52 The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, by William Shakespeare

ACT III

SCENE I. A field near Frogmore

Enter Sir Hugh Evans and
Simple.

EVANS.
I pray you now, good Master Slender’s servingman, and friend Simple by your
name, which way have you looked for Master Caius, that calls himself doctor of
physic?

SIMPLE.
Marry, sir, the Petty-ward, the Park-ward, every way; old Windsor way, and
every way but the town way.

EVANS.
I most fehemently desire you, you will also look that way.

SIMPLE.
I will, Sir.

[Exit Simple.]

EVANS
Pless my soul, how full of cholers I am, and trempling of mind! I shall be
glad if he have deceived me. How melancholies I am! I will knog his urinals
about his knave’s costard when I have good opportunities for the ’ork. Pless my
soul!

[Sings.]

To shallow rivers, to whose falls
Melodious birds sings madrigals.
There will we make our peds of roses
And a thousand fragrant posies.
To shallow—

Mercy on me, I have a great dispositions to cry.

[Sings.]

Melodious birds sing madrigals—
Whenas I sat in Pabylon—
And a thousand vagram posies.
To shallow rivers, to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.

Enter Simple.

SIMPLE
Yonder he is, coming this way, Sir Hugh.

EVANS.
He’s welcome.

[Sings.] To shallow rivers, to whose falls—
Heaven prosper the right! What weapons is he?

SIMPLE.
No weapons, sir. There comes my master, Master Shallow, and another gentleman,
from Frogmore, over the stile, this way.

EVANS.
Pray you, give me my gown—or else keep it in your arms.

Enter Page, Shallow and
Slender.

SHALLOW
How now, Master Parson? Good morrow, good Sir Hugh. Keep a gamester from the
dice, and a good student from his book, and it is wonderful.

SLENDER.
[Aside.] Ah, sweet Anne Page!

PAGE.
God save you, good Sir Hugh!

EVANS.
God pless you from his mercy sake, all of you!

SHALLOW.
What, the sword and the word? Do you study them both, Master Parson?

PAGE.
And youthful still—in your doublet and hose, this raw rheumatic day?

EVANS.
There is reasons and causes for it.

PAGE.
We are come to you to do a good office, Master Parson.

EVANS.
Fery well; what is it?

PAGE.
Yonder is a most reverend gentleman who, belike having received wrong by some
person, is at most odds with his own gravity and patience that ever you saw.

SHALLOW.
I have lived fourscore years and upward; I never heard a man of his place,
gravity, and learning, so wide of his own respect.

EVANS.
What is he?

PAGE.
I think you know him: Master Doctor Caius, the renowned French physician.

EVANS.
Got’s will and His passion of my heart! I had as lief you would tell me of a
mess of porridge.

PAGE.
Why?

EVANS.
He has no more knowledge in Hibbocrates and Galen, and he is a knave besides, a
cowardly knave as you would desires to be acquainted withal.

PAGE.
I warrant you, he’s the man should fight with him.

SLENDER.
[Aside.] O, sweet Anne Page!

SHALLOW.
It appears so by his weapons. Keep them asunder. Here comes Doctor Caius.

Enter Host, Caius and
Rugby.

PAGE
Nay, good Master Parson, keep in your weapon.

SHALLOW.
So do you, good Master Doctor.

HOST.
Disarm them, and let them question. Let them keep their limbs whole and hack
our English.

CAIUS.
I pray you, let-a me speak a word with your ear. Verefore will you not meet-a
me?

EVANS.
[Aside to Caius.] Pray you, use your patience. In good time.

CAIUS.
By gar, you are de coward, de Jack dog, John ape.

EVANS.
[Aside to Caius.] Pray you, let us not be laughing stocks to other men’s
humours. I desire you in friendship, and I will one way or other make you
amends.
[Aloud.] By Jeshu, I will knog your urinal about your knave’s cogscomb.

CAIUS.
Diable! Jack Rugby, mine Host de Jarteer, have I not stay for him to
kill him? Have I not, at de place I did appoint?

