master Brook. Ford. "Tis past eight already, sir. Fal. Is it? I will then address me to my ap[Exit.pointment: Come to me at your convenient leisure, and you shall know how I speed; and joying her: Adieu. You shall have her, master the conclusion shall be crowned with your en Brook; master Brook, you shall cuckold Ford. [Exit. Ford. Bless you, sir? Fal. Now, master Brook? you come to know what hath passed between me and Ford's wife Ford. That, indeed, Sir John, is my business. Fal. Master Brook, I will not lie to you, I was at her house the hour she appointed me. Ford. And how sped you, sir! Fal. Very ill-favouredly, Master Brook. Ford. How so, sir? Did she change her determination? Fal. No, master Brook; but the peaking cornuto, her husband, master Brook, dwelling in a continual 'larum of jealousy, comes me in the instant of our encounter, after we had embraced, kissed, protested, and, as it were, spoke the prologue of our comedy; and at his heels a rabble of his companions, thither provoked and instigated by his distemper, and, forsooth, to search his house for his wife's love. Ford. What, while you were there? Ford. And did he search for you, and could not find you? Fal. You shall hear. As good luck would have it, comes in one mistress Page; gives intelligence of Ford's approach; and, by her invention, and Ford's wife's distraction, they conveyed me into a buck-basket. Ford. A buck-basket? Ford. Hum! ha! is this a vision? is this a dream? do I sleep? Master Ford, awake; awake, master Ford; there's a hole' made in your best coat, master Ford. This 'tis to be married! this 'tis to have linen, and buckbaskets!-Well, I will proclaim myself what 1 am: I will now take the lecher; he is at my house he cannot 'scape me; 'tis impossible he should; he cannot creep into a halfpenny purse, nor into a pepper-box: but, lest the devil that guides him should aid him, I will search impossible places. Though what I am I cannot avoid, yet to be what I would not, shall not make me tame: if I have horns to make one mad, let the proverb go with ine, I'll be horn mad. [Exit. ACT IV. SCENE I. The Street. Quick. Sure, he is by this: or will be presently: but truly, he is very courageous mad, about his throwing into the water. Mistress Ford desires you to come suddenly. Mrs. Page. I'll be with her by and by; I'll but bring my young man here to school: Look, where his master comes; 'tis a playing-day, 1 Fal. By the Lord, a buck-basket: rammed me in with foul shirts and smocks, socks, foul stock-see. ings, and greasy napkins; that, master Brook, there was the rankest compound of villanous smell, that ever offended nostril. Enter Sir Hugh Evans. How now, Sir Hugh? no school to-day? Ford. And how long lay you there 7 Fal. Nay, you shall hear, master Brook, what I have suffered to bring this woman to evil, for your good. Being thus crammed in the basket, a couple of Ford's knaves, his hinds, were called forth, by their mistress, to carry me in the name of foul clothes to Dachet-lane: they took me on their shoulders; met the jealous knave, their Eva. Come hither, William; hold up your master, in the door; who asked them once or head; come. twice what they had in their basket: I quaked Mrs. Page. Come on, sirrah; hold up your for fear,lest the lunatic knave would have search-head; answer your master, be not afraid Will. A pebble. Mrs. Page. Why, woman, your husband is in his old lunes again: he so takes on yonder with my husband; so rails against all married mankind; so curses all Eve's daughters, of what Eva. No, it is lapis; I pray you remember in complexion soever; and so buffets himself on e your prain. Will. Lapis. Eva. That is good, William. What is he, William, that does lend articles? Will. Articles are borrowed of the pronoun, and be thus declined, Singulariter, nominativo, hic, hæc, hoc. Eva. Nominativo, hig, hag, hog; pray you, mark: genitivo, hujus: Well, what is your accusative case? Will. Accusativo, hinc. Eva. I pray you have your remembrance, child; Accusativo, hing, hang, hog. Quick. Hang hog, is Latin for bacon, I warraut you. Era. Leave your prabbles, 'oman. the focative case, William ? Will. -vocativo, O. What is Eva. Remember, William ; focative is caret. Quick. And that's a good root. Eva. 'Oman, forbear. Mrs. Page. Peace. forehead, crying, Peer out, peer out! that any Mrs. Ford. How near is he, mistress Page? Mrs. Page. Hard by; at street end; he will be here anon. Mrs. Ford. I am undone !-the knight is here. Mrs. Page. Why, then you are utterly shamed, and he's but a dead man. What a woman are you?