Shal. Come, Sir John, which four will you have? Shal. Marry then,--Mouldy, Bullcalf, Feeble, and Shadow. Fal. Mouldy and Bullealf:-for you, Mouldy, stay at home till you are past service: and for your part, Bullcalf, -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 thews, 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, 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 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. -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,-I was then Sir Dagonet in Arthur's show, there was a little quiver fellow, and he would manage you his piece thus; and he would about and about, and come you in and come you in: rah, tah, tah, would he say; bounce would he say; and away again would he go, and again would he 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. 'Fore God, I would you would, Master Shallow. Shal. Go to; I have spoke at a word. Fare you well. [Exeunt SHAL. and SIL. 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 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 invincible: 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 overscutched huswifes that he heard the carmen whistle, and sware they were his fancies or his good-nights. 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 thrust 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. Arch. 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. Mowb. Thus do the hopes we have in him touch ground, And dash themselves to pieces. Hast. Enter a Messenger. Now, what news? Mess. West of this forest, scarcely off a mile, In goodly form comes on the enemy; And, by the ground they hide, I judge their number Mowb. The just proportion that we gave them out. Let us sway on, and face them in the field. Arch. What well-appointed leader fronts us here? Enter WESTMORELAND. West. Health and fair greeting from our general West. The substance of my speech. If that rebellion I say, if damn'd commotion so appear'd, In his true, native, and most proper shape, With your fair honours. You, lord archbishop,- Whose beard the silver hand of peace hath touch'd; --- Whose learning and good letters peace hath tutor'd; Arch. Wherefore do I this?-so the question stands. And purge the obstructions which begin to stop I have in equal balance justly weigh'd What wrongs our arms may do, what wrongs we suffer, And find our griefs heavier than our offences. We see which way the stream of time doth run, And have the summary of all our griefs, Even by those men that most have done us wrong. West. When ever yet was your appeal denied; What peer hath been suborn'd to grate on you;- Arch. My brother general, the commonwealth, I make my quarrel in particular. West. There is no need of any such redress; Or if there were, it not belongs to you. Mowb. Why not to him in part, and to us all And suffer the condition of these times West. O, when the king did throw his warder down, His own life hung upon the staff he threw; Then threw he down himself, and all their lives That by indictment and by dint of sword Have since miscarried under Bolingbroke. West. You speak, Lord Mowbray, now you know not what. The Earl of Hereford was reputed then In England the most valiant gentleman: Who knows on whom fortune would then have smil'd? |