EVANS.
As I am a Christians soul, now look you, this is the place appointed. I’ll be
judgment by mine host of the Garter.

HOST.
Peace, I say, Gallia and Gaul, French and Welsh, soul-curer and body-curer!

CAIUS.
Ay, dat is very good; excellent.

HOST.
Peace, I say! Hear mine host of the Garter. Am I politic? Am I subtle? Am I a
Machiavel? Shall I lose my doctor? No, he gives me the potions and the motions.
Shall I lose my parson, my priest, my Sir Hugh? No, he gives me the proverbs
and the no-verbs. [To Caius.] Give me thy hand, terrestrial; so. [To
Evans.] Give me thy hand, celestial; so. Boys of art, I have deceived you
both. I have directed you to wrong places. Your hearts are mighty, your skins
are whole, and let burnt sack be the issue. Come, lay their swords to pawn.
Follow me, lads of peace, follow, follow, follow.

[Exit Host.]

SHALLOW.
Afore God, a mad host! Follow, gentlemen, follow.

SLENDER.
[Aside.] O, sweet Anne Page!

[Exeunt Shallow, Slender and
Page.]

CAIUS
Ha, do I perceive dat? Have you make-a de sot of us, ha, ha?

EVANS.
This is well, he has made us his vlouting-stog. I desire you that we may be
friends, and let us knog our prains together to be revenge on this same scall,
scurvy, cogging companion, the host of the Garter.

CAIUS.
By gar, with all my heart. He promise to bring me where is Anne Page; by gar,
he deceive me too.

EVANS.
Well, I will smite his noddles. Pray you follow.

[Exeunt.]

SCENE II. A street in Windsor

Enter Mistress Page following
Robin.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Nay, keep your way, little gallant. You were wont to be a follower, but now you
are a leader. Whether had you rather, lead mine eyes, or eye your master’s
heels?

ROBIN.
I had rather, forsooth, go before you like a man than follow him like a dwarf.

MISTRESS PAGE.
O, you are a flattering boy! Now I see you’ll be a courtier.

Enter Ford.

FORD
Well met, Mistress Page. Whither go you?

MISTRESS PAGE.
Truly, sir, to see your wife. Is she at home?

FORD.
Ay, and as idle as she may hang together, for want of company. I think if your
husbands were dead you two would marry.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Be sure of that—two other husbands.

FORD.
Where had you this pretty weathercock?

MISTRESS PAGE.
I cannot tell what the dickens his name is my husband had him of. What do you
call your knight’s name, sirrah?

ROBIN.
Sir John Falstaff.

FORD.
Sir John Falstaff!

MISTRESS PAGE.
He, he; I can never hit on’s name. There is such a league between my good man
and he! Is your wife at home indeed?

FORD.
Indeed she is.

MISTRESS PAGE.
By your leave, sir, I am sick till I see her.

[Exeunt Mistress Page and
Robin.]

FORD
Has Page any brains? Hath he any eyes? Hath he any thinking? Sure, they sleep;
he hath no use of them. Why, this boy will carry a letter twenty mile as easy
as a cannon will shoot point-blank twelve score. He pieces out his wife’s
inclination, he gives her folly motion and advantage. And now she’s going to my
wife, and Falstaff’s boy with her. A man may hear this shower sing in the wind.
And Falstaff’s boy with her! Good plots they are laid, and our revolted wives
share damnation together. Well, I will take him, then torture my wife, pluck
the borrowed veil of modesty from the so-seeming Mistress Page, divulge Page
himself for a secure and wilful Actaeon, and to these violent proceedings all
my neighbours shall cry aim. [Clock strikes.] The clock gives me my cue,
and my assurance bids me search. There I shall find Falstaff. I shall be rather
praised for this than mocked, for it is as positive as the earth is firm that
Falstaff is there. I will go.

Enter Page, Shallow, Slender, Host, Sir Hugh Evans,
Caius and Rugby.

SHALLOW, PAGE, etc.
Well met, Master Ford.

