51 The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, by William Shakespeare
ACT II
SCENE I. Before Page’s house
Enter Mistress Page reading a letter.
MISTRESS PAGE.
What, have I scaped love-letters in the holiday-time of my beauty, and am I now
a subject for them? Let me see.
[Reads.] Ask me no reason why I love you, for though Love use Reason
for his precisian, he admits him not for his counsellor. You are not young, no
more am I. Go to, then, there’s sympathy. You are merry, so am I. Ha, ha, then
there’s more sympathy. You love sack, and so do I. Would you desire better
sympathy? Let it suffice thee, Mistress Page, at the least, if the love of
soldier can suffice, that I love thee. I will not say, pity me—’tis not a
soldier-like phrase—but I say love me. By me,
Thine own true knight,
By day or night,
Or any kind of light,
With all his might,
For thee to fight,
John Falstaff.
What a Herod of Jewry is this! O wicked, wicked world! One that is well-nigh
worn to pieces with age, to show himself a young gallant! What an unweighed
behaviour hath this Flemish drunkard picked—with the devil’s name!—out of my
conversation, that he dares in this manner assay me? Why, he hath not been
thrice in my company! What should I say to him? I was then frugal of my
mirth. Heaven forgive me! Why, I’ll exhibit a bill in the parliament for the
putting down of men. How shall I be revenged on him? For revenged I will be, as
sure as his guts are made of puddings.
Enter Mistress Ford.
MISTRESS FORD.
Mistress Page! Trust me, I was going to your house.
MISTRESS PAGE.
And, trust me, I was coming to you. You look very ill.
MISTRESS FORD.
Nay, I’ll ne’er believe that. I have to show to the contrary.
MISTRESS PAGE.
Faith, but you do, in my mind.
MISTRESS FORD.
Well, I do, then. Yet I say I could show you to the contrary. O, Mistress
Page, give me some counsel.
MISTRESS PAGE.
What’s the matter, woman?
MISTRESS FORD.
O woman, if it were not for one trifling respect, I could come to such honour!
MISTRESS PAGE.
Hang the trifle, woman; take the honour. What is it? Dispense with
trifles. What is it?
MISTRESS FORD.
If I would but go to hell for an eternal moment or so, I could be knighted.
MISTRESS PAGE.
What? Thou liest! Sir Alice Ford! These knights will hack, and so thou shouldst
not alter the article of thy gentry.
MISTRESS FORD.
We burn daylight. Here, read, read. Perceive how I might be knighted. I shall
think the worse of fat men as long as I have an eye to make difference of men’s
liking. And yet he would not swear; praised women’s modesty; and gave such
orderly and well-behaved reproof to all uncomeliness that I would have sworn
his disposition would have gone to the truth of his words. But they do no more
adhere and keep place together than the Hundredth Psalm to the tune of
“Greensleeves.” What tempest, I trow, threw this whale, with so many tuns of
oil in his belly, ashore at Windsor? How shall I be revenged on him? I think
the best way were to entertain him with hope, till the wicked fire of lust have
melted him in his own grease. Did you ever hear the like?
MISTRESS PAGE.
Letter for letter, but that the name of Page and Ford differs! To thy great
comfort in this mystery of ill opinions, here’s the twin brother of thy letter.
But let thine inherit first, for I protest mine never shall. I warrant he hath
a thousand of these letters, writ with blank space for different names—sure,
more, and these are of the second edition. He will print them, out of doubt;
for he cares not what he puts into the press, when he would put us two. I had
rather be a giantess and lie under Mount Pelion. Well, I will find you twenty
lascivious turtles ere one chaste man.
MISTRESS FORD.
Why, this is the very same—the very hand, the very words. What doth he think
of us?
MISTRESS PAGE.
Nay, I know not. It makes me almost ready to wrangle with mine own honesty.
I’ll entertain myself like one that I am not acquainted withal; for, sure,
unless he know some strain in me that I know not myself, he would never have
boarded me in this fury.
MISTRESS FORD.
“Boarding” call you it? I’ll be sure to keep him above deck.
MISTRESS PAGE.
