word to your master that I am yet come to town: there's for your silence.

Bard. I have no tongue, sir.

Page. And for mine, sir, I will govern it.

P. Hen. Fare ye well; go.-[Exeunt BARDOLPH, and Page.]-This Doll Tear-sheet should be some road.

Poins. I warrant you, as common as the way between Saint Alban's and London.

P. Hen. How might we see Falstaff bestow himself to-night in his true colours, and not ourselves be seen?

Poins. Put on two leathern jerkins, and aprons, and wait upon him at his table as drawers.

P. Hen. From a god to a bull? a heavy descension! it was Jove's case. From a prince to a pren

tice? a low transformation! that shall be mine; for in every thing the purpose must weigh with the folly. Follow me, Ned. [Exeunt.

SCENE III.-Warkworth. Before the Castle. Enter NORTHUMBERLAND, Lady NORTHUMBERLAND, and Lady PERCY.

North. I pray thee, loving wife and gentle daughter,

Give even way unto my rough affairs:
Put not you on the visage of the times,
And be like them to Percy troublesome.

Lady N. I have given over, I will speak no

North. Alas, sweet wife, my honour is at pawn, And, but my going, nothing can redeem it. Lady P. O, yet, for God's sake, go not to these wars!

The time was, father, that you broke your word,
When you were more endear'd to it than now;
When your own Percy, when my heart-dear
Harry,

Threw many a northward look, to see his father
Bring up his powers; but he did long in vain.
Who then persuaded you to stay at home?
There were two honours lost, yours, and your

son's:

For yours,-may heavenly glory brighten it!
For his, it stuck upon him, as the sun

In the grey vault of heaven: and, by his light,
Did all the chivalry of England move

To do brave acts: he was, indeed, the glass
Wherein the noble youth did dress themselves.
He had no legs, that practised not his gait;

And speaking thick, which nature made his blemish,
Became the accents of the valiant;

For those that could speak low, and tardily,
Would turn their own perfection to abuse,

To seem like him: so that, in speech, in gait,
In diet, in affections of delight,

In military rules, humours of blood,

He was the mark and glass, copy and book,

That fashion'd others. And him,-O wondrous

him!

O miracle of men!-him did you leave,

(Second to none, unseconded by you,)
To look upon the hideous god of war
In disadvantage; to abide a field,

Where nothing but the sound of Hotspur's name
Did seem defensible :-so you left him.
Never, O! never, do his ghost the wrong,
To hold your honour more precise and nice
With others, than with him: let them alone.
The marshal, and the archbishop, are strong:
Had my sweet Harry had but half their numbers,
To-day might I, hanging on Hotspur's neck,
Have talk'd of Monmouth's grave.

North.

Beshrew your heart, Fair daughter! you do draw my spirits from me, With new lamenting ancient oversights.

But I must go, and meet with danger there,
Or it will seek me in another place,
And find me worse provided.

Lady N.

O! fly to Scotland.

Till that the nobles, and the armed commons,
Have of their puissance made a little taste.

Lady P. If they get ground and vantage of the king,

Then join you with them, like a rib of steel,
To make strength stronger; but, for all our loves,
First let them try themselves. So did your son;
He was so suffer'd; so came I a widow,
And never shall have length of life enough,
To rain upon remembrance with mine eyes,
That it may grow and sprout as high as heaven,
For recordation to my noble husband.

North. Come, come, go in with me. 'Tis with my mind,

As with the tide swell'd up unto its height,
That makes a still-stand, running neither way:
Fain would I go to meet the archbishop,
But many thousand reasons hold me back.-
I will resolve for Scotland: there am I,
Till time and vantage crave my company.

[Exeunt.

SCENE IV.-London. A Room in the Boar's Head Tavern, in Eastcheap.

Enter two Drawers.

1 Draw. What the devil hast thou brought there! apple-Johns? thou know'st sir John cannot endure an apple-John.

2 Draw. Mass, thou sayest true. The prince once set a dish of apple-Johns before him, and told him, there were five more sir Johns; and, putting off his hat, said, "I will now take my leave of these six dry, round, old, withered knights." It angered him to the heart, but he hath forgot that.

1 Draw. Why then, cover, and set them down. and see if thou canst find out Sneak's noise; mistress Tear-sheet would fain hear some music. Dispatch :-the room where they supped is too hot; they'll come in straight.

2 Draw. Sirrah, here will be the prince, and master Poins anon; and they will put on two of our jerkins and aprons, and sir John must not know of it: Bardolph hath brought word.

