The Complete Works of William Shakespeare Part 354

Enter FENTON

FENTON. How now, good woman, how dost thou?

QUICKLY. The better that it pleases your good wors.h.i.+p to ask.

FENTON. What news? How does pretty Mistress Anne?

QUICKLY. In truth, sir, and she is pretty, and honest, and gentle; and one that is your friend, I can tell you that by the way; I praise heaven for it.

FENTON. Shall I do any good, think'st thou? Shall I not lose my suit?

QUICKLY. Troth, sir, all is in His hands above; but notwithstanding, Master Fenton, I'll be sworn on a book she loves you. Have not your wors.h.i.+p a wart above your eye?

FENTON. Yes, marry, have I; what of that?

QUICKLY. Well, thereby hangs a tale; good faith, it is such another Nan; but, I detest, an honest maid as ever broke bread. We had an hour's talk of that wart; I shall never laugh but in that maid's company! But, indeed, she is given too much to allicholy and musing; but for you-well, go to.

FENTON. Well, I shall see her to-day. Hold, there's money for thee; let me have thy voice in my behalf. If thou seest her before me, commend me.

QUICKLY. Will I? I' faith, that we will; and I will tell your wors.h.i.+p more of the wart the next time we have confidence; and of other wooers.

FENTON. Well, farewell; I am in great haste now.

QUICKLY. Farewell to your wors.h.i.+p. [Exit FENTON] Truly, an honest gentleman; but Anne loves him not; for I know Anne's mind as well as another does. Out upon 't, what have I forgot? Exit

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ACT II. SCENE 1.

Before PAGE'S house

Enter MISTRESS PAGE, with a letter

MRS. PAGE. What! have I scap'd 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 pick'd-with the devil's name!

-out of my conversation, that he dares in this manner a.s.say 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 reveng'd on him? for reveng'd I will be, as sure as his guts are made of puddings.

Enter MISTRESS FORD

MRS. FORD. Mistress Page! trust me, I was going to your house.

MRS. PAGE. And, trust me, I was coming to you. You look very ill.

MRS. FORD. Nay, I'll ne'er believe that; I have to show to the contrary.

MRS. PAGE. Faith, but you do, in my mind.

MRS. FORD. Well, I do, then; yet, I say, I could show you to the contrary. O Mistress Page, give me some counsel.

MRS. PAGE. What's the matter, woman?

MRS. FORD. O woman, if it were not for one trifling respect, I could come to such honour!

MRS. PAGE. Hang the trifle, woman; take the honour. What is it? Dispense with trifles; what is it?

MRS. FORD. If I would but go to h.e.l.l for an eternal moment or so, I could be knighted.

MRS. PAGE. What? Thou liest. Sir Alice Ford! These knights will hack; and so thou shouldst not alter the article of thy gentry.

MRS. 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; prais'd 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, ash.o.r.e 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 l.u.s.t have melted him in his own grease.

Did you ever hear the like?

MRS. 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 s.p.a.ce 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.

MRS. FORD. Why, this is the very same; the very hand, the very words. What doth he think of us?

MRS. 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.

MRS. FORD. 'Boarding' call you it? I'll be sure to keep him above deck.

MRS. PAGE. So will I; if he come under my hatches, I'll never to sea again. Let's be reveng'd 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 p.a.w.n'd his horses to mine host of the Garter.

MRS. 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.

MRS. 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.

MRS. FORD. You are the happier woman.

MRS. 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 humour'd 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; and there's the humour of it. Adieu. Exit Nym PAGE. 'The humour of it,' quoth 'a! Here's a fellow frights English out of his wits.

FORD. I will seek out Falstaff.

PAGE. I never heard such a drawling, affecting rogue.

FORD. If I do find it-well.

PAGE. I will not believe such a Cataian though the priest o'

th' town commended him for a true man.

FORD. 'Twas a good sensible fellow. Well.

MISTRESS PAGE and MISTRESS FORD come forward

PAGE. How now, Meg!

MRS. PAGE. Whither go you, George? Hark you.

MRS. FORD. How now, sweet Frank, why art thou melancholy?

FORD. I melancholy! I am not melancholy. Get you home; go.

MRS. FORD. Faith, thou hast some crotchets in thy head now.

Will you go, Mistress Page?

Enter MISTRESS QUICKLY

MRS. PAGE. Have with you. You'll come to dinner, George?

[Aside to MRS. FORD] Look who comes yonder; she shall be our messenger to this paltry knight.