-Away with him, away with him, better shame than murder. Mrs. Ford. Which way should he go? how basket again? Era. What is your genitive case plural, Wil- should I bestow him? Shall I put him into the liam ? Will. Genitive case? Will. Genitivo,-horum, harum, horum. Quick. You do ill to teach the child such words; he teaches him to hick and to hack, which they'll do fast enough of themselves; and to call horum: -fie upon you! Eva. Oman, art thou lunatics? hast thou no understandings for thy cases, and the numbers of the genders? Thou art as foolish christian creatures as I would desires. Re-enter Falstaff. Fal. No, I'll come no more i' the basket: May 1 not go out, ere he come ? Mrs. Page. Alas, three of master Ford's brothers watch the door with pistols, that none shall issue out; otherwise you might slip away ere he came. But what make you here ? Fal. What shall I do ?-I'll creep up into the chimney. Mrs. Ford. There they always used to discharge their birding-pieces: Creep into the kiln-hole. Fal. Where is it? Mrs. Ford. He will seek there on my word. Neither press, coffer, chest, trunk, well, vault, but he hath an abstract for the remembrance of Era. Shew me now, William, some declen- such places, and goes to them by his note: There sions of your pronouns. Mrs. Page. Pr'ythee hold thy peace. Will. Forsooth, I have forgot. Eca. It is ki, kæ, cod; if you forget your kies, your kæs, and your cods, you must be preeches. Go your ways, and play, go. Mrs. Page. He is a better scholar than I thought he was. Eva. He is a good sprag memory. Farewell, mistress Page. Mrs. Page. Adieu, good Sir Hngh, [Exit Sir Hugh. Get you home, boy.-Come, we stay too long. [Exeunt SCENE II. A Room in Ford's House. Enter Falstaff and Mrs. Ford. Fal Mistress Ford, your sorrow hath eaten up my sufferance: I see, you are obsequious in your love, and I profess your requital to a hair's breadth not only, mistress Ford, in the simple office of love, but in all the accoutrement, complement, and ceremony of it. But are you sure of your husband now ? Mrs. Ford. He's a birding, sweet Sir John. Mrs. Page. [within.] What hoa, gossip Ford! what hoa! Mrs. Ford. Step into the chamber, Sir John. [Exit Falstaff. is no hiding you in the house. Fal. I'll go out then. Mrs. Page. if you go out in your own semblance, you die, Sir Johu. Unless you go out disguised, Mrs. Ford. How might we disguise him? Mrs. Page. Alas the day, I know not. There is no woman's gown big enough for him; otherwise, he might put on a hat, a muffler, and a kerchief, and so escape. Fal. Good hearts, devise something: any extremity, rather than a mischief. Mrs. Ford. My maid's aunt, the fat woman of Brentford, has a gown above. Mrs. Page. On my word, it will serve him; she's as big as he is: and there's her thrum'd hat, and her muffler too: run up, Sir John. Mrs. Ford. Go, go, sweet Sir John: mistress Page and I will look some linen for your head. Mrs. Page. Quick, quick; we'll come dress you straight: put on the gown the while. [Exit Falstaff. Mrs. Ford. I would my husband would meet him in this shape; he cannot abide the old wo man of Brentford; he swears, she's a witch; forbade her my house, and hath threatened to beat her. Mrs. Page. Heaven guide him to thy hus- follow the imaginations of your own heart: this band's cudge; and the devil guide his cudgel is jealousies. afterwards Mrs. Ford. But is my husband coming? Mrs. Page. Ay, in good sadness, is he; and talks of the basket too, howsoever he hath had intelligence. Mrs. Ford. We'll try that; for I'll appoint my men to carry the basket again, to meet him at the door with it, as they did last time. Mrs. Page. Nay, but he'll be here presently: let's go dress him like the witch of Brentford. Mrs. Ford. I'll first direct my mer, what they shall do with the basket. Go up, I'll bring linen for him straight. Erit. Mrs. Page. Hang him dishonest varlet! we cannot misuse him enouga. We'll leave a proof by that which we will do, Re-enter Mrs. Ford, with two Servants. 1 Serv. Come, come, take it up. 2 Serv. Pray heaven, it be not full of the knight again. 1 Serv. I hope not; I had as lief bear so much lead. Enter Ford, Page, Shallow, Caius, and Sir Ford. Well, he's not here I seek for. Page. No, nor no where else, but in your brain. Ford. Help to search my house this one time; if I find not what I seek, show no colour for my extremity, let me for ever be your table-sport; let them say of me, As jealous as Ford, that searched a hollow walnut for his wife's leman. Satisfy me once more; once more search with me. Mrs. Ford. What hoa, mistress Page! come you, and the old woman down; my husband will come into the chamber. Ford. Old woman; what old woman's that? Mrs. Ford. Why, it is my maid's aunt of Brentford. Ford. A witch, a quean, an old cozening quean Have I not forbid her my house 7 She comes of errands, does she? We are simple men; we do not know what's brought to pass under the profession of fortune telling. She works by charms, by spells, by the figure, and such daubery as this is; beyond our element; we know nothing. Come down, you witch, you hag you; come down, I say. Mrs. Ford. Nay, good, sweet husband ;-good gentlemen, let him not strike the old woman. Enter Falstaff in woman's clothes, led by Mrs. Page. Mrs. Page. Come, mother Pratt, come, give me your hand. Ford. I'll prat her:-Out of my door, you witch! [beats him] you rag, you baggage, you polecat, you ronyon! out! out! I'll conjure you, (Erit Falstaff. Mrs. Page. Are you not ashamed? I think you have killed the poor woman. Mrs. Ford. Nay, he will do it ;-Tis a goodly credit for you. Ford. Ay, but if it prove true, master Page, have you any way then to unfool me again I'll fortune-tell you. Set down the basket, villain: Somebody call, my wife-you, youth in a basket, come out here!