1 Draw. By the mass, here will be old utis: it will be an excellent stratagem.

2 Draw. I'll see, if I can find out Sneak. [Exit.

Enter Hostess, and DOLL TEar-sheet. Host. I' faith, sweet heart, methinks now, you are in an excellent good temperality: your pulsidge beats as extraordinarily as heart would desire, and your colour, I warrant you, is as red as any rose: but, i' faith, you have drunk too much canaries, and that's a marvellous searching wine, and it perfumes the blood ere one can say,—What's this? do you now?

How

Dol. Better than I was. Hem. Host. Why, that's well said; a good heart's worth gold. Lo! here comes sir John. Enter FALSTAFf, singing.

Fal. "When Arthur first in court"-Empty the jordan." And was a worthy king."

How now, mistress Doll?

[Exit Drawer.

Host. Sick of a calm: yea, good sooth.

Fal. So is all her sect; an they be once in a calm, they are sick.

Dol. You muddy rascal, is that all the comfort you give me?

Fal. You make fat rascals, mistress Doll.

Dol. I make them! gluttony and diseases make them; I make them not.

Fal. If the cook help to make the gluttony, you help to make the diseases, Doll: we catch of you. Doll, we catch of you; grant that, my poor virtue, grant that.

Dol. Yea, joy; our chains, and our jewels.

Fal. "Your brooches, pearls, and owches:"for to serve bravely, is to come halting off, you know to come off the breach with his pike bent bravely, and to surgery bravely; to venture upon the charged chambers bravely :

Dol. Hang yourself, you muddy conger, hang yourself!

Host. By my troth, this is the old fashion: you two never meet, but you fall to some discord. You are both, in good troth, as rheumatic as two dry toasts; you cannot one bear with another's confirmities. What the good year! one must bear, and that must be you: you are the weaker vessel; as they say, the emptier vessel.

Dol. Can a weak empty vessel bear such a huge full hogshead? there's a whole merchant's venture of Bourdeaux stuff in him: you have not seen a hulk better stuffed in the hold.-Come, I'll be friends with thee, Jack: thou art going to the wars; and whether I shall ever see thee again, or no, there is nobody cares.

Re-enter Drawer.

Draw. Sir, ancient Pistol's below, and would speak with you.

Dol. Hang him, swaggering rascal! let him not come hither: it is the foul mouth'dst rogue in England.

Host. If he swagger, let him not come here: no, by my faith; I must live amongst my neighbours; I'll no swaggerers. I am in good name and fame with the very best.-Shut the door;-there comes no swaggerers here: I have not lived all this while, to have swaggering now.-Shut the door, I pray you. Fal. Dost thou hear, hostess ?

Host. Pray you, pacify yourself, sir John: there comes no swaggerers here.

Fal. Dost thou hear? it is mine ancient.

Host. Tilly-valley, sir John, never tell me : your ancient swaggerer comes not in my doors. I was before master Tisick, the deputy, t'other day; and, as he said to me,—it was no longer ago than Wednesday last,-"Neighbour Quickly," says he;— master Dumb, our minister, was by then;

Neighbour Quickly," says he, "receive those that are civil; for," said he, "you are in an ill name:"-now, he said so, I can tell whereupon;

for," says he, "you are an honest woman, and well thought on; therefore take heed what guests you receive receive," says he, "no swaggering companions."-There comes none here:-you would bless you to hear what he said.-No, I'll no

swaggerers.

Fal. He's no swaggerer, hostess; a tame cheater, i' faith; you may stroke him as gently as a puppy greyhound: he will not swagger with a Barbary hen, if her feathers turn back in any show of resistance.-Call him up, drawer.

Host. Cheater, call you him? I will bar no honest man my house, nor no cheater; but I do not love swaggering: by my troth, I am the worse, when one says-swagger. Feel, masters, how I shake; look you, I warrant you.

Dol. So you do, hostess.

Host. Do I? yea, in very truth do I, an 'twere an aspen leaf. I cannot abide swaggerers.

Enter PISTOL, BARDOLPH, and Page. Pist. God save you, sir John!

Fal. Welcome, ancient Pistol. Here, Pistol, I charge you with a cup of sack: do you discharge upon mine hostess.

Pist. I will discharge upon her, sir John, with two bullets.

Fal. She is pistol-proof, sir; you shall hardly offend her.

Host. Come, I'll drink no proofs, nor no bullets. I'll drink no more than will do me good, for no man's pleasure, I.