So will I. If he come under my hatches, I’ll never to sea again. Let’s be
revenged on him. Let’s appoint him a meeting, give him a show of comfort in his
suit, and lead him on with a fine-baited delay, till he hath pawned his horses
to mine host of the Garter.
MISTRESS FORD.
Nay, I will consent to act any villainy against him that may not sully the
chariness of our honesty. O, that my husband saw this letter! It would give
eternal food to his jealousy.
MISTRESS PAGE.
Why, look where he comes; and my good man too. He’s as far from jealousy as I
am from giving him cause, and that, I hope, is an unmeasurable distance.
MISTRESS FORD.
You are the happier woman.
MISTRESS PAGE.
Let’s consult together against this greasy knight. Come hither.
[They retire.]
Enter Ford with Pistol, and Page with
Nym.
FORD
Well, I hope it be not so.
PISTOL.
Hope is a curtal dog in some affairs.
Sir John affects thy wife.
FORD.
Why, sir, my wife is not young.
PISTOL.
He woos both high and low, both rich and poor,
Both young and old, one with another, Ford.
He loves the gallimaufry. Ford, perpend.
FORD.
Love my wife?
PISTOL.
With liver burning hot.
Prevent, or go thou like Sir Actaeon he,
With Ringwood at thy heels.
O, odious is the name!
FORD.
What name, sir?
PISTOL.
The horn, I say. Farewell.
Take heed, have open eye, for thieves do foot by night.
Take heed, ere summer comes, or cuckoo birds do sing.—
Away, Sir Corporal Nym.—Believe it, Page, he speaks sense.
[Exit Pistol.]
FORD
[Aside.] I will be patient. I will find out this.
NYM.
[To Page.] And this is true, I like not the humour of lying. He hath
wronged me in some humours. I should have borne the humoured letter to her; but
I have a sword, and it shall bite upon my necessity. He loves your wife;
there’s the short and the long. My name is Corporal Nym. I speak, and I avouch
’tis true. My name is Nym, and Falstaff loves your wife. Adieu. I love not the
humour of bread and cheese. Adieu.
[Exit Nym.]
PAGE
[Aside.] “The humour of it,” quoth ’a! Here’s a fellow frights English
out of his wits.
FORD.
[Aside.] I will seek out Falstaff.
PAGE.
[Aside.] I never heard such a drawling, affecting rogue.
FORD.
[Aside.] If I do find it—well.
PAGE.
[Aside.] I will not believe such a Cataian, though the priest o’ the
town commended him for a true man.
FORD.
[Aside.] ’Twas a good sensible fellow—well.
Mistress Page and
Mistress Ford come forward.
PAGE.
How now, Meg?
MISTRESS PAGE.
Whither go you, George? Hark you.
MISTRESS FORD.
How now, sweet Frank, why art thou melancholy?
FORD.
I melancholy? I am not melancholy. Get you home, go.
MISTRESS FORD.
Faith, thou hast some crotchets in thy head now.—Will you go, Mistress Page?
MISTRESS PAGE.
Have with you. You’ll come to dinner, George?
[Aside to Mistress Ford.] Look who comes yonder. She shall be our
messenger to this paltry knight.
MISTRESS FORD.
[Aside to Mistress Page.] Trust me, I thought on her. She’ll fit it.
Enter Mistress Quickly.
MISTRESS PAGE.
You are come to see my daughter Anne?
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Ay, forsooth. And, I pray, how does good Mistress Anne?
MISTRESS PAGE.
Go in with us and see. We’d have an hour’s talk with you.
[Exeunt Mistress Page, Mistress Ford and
Mistress Quickly.]
PAGE
How now, Master Ford?
FORD.
You heard what this knave told me, did you not?
PAGE.
Yes, and you heard what the other told me?
FORD.
Do you think there is truth in them?
PAGE.
Hang ’em, slaves! I do not think the knight would offer it, but these that
accuse him in his intent towards our wives are a yoke of his discarded men,
very rogues, now they be out of service.
FORD.
Were they his men?
PAGE.
Marry, were they.
FORD.
I like it never the better for that. Does he lie at the Garter?
PAGE.
Ay, marry, does he. If he should intend this voyage toward my wife, I would
turn her loose to him; and what he gets more of her than sharp words, let it
lie on my head.