-0, you panderly rascals! there's a knot, a ging, a pack, a conspiracy against me: Now, shall the devil be shamed. What! wife, I say! come, come forth; behold what honest clothes you send forth to bleaching. Page. Why, this passes ! master Ford, you are not to go loose any longer; you must be pinioned. Eva. Why, this is lunatics! this is mad as a mad dog! Shal. Indeed, master Ford, this is not well; indeed. Enter Mrs. Ford. Ford. So say I too, sir.-Come hither, mistress Ford; mistress Ford, the honest woman, the modest wife, the virtuous creature, that hath the jealous fool to her husband!-I suspect without cause, mistress, do I? Ford. Hang her, witch! Eva. By yea and no, I think, the 'oman is a witch indeed: I like not when a 'oman has a great peard: I spy a great peard under her muffler. Ford. Will you follow, gentlemen ? I beseech you, follow; see but the issue of my jealousy; if I cry out thus upon no trail, never trust me when I open again. Page. Let's obey his humour a little further: Come, gentlemen. [Exeunt Page, Ford, Shallow, and Evans. Mrs. Page. Trust me, he beat him most pitifully. Mrs. Ford. Nay, by the mass that he did not; he beat him most unpitifully, methought. Mrs. Page. I'll have the cudgel hallowed, and hung o'er the altar; it hath done meritorious Mrs. Ford. Heaven be my witness, you do, if [Pulls the clothes out of the basket. Page. This passes! Ford. I shall find you anon. Mrs. Ford. What think you? May we, with the warrant of woman-hood, and the witness of a good conscience, pursue him with any further revenge? Mrs. Page. The spirit of wantonness is, sure, scared out of him; if the devil have him not in Eva. 'Tis unreasonable! will you take up your fee-simple, with fine and recovery, he will never, wife's clothes? Come away. Mrs. Ford. If you find a man there, he shall die a flea's death. Page. Here's no man. Eva. Master Ford, you must pray, and not! I think, in the way of waste, attempt us again. Mrs. Ford. Shall we tell our husbands how we have served him? Mrs. Page. Yes, by all means; if it be but to scrape the figures out of your husband's brains. If they can find in their hearts, the poor unvirtuous fat knight shall be any further afflicted, we two will still be the ministers. Mrs. Ford. I'll warrant they'll have him publickly shamed: and, methinks, there would be no period to the jest, should he not be publickly shamed. Mrs. Page. Come to the forge with it, then shape it: I would not have things cool. [Exeunt SCENE III. A room in the Garter Inn. Enter Host and Bardolph. Bard. Sir, the Germans desire to have three of your horses: the duke himself will be to-morrow at court, and they are going to meet him. Host. What duke should that be comes so secretly 7 hear not of him in the court: Let me speak with the gentlemen; they speak English? Bard. Ay, sir, I'll call them to you. Host. They shall have my horses: but I'll make them pay, I'll sauce them: they have had my house a week at command: I have turned away my other guests: they must come off: I'll sauce them; Come. [Exeunt. SCENE IV. A Room in Ford's House. Enter Page, Ford, Mrs. Page, Mrs. Ford, and Eva. 'Tis one of the pest discretions of a 'oman as ever I did look upon. Page. And did he send you both these letters at an instant ? Mrs. Page. Within a quarter of an hour. Ford. Pardon me, wife: Henceforth do what thou wilt; 1 rather will suspect the sun with cold, In him that was of late an heretic, Page. Nan Page my daughter, and my little son, Like urchins, ouphes, and fairies, green and With rounds of waxen tapers on their heads, Ford. That will be excellent. I'll go buy them ho-vizards. 'Tis well, 'tis well; no more. But let our plot go forward let our wives Page. How! to send him word they'll meet him come. Eva. You say, he has been thrown into the rivers; and has been grievously peaten, as an old 'oman; 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 And let us two devise to bring him thither. Sometime a keeper here in Windsor forest, 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: 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 Shall master Slender steal my Nan away, Ford. Nay,I'll to him again in name of Brook; And tricking for our fairies. [Exeunt Page, Ford, and Evans. I'll to the doctor; he hath my good will, SCENE V. A Room in the Garter Inn. 