Pist. Then to you, mistress Dorothy: I will charge you.

Dol. Charge me? I scorn you, scurvy companion. What! you poor, base, rascally, cheating, lack-linen mate! Away, you mouldy rogue, away! I am meat for your master.

Pist. I know you, mistress Dorothy.

Dol. Away, you cut-purse rascal! you filthy bung, away! By this wine, I'll thrust my knife in your mouldy chaps, an you play the saucy cuttle with me. Away, you bottle-ale rascal! you basket-hilt stale juggler, you!-Since when, I pray you, sir?-God's light! with two points on your shoulder? much!

Pist. I will murder your ruff for this.

Fal. No more, Pistol: I would not have you go off here. Discharge yourself of our company, Pistol.

Host. No, good captain Pistol; not here, sweet captain.

Dol. Captain! thou abominable damned cheater, art thou not ashamed to be called captain? An captains were of my mind, they would truncheon you out, for taking their names upon you before you have earned them. You a captain, you slave! for what? for tearing a poor whore's ruff in a bawdyhouse?-He a captain! Hang him, rogue! He lives upon mouldy stew'd prunes, and dried cakes. A captain! these villains will make the word captain as odious as the word "occupy," which was an excellent good word before it was ill sorted: therefore captains had need look to't.

Bard. Pray thee, go down, good ancient. Fal. Hark thee hither, mistress Doll. Pist. Not I: I tell thee what, corporal Bardolph; I could tear her.-I'll be revenged of her. Page. Pray thee, go down.

Pist. I'll see her damned first ;-to Pluto's damned lake, by this hand, to the infernal deep, with Erebus and tortures vile also. Hold hook and line, say I. Down! down, dogs! down faitors! Have we not Hiren here?

Host. Good captain Peesel, be quiet; it is very late, i' faith. I beseek you now, aggravate your

choler.

Pist. These be good humours, indeed! Shall pack-horses,

And hollow pamper'd jades of Asia,
Which cannot go but thirty miles a day,
Compare with Cæsars, and with Cannibals,

And Trojan Greeks? nay, rather damn them with
King Cerberus, and let the welkin roar.
Shall we fall foul for toys?

Host. By my troth, captain, these are very bitter words.

Bard. Begone, good ancient: this will grow to a brawl anon.

Pist. Die men, like dogs; give crowns like pins. Have we not Hiren here?

Host. On my word, captain, there's none such here. What the goodyear! do you think I would deny her? for God's sake, be quiet.

Pist. Then feed, and be fat, my fair Calipolis. Come, give's some sack.

Si fortune me tormente, sperato me contento.Fear we broadsides? no, let the fiend give fire: Give me some sack; and, sweetheart, lie thou there. [Laying down his sword. Come we to full points here, and are et cetera's nothing?

Fal. Pistol, I would be quiet.

Pist. Sweet knight, I kiss thy neif. What! we have seen the seven stars.

Dol. For God's sake, thrust him down stairs: I cannot endure such a fustian rascal.

Pist. Thrust him down stairs! know we not Galloway nags ?

gone. you.

Host. Are you not hurt i' the groin? methought he made a shrewd thrust at your belly.

Dol. Ah, you sweet little rogue, you! Alas, poor ape, how thou sweat'st! Come, let me wipe

rogue! i' faith, I love thee. Thou art as valorous as Hector of Troy, worth five of Agamemnon, and ten times better than the nine worthies. Ah, villain! Fal. A rascally slave! I will toss the rogue in a blanket.

Dol. Do, if thou darest for thy heart: if thou dost, I'll canvass thee between a pair of sheets. Enter Music.

Page. The music is come, sir.

Fal. Let them play.-Play, sirs.-Sit on my

knee, Doll.-A rascal bragging slave! the rogue fled from me like quicksilver.

Dol. I' faith, and thou followedst him like a church. Thou whoreson little tidy Bartholomew boar-big, when wilt thou leave fighting o' days, and foining o' nights, and begin to patch up thine old body for heaven?

Enter behind, Prince HENRY, and POINS, disguised like Drawers.

Fal. Peace, good Doll! do not speak like a death's head do not bid me remember mine end. Dol. Sirrah, what humour is the prince of? Fal. A good shallow young fellow he would have made a good pantler, he would have chipped bread well.

Dol. They say, Poins has a good wit.

Fal. He a good wit? hang him, baboon! his wit is as thick as Tewksbury mustard: there is no more conceit in him, than is in a mallet.