FORD.
I do not misdoubt my wife, but I would be loath to turn them together. A man
may be too confident. I would have nothing lie on my head. I cannot be thus
satisfied.
Enter Host.
PAGE.
Look where my ranting host of the Garter comes. There is either liquor in his
pate or money in his purse when he looks so merrily.—How now, mine host?
HOST.
How now, bully rook? Thou’rt a gentleman.—Cavaliero Justice, I say!
Enter Shallow.
SHALLOW.
I follow, mine host, I follow.—Good even and twenty, good Master Page. Master
Page, will you go with us? We have sport in hand.
HOST.
Tell him, Cavaliero Justice; tell him, bully rook.
SHALLOW.
Sir, there is a fray to be fought between Sir Hugh the Welsh priest and Caius
the French doctor.
FORD.
Good mine host o’ the Garter, a word with you.
HOST.
What say’st thou, my bully rook?
[Ford and the
Host talk apart.]
SHALLOW
[To Page.] Will you go with us to behold it? My merry host hath had the
measuring of their weapons, and, I think, hath appointed them contrary places;
for, believe me, I hear the parson is no jester. Hark, I will tell you what our
sport shall be.
[Shallow and
Page talk apart.
Ford and the
Host come forward.]
HOST
Hast thou no suit against my knight, my guest cavaliero?
FORD.
None, I protest. But I’ll give you a pottle of burnt sack to give me recourse
to him, and tell him my name is Brook, only for a jest.
HOST.
My hand, bully. Thou shalt have egress and regress—said I well?—and thy name
shall be Brook. It is a merry knight. Will you go, myn-heers?
SHALLOW.
Have with you, mine host.
PAGE.
I have heard the Frenchman hath good skill in his rapier.
SHALLOW.
Tut, sir, I could have told you more. In these times you stand on distance—your
passes, stoccadoes, and I know not what. ’Tis the heart, Master Page; ’tis
here, ’tis here. I have seen the time, with my long sword I would have made you
four tall fellows skip like rats.
HOST.
Here, boys, here, here! Shall we wag?
PAGE.
Have with you. I had rather hear them scold than fight.
[Exeunt Host, Shallow and
Page.]
FORD
Though Page be a secure fool, and stands so firmly on his wife’s frailty, yet I
cannot put off my opinion so easily. She was in his company at Page’s house,
and what they made there I know not. Well, I will look further into ’t, and I
have a disguise to sound Falstaff. If I find her honest, I lose not my labour.
If she be otherwise, ’tis labour well bestowed.
[Exit.]
SCENE II. A room in the Garter Inn
Enter Falstaff and
Pistol.
FALSTAFF.
I will not lend thee a penny.
PISTOL.
Why then, the world’s mine oyster,
Which I with sword will open.
FALSTAFF.
Not a penny. I have been content, sir, you should lay my countenance to pawn; I
have grated upon my good friends for three reprieves for you and your
coach-fellow Nym, or else you had looked through the grate like a gemini of
baboons. I am damned in hell for swearing to gentlemen my friends you were good
soldiers and tall fellows. And when Mistress Bridget lost the handle of her
fan, I took ’t upon mine honour thou hadst it not.
PISTOL.
Didst not thou share? Hadst thou not fifteen pence?
FALSTAFF.
Reason, you rogue, reason. Think’st thou I’ll endanger my soul gratis? At a
word, hang no more about me, I am no gibbet for you. Go—a short knife and a
throng—to your manor of Pickt-hatch, go. You’ll not bear a letter for me, you
rogue? You stand upon your honour! Why, thou unconfinable baseness, it is as
much as I can do to keep the terms of my honour precise. Ay, ay, I myself
sometimes, leaving the fear of God on the left hand, and hiding mine honour in
my necessity, am fain to shuffle, to hedge, and to lurch; and yet you, rogue,
will ensconce your rags, your cat-a-mountain looks, your red-lattice phrases,
and your bold beating oaths, under the shelter of your honour! You will not do
it! You!
PISTOL.
I do relent. What wouldst thou more of man?
Enter Robin.
ROBIN
Sir, here’s a woman would speak with you.
FALSTAFF.
Let her approach.
