Windsor. Before PAGE'S house
Enter JUSTICE SHALLOW, SLENDER, and SIR HUGH EVANS SHALLOW Sir Hugh, persuade me not; I will make a Star
Chamber matter of it; if he were twenty Sir John Falstaffs,
he shall not abuse Robert Shallow, esquire.
SLENDER In the county of Gloucester, Justice of Peace, and
Coram.
SHALLOW Ay, cousin Slender, and Custalorum.
SLENDER Ay, and Ratolorum too; and a gentleman born,
Master Parson, who writes himself 'Armigero' in any bill,
warrant, quittance, or obligation-'Armigero.'
SHALLOW Ay, that I do; and have done any time these three
hundred years.
SLENDER All his successors, gone before him, hath done't;
and all his ancestors, that come after him, may: they may
give the dozen white luces in their coat.
SHALLOW It is an old coat.
EVANS The dozen white louses do become an old coat well;
it agrees well, passant; it is a familiar beast to man, and
signifies love.
SHALLOW The luce is the fresh fish; the salt fish is an old
coat.
SLENDER I may quarter, coz.
SHALLOW You may, by marrying.
EVANS It is marring indeed, if he quarter it.
SHALLOW Not a whit.
EVANS Yes, py'r lady! If he has a quarter of your coat, there
is but three skirts for yourself, in my simple conjectures;
but that is all one. If Sir John Falstaff have committed
disparagements unto you, I am of the church, and will be
glad to do my benevolence, to make atonements and
compremises between you.
SHALLOW The Council shall hear it; it is a riot.
EVANS It is not meet the Council hear a riot; there is no
fear of Got in a riot; the Council, look you, shall desire
to hear the fear of Got, and not to hear a riot; take your
vizaments in that.
SHALLOW Ha! o' my life, if I were young again, the sword
should end it.
EVANS It is petter that friends is the sword and end it;
and there is also another device in my prain, which
peradventure prings goot discretions with it. There is Anne
Page, which is daughter to Master George Page, which is
pretty virginity.
SLENDER Mistress Anne Page? She has brown hair, and
speaks small like a woman.
EVANS It is that fery person for all the orld, as just as you
will desire; and seven hundred pounds of moneys, and
gold, and silver, is her grandsire upon his death's-bed-Got
deliver to a joyful resurrections!-give, when she is able to
overtake seventeen years old. It were a goot motion if we
leave our pribbles and prabbles, and desire a marriage
between Master Abraham and Mistress Anne Page.
SHALLOW Did her grandsire leave her seven hundred pound?
EVANS Ay, and her father is make her a petter penny.
SHALLOW I know the young gentlewoman; she has good
gifts.
EVANS Seven hundred pounds, and possibilities, is goot gifts.
SHALLOW Well, let us see honest Master Page. Is Falstaff
there?
EVANS Shall I tell you a lie? I do despise a liar as I do
despise one that is false; or as I despise one that is not
true. The knight Sir John is there; and, I beseech you, be
ruled by your well-willers. I will peat the door for Master
Page.
[Knocks] What, hoa! Got pless your house here!
PAGE [Within] Who's there?
Enter PAGE EVANS Here is Got's plessing, and your friend, and Justice
Shallow; and here young Master Slender, that peradventures
shall tell you another tale, if matters grow to your
likings.
PAGE I am glad to see your worships well. I thank you for
my venison, Master Shallow.
SHALLOW Master Page, I am glad to see you; much good do
it your good heart! I wish'd your venison better; it was ill
kill'd. How doth good Mistress Page?-and I thank you
always with my heart, la! with my heart.
PAGE Sir, I thank you.
SHALLOW Sir, I thank you; by yea and no, I do.
PAGE I am glad to see you, good Master Slender.
SLENDER How does your fallow greyhound, sir? I heard say
he was outrun on Cotsall.
PAGE It could not be judg'd, sir.
SLENDER You'll not confess, you'll not confess.
SHALLOW That he will not. 'Tis your fault; 'tis your fault;
'tis a good dog.
PAGE A cur, sir.
SHALLOW Sir, he's a good dog, and a fair dog. Can there be
more said? He is good, and fair. Is Sir John Falstaff here?
PAGE Sir, he is within; and I would I could do a good office
between you.
EVANS It is spoke as a Christians ought to speak.
SHALLOW He hath wrong'd me, Master Page.
PAGE Sir, he doth in some sort confess it.
SHALLOW If it be confessed, it is not redressed; is not that
so, Master Page? He hath wrong'd me; indeed he hath; at a
word, he hath, believe me; Robert Shallow, esquire, saith
he is wronged.
