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

ACT IV

SCENE I. The street

Enter Mistress Page, Mistress Quickly and
William.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Is he at Master Ford’s already, think’st thou?

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
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.

MISTRESS 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, I see.

Enter Sir Hugh Evans.

How now, Sir Hugh, no school today?

EVANS.
No, Master Slender is let the boys leave to play.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Blessing of his heart!

MISTRESS PAGE.
Sir Hugh, my husband says my son profits nothing in the world at his book. I
pray you ask him some questions in his accidence.

EVANS.
Come hither, William. Hold up your head, come.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Come on, sirrah. Hold up your head. Answer your master, be not afraid.

EVANS.
William, how many numbers is in nouns?

WILLIAM.
Two.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Truly, I thought there had been one number more, because they say “’Od’s
nouns.”

EVANS.
Peace your tattlings! What is “fair,” William?

WILLIAM.
Pulcher.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Polecats? There are fairer things than polecats, sure.

EVANS.
You are a very simplicity ’oman; I pray you, peace.—What is lapis,
William?

WILLIAM.
A stone.

EVANS.
And what is “a stone,” William?

WILLIAM.
A pebble.

EVANS.
No, it is lapis. I pray you remember in your prain.

WILLIAM.
Lapis.

EVANS.
That is a good William. What is he, William, that does lend articles?

WILLIAM.
Articles are borrowed of the pronoun, and be thus declined: singulariter,
nominativo, hic, haec, hoc.

EVANS.
Nominativo, hig, haeg, hog, pray you, mark: genitivo, huius. Well,
what is your accusative case?

WILLIAM.
Accusativo, hinc.

EVANS.
I pray you, have your remembrance, child. Accusativo, hung, hang, hog.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
“Hang-hog” is Latin for bacon, I warrant you.

EVANS.
Leave your prabbles, ’oman.—What is the focative case, William?

WILLIAM.
O—vocativo—O—

EVANS.
Remember, William; focative is caret.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
And that’s a good root.

EVANS.
’Oman, forbear.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Peace.

EVANS.
What is your genitive case plural, William?

WILLIAM.
Genitive case?

EVANS.
Ay.

WILLIAM.
Genitive: horum, harum, horum.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Vengeance of Jenny’s case, fie on her! Never name her, child, if she be a
whore.

EVANS.
For shame, ’oman.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
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 “whore ’m”!—Fie upon
you!

EVANS.
’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.

MISTRESS PAGE.
[To Quickly.] Prithee, hold thy peace.

EVANS.
Show me now, William, some declensions of your pronouns.

WILLIAM.
Forsooth, I have forgot.

EVANS.
It is qui, quae, quod. If you forget your quis, your quaes,
and your quods, you must be preeches. Go your ways and play, go.

MISTRESS PAGE.
He is a better scholar than I thought he was.

EVANS.
He is a good sprag memory. Farewell, Mistress Page.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Adieu, good Sir Hugh.

[Exit Sir Hugh Evans.]

Get you home, boy. Come, we stay too long.

[Exeunt.]

SCENE II. A room in Ford’s house

Enter Falstaff and
Mistress Ford.

FALSTAFF.
Mistress Ford, your sorrow hath eaten up my sufferance. I see you are
obsequious in your love, and I profess requital to a hair’s breadth, not only,
Mistress Ford, in the simple office of love, but in all the accoutrement,
compliment, and ceremony of it. But are you sure of your husband now?

MISTRESS FORD.
He’s a-birding, sweet Sir John.

MISTRESS PAGE.
[Within.] What ho, gossip Ford, what ho!

MISTRESS FORD.
Step into the chamber, Sir John.

[Exit Falstaff.]

Enter Mistress Page.

MISTRESS PAGE.
How now, sweetheart, who’s at home besides yourself?

MISTRESS FORD.
Why, none but mine own people.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Indeed?

MISTRESS FORD.
No, certainly.
[Aside to her.] Speak louder.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Truly, I am so glad you have nobody here.

MISTRESS FORD.
Why?

MISTRESS 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 complexion soever, and so buffets himself on the forehead,
crying “Peer out, peer out!” that any madness I ever yet beheld seemed but
tameness, civility, and patience, to this his distemper he is in now. I am glad
the fat knight is not here.

MISTRESS FORD.
Why, does he talk of him?