Enter Mistress Quickly.
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Give your worship good morrow.
FALSTAFF.
Good morrow, goodwife.
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Not so, an’t please your worship.
FALSTAFF.
Good maid, then.
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
I’ll be sworn, as my mother was, the first hour I was born.
FALSTAFF.
I do believe the swearer. What with me?
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Shall I vouchsafe your worship a word or two?
FALSTAFF.
Two thousand, fair woman; and I’ll vouchsafe thee the hearing.
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
There is one Mistress Ford, sir—I pray, come a little nearer this ways. I
myself dwell with Master Doctor Caius.
FALSTAFF.
Well, on; Mistress Ford, you say—
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Your worship says very true. I pray your worship come a little nearer this
ways.
FALSTAFF.
I warrant thee, nobody hears. Mine own people, mine own people.
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Are they so? God bless them, and make them His servants!
FALSTAFF.
Well, Mistress Ford, what of her?
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Why, sir, she’s a good creature. Lord, Lord, your worship’s a wanton! Well,
heaven forgive you, and all of us, I pray!
FALSTAFF.
Mistress Ford, come, Mistress Ford.
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Marry, this is the short and the long of it: you have brought her into such a
canaries as ’tis wonderful. The best courtier of them all, when the court lay
at Windsor, could never have brought her to such a canary. Yet there has been
knights, and lords, and gentlemen, with their coaches, I warrant you, coach
after coach, letter after letter, gift after gift, smelling so sweetly, all
musk, and so rushling, I warrant you, in silk and gold, and in such alligant
terms, and in such wine and sugar of the best and the fairest, that would have
won any woman’s heart; and I warrant you, they could never get an eye-wink of
her. I had myself twenty angels given me this morning, but I defy all angels in
any such sort, as they say, but in the way of honesty. And, I warrant you, they
could never get her so much as sip on a cup with the proudest of them all. And
yet there has been earls—nay, which is more, pensioners—but, I warrant you, all
is one with her.
FALSTAFF.
But what says she to me? Be brief, my good she-Mercury.
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Marry, she hath received your letter, for the which she thanks you a thousand
times; and she gives you to notify that her husband will be absence from his
house between ten and eleven.
FALSTAFF.
Ten and eleven?
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Ay, forsooth; and then you may come and see the picture, she says, that you wot
of. Master Ford, her husband, will be from home. Alas, the sweet woman leads an
ill life with him. He’s a very jealousy man; she leads a very frampold life
with him, good heart.
FALSTAFF.
Ten and eleven. Woman, commend me to her; I will not fail her.
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Why, you say well. But I have another messenger to your worship. Mistress Page
hath her hearty commendations to you too; and let me tell you in your ear,
she’s as fartuous a civil modest wife, and one, I tell you, that will not miss
you morning nor evening prayer, as any is in Windsor, whoe’er be the other; and
she bade me tell your worship that her husband is seldom from home, but she
hopes there will come a time. I never knew a woman so dote upon a man. Surely I
think you have charms, la! Yes, in truth.
FALSTAFF.
Not I, I assure thee. Setting the attraction of my good parts aside, I have no
other charms.
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Blessing on your heart for ’t!
FALSTAFF.
But, I pray thee, tell me this: has Ford’s wife and Page’s wife acquainted each
other how they love me?
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
That were a jest indeed! They have not so little grace, I hope. That were a
trick indeed! But Mistress Page would desire you to send her your little page,
of all loves. Her husband has a marvellous infection to the little page; and,
truly, Master Page is an honest man. Never a wife in Windsor leads a better
life than she does. Do what she will, say what she will, take all, pay all, go
to bed when she list, rise when she list, all is as she will, and truly she
deserves it, for if there be a kind woman in Windsor, she is one. You must send
her your page, no remedy.
FALSTAFF.
Why, I will.
MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Nay, but do so then, and, look you, he may come and go between you both; and in
any case have a nay-word, that you may know one another’s mind, and the boy
never need to understand anything; for ’tis not good that children should know
any wickedness. Old folks, you know, have discretion, as they say, and know the
world.
FALSTAFF.
Fare thee well, commend me to them both. There’s my purse; I am yet thy debtor.