PAGE Here comes Sir John.
Enter SIR JOHN FALSTAFF, BARDOLPH, NYM, and PISTOL FALSTAFF Now, Master Shallow, you'll complain of me to
the King?
SHALLOW Knight, you have beaten my men, kill'd my deer,
and broke open my lodge.
FALSTAFF But not kiss'd your keeper's daughter.
SHALLOW Tut, a pin! this shall be answer'd.
FALSTAFF I will answer it straight: I have done all this.
That is now answer'd.
SHALLOW The Council shall know this.
FALSTAFF 'Twere better for you if it were known in counsel:
you'll be laugh'd at.
EVANS Pauca verba, Sir John; goot worts.
FALSTAFF Good worts! good cabbage! Slender, I broke your
head; what matter have you against me?
SLENDER Marry, sir, I have matter in my head against you;
and against your cony-catching rascals, Bardolph, Nym,
and Pistol. They carried me to the tavern, and made me
drunk, and afterwards pick'd my pocket.
BARDOLPH You Banbury cheese!
SLENDER Ay, it is no matter.
PISTOL How now, Mephostophilus!
SLENDER Ay, it is no matter.
NYM Slice, I say! pauca, pauca; slice! That's my humour.
SLENDER Where's Simple, my man? Can you tell, cousin?
EVANS Peace, I pray you. Now let us understand. There is
three umpires in this matter, as I understand: that is,
Master Page, fidelicet Master Page; and there is myself,
fidelicet myself; and the three party is, lastly and
finally, mine host of the Garter.
PAGE We three to hear it and end it between them.
EVANS Fery goot. I will make a prief of it in my note-book;
and we will afterwards ork upon the cause with as great
discreetly as we can.
FALSTAFF Pistol!
PISTOL He hears with ears.
EVANS The tevil and his tam! What phrase is this, 'He hears
with ear'? Why, it is affectations.
FALSTAFF Pistol, did you pick Master Slender's purse?
SLENDER Ay, by these gloves, did he-or I would I might
never come in mine own great chamber again else!-of
seven groats in mill-sixpences, and two Edward
shovel-boards that cost me two shilling and two pence apiece
of Yead Miller, by these gloves.
FALSTAFF Is this true, Pistol?
EVANS No, it is false, if it is a pick-purse.
PISTOL Ha, thou mountain-foreigner! Sir John and master mine,
I combat challenge of this latten bilbo.
Word of denial in thy labras here!
Word of denial! Froth and scum, thou liest.
SLENDER By these gloves, then, 'twas he.
NYM Be avis'd, sir, and pass good humours; I will say
'marry trap' with you, if you run the nuthook's humour on
me; that is the very note of it.
SLENDER By this hat, then, he in the red face had it; for
though I cannot remember what I did when you made me
drunk, yet I am not altogether an ass.
FALSTAFF What say you, Scarlet and John?
BARDOLPH Why, sir, for my part, I say the gentleman had
drunk himself out of his five sentences.
EVANS It is his five senses; fie, what the ignorance is!
BARDOLPH And being fap, sir, was, as they say, cashier'd;
and so conclusions pass'd the careers.
SLENDER Ay, you spake in Latin then too; but 'tis no matter;
I'll ne'er be drunk whilst I live again, but in honest,
civil, godly company, for this trick. If I be drunk, I'll be
drunk with those that have the fear of God, and not with
drunken knaves.
EVANS So Got udge me, that is a virtuous mind.
FALSTAFF You hear all these matters deni'd, gentlemen; you
hear it.
Enter MISTRESS ANNE PAGE with wine; MISTRESS FORD
and MISTRESS PAGE, following PAGE Nay, daughter, carry the wine in; we'll drink within.
Exit ANNE PAGE SLENDER O heaven! this is Mistress Anne Page.
PAGE How now, Mistress Ford!
FALSTAFF Mistress Ford, by my troth, you are very well
met; by your leave, good mistress.
[Kisses her] PAGE Wife, bid these gentlemen welcome. Come, we have a
hot venison pasty to dinner; come, gentlemen, I hope we
shall drink down all unkindness.
Exeunt all but SHALLOW, SLENDER, and EVANS SLENDER I had rather than forty shillings I had my Book of
Songs and Sonnets here.
Enter SIMPLE How, Simple! Where have you been? I must wait on
myself, must I? You have not the Book of Riddles about you,
have you?
SIMPLE Book of Riddles! Why, did you not lend it to Alice
Shortcake upon Allhallowmas last, a fortnight afore
Michaelmas?