MISTRESS PAGE.
Of none but him, and swears he was carried out, the last time he searched for
him, in a basket; protests to my husband he is now here; and hath drawn him and
the rest of their company from their sport, to make another experiment of his
suspicion. But I am glad the knight is not here. Now he shall see his own
foolery.

MISTRESS FORD.
How near is he, Mistress Page?

MISTRESS PAGE.
Hard by, at street end. He will be here anon.

MISTRESS FORD.
I am undone! The knight is here.

MISTRESS 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.

MISTRESS FORD.
Which way should he go? How should I bestow him? Shall I put him into the
basket again?

Enter Falstaff.

FALSTAFF.
No, I’ll come no more i’ the basket. May I not go out ere he come?

MISTRESS 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?

FALSTAFF.
What shall I do? I’ll creep up into the chimney.

MISTRESS FORD.
There they always use to discharge their birding-pieces.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Creep into the kiln-hole.

FALSTAFF.
Where is it?

MISTRESS FORD.
He will seek there, on my word. Neither press, coffer, chest, trunk, well,
vault, but he hath an abstract for the remembrance of such places, and goes to
them by his note. There is no hiding you in the house.

FALSTAFF.
I’ll go out then.

MISTRESS PAGE.
If you go out in your own semblance, you die, Sir John—unless you go out
disguised.

MISTRESS FORD.
How might we disguise him?

MISTRESS 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.

FALSTAFF.
Good hearts, devise something. Any extremity rather than a mischief.

MISTRESS FORD.
My maid’s aunt, the fat woman of Brentford, has a gown above.

MISTRESS PAGE.
On my word, it will serve him. She’s as big as he is. And there’s her thrummed
hat, and her muffler too.—Run up, Sir John.

MISTRESS FORD.
Go, go, sweet Sir John. Mistress Page and I will look some linen for your head.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Quick, quick! We’ll come dress you straight; put on the gown the while.

[Exit Falstaff.]

MISTRESS FORD.
I would my husband would meet him in this shape. He cannot abide the old woman
of Brentford; he swears she’s a witch, forbade her my house, and hath
threatened to beat her.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Heaven guide him to thy husband’s cudgel and the devil guide his cudgel
afterwards!

MISTRESS FORD.
But is my husband coming?

MISTRESS PAGE.
Ay, in good sadness is he, and talks of the basket too, howsoever he hath had
intelligence.

MISTRESS 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.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Nay, but he’ll be here presently. Let’s go dress him like the witch of
Brentford.

MISTRESS FORD.
I’ll first direct my men what they shall do with the basket. Go up, I’ll bring
linen for him straight.

[Exit Mistress Ford.]

MISTRESS PAGE.
Hang him, dishonest varlet! We cannot misuse him enough.
We’ll leave a proof, by that which we will do,
Wives may be merry and yet honest too.
We do not act that often jest and laugh;
’Tis old but true: “Still swine eats all the draff.”

[Exit.]

Enter Mistress Ford with
John and Robert.

MISTRESS FORD.
Go, sirs, take the basket again on your shoulders. Your master is hard at door;
if he bid you set it down, obey him. Quickly, dispatch.

[Exit Mistress Ford.]

JOHN.
Come, come, take it up.

ROBERT.
Pray heaven it be not full of knight again.

JOHN.
I hope not, I had lief as bear so much lead.

Enter Ford, Page, Shallow, Caius and
Sir Hugh Evans.

FORD
Ay, but if it prove true, Master Page, have you any way then to unfool me
again?—Set down the basket, villain! Somebody call my wife. Youth in a basket!
O you panderly rascals! There’s a knot, a gin, 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.

EVANS.
Why, this is lunatics, this is mad as a mad dog.

SHALLOW.
Indeed, Master Ford, this is not well, indeed.

FORD.
So say I too, sir.

Enter Mistress Ford.

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?

MISTRESS FORD.
Heaven be my witness you do, if you suspect me in any dishonesty.

FORD.
Well said, brazen-face, hold it out.—Come forth, sirrah.

[Pulls clothes out of the basket.]

PAGE.
This passes.

MISTRESS FORD.
Are you not ashamed? Let the clothes alone.

FORD.
I shall find you anon.

EVANS.
’Tis unreasonable. Will you take up your wife’s clothes? Come, away.

FORD.
Empty the basket, I say.

MISTRESS FORD.
Why, man, why?