Boy, go along with this woman.—This news distracts me.
[Exeunt Mistress Quickly and
Robin.]
PISTOL.
This punk is one of Cupid’s carriers;
Clap on more sails, pursue; up with your fights;
Give fire! She is my prize, or ocean whelm them all!
[Exit Pistol.]
FALSTAFF.
Sayst thou so, old Jack? Go thy ways, I’ll make more of thy old body than I
have done. Will they yet look after thee? Wilt thou, after the expense of so
much money, be now a gainer? Good body, I thank thee. Let them say ’tis grossly
done; so it be fairly done, no matter.
Enter Bardolph with a cup of sack.
BARDOLPH
Sir John, there’s one Master Brook below would fain speak with you and be
acquainted with you, and hath sent your worship a morning’s draught of sack.
FALSTAFF.
Brook is his name?
BARDOLPH.
Ay, sir.
FALSTAFF.
Call him in.
[Exit Bardolph.]
Such Brooks are welcome to me, that o’erflow such liquor. Ah, ha, Mistress Ford
and Mistress Page, have I encompassed you? Go to, via!
Enter Bardolph with
Ford disguised as Brook.
FORD
God bless you, sir.
FALSTAFF.
And you, sir. Would you speak with me?
FORD.
I make bold to press with so little preparation upon you.
FALSTAFF.
You’re welcome. What’s your will?—Give us leave, drawer.
[Exit Bardolph.]
FORD
Sir, I am a gentleman that have spent much. My name is Brook.
FALSTAFF.
Good Master Brook, I desire more acquaintance of you.
FORD.
Good Sir John, I sue for yours; not to charge you, for I must let you
understand I think myself in better plight for a lender than you are, the which
hath something emboldened me to this unseasoned intrusion; for they say, if
money go before, all ways do lie open.
FALSTAFF.
Money is a good soldier, sir, and will on.
FORD.
Troth, and I have a bag of money here troubles me. If you will help to bear it,
Sir John, take all, or half, for easing me of the carriage.
FALSTAFF.
Sir, I know not how I may deserve to be your porter.
FORD.
I will tell you, sir, if you will give me the hearing.
FALSTAFF.
Speak, good Master Brook. I shall be glad to be your servant.
FORD.
Sir, I hear you are a scholar—I will be brief with you—and you have been a
man long known to me, though I had never so good means as desire to make
myself acquainted with you. I shall discover a thing to you, wherein I must
very much lay open mine own imperfection. But, good Sir John, as you have one
eye upon my follies, as you hear them unfolded, turn another into the register
of your own, that I may pass with a reproof the easier, sith you yourself know
how easy it is to be such an offender.
FALSTAFF.
Very well, sir, proceed.
FORD.
There is a gentlewoman in this town, her husband’s name is Ford.
FALSTAFF.
Well, sir.
FORD.
I have long loved her, and, I protest to you, bestowed much on her, followed
her with a doting observance, engrossed opportunities to meet her, fee’d every
slight occasion that could but niggardly give me sight of her, not only bought
many presents to give her, but have given largely to many to know what she
would have given. Briefly, I have pursued her as love hath pursued me, which
hath been on the wing of all occasions. But whatsoever I have merited, either
in my mind or in my means, meed, I am sure, I have received none, unless
experience be a jewel. That I have purchased at an infinite rate, and that hath
taught me to say this:
Love like a shadow flies when substance love pursues,
Pursuing that that flies, and flying what pursues.
FALSTAFF.
Have you received no promise of satisfaction at her hands?
FORD.
Never.
FALSTAFF.
Have you importuned her to such a purpose?
FORD.
Never.
FALSTAFF.
Of what quality was your love, then?
FORD.
Like a fair house built on another man’s ground, so that I have lost my edifice
by mistaking the place where I erected it.
FALSTAFF.
To what purpose have you unfolded this to me?
FORD.
When I have told you that, I have told you all. Some say that though she appear
honest to me, yet in other places she enlargeth her mirth so far that there is
shrewd construction made of her. Now, Sir John, here is the heart of my
purpose: you are a gentleman of excellent breeding, admirable discourse, of
great admittance, authentic in your place and person, generally allowed for
your many warlike, courtlike, and learned preparations.