FORD.
Trust me, a good knot. I have good cheer at home, and I pray you all go with
me.

SHALLOW.
I must excuse myself, Master Ford.

SLENDER.
And so must I, sir; we have appointed to dine with Mistress Anne, and I would
not break with her for more money than I’ll speak of.

SHALLOW.
We have lingered about a match between Anne Page and my cousin Slender, and
this day we shall have our answer.

SLENDER.
I hope I have your good will, father Page.

PAGE.
You have, Master Slender, I stand wholly for you.—But my wife, Master doctor,
is for you altogether.

CAIUS.
Ay, be-gar; and de maid is love-a me! My nursh-a Quickly tell me so mush.

HOST.
What say you to young Master Fenton? He capers, he dances, he has eyes of
youth, he writes verses, he speaks holiday, he smells April and May. He will
carry ’t, he will carry ’t. ’Tis in his buttons he will carry ’t.

PAGE.
Not by my consent, I promise you. The gentleman is of no having. He kept
company with the wild Prince and Poins. He is of too high a region, he knows
too much. No, he shall not knit a knot in his fortunes with the finger of my
substance. If he take her, let him take her simply. The wealth I have waits on
my consent, and my consent goes not that way.

FORD.
I beseech you, heartily, some of you go home with me to dinner. Besides your
cheer, you shall have sport: I will show you a monster. Master Doctor, you
shall go; so shall you, Master Page, and you, Sir Hugh.

SHALLOW.
Well, fare you well. We shall have the freer wooing at Master Page’s.

[Exeunt Shallow and
Slender.]

CAIUS
Go home, John Rugby; I come anon.

[Exit Rugby.]

HOST
Farewell, my hearts. I will to my honest knight Falstaff, and drink canary with
him.

[Exit Host.]

FORD
[Aside.] I think I shall drink in pipe-wine first with him; I’ll make
him dance.—Will you go, gentles?

ALL.
Have with you to see this monster.

[Exeunt.]

SCENE III. A room in Ford’s house

Enter Mistress Ford and
Mistress Page.

MISTRESS FORD.
What, John! What, Robert!

MISTRESS PAGE.
Quickly, quickly! Is the buck-basket—

MISTRESS FORD.
I warrant.—What, Robin, I say!

Enter John and
Robert with a great buck-basket.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Come, come, come.

MISTRESS FORD.
Here, set it down.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Give your men the charge; we must be brief.

MISTRESS FORD.
Marry, as I told you before, John and Robert, be ready here hard by in the
brew-house; and when I suddenly call you, come forth, and, without any pause or
staggering, take this basket on your shoulders. That done, trudge with it in
all haste, and carry it among the whitsters in Datchet Mead, and there empty it
in the muddy ditch close by the Thames side.

MISTRESS PAGE.
You will do it?

MISTRESS FORD.
I ha’ told them over and over, they lack no direction.—Be gone, and come when
you are called.

[Exeunt John and
Robert.]

MISTRESS PAGE.
Here comes little Robin.

Enter Robin.

MISTRESS FORD.
How now, my eyas-musket, what news with you?

ROBIN.
My Master, Sir John, is come in at your back door, Mistress Ford, and requests
your company.

MISTRESS PAGE.
You little Jack-a-Lent, have you been true to us?

ROBIN.
Ay, I’ll be sworn. My master knows not of your being here, and hath threatened
to put me into everlasting liberty if I tell you of it; for he swears he’ll
turn me away.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Thou’rt a good boy, this secrecy of thine shall be a tailor to thee, and shall
make thee a new doublet and hose. I’ll go hide me.

MISTRESS FORD.
Do so.—Go tell thy master I am alone.

[Exit Robin.]

Mistress Page, remember you your cue.

MISTRESS PAGE.
I warrant thee. If I do not act it, hiss me.

[Exit Mistress Page.]

MISTRESS FORD.
Go to, then. We’ll use this unwholesome humidity, this gross watery pumpion;
we’ll teach him to know turtles from jays.

Enter Falstaff.

