gunpowder Percy, though he be dead: How, if he should counterfeit too, and rise? I am afraid, he would prove the better counterfeit. Therefore I'll make him sure: yea, and I'll swear I killed him. Why may not he rise, as well as I? Nothing confutes me but eyes, and nobody sees me. Therefore, sirrah, (stabbing him) with a new wound in your thigh, come you along with me. (Takes Hotspur on his back.) Re-enter Prince HENRY and Prince JOHN. P. Hen. Come, brother John, full bravely hast thou flesh'd Thy maiden sword. P. John. But, soft! whom have we here? Art thou alive? or is it phantasy Fal. No, that's certain; I am not a double man: but if I be not Jack Falstaff, then am I a Jack. There is Peroy, (throwing the body down) if your father will do me any honour, so; if not, let him kill the next Percy himself. I look to be either earl or duke, I can assure you. P. Hen. Why, Percy I killed myself, and saw thee dead. Fal. Didst thou?-Lord! Lord! how this world is given to lying!-I grant you, I was down, and out of breath; and so was he: but we rose both at an instant, and fought a long hour by Shrewsbury clock. If I may be believed, so; if not, let them, that should reward valour, bear the sin upon their own heads. I'll take it upon my death, I gave him this wound in the thigh: if the man were alive, and would deny it, I would make him eat a piece of my sword. [heard. P.John. This is the strangest tale that e'er I P. Hen. This is the strangest fellow, brother John. Come, bring your luggage nobly on your back: (A retreat is sounded.) [Exeunt Prince Henry and Prince John. Fal, I'll follow, as they say, for reward. He that rewards me, God reward him! If I do grow great, I'll grow less; for I'll purge, and leave sack, and live cleanly, as a nobleman should do. [Exit, bearing off the body. SCENE V. Another Part of the Field. If, like a christian, thou hadst truly borne [too: K. Hen. Bear Worcester to the death, and Vernon Other offenders we will pause upon. [Exeunt Worcester and Vernon, guarded. How goes the field? [saw P. Hen. The noble Scot, lord Douglas, when he The fortune of the day quite turn'd from him, The noble Percy slain, and all his men Upon the foot of fear,-fled with the rest; And, falling from a hill, he was so bruis'd, That the pursuers took him. At my tent The Douglas is; and I beseech your grace, I may dispose of him. K. Hen. With all my heart. P. Hen. Then, brother John of Lancaster, to you This honourable bounty shall belong : Go to the Douglas, and deliver him Up to his pleasure, ransomeless, and free: His valour, shown upon our crests to-day, Hath taught us how to cherish such high deeds, Even in the bosom of our adversaries. [power. K. Hen. Then this remains,-that we divide our You, son John, and my cousin Westmoreland, Towards York shall bend you, with your dearest speed, To meet Northumberland, and the prelate Scroop, INDUCTION. Enemies to the A Porter. A Dancer, Speaker of the Epilogue. LADY NORTHUMBERLAND. LADY PERCY. Hostess QUICKLY. DOLL TEAR-SHEET. Lords and other Attendants; Officers, Soldiers, Messenger, Drawers, Beadles, Grooms, &c. SCENE,-England. Warkworth. Before Northumberland's Castle. The vent of hearing, when loud Rumour speaks? That the blunt monster with uncounted heads, Among my household? Why is Rumour here? I run before king Harry's victory; To noise abroad,-that Harry Monmouth fell They bring smooth comforts false, worse than true ACT I. Bard. That the lord Bardolph doth attend him here. Please it your honour, knock but at the gate, Bard. Tell thou the earl, | Where hateful death put on his ugliest mask, Enter NORTHUMBERLAND. Here comes the earl. North. What news, lord Bardolph? every mi nute now Should be the father of some stratagem: Bard. Noble earl, I bring you certain news from Shrewsbury, Bard. North. How is this deriv'd? A gentleman well bred, and of good name, [I sent Bard. My lord, I over-rode him on the way; Enter TRAVERS. North. Now, Travers, what good tidings come with you? Tra. My lord, sir John Umfrevile turn'd me back North. Ha!-Again. Said he, young Harry Percy's spur was cold? Of Hotspur, coldspur? that rebellion Had met ill luck! Your brother, thus; so fought the noble Douglas; North. Why, he is dead. North. Yet, for all this, say not, that Percy's Bard. I cannot think, my lord, your son is dead. Lend to this weight such lightness with their fear, mourn. In poison there is physic; and these news, Like strengthless hinges, buckle under life, Out of his keeper's arms; even so my limbs, A scaly gauntlet now, with joints of steel, Thou art a guard too wanton for the head, Tra. This strained passion doth you wrong, my Let us make head. It was your presurmise, Bard. We all, that are engaged to this loss, I hear for certain, and do speak the truth,- North. I knew of this before; but, to speak truth, SCENE II.