FALSTAFF.
O, sir!
FORD.
Believe it, for you know it. There is money. Spend it, spend it; spend more;
spend all I have; only give me so much of your time in exchange of it as to lay
an amiable siege to the honesty of this Ford’s wife. Use your art of wooing,
win her to consent to you. If any man may, you may as soon as any.
FALSTAFF.
Would it apply well to the vehemency of your affection that I should win what
you would enjoy? Methinks you prescribe to yourself very preposterously.
FORD.
O, understand my drift. She dwells so securely on the excellency of her honour
that the folly of my soul dares not present itself; she is too bright to be
looked against. Now, could I come to her with any detection in my hand, my
desires had instance and argument to commend themselves. I could drive her then
from the ward of her purity, her reputation, her marriage vow, and a thousand
other her defences, which now are too too strongly embattled against me. What
say you to’t, Sir John?
FALSTAFF.
Master Brook, I will first make bold with your money; next, give me your hand;
and last, as I am a gentleman, you shall, if you will, enjoy Ford’s wife.
FORD.
O good sir!
FALSTAFF.
I say you shall.
FORD.
Want no money, Sir John; you shall want none.
FALSTAFF.
Want no Mistress Ford, Master Brook; you shall want none. I shall be with her,
I may tell you, by her own appointment; even as you came in to me, her assistant
or go-between parted from me. I say I shall be with her between ten and eleven,
for at that time the jealous rascally knave her husband will be forth. Come
you to me at night. You shall know how I speed.
FORD.
I am blessed in your acquaintance. Do you know Ford, sir?
FALSTAFF.
Hang him, poor cuckoldly knave! I know him not. Yet I wrong him to call him
poor. They say the jealous wittolly knave hath masses of money, for the which
his wife seems to me well-favoured. I will use her as the key of the cuckoldly
rogue’s coffer, and there’s my harvest-home.
FORD.
I would you knew Ford, sir, that you might avoid him if you saw him.
FALSTAFF.
Hang him, mechanical salt-butter rogue! I will stare him out of his wits, I
will awe him with my cudgel; it shall hang like a meteor o’er the cuckold’s
horns. Master Brook, thou shalt know I will predominate over the peasant, and
thou shalt lie with his wife. Come to me soon at night. Ford’s a knave, and I
will aggravate his style. Thou, Master Brook, shalt know him for knave and
cuckold. Come to me soon at night.
[Exit Falstaff.]
FORD.
What a damned epicurean rascal is this! My heart is ready to crack with
impatience. Who says this is improvident jealousy? My wife hath sent to him,
the hour is fixed, the match is made. Would any man have thought this? See the
hell of having a false woman: my bed shall be abused, my coffers ransacked, my
reputation gnawn at; and I shall not only receive this villanous wrong, but
stand under the adoption of abominable terms, and by him that does me this
wrong. Terms, names! Amaimon sounds well; Lucifer, well; Barbason, well; yet
they are devils’ additions, the names of fiends. But cuckold? Wittol? Cuckold?
The devil himself hath not such a name. Page is an ass, a secure ass; he will
trust his wife, he will not be jealous. I will rather trust a Fleming with my
butter, Parson Hugh the Welshman with my cheese, an Irishman with my aqua-vitae
bottle, or a thief to walk my ambling gelding, than my wife with herself. Then
she plots, then she ruminates, then she devises; and what they think in their
hearts they may effect, they will break their hearts but they will effect. God
be praised for my jealousy! Eleven o’clock the hour. I will prevent this,
detect my wife, be revenged on Falstaff, and laugh at Page. I will about it.
Better three hours too soon than a minute too late. Fie, fie, fie! Cuckold,
cuckold, cuckold!
[Exit.]
SCENE III. A field near Windsor
Enter Doctor Caius and
Rugby.
CAIUS.
Jack Rugby!
RUGBY.
Sir?
CAIUS.
Vat is de clock, Jack?
RUGBY.
’Tis past the hour, sir, that Sir Hugh promised to meet.
CAIUS.
By gar, he has save his soul, dat he is no come. He has pray his Pible well dat
he is no come. By gar, Jack Rugby, he is dead already, if he be come.