FALSTAFF.
“Have I caught thee, my heavenly jewel?” Why, now let me die, for I have lived
long enough. This is the period of my ambition. O this blessed hour!

MISTRESS FORD.
O, sweet Sir John!

FALSTAFF.
Mistress Ford, I cannot cog, I cannot prate, Mistress Ford. Now shall I sin in
my wish: I would thy husband were dead. I’ll speak it before the best lord: I
would make thee my lady.

MISTRESS FORD.
I your lady, Sir John? Alas, I should be a pitiful lady.

FALSTAFF.
Let the court of France show me such another. I see how thine eye would emulate
the diamond. Thou hast the right arched beauty of the brow that becomes the
ship-tire, the tire-valiant, or any tire of Venetian admittance.

MISTRESS FORD.
A plain kerchief, Sir John. My brows become nothing else, nor that well
neither.

FALSTAFF.
By the Lord, thou art a traitor to say so. Thou wouldst make an absolute
courtier, and the firm fixture of thy foot would give an excellent motion to
thy gait in a semi-circled farthingale. I see what thou wert, if Fortune thy
foe were not, Nature thy friend. Come, thou canst not hide it.

MISTRESS FORD.
Believe me, there’s no such thing in me.

FALSTAFF.
What made me love thee? Let that persuade thee there’s something extraordinary
in thee. Come, I cannot cog and say thou art this and that, like a many of
these lisping hawthorn buds that come like women in men’s apparel, and smell
like Bucklersbury in simple-time. I cannot. But I love thee, none but thee; and
thou deservest it.

MISTRESS FORD.
Do not betray me, sir; I fear you love Mistress Page.

FALSTAFF.
Thou mightst as well say I love to walk by the Counter gate, which is as
hateful to me as the reek of a lime-kiln.

MISTRESS FORD.
Well, heaven knows how I love you, and you shall one day find it.

FALSTAFF.
Keep in that mind, I’ll deserve it.

MISTRESS FORD.
Nay, I must tell you, so you do; or else I could not be in that mind.

Enter Robin.

ROBIN.
Mistress Ford, Mistress Ford, here’s Mistress Page at the door, sweating and
blowing and looking wildly, and would needs speak with you presently.

FALSTAFF.
She shall not see me; I will ensconce me behind the arras.

MISTRESS FORD.
Pray you, do so; she’s a very tattling woman.

[Falstaff hides himself
behind the arras.]

Enter Mistress Page.

What’s the matter? How now?

MISTRESS PAGE.
O Mistress Ford, what have you done? You’re shamed, you’re overthrown, you’re
undone for ever!

MISTRESS FORD.
What’s the matter, good Mistress Page?

MISTRESS PAGE.
O well-a-day, Mistress Ford, having an honest man to your husband, to give him
such cause of suspicion!

MISTRESS FORD.
What cause of suspicion?

MISTRESS PAGE.
What cause of suspicion? Out upon you! How am I mistook in you!

MISTRESS FORD.
Why, alas, what’s the matter?

MISTRESS PAGE.
Your husband’s coming hither, woman, with all the officers in Windsor, to
search for a gentleman that he says is here now in the house, by your consent,
to take an ill advantage of his absence. You are undone.

MISTRESS FORD.
’Tis not so, I hope.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Pray heaven it be not so, that you have such a man here! But ’tis most certain
your husband’s coming, with half Windsor at his heels, to search for such a
one. I come before to tell you. If you know yourself clear, why, I am glad of
it; but if you have a friend here, convey, convey him out. Be not amazed, call
all your senses to you; defend your reputation, or bid farewell to your good
life for ever.

MISTRESS FORD.
What shall I do? There is a gentleman, my dear friend; and I fear not mine own
shame as much as his peril. I had rather than a thousand pound he were out of
the house.

MISTRESS PAGE.
For shame! Never stand “you had rather” and “you had rather”. Your husband’s
here at hand. Bethink you of some conveyance. In the house you cannot hide him.
O, how have you deceived me! Look, here is a basket. If he be of any reasonable
stature, he may creep in here; and throw foul linen upon him, as if it were
going to bucking. Or—it is whiting-time—send him by your two men to Datchet
Mead.