-London. A Street. Enter Sir JOHN FALSTAFF, with his Page, bearing his sword and buckler. Fal. Sirrah, you giant, what says the doctor to my water? Page. He said, sir, the water itself was a good might have more diseases than he knew for. healthy water: but, for the party that owed it, he Fal. Men of all sorts take a pride to gird at me: The brain of this foolish-compounded clay, man, ter, more than I invent, or is invented on me: I is not able to vent any thing, that tends to laugham not only witty in myself, but the cause that wit is in other men. I do here walk before thee, like a sow, that hath overwhelmed all her litter but one. If the prince put thee into my service for any other reason than to set me off, why then I have no judgment. Thou whoreson mandrake, thou art fitter to be worn in my cap, than to wait at my heels. I was never manned with an agate till now: but I apparel, and send you back again to your master, will set you neither in gold nor silver, but in vile for a jewel; the juvenal, the prince your master, whose chin is not yet fledged. I will sooner have a beard grow in the palm of my hand, than he shall get one on his cheek; and yet he will not stick to say, his face is a face-royal: God may finish it when still as a face-royal, for a barber shall never earn he will, it is not a hair amiss yet: he may keep it sixpence out of it; and yet he will be crowing, as if he had writ man ever since his father was a bachelor. He may keep his own grace, but he is almost out of mine, I can assure him.-What said master Dumbleton about the satin for my short cloak, and slops? better assurance than Bardolph: he would not take Page. He said, sir, you should procure him his bond and yours; he liked not the security. Fal. Let him be damned like the glutton! may his tongue be hotter!-A whoreson Achitophel! a rascally yea-forsooth knave! to bear a gentleman in hand, and then stand upon security!--The whoreson smooth-pates do now wear nothing but high shoes, and bunches of keys at their girdles; and if a man is thorough with them in honest taking up, then they must stand upon-security. I had as lief they would put ratsbane in my mouth, as offer to stop it with security. I looked he should have sent me two and twenty yards of satin, as I am a true knight, and he sends me security. Well, he may sleep in security, for he hath the horn of abundance, and the lightness of his wife shines through it: and yet cannot he see, though he have his own lantern to light him.-Where's Bardolph ? Page. He's gone into Smithfield, to buy your worship a horse. Fal. I bought him in Paul's, and he'll buy me a horse in Smithfield: an I could get me but a wife in the stews, I were manned, horsed, and wived. Enter the Lord Chief Justice, and an Attendant. Ch. Just. He that was in question for the robbery? Atten. He, my lord: but he hath since done good service at Shrewsbury; and, as I hear, is now going with some charge to the lord John of Lancaster. Ch. Just. What, to York? Call him back again, Fal. Boy, tell him I am deaf. [deaf. Page. You must speak louder, my master is Ch. Just. I am sure he is, to the hearing of any thing good.-Go, pluck him by the elbow; I must speak with him. Atten. Sir John, Fal. What! a young knave, and beg! Is there | you may thank the unquiet time for your quiet not wars? is there not employment? Doth not the o'erposting that action. king lack subjects? do not the rebels need soldiers? Fal. My lord? Though it be a shame to be on any side but one, it is worse shame to beg than to be on the worst side, were it worse than the name of rebellion can tell how to make it. Atten. You mistake me, sir. Fal. Why, sir, did I say you were an honest man? setting my knighthood and my soldiership aside, I had lied in my throat, if I had said so. Atten. I pray you, sir, then set your knighthood and your soldiership aside; and give me leave to tell you, you lie in your throat, if you say I am any other than an honest man. Fal. I give thee leave to tell me so! I lay aside that, which grows to me! If thou get'st any leave of me, hang me; if thou takest leave, thou wert better be hanged: You hunt-counter, hence! avaunt! Atten. Sir, my lord would speak with you. Ch. Just. Sir John Falstaff, a word with you. Fal. My good lord!-God give your lordship good time of day. I am glad to see your lordship abroad: I heard say, your lordship was sick: I hope, your lordship goes abroad by advice. Your lordship, though not clean past your, youth, hath yet some smack of age in you, some relish of the saltness of time; and I most humbly beseech your lordship, to have a reverend care of your health. Ch. Just. Sir John, I sent for you before your expedition to Shrewsbury. Fal. An't please your lordship, I hear, his majesty is returned with some discomfort from Wales. Ch. Just. I talk not of his majesty:-You would not come when I sent for you. Fal. And I hear, moreover, his highness is fallen into this same whoreson apoplexy. Ch. Just. Well, heaven mend him! I pray, let me speak with you. Fal. This apoplexy is, as I take it, a kind of lethargy, an't please your