RUGBY.
He is wise, sir; he knew your worship would kill him if he came.
CAIUS.
By gar, de herring is no dead so as I vill kill him. Take your rapier, Jack; I
vill tell you how I vill kill him.
RUGBY.
Alas, sir, I cannot fence.
CAIUS.
Villainy, take your rapier.
RUGBY.
Forbear; here’s company.
Enter Page, Shallow, Slender and
Host.
HOST
God bless thee, bully doctor!
SHALLOW.
God save you, Master Doctor Caius!
PAGE.
Now, good Master Doctor!
SLENDER.
Give you good morrow, sir.
CAIUS.
Vat be all you, one, two, tree, four, come for?
HOST.
To see thee fight, to see thee foin, to see thee traverse; to see thee here, to
see thee there; to see thee pass thy punto, thy stock, thy reverse, thy
distance, thy montant. Is he dead, my Ethiopian? Is he dead, my Francisco? Ha,
bully? What says my Aesculapius, my Galen, my heart of elder, ha? Is he dead,
bully stale? Is he dead?
CAIUS.
By gar, he is de coward Jack-priest of de vorld. He is not show his face.
HOST.
Thou art a Castalion King Urinal Hector of Greece, my boy!
CAIUS.
I pray you, bear witness that me have stay six or seven, two, tree hours for
him, and he is no come.
SHALLOW.
He is the wiser man, Master doctor. He is a curer of souls, and you a curer of
bodies. If you should fight, you go against the hair of your professions. Is it
not true, Master Page?
PAGE.
Master Shallow, you have yourself been a great fighter, though now a man of
peace.
SHALLOW.
Bodykins, Master Page, though I now be old, and of the peace, if I see a sword
out, my finger itches to make one. Though we are justices and doctors and
churchmen, Master Page, we have some salt of our youth in us. We are the sons
of women, Master Page.
PAGE.
’Tis true, Master Shallow.
SHALLOW.
It will be found so, Master Page.—Master Doctor Caius, I come to fetch you
home. I am sworn of the peace. You have showed yourself a wise physician, and
Sir Hugh hath shown himself a wise and patient churchman. You must go with me,
Master Doctor.
HOST.
Pardon, guest justice.—A word, Monsieur Mockwater.
CAIUS.
Mockvater? Vat is dat?
HOST.
Mockwater, in our English tongue, is valour, bully.
CAIUS.
By gar, then I have as much mockvater as de Englishman. Scurvy jack-dog priest!
By gar, me vill cut his ears.
HOST.
He will clapper-claw thee tightly, bully.
CAIUS.
Clapper-de-claw? Vat is dat?
HOST.
That is, he will make thee amends.
CAIUS.
By gar, me do look he shall clapper-de-claw me, for, by gar, me vill have it.
HOST.
And I will provoke him to’t, or let him wag.
CAIUS.
Me tank you for dat.
HOST.
And, moreover, bully—but first, Master guest, and Master Page, and eke
Cavaliero Slender, go you through the town to Frogmore.
PAGE
[Aside to Host.] Sir Hugh is there, is he?
HOST.
[Aside to Page.] He is there. See what humour he is in; and I will
bring the doctor about by the fields. Will it do well?
SHALLOW.
[Aside to Host.] We will do it.
PAGE, SHALLOW and SLENDER
Adieu, good Master Doctor.
[Exeunt Page, Shallow and
Slender.]
CAIUS
By gar, me vill kill de priest, for he speak for a jackanape to Anne Page.
HOST.
Let him die. Sheathe thy impatience; throw cold water on thy choler. Go about
the fields with me through Frogmore. I will bring thee where Mistress Anne Page
is, at a farm-house a-feasting, and thou shalt woo her. Cried game! Said I
well?
CAIUS.
By gar, me tank you for dat. By gar, I love you; and I shall procure-a you de
good guest: de earl, de knight, de lords, de gentlemen, my patients.
HOST.
For the which I will be thy adversary toward Anne Page. Said I well?
CAIUS.
By gar, ’tis good; vell said.
HOST.
Let us wag, then.
CAIUS.
Come at my heels, Jack Rugby.
[Exeunt.]