MISTRESS FORD.
He’s too big to go in there. What shall I do?

FALSTAFF.
[Comes out of hiding.] Let me see ’t, let me see ’t! O, let me see ’t!
I’ll in, I’ll in. Follow your friend’s counsel. I’ll in.

MISTRESS PAGE.
What, Sir John Falstaff? Are these your letters, knight?

FALSTAFF.
I love thee, and none but thee. Help me away. Let me creep in here. I’ll never—

[He goes into the basket; they cover him with dirty clothes.]

MISTRESS PAGE.
Help to cover your master, boy.—Call your men, Mistress Ford.—You dissembling
knight!

[Exit Robin.]

MISTRESS FORD.
What, John! Robert! John!

Enter John and
Robert.

Go, take up these clothes here, quickly. Where’s the cowl-staff? Look how you
drumble! Carry them to the laundress in Datchet Mead; quickly, come.

Enter Ford, Page, Caius and
Sir Hugh Evans.

FORD.
Pray you come near. If I suspect without cause, why then make sport at me, then
let me be your jest; I deserve it.—How now? Whither bear you this?

JOHN and ROBERT.
To the laundress, forsooth.

MISTRESS FORD.
Why, what have you to do whither they bear it? You were best meddle with
buck-washing!

FORD.
Buck? I would I could wash myself of the buck! Buck, buck, buck! Ay, buck! I
warrant you, buck, and of the season too, it shall appear.

[Exeunt John and
Robert with the basket.]

Gentlemen, I have dreamed tonight; I’ll tell you my dream. Here, here, here be
my keys. Ascend my chambers, search, seek, find out. I’ll warrant we’ll
unkennel the fox. Let me stop this way first. [Locks the door.] So, now
uncape.

PAGE.
Good Master Ford, be contented: you wrong yourself too much.

FORD.
True, Master Page.—Up, gentlemen, you shall see sport anon. Follow me,
gentlemen.

[Exit Ford.]

EVANS
This is fery fantastical humours and jealousies.

CAIUS.
By gar, ’tis no the fashion of France; it is not jealous in France.

PAGE.
Nay, follow him, gentlemen; see the issue of his search.

[Exeunt Page, Evans and
Caius.]

MISTRESS PAGE.
Is there not a double excellency in this?

MISTRESS FORD.
I know not which pleases me better, that my husband is deceived, or Sir John.

MISTRESS PAGE.
What a taking was he in when your husband asked who was in the basket!

MISTRESS FORD.
I am half afraid he will have need of washing, so throwing him into the water
will do him a benefit.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Hang him, dishonest rascal! I would all of the same strain were in the same
distress.

MISTRESS FORD.
I think my husband hath some special suspicion of Falstaff’s being here, for I
never saw him so gross in his jealousy till now.

MISTRESS PAGE.
I will lay a plot to try that, and we will yet have more tricks with Falstaff.
His dissolute disease will scarce obey this medicine.

MISTRESS FORD.
Shall we send that foolish carrion Mistress Quickly to him, and excuse his
throwing into the water, and give him another hope, to betray him to another
punishment?

MISTRESS PAGE.
We will do it. Let him be sent for tomorrow eight o’clock to have amends.

Enter Ford, Page, Caius and
Sir Hugh Evans.

FORD
I cannot find him. Maybe the knave bragged of that he could not compass.

MISTRESS PAGE.
[Aside to Mistress Ford.] Heard you that?

MISTRESS FORD.
You use me well, Master Ford, do you?

FORD.
Ay, I do so.

MISTRESS FORD.
Heaven make you better than your thoughts!

FORD.
Amen!

MISTRESS PAGE.
You do yourself mighty wrong, Master Ford.

FORD.
Ay, ay; I must bear it.

EVANS.
If there be anypody in the house, and in the chambers, and in the coffers, and
in the presses, heaven forgive my sins at the day of judgment!