FORD.
Master Page, as I am a man, there was one conveyed out of my house yesterday in
this basket. Why may not he be there again? In my house I am sure he is. My
intelligence is true, my jealousy is reasonable.—Pluck me out all the linen.

MISTRESS FORD.
If you find a man there, he shall die a flea’s death.

PAGE.
Here’s no man.

SHALLOW.
By my fidelity, this is not well, Master Ford, this wrongs you.

EVANS.
Master Ford, you must pray, and not follow the imaginations of your own heart.
This is jealousies.

FORD.
Well, he’s not here I seek for.

PAGE.
No, nor nowhere 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.

[Exeunt John and
Robert with the basket.]

MISTRESS FORD.
What, ho, Mistress Page! Come you and the old woman down; my husband will come
into the chamber.

FORD.
Old woman? What old woman’s that?

MISTRESS 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? 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!

MISTRESS FORD.
Nay, good sweet husband!—Good gentlemen, let him not strike the old woman.

Enter Falstaff disguised as an old woman, led by
Mistress Page.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Come, Mother Prat; come, give me your hand.

FORD.
I’ll prat her. [Beats him.] Out of my door, you witch, you rag, you
baggage, you polecat, you runnion! Out, out! I’ll conjure you, I’ll fortune-tell
you.

[Exit Falstaff.]

MISTRESS PAGE.
Are you not ashamed? I think you have killed the poor woman.

MISTRESS FORD.
Nay, he will do it. ’Tis a goodly credit for you.

FORD.
Hang her, witch!

EVANS.
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 Ford, Page, Caius, Evans and
Shallow.]

MISTRESS PAGE.
Trust me, he beat him most pitifully.

MISTRESS FORD.
Nay, by th’ mass, that he did not; he beat him most unpitifully, methought.

MISTRESS PAGE.
I’ll have the cudgel hallowed and hung o’er the altar. It hath done meritorious
service.

MISTRESS FORD.
What think you? May we, with the warrant of womanhood and the witness of a good
conscience, pursue him with any further revenge?

MISTRESS PAGE.
The spirit of wantonness is sure scared out of him. If the devil have him not
in fee-simple, with fine and recovery, he will never, I think, in the way of
waste, attempt us again.

MISTRESS FORD.
Shall we tell our husbands how we have served him?

MISTRESS 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.

MISTRESS FORD.
I’ll warrant they’ll have him publicly shamed, and methinks there would be no
period to the jest should he not be publicly shamed.

MISTRESS 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.

BARDOLPH.
Sir, the Germans desire to have three of your horses. The Duke himself will be
tomorrow at court, and they are going to meet him.

HOST.
What duke should that be comes so secretly? I hear not of him in the court. Let
me speak with the gentlemen. They speak English?

BARDOLPH.
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, Mistress Page, Mistress Ford
and Sir Hugh Evans.

EVANS.
’Tis one of the best discretions of a ’oman as ever I did look upon.

PAGE.
And did he send you both these letters at an instant?

MISTRESS PAGE.
Within a quarter of an hour.

FORD.
Pardon me, wife. Henceforth, do what thou wilt.
I rather will suspect the sun with cold
Than thee with wantonness. Now doth thy honour stand,
In him that was of late an heretic,
As firm as faith.

PAGE.
’Tis well, ’tis well, no more.
Be not as extreme in submission as in offence.
But let our plot go forward. Let our wives
Yet once again, to make us public sport,
Appoint a meeting with this old fat fellow,
Where we may take him and disgrace him for it.

FORD.
There is no better way than that they spoke of.

PAGE.
How? To send him word they’ll meet him in the park at midnight? Fie, fie, he’ll
never come.

EVANS.
You say he has been thrown in 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.

MISTRESS FORD.
Devise but how you’ll use him when he comes,
And let us two devise to bring him thither.

MISTRESS PAGE.
There is an old tale goes that Herne the hunter,
Sometime a keeper here in Windsor Forest,
Doth all the winter time, at still midnight,
Walk round about an oak, with great ragged horns,
And there he blasts the tree, and takes the cattle,
And makes milch-kine yield blood, and shakes a chain
In a most hideous and dreadful manner.
You have heard of such a spirit, and well you know
The superstitious idle-headed eld
Received and did deliver to our age,
This tale of Herne the hunter for a truth.

PAGE.
Why, yet there want not many that do fear
In deep of night to walk by this Herne’s oak.
But what of this?

MISTRESS FORD.
Marry, this is our device,
That Falstaff at that oak shall meet with us,
Disguised like Herne, with huge horns on his head.