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 You have heard of such a spirit; and well you John Falstaff from master Slender. know, The superstitious idle-headed eld Received, and did deliver to our age, In deep of night to walk by this Herne's oak; Mrs. Ford. Marry, this is our device; 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 l'age. That likewise have we thought upon and thus: Host. There's his chamber, his house, his castle, his standing-bed, and truckle-bed; 'tis painted about with the story of the prodigal, fresh and new: Go, knock and call; he'll speak like an anthropophaginian 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, mire 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: Fie! privacy? fie! Enter Falstaff. of Brentford? Fal. Ay, marry, was it, muscle-shell; what would you with her? Sim. My master, sir, my master Slender, sent to her, seeing her go through 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. im of it. Sim. I would I could have spoken with the Fal. What are they? let us know. Sim. I may not conceal them, sir. Sim. What, sir? but about Fal. To have her,-or no: Go; say the man told me so. should come to the ear of the court, how I have Quick. From the two parties forsooth. Quick. And have not they suffered ? Yes, 1 warrant, speciously one of them; mistress Ford, good heart, is beaten black and blue, that you cannot see a white spot about her. I was beaten myself into all the colours of the Fal. What tell'st thou me of black and blue! rainbow, and I was like to be apprehended for the witch of Brentford; but that my admirable dexterity of wit, my counterfeiting the action wo-stable had set me i' the stocks, i' the common of an old woman, deliver'd me, the knave constocks, for a witch. Sim. May I be so bold to say so, sir 7 John was there a wise woman with thee? Fal. Ay, that there was, mine host; one that hath taught me more wit than ever I learned before in my life and I paid nothing for it neither, but was paid for my learning. Enter Bardolph. Quick. Sir, let me speak with you in your warrant, to your content. chamber; you shall hear how things go; and 1 Here is a letter will say somewhat. Good hearts, what ado here is En'er Fenton and Host. Bard. Out, alas, sir! cozenage! mere cozen-mind is heavy, I will give over all. Fent. Yet hear me speak: Assist me in my Host. Thy are gone but to meet the duke, villain: do not say they be fled; Germans are honest men. • purpose, And, as I am a gentleman, I'll give thee Bard. Run away with the cozeners: for so soon as I came beyond Eton, they threw me off, from behind one of them, in a slough of mire; and set spurs, and away, like three Ger-Fent. From time to time I have acquainted you man devils, three Dr. Faustuses. With the dear love I bear to fair Anne Page; Who mutually hath answer'd my affection (So far forth as herself might be her chooser,) Even to my wish: 1have a letter from her Of such contents as you will wonder at; The mirth whereof so larded with my matter, That neither, singly, can be manifested, Without the show of both;-wherein fat Falstaff Hath a great scene: the image of the jest [Showing the letter. Enter Sir Hugh Evans. Era. Where is mine host? Host. What is the matter, sir? Eva. Have a care of your entertainments: there is a friend of mine come to town, tells me, there is three cousin germans that has cozened I'll show you here at large. Hark, good mine all the hosts of Readings, of Maidenhead, of Colebrook, of horses and money. I tell you for good-To-night at Herne's oak, just 'twixt twelve and will, look you: you are wise and full of gibes and vlouting-stogs; and it is not convenient you should be cozened: Fare you well. [Exit. Enter Doctor Caius. Caius. Vere is mine Host de Jarterre? Host. Here, master doctor, in perplexity, and doubtful dilemma. vill: adieu. one, host: Must my sweet Nan present the fairy queen; Caius. I cannot tell vat is dat but it is tell-a Her mother, even strong against that match, me, dat you make grand preparations for a duke | And firm for doctor Cafus, hath appointed de Jarmany: by my trot, dere is no duke, dat That he shall likewise shuffle her away, the court is know to come; I tell you for good While other sports are tasking of their minds, And at the deanery, where a priest attends, Straight marry her to this her mother's plot She, seemingly obedient, likewise hath Made promise to the doctor;-Now thus it rests. Her father means she shall be all in white; And in that habit, when Slender sees his time To take her by the hand, and bid her go, [Exit. Host. Hue and cry, villain, go-assist me, knight; I am undone:-fly, run, hue and cry, villain! I am undone ! [Exeunt Host and Bardolph. Fal. I would all the world might be cozened; or I have been cozen'd and beaten too. If it |