CAIUS.
Be gar, nor I too; there is nobodies.

PAGE.
Fie, fie, Master Ford, are you not ashamed? What spirit, what devil suggests
this imagination? I would not ha’ your distemper in this kind for the wealth of
Windsor Castle.

FORD.
’Tis my fault, Master Page. I suffer for it.

EVANS.
You suffer for a pad conscience. Your wife is as honest a ’omans as I will
desires among five thousand, and five hundred too.

CAIUS.
By gar, I see ’tis an honest woman.

FORD.
Well, I promised you a dinner. Come, come, walk in the park. I pray you pardon
me; I will hereafter make known to you why I have done this. Come, wife, come,
Mistress Page, I pray you pardon me. Pray heartily, pardon me.

PAGE.
Let’s go in, gentlemen; but, trust me, we’ll mock him. I do invite you tomorrow
morning to my house to breakfast; after, we’ll a-birding together; I have a
fine hawk for the bush. Shall it be so?

FORD.
Anything.

EVANS.
If there is one, I shall make two in the company.

CAIUS.
If there be one or two, I shall make-a the turd.

FORD.
Pray you go, Master Page.

[Exeunt all but Evans and
Caius.]

EVANS.
I pray you now, remembrance tomorrow on the lousy knave, mine host.

CAIUS.
Dat is good, by gar, with all my heart.

EVANS.
A lousy knave, to have his gibes and his mockeries!

[Exeunt.]

SCENE IV. A room in Page’s house

Enter Fenton and
Anne Page.

FENTON.
I see I cannot get thy father’s love;
Therefore no more turn me to him, sweet Nan.

ANNE.
Alas, how then?

FENTON.
Why, thou must be thyself.
He doth object I am too great of birth,
And that my state being galled with my expense,
I seek to heal it only by his wealth.
Besides these, other bars he lays before me:
My riots past, my wild societies—
And tells me ’tis a thing impossible
I should love thee but as a property.

ANNE.
Maybe he tells you true.

FENTON.
No, heaven so speed me in my time to come!
Albeit I will confess thy father’s wealth
Was the first motive that I wooed thee, Anne,
Yet, wooing thee, I found thee of more value
Than stamps in gold or sums in sealed bags.
And ’tis the very riches of thyself
That now I aim at.

ANNE.
Gentle Master Fenton,
Yet seek my father’s love, still seek it, sir.
If opportunity and humblest suit
Cannot attain it, why then—hark you hither.

[They talk apart.]

Enter Shallow, Slender and
Mistress Quickly.

SHALLOW.
Break their talk, Mistress Quickly. My kinsman shall speak for himself.

SLENDER.
I’ll make a shaft or a bolt on ’t. ’Slid, ’tis but venturing.

SHALLOW.
Be not dismayed.

SLENDER.
No, she shall not dismay me. I care not for that, but that I am afeard.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Hark ye, Master Slender would speak a word with you.

ANNE.
I come to him.
[Aside.] This is my father’s choice.
O, what a world of vile ill-favoured faults
Looks handsome in three hundred pounds a year!

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
And how does good Master Fenton? Pray you, a word with you.

[They talk aside.]

SHALLOW.
[To Slender.] She’s coming; to her, coz. O boy, thou hadst a father!

SLENDER.
I had a father, Mistress Anne; my uncle can tell you good jests of him.—Pray
you, uncle, tell Mistress Anne the jest how my father stole two geese out of a
pen, good uncle.

SHALLOW.
Mistress Anne, my cousin loves you.

SLENDER.
Ay, that I do, as well as I love any woman in Gloucestershire.

SHALLOW.
He will maintain you like a gentlewoman.

SLENDER.
Ay, that I will, come cut and long-tail, under the degree of a squire.

SHALLOW.
He will make you a hundred and fifty pounds jointure.

ANNE.
Good Master Shallow, let him woo for himself.

SHALLOW.
Marry, I thank you for it, I thank you for that good comfort.—She calls you,
coz; I’ll leave you.