PAGE.
Well, let it not be doubted but he’ll come,
And in this shape; when you have brought him thither,
What shall be done with him? What is your plot?

MISTRESS PAGE.
That likewise have we thought upon, and thus:
Nan Page my daughter, and my little son,
And three or four more of their growth, we’ll dress
Like urchins, oafs and fairies, green and white,
With rounds of waxen tapers on their heads
And rattles in their hands. Upon a sudden,
As Falstaff, she, and I are newly met,
Let them from forth a sawpit rush at once
With some diffused song; upon their sight
We two in great amazedness will fly.
Then let them all encircle him about,
And fairy-like, to pinch the unclean knight,
And ask him why, that hour of fairy revel,
In their so sacred paths he dares to tread
In shape profane.

MISTRESS FORD.
And till he tell the truth,
Let the supposed fairies pinch him sound
And burn him with their tapers.

MISTRESS PAGE.
The truth being known,
We’ll all present ourselves, dis-horn the spirit,
And mock him home to Windsor.

FORD.
The children must
Be practised well to this, or they’ll ne’er do ’t.

EVANS.
I will teach the children their behaviours, and I will be like a jackanapes
also, to burn the knight with my taber.

FORD.
That will be excellent. I’ll go buy them vizards.

MISTRESS 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.
[Aside.] And in that time
Shall Master Slender steal my Nan away,
And marry her at Eton.—Go, send to Falstaff straight.

FORD.
Nay, I’ll to him again in name of Brook.
He’ll tell me all his purpose. Sure, he’ll come.

MISTRESS PAGE.
Fear not you that. Go, get us properties
And tricking for our fairies.

EVANS.
Let us about it. It is admirable pleasures and fery honest knaveries.

[Exeunt Page, Ford and
Evans.]

MISTRESS PAGE.
Go, Mistress Ford.
Send quickly to Sir John to know his mind.

[Exit Mistress Ford.]

I’ll to the Doctor. He hath my good will,
And none but he, to marry with Nan Page.
That Slender, though well landed, is an idiot,
And he my husband best of all affects.
The Doctor is well moneyed, and his friends
Potent at court. He, none but he, shall have her,
Though twenty thousand worthier come to crave her.

[Exit.]

SCENE V. A room in the Garter Inn

Enter Host and
Simple.

HOST.
What wouldst thou have, boor? What, thick-skin? Speak, breathe, discuss; brief,
short, quick, snap.

SIMPLE.
Marry, sir, I come to speak with Sir John Falstaff from Master Slender.

HOST.
There’s his chamber, his house, his castle, his standing-bed and truckle-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.

SIMPLE.
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.

FALSTAFF.
[Above.] How now, mine host?

HOST.
Here’s a Bohemian-Tartar tarries the coming down of thy fat woman. Let her
descend, bully, let her descend. My chambers are honourable. Fie! Privacy? Fie!

Enter Falstaff.

FALSTAFF.
There was, mine host, an old fat woman even now with me, but she’s gone.

SIMPLE.
Pray you, sir, was’t not the wise woman of Brentford?

FALSTAFF.
Ay, marry was it, mussel-shell. What would you with her?

SIMPLE.
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.

FALSTAFF.
I spake with the old woman about it.

SIMPLE.
And what says she, I pray, sir?

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

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

FALSTAFF.
What are they? Let us know.

HOST.
Ay, come. Quick.

SIMPLE.
I may not conceal them, sir.

FALSTAFF.
Conceal them, or thou diest.

SIMPLE.
Why, sir, they were nothing but about Mistress Anne Page, to know if it were my
master’s fortune to have her or no.

FALSTAFF.
’Tis, ’tis his fortune.

SIMPLE.
What sir?

FALSTAFF.
To have her, or no. Go, say the woman told me so.

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

FALSTAFF.
Ay, sir; like who more bold?

SIMPLE.
I thank your worship; I shall make my master glad with these tidings.

[Exit Simple.]

HOST
Thou art clerkly, thou art clerkly, Sir John. Was there a wise woman with thee?

FALSTAFF.
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.

BARDOLPH
Out, alas, sir, cozenage, mere cozenage!

HOST.
Where be my horses? Speak well of them, varletto.

BARDOLPH.
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 German devils, three Doctor Faustuses.

HOST.
They are gone but to meet the Duke, villain, do not say they be fled. Germans
are honest men.

