Part 130

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._]

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.