ANNE.
Now, Master Slender.

SLENDER.
Now, good Mistress Anne.

ANNE.
What is your will?

SLENDER.
My will? ’Od’s heartlings, that’s a pretty jest indeed! I ne’er made my will
yet, I thank heaven. I am not such a sickly creature, I give heaven praise.

ANNE.
I mean, Master Slender, what would you with me?

SLENDER.
Truly, for mine own part I would little or nothing with you. Your father and my
uncle hath made motions. If it be my luck, so; if not, happy man be his dole.
They can tell you how things go better than I can. You may ask your father.
Here he comes.

Enter Page and
Mistress Page.

PAGE
Now, Master Slender.—Love him, daughter Anne.—
Why, how now? What does Master Fenton here?
You wrong me, sir, thus still to haunt my house.
I told you, sir, my daughter is disposed of.

FENTON.
Nay, Master Page, be not impatient.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Good Master Fenton, come not to my child.

PAGE.
She is no match for you.

FENTON.
Sir, will you hear me?

PAGE.
No, good Master Fenton.—
Come, Master Shallow; come, son Slender, in.—
Knowing my mind, you wrong me, Master Fenton.

[Exeunt Page, Shallow and
Slender.]

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Speak to Mistress Page.

FENTON.
Good Mistress Page, for that I love your daughter
In such a righteous fashion as I do,
Perforce, against all checks, rebukes, and manners,
I must advance the colours of my love
And not retire. Let me have your good will.

ANNE.
Good mother, do not marry me to yond fool.

MISTRESS PAGE.
I mean it not; I seek you a better husband.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
That’s my master, Master Doctor.

ANNE.
Alas, I had rather be set quick i’ th’ earth,
And bowled to death with turnips.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Come, trouble not yourself, good Master Fenton,
I will not be your friend, nor enemy.
My daughter will I question how she loves you,
And as I find her, so am I affected.
Till then, farewell, sir. She must needs go in;
Her father will be angry.

FENTON.
Farewell, gentle mistress. Farewell, Nan.

[Exeunt Mistress Page and
Anne.]

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
This is my doing now. “Nay,” said I, “will you cast away your child on a fool,
and a physician? Look on Master Fenton.” This is my doing.

FENTON.
I thank thee; and I pray thee, once tonight
Give my sweet Nan this ring. There’s for thy pains.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Now Heaven send thee good fortune!

[Exit Fenton.]

A kind heart he hath. A woman would run through fire and water for such a kind
heart. But yet I would my master had Mistress Anne, or I would Master Slender
had her; or, in sooth, I would Master Fenton had her. I will do what I can for
them all three, for so I have promised and I’ll be as good as my word—but
speciously for Master Fenton. Well, I must of another errand to Sir John
Falstaff from my two mistresses. What a beast am I to slack it!

[Exit.]

SCENE V. A room in the Garter Inn

Enter Falstaff.

FALSTAFF.
Bardolph, I say!

Enter Bardolph.

BARDOLPH.
Here, sir.

FALSTAFF.
Go fetch me a quart of sack; put a toast in ’t.

[Exit Bardolph.]

Have I lived to be carried in a basket like a barrow of butcher’s offal, and to
be thrown in the Thames? Well, if I be served such another trick, I’ll have my
brains ta’en out and buttered, and give them to a dog for a New Year’s gift.
’Sblood, the rogues slighted me into the river with as little remorse as they
would have drowned a blind bitch’s puppies, fifteen i’ the litter; and you may
know by my size that I have a kind of alacrity in sinking; if the bottom were
as deep as hell, I should down. I had been drowned, but that the shore was
shelvy and shallow—a death that I abhor, for the water swells a man, and what
a thing should I have been when I had been swelled! I should have been a
mountain of mummy.

Enter Bardolph with sack.

BARDOLPH
Here’s Mistress Quickly, sir, to speak with you.

FALSTAFF.
Come, let me pour in some sack to the Thames water, for my belly’s as cold as
if I had swallowed snowballs for pills to cool the reins. Call her in.