SHALLOW Come, coz; come, coz; we stay for you. A word
with you, coz; marry, this, coz: there is, as 'twere, a
tender, a kind of tender, made afar off by Sir Hugh here. Do
you understand me?
SLENDER Ay, sir, you shall find me reasonable; if it be so, I
shall do that that is reason.
SHALLOW Nay, but understand me.
SLENDER So I do, sir.
EVANS Give ear to his motions: Master Slender, I will
description the matter to you, if you be capacity of it.
SLENDER Nay, I will do as my cousin Shallow says; I pray
you pardon me; he's a justice of peace in his country,
simple though I stand here.
EVANS But that is not the question. The question is
concerning your marriage.
SHALLOW Ay, there's the point, sir.
EVANS Marry is it; the very point of it; to Mistress Anne
Page.
SLENDER Why, if it be so, I will marry her upon any
reasonable demands.
EVANS But can you affection the oman? Let us command to
know that of your mouth or of your lips; for divers
philosophers hold that the lips is parcel of the mouth. Therefore,
precisely, can you carry your good will to the maid?
SHALLOW Cousin Abraham Slender, can you love her?
SLENDER I hope, sir, I will do as it shall become one that
would do reason.
EVANS Nay, Got's lords and his ladies! you must speak possitable,
if you can carry her your desires towards her.
SHALLOW That you must. Will you, upon good dowry,
marry her?
SLENDER I will do a greater thing than that upon your request,
cousin, in any reason.
SHALLOW Nay, conceive me, conceive me, sweet coz; what
I do is to pleasure you, coz. Can you love the maid?
SLENDER I will marry her, sir, at your request; but if there
be no great love in the beginning, yet heaven may decrease
it upon better acquaintance, when we are married and
have more occasion to know one another. I hope upon
familiarity will grow more contempt. But if you say
'marry her,' I will marry her; that I am freely dissolved,
and dissolutely.
EVANS It is a fery discretion answer, save the fall is in the
ord 'dissolutely': the ort is, according to our meaning,
'resolutely'; his meaning is good.
SHALLOW Ay, I think my cousin meant well.
SLENDER Ay, or else I would I might be hang'd, la!
Re-enter ANNE PAGE SHALLOW Here comes fair Mistress Anne. Would I were
young for your sake, Mistress Anne!
ANNE The dinner is on the table; my father desires your
worships' company.
SHALLOW I will wait on him, fair Mistress Anne!
EVANS Od's plessed will! I will not be absence at the grace.
Exeunt SHALLOW and EVANS ANNE Will't please your worship to come in, sir?
SLENDER No, I thank you, forsooth, heartily; I am very
well.
ANNE The dinner attends you, sir.
SLENDER I am not a-hungry, I thank you, forsooth. Go,
sirrah, for all you are my man, go wait upon my cousin
Shallow.
[Exit SIMPLE] A justice of peace sometime may
be beholding to his friend for a man. I keep but three men
and a boy yet, till my mother be dead. But what though?
Yet I live like a poor gentleman born.
ANNE I may not go in without your worship; they will not
sit till you come.
SLENDER I' faith, I'll eat nothing; I thank you as much as
though I did.
ANNE I pray you, sir, walk in.
SLENDER I had rather walk here, I thank you. I bruis'd my
shin th' other day with playing at sword and dagger with
a master of fence-three veneys for a dish of stew'd prunes
-and, I with my ward defending my head, he hot my shin,
and, by my troth, I cannot abide the smell of hot meat
since. Why do your dogs bark so? Be there bears i' th'
town?
ANNE I think there are, sir; I heard them talk'd of.
SLENDER I love the sport well; but I shall as soon quarrel at
it as any man in England. You are afraid, if you see the
bear loose, are you not?
ANNE Ay, indeed, sir.
SLENDER That's meat and drink to me now. I have seen
Sackerson loose twenty times, and have taken him by the
chain; but I warrant you, the women have so cried and
shriek'd at it that it pass'd; but women, indeed, cannot
abide 'em; they are very ill-favour'd rough things.
Re-enter PAGE PAGE Come, gentle Master Slender, come; we stay for you.
SLENDER I'll eat nothing, I thank you, sir.
PAGE By cock and pie, you shall not choose, sir! Come,
come.
SLENDER Nay, pray you lead the way.
PAGE Come on, sir.
SLENDER Mistress Anne, yourself shall go first.
ANNE Not I, sir; pray you keep on.
SLENDER Truly, I will not go first; truly, la! I will not do
you that wrong.
ANNE I pray you, sir.
SLENDER I'll rather be unmannerly than troublesome. You
do yourself wrong indeed, la!
Exeunt