not care; but, rather, because I am unwilling, and, for mine own part, have a desire to stay with my friends; else, sir, I did not care, for mine own part, so much. Bard. Go to; stand aside.

Moul. And good master corporal captain, for my old dame's sake, stand my friend: she has nobody to do any thing about her, when I am gone; and she is old, and cannot help herself: you shall have forty, sir.

Bard. Go to; stand aside.

Feeble. By my troth I care not ;-a man can die but once ;-we owe God a death;-I'll ne'er bear a base mind-an't be my destiny, so; an't be not, so: No man's too good to serve his prince; and, let it go which way it will, he that dies this year, is quit for the next. Bard. Well said; thou'rt a good fellow. Feeble. 'Faith, I'll bear no base mind.

Re-enter FALSTAFF, and Justices.

Fal. Come, sir, which men shall I have?
Shal. Four, of which you please.

Bard. Sir, a word with you :-I have three pound to free Mouldy and Bull-calf. 8

Fal. Go to; well.

Shal. Come, sir John, which four will you have?
Fal. Do you choose for me.

Shal. Marry then,-Mouldy, Bull-calf, Feeble, and Shadow.

Fal. Mouldy,and Bull-calf:-For you, Mouldy, stay at home still; you are past service :-and, for your part, Bull-calf,-grow till you come unto it; I will none of

you.

Shal. Sir John, sir John, do not yourself wrong; they are your likeliest men, and I would have you served with the best.

Fal. Will you tell me, master Shallow, how to choose a man? Care I for the limb, the thewes, the stature, bulk, and big assemblance of a man! give me the spirit, master Shallow.-Here's Wart;-you see what a ragged appearance it is: he shall charge you, and discharge you, with the motion of a pewterer's hammer; come off, and on, swifter than he that gibbets-on the brewer's bucket." And this same half-faced fellow,

(8) Here seems to be a wrong computation. He had forty shillings for each. Perhaps he meant to conceal part of the profit. JOHNS.

(9) i. e. the muscular strength or appearance of manhood. STEEV. (1) Swifter than he that carries beer from the vat to the barrel, in buckets hung upon a gibbet or beam crossing his shoulders. JOHNS.

Shadow,-give me this man; he presents no mark to the enemy; the foeman may with as great aim level at the edge of a penknife: And, for a retreat,-how swiftly will this Feeble, the woman's tailor, run off? O, give me the spare men, and spare me the great ones.Put me a caliver 2 into Wart's hand, Bardolph.

Bard. Hold, Wart, traverse; thus, thus, thus.

Fal. Come, manage me your caliver. So :-very well :-go to :-very good :-exceeding good.—O, give me always a little,lean, old, chapped, bald shot. 3-Well said, i'faith, Wart; thou'rt a good scab: hold, there's a tester for thee.

Shal. He is not his craft's-master, he doth not do it right. I remember at Mile-End green, (when I lay at Clement's-Inn, was then, sir Dagonet in Arthur's show,) there was a little quiver fellow, and 'a would manage you his piece thus: and 'a would about, and about, and come you in, and come you in: rah, tah, tah, would 'a say; bounce, would 'a say; and away again would 'a go, and again would 'a come :-I shall never see such a fellow.

Fal. These fellows will do well, master Shallow.God keep you, master Silence; I will not use many words with you :-Fare you well, gentlemen both: I thank you I must a dozen mile to-night.-Bardolph, give the soldiers coats.

Shal. Sir John, heaven bless you, and prosper your affairs, and send us peace! As you return, visit my house; let our old acquaintance be renewed: peradventure, I will with you to the court.

Fal. I would you would, master Shallow. Shal. Go to; I have spoke, at a word. Fare you well. [Exeunt SHALLOW and SILENCE. Fal. Fare you well, gentle gentlemen.-On, Bardolph ; lead the men away. [Exeunt BARDOLPH, Recruits, &c.] As I return, I will fetch off these justices: I do see the bottom of justice Shallow. Lord, lord, how subject we old men are to this vice of lying! This same starved justice hath done nothing but prate to me of the wildness of his youth, and the feats he hath done about Turnbull-Street; and every third word a lie, duer paid to the hearer than the Turk's tribute. I do remember him at Clement's-Inn, like a man made after supper of

[2] A hand-gun. JOHNS.

3 Shot is used for shooter, one who is to fight by shooting.

JOHNS.

5

a cheese-paring: when he was naked, he was, for all the world, like a forked radish, with a head fantastically carved upon it with a knife: he was so forlorn, that his dimensions to any thick sight, were invisible: he was the very genius of famine, yet lecherous as a monkey, and the whores called him-mandrake. He came ever in the rear-ward of the fashion; and sung those tunes to the over-scutched huswives4 that he heard the carmen whistle, and sware-they were his fancies, or his goodnights. And now is this Vice's dagger become a squire; and talks as familiarly of John of Gaunt, as if he had been sworn brother to him and I'll be sworn he never saw him but once in the Tilt-yard; and then he burst his head, for crowding among the marshal's men. I saw it; and told John of Gaunt, he beat his own name: For you might have truss'd him, and all his apparel, into an eel-skin; the case of a treble hautboy was a mansion for him, a court: and now has he land and beeves. Well; I will be acquainted with him, if I return and it shall go hard, but I will make him a philosopher's two stones to me: If the young dace be a bait for the old pike, I see no reason, in the law of nature, but I may snap at him. Let time shape, and there an end. [Exit.