Dol. Why does the prince love him so then? Fal. Because their legs are both of a bigness; and he plays at quoits well; and eats conger and fennel; and drinks off candles' ends for flap-dragons; and rides the wild mare with the boys; and jumps upon joint-stools; and swears with a good grace; and wears his boot very smooth, like unto the sign of the leg; and breeds no bate with telling of discreet stories; and such other gambol faculties he has, that show a weak mind and an able body, for the which the prince admits him: for the prince himself is such another; the weight of a hair will turn the scales between their avoirdupois.

P. Hen. Would not this nave of a wheel have his ears cut off?

Poins. Let's beat him before his whore.

P. Hen. Look, whether the withered elder hath not his poll clawed like a parrot.

Poins. Is it not strange, that desire should so many years outlive performance?

Fal. Kiss me, Doll.

P. Hen. Saturn and Venus this year in conjunction! what says the almanack to that?

Poins. And, look, whether the fiery Trigon, his man, be not lisping to his master's old tables, his note-book, his counsel-keeper.

Fal. Thou dost give me flattering busses. Dol. Nay, truly; I kiss thee with a most constant heart.

Fal. I am old, I am old.

Dol. I love thee better than I love e'er a scurvy young boy of them all.

Fal. What stuff wilt have a kirtle of? I shall receive money on Thursday; thou shalt have a cap to-morrow. A merry song! come: it grows late; we'll to bed. Thou'lt forget me, when I am gone.

Dol. By my troth, thou'lt set me weeping, an thou say'st so: prove that ever I dress myself handsome till thy return.-Well, hearken the end. Fal. Some sack, Francis!

P. Hen. Poins. Anon, anon, sir. [Advancing. Fal. Ha! a bastard son of the king's.-And art not thou Poins his brother?

P. Hen. Why, thou globe of sinful continents, what a life dost thou lead!

Fal. A better than thou: I am a gentleman; thou art a drawer.

P. Hen. Very true, sir, and I come to draw you out by the ears.

Host. Ŏ, the Lord preserve thy good grace! by my troth, welcome to London.-Now, the Lord

P. Hen. You whoreson candle-mine, you, how vilely did you speak of me even now, before this honest, virtuous, civil gentlewoman?

Host. God's blessing of your good heart! and so she is, by my troth.

Fal. Didst thou hear me?

P. Hen. Yes; and you knew me, as you did, when you ran away by Gad's-hill: you knew, I was at your back, and spoke it on purpose to try my patience.

Fal. No, no, no; not so; I did not think thou wast within hearing.

P. Hen. I shall drive you, then, to confess the wilful abuse; and then I know how to handle you. Fal. No abuse, Hal, on mine honour; no abuse. P. Hen. Not to dispraise me, and call me pantler, and bread-chipper, and I know not what? Fal. No abuse, Hal.

Poins. No abuse!

Fal. No abuse, Ned, i' the world; honest Ned, none. I dispraised him before the wicked, that the wicked might not fall in love with him;-in which doing, I have done the part of a careful friend, and a true subject, and thy father is to give me thanks for it. No abuse, Hal;-none, Ned, none;-no, i' faith boys, none.

P. Hen. See now, whether pure fear, and entire cowardice, doth not make thee wrong this virtuous gentlewoman to close with us? Is she of the wicked? Is thine hostess here of the wicked? Or is thy boy of the wicked? Or honest Bardolph, whose zeal burns in his nose, of the wicked?

Poins. Answer, thou dead elm, answer.

Fal. The fiend hath pricked down Bardolph irrecoverable; and his face is Lucifer's privy-kitchen, where he doth nothing but roast malt-worms. For the boy, there is a good angel about him, but the devil outbids him too.

P. Hen. For the women?

Fal. For one of them, she is in hell already, and burns, poor soul! For the other, I owe her money, and whether she be damned for that, I know not.

Host. No, I warrant you.

Fal. No, I think thou art not; I think, thou art quit for that. Marry, there is another indictment upon thee, for suffering flesh to be eaten in thy house, contrary to the law; for the which, I think, thou wilt howl.

Host. All victuallers do so: what's a joint of mutton or two in a whole Lent? P. Hen. You, gentlewoman,Dol. What says your grace? Fal. His grace says that which his flesh rebels against. [Knocking heard. Host. Who knocks so loud at door? look to the door there, Francis.

Enter PETO.

P. Hen. Peto, how now! what news? Peto. The king your father is at Westminster, And there are twenty weak and wearied posts,