Enter Sir Hugh Evans.

EVANS
Where is mine host?

HOST.
What is the matter, sir?

EVANS.
Have a care of your entertainments. There is a friend of mine come to town
tells me there is three cozen-Germans that has cozened all the hosts of
Readings, of Maidenhead, of Colebrook, of horses and money. I tell you for good
will, look you. You are wise, and full of gibes and vlouting-stocks, and ’tis
not convenient you should be cozened. Fare you well.

[Exit Evans.]

Enter Doctor Caius.

CAIUS.
Vere is mine host de Jarteer?

HOST.
Here, Master Doctor, in perplexity and doubtful dilemma.

CAIUS.
I cannot tell vat is dat, but it is tell-a me dat you make grand preparation
for a Duke de Jamany. By my trot, dere is no duke that the court is know to
come. I tell you for good will. Adieu.

[Exit Doctor Caius.]

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.]

FALSTAFF.
I would all the world might be cozened, for I have been cozened and beaten too.
If it should come to the ear of the court how I have been transformed, and how
my transformation hath been washed and cudgelled, they would melt me out of my
fat drop by drop, and liquor fishermen’s boots with me. I warrant they would
whip me with their fine wits till I were as crestfallen as a dried pear. I
never prospered since I forswore myself at primero. Well, if my wind were but
long enough, I would repent.

Enter Mistress Quickly.

Now, whence come you?

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
From the two parties, forsooth.

FALSTAFF.
The devil take one party and his dam the other, and so they shall be both
bestowed. I have suffered more for their sakes, more than the villainous
inconstancy of man’s disposition is able to bear.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
And have not they suffered? Yes, I warrant, speciously one of them. Mistress
Ford, good heart, is beaten black and blue, that you cannot see a white spot
about her.

FALSTAFF.
What tellst thou me of black and blue? I was beaten myself into all the
colours of the rainbow, and was like to be apprehended for the witch of
Brentford. But that my admirable dexterity of wit, my counterfeiting the action
of an old woman, delivered me, the knave constable had set me i’ the stocks, i’
the common stocks, for a witch.

MISTRESS QUICKLY.
Sir, let me speak with you in your chamber, you shall hear how things go, and,
I warrant, to your content. Here is a letter will say somewhat. Good hearts,
what ado here is to bring you together! Sure, one of you does not serve heaven
well, that you are so crossed.

FALSTAFF.
Come up into my chamber.

[Exeunt.]

SCENE VI. Another room in the Garter Inn

Enter Fenton and
Host.

HOST.
Master Fenton, talk not to me. My mind is heavy. I will give over all.

FENTON.
Yet hear me speak. Assist me in my purpose,
And, as I am a gentleman, I’ll give thee
A hundred pound in gold more than your loss.

HOST.
I will hear you, Master Fenton, and I will, at the least, keep your counsel.

FENTON.
From time to time I have acquainted you
With the dear love I bear to fair Anne Page,
Who mutually hath answered my affection,
So far forth as herself might be her chooser,
Even to my wish. I have 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
I’ll show you here at large. Hark, good mine host:
Tonight at Herne’s oak, just ’twixt twelve and one,
Must my sweet Nan present the Fairy Queen—
The purpose why is here—in which disguise,
While other jests are something rank on foot,
Her father hath commanded her to slip
Away with Slender, and with him at Eton
Immediately to marry. She hath consented. Now, sir,
Her mother, even strong against that match
And firm for Doctor Caius, hath appointed
That he shall likewise shuffle her away,
While other sports are tasking of their minds,
And at the dean’ry, 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,
She shall go with him. Her mother hath intended
The better to denote her to the doctor,
For they must all be masked and vizarded—
That quaint in green she shall be loose enrobed,
With ribbons pendant flaring ’bout her head;
And when the doctor spies his vantage ripe,
To pinch her by the hand, and on that token
The maid hath given consent to go with him.

HOST.
Which means she to deceive, father or mother?

FENTON.
Both, my good host, to go along with me.
And here it rests, that you’ll procure the vicar
To stay for me at church, ’twixt twelve and one,
And, in the lawful name of marrying,
To give our hearts united ceremony.

HOST.
Well, husband your device; I’ll to the vicar.
Bring you the maid, you shall not lack a priest.

FENTON.
So shall I evermore be bound to thee;
Besides, I’ll make a present recompense.

[Exeunt.]