ACT IV.

SCENE I-A Forest in Yorkshire. Enter the Archbishop of York, MOWBRAY, HASTINGS, and others.

Archbishop.

WHAT is this forest call'd?

Hast. 'Tis Gualtree forest,an't shall please your grace. Arch. Here stand, my lords; and send discoverers forth To know the numbers of our enemies.

Hast. We have sent forth already.

JOHNS.

STEEV:

[4] Over-scutched, I think means dirty, or grimed. [5] Fancies and Good-nights were the titles of little poms. [6] Vice was the name given to a droll figure, heretofore much shown upon our stage, and brought in to play the fool and make sport for the populace. His dress was always a long jerkin, a fool's cap with ass's ears, and a thin wooden dagger, such as is still retained in the modern figures of Harlequin and Scaramouch. HANMER.

[7] That is, beat gaunt, a fellow so slender, that his name might have been gaunt. JOHNS.

[8] That is, if the pike may prey upon the dace, if it be the law of nature that the stronger may seize upon the weaker, Falstaff may, with great propriety, devour Shallow. JOHNS.

Say you not then, our offer is compell'd.

Mowb. Well, by my will, we shall admit no parley. West. That argues but the shame of your offence:

A rotten case abides no handling.

Hast. Hath the prince John a full commission, In very ample virtue of his father,

To hear, and absolutely to determine

Of what conditions we shall stand upon?

West. That is intended in the general's name :2

I muse you make so slight a question.

York. Then take, my lord of Westmoreland, this schedule;

For this contains our general grievances :-
Each several article herein redress'd;

All members of our cause, both here and hence,

That are insinew'd to this action,

Acquitted by a true substantial form ;3
And present execution of our wills

To us, and to our purposes, consign'd ;4
We come within our awful banks again,
And knit our powers to the arm of peace.

West. This will I shew the general. Please you, lords, In sight of both our battles we may meet :

And either end in peace, which heaven so frame!

Or to the place of difference call the swords

Which must decide it.

Arch. My lord, we will do so.

[Exit WEST,

Mowb. There is a thing within my bosom, tells me,

That no conditions of our peace can stand.

Hast. Fear you not that: if we can make our peace Upon such large terms, and so absolute,

As our conditions shall consist upon,

Our peace shall stand as firm as rocky mountains.
Mowb. Ay, but our valuation shall be such,
That every slight and false-derived cause,
Yea, every idle, nice, and wanton reason,
Shall, to the king, taste of this action:
That, were our royal faiths martyrs in love,
We shall be winnow'd with so rough a wind,
That even our corn shall seem as light as chaff,
And good from bad find no partition.

[2] That is, This power is included in the name or office of a general. We wonder that you can ask question so trifling.

*

JOHNS.

STEEV.

[3] That is, By a pardon of legal validity. JOHNS. [4] I believe we should read-confirm'd."

Arch. No, no, my lord; note this,-the king is weary Of dainty and such picking grievances :

For he hath found,-to end one doubt by death,
Revives two greater in the heirs of life.
And therefore will he wipe his tables clean;5
And keep no tell-tale to his memory,
That may repeat and history his loss

To new remembrance: For full well he knows,
He cannot so precisely weed this land,
As his misdoubts present occasion:
His foes are so enrooted with his friends,
That, plucking to unfix an enemy,
He doth unfasten so, and shake a friend.
So that this land, like an offensive wife,
That hath enrag'd him on to offer strokes,
As he is striking, holds his infant up,
And hangs resolv'd correction in the arm
That was uprear'd to execution.

Hast. Besides, the king hath wasted all his rods
On late offenders, that he now doth lack

The very instruments of chastisement:

So that his power, like to a fangless lion,
May offer, but not hold.

Arch. Tis very true;

And therefore be assur'd, my good lord marshall,
If we do now make our atonement well,

Our peace will, like a broken limb united,
Grow stronger for the breaking.

Mowb. Be it so.

Here is return'd my lord of Westmoreland.
Re-enter WESTMORELAND.

Wes. The prince is here at hand: pleaseth your lordship, To meet his grace just distance 'tween our armies? Mowb. Your grace of York in God's name then set

forward.

Arch. Before, and greet his grace :-My lord, we come.

SCENE II.

[Exeunt.

Another Part of the Forest. Enter, on one side, MOWBRAY, the Archbishop, HASTINGS, and others; from the other side, Prince JOHN of Lancaster, WESTMORELAND, Officers, and Attendants. P. John. You are well encounter'd here, my cousin Mowbray :

(5) Alluding to a table-book of slate, or ivory. WARE.