lordship; a kind of sleeping in the blood, a whoreson tingling. Ch. Just. What tell you me of it? be it as it is. Fal. It hath its original from much grief; from study, and perturbation of the brain: I have read the cause of his effects in Galen; it is a kind of deafness. Ch. Just. I think, you are fallen into the disease; for you hear not what I say to you. Fal. Very well, my lord, very well: rather, an't please you, it is the disease of not listening, the malady of not marking, that I am troubled withal. Ch. Just. To punish you by the heels, would amend the attention of your ears; and I care not if I do become your physician. Fal. I am as poor as Job, my lord: but not so patient: your lordship may minister the potion of punishment to me, in respect of poverty; but how I should be your patient to follow your prescriptions, the wise may make some dram of a scruple, or, indeed, a scruple itself. Ch. Just. I sent for you, when there were matters against you for your life, to come speak with me: Fal. As I was then advised by my learned counsel in the laws of this land-service, I did not come. Ch. Just. Well, the truth is, sir John, you live in great infamy. Fal. He, that buckles him in my belt, cannot live in less. [waste is great. Ch. Just. Your means are very slender, and your Fal. I would it were otherwise; I would my means were greater, and my waist slenderer. Ch. Just. You have misled the youthful prince. Fal. The young prince hath misled me: I am the fellow with the great belly, and he my dog. Ch. Just. Well, I am loath to gall a new-healed wound; your day's service at Shrewsbury hath a little gilded over your night's exploit on Gads-hill [not a sleeping wolf. Ch. Just. But since all is well, keep it so: wake Fal. To wake a wolf, is as bad as to smell a fox. Ch. Just. What! you are as a candle, the better part burnt out. Fal. A wassel candle, my lord; all tallow: if I did say of wax, my growth would approve the truth. Ch. Just. There is not a white hair on your face, but should have his effect of gravity. Fal. His effect of gravy, gravy, gravy. Ch. Just. You follow the young prince up and down, like his ill angel. Fal. Not so, my lord; your ill angel is light; but, I hope, he, that looks upon me, will take me without weighing: and yet, in some respects, I grant, I cannot go, I cannot tell: virtue is of so little regard in these coster-monger times, that true valour is turned bear-herd: Pregnancy is made a tapster, and hath his quick wit wasted in giving reckonings: all the other gifts, appertinent to man, as the malice of this age shapes them, are not worth a gooseberry. You, that are old, consider not the capacities of us that are young: you measure the heat of our livers with the bitterness of your galls: and we, that are in the vaward of our youth, I must confess, are wags too. Ch. Just. Do you set down your name in the scroll of youth, that are written down old with all the characters of age? Have you not a moist eye? a dry hand? a yellow cheek? a white beard? a decreasing leg? an increasing helly? 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? Fy, fy, fy, sir John! Fal. My lord, I was born about three of the clock in the afternoon, with a white head, and something a round belly. For my voice,-I have lost it with hollaing, and singing of anthems. To approve my youth further, I will not: the truth is, I am only old in judgment and understanding; and be, that will caper with me for a thousand marks, let him lend me the money, and have at him. For the box o'the ear that the prince gave you,-he gave it like a rude prince, and you took it like a sensible lord. I have checked him for it; and the young lion repents: marry, not in ashes, and sackcloth; but in new silk, and old sack. Ch. Just. Well, heaven send the prince a better companion! Fal. Heaven send the companion a better prince! I cannot rid my hands of him. Ch. Just. Well, the king hath severed you and prince Harry: I hear, you are going with lord John of Lancaster, against the archbishop, and the earl of Northumberland. Fal. Yea; I thank your pretty sweet wit for it. But look you pray, all you that kiss my lady peace at home, that our armies join not in a hot day! for, by the Lord, I take but two shirts out with me, and I mean not to sweat extraordinarily if it be a hot day, an I brandish any thing but my bottle, I would I might never spit white again. There is not a dangerous action can peep out his head, but I am thrust upon it: Well, I cannot last ever: But it was always yet the trick of our English nation, if they have a good thing, to make it too common. If you will needs say, I am an old man, you should give me rest. I would to God, my name were not so terrible to the enemy as it is. were better to be eaten to death with rust, than to be scoured to nothing with perpetual motion. I Ch. Just. Well, be honest, be honest; And God bless your expedition! Ful. Will your lordship lend me a thousand pound, to furnish me forth? |