BARDOLPH.
Come in, woman.

Enter Mistress Quickly.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
By your leave, I cry you mercy. Give your worship good morrow.

FALSTAFF.
Take away these chalices. Go, brew me a pottle of sack finely.

BARDOLPH.
With eggs, sir?

FALSTAFF.
Simple of itself. I’ll no pullet sperm in my brewage.

[Exit Bardolph.]

How now?

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Marry, sir, I come to your worship from Mistress Ford.

FALSTAFF.
Mistress Ford? I have had ford enough. I was thrown into the ford, I have my
belly full of ford.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Alas the day, good heart, that was not her fault. She does so take on with her
men; they mistook their erection.

FALSTAFF.
So did I mine, to build upon a foolish woman’s promise.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
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.

FALSTAFF.
Well, I will visit her. Tell her so, and bid her think what a man is. Let her
consider his frailty, and then judge of my merit.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
I will tell her.

FALSTAFF.
Do so. Between nine and ten, sayst thou?

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Eight and nine, sir.

FALSTAFF.
Well, be gone. I will not miss her.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Peace be with you, sir.

[Exit Mistress Quickly.]

FALSTAFF.
I marvel I hear not of Master Brook; he sent me word to stay within. I like his
money well. O, here he comes.

Enter Ford disguised.

FORD
God bless you, sir.

FALSTAFF.
Now, Master Brook, you come to know what hath passed between me and Ford’s
wife?

FORD.
That indeed, Sir John, is my business.

FALSTAFF.
Master Brook, I will not lie to you. I was at her house the hour she appointed
me.

FORD.
And how sped you, sir?

FALSTAFF.
Very ill-favouredly, Master Brook.

FORD.
How so, sir? Did she change her determination?

FALSTAFF.
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?

FALSTAFF.
While I was there.

FORD.
And did he search for you, and could not find you?

FALSTAFF.
You shall hear. As good luck would have it, comes in one Mistress Page, gives
intelligence of Ford’s approach; and, in her invention and Ford’s wife’s
distraction, they conveyed me into a buck-basket.

FORD.
A buck-basket!

FALSTAFF.
By the Lord, a buck-basket! Rammed me in with foul shirts and smocks, socks,
foul stockings, greasy napkins, that, Master Brook, there was the rankest
compound of villainous smell that ever offended nostril.

FORD.
And how long lay you there?

FALSTAFF.
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 Datchet Lane. They took me on their shoulders, met the
jealous knave their master in the door, who asked them once or twice what they
had in their basket. I quaked for fear lest the lunatic knave would have
searched it; but Fate, ordaining he should be a cuckold, held his hand. Well,
on went he for a search, and away went I for foul clothes. But mark the sequel,
Master Brook. I suffered the pangs of three several deaths: first, an
intolerable fright to be detected with a jealous rotten bell-wether; next, to
be compassed like a good bilbo in the circumference of a peck, hilt to point,
heel to head; and then, to be stopped in, like a strong distillation, with
stinking clothes that fretted in their own grease. Think of that, a man of my
kidney, think of that—that am as subject to heat as butter; a man of continual
dissolution and thaw. It was a miracle to ’scape suffocation. And in the height
of this bath, when I was more than half stewed in grease, like a Dutch dish, to
be thrown into the Thames and cooled, glowing hot, in that surge, like a
horseshoe! Think of that—hissing hot—think of that, Master Brook.

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?

FALSTAFF.
Master Brook, I will be thrown into Etna, as I have been into 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.

FALSTAFF.
Is it? I will then address me to my appointment. Come to me at your convenient
leisure, and you shall know how I speed; and the conclusion shall be crowned
with your enjoying her. Adieu. You shall have her, Master Brook. Master Brook,
you shall cuckold Ford.

[Exit Falstaff.]

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 buck-baskets! Well, I will
proclaim myself what I 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 half-penny
purse, nor into a pepperbox. 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 me: I’ll be horn-mad.

[Exit.]