Eastcheap. The Boar’s-Head Tavern.
[Enter FALSTAFF and BARDOLPH]
FALSTAFF
Bardolph, am I not fallen away vilely since this last action? do I not bate? do I not dwindle? Why my skin hangs about me like an like an old lady’s loose gown; I am withered like an old apple-john. Well, I’ll repent, and that suddenly, while I am in some liking; I shall be out of heart shortly, and then I shall have no strength to repent. An I have not forgotten what the inside of a church is made of, I am a peppercorn, a brewer’s horse: the inside of a church! Company, villanous company, hath been the spoil of me.
BARDOLPH Sir John, you are so fretful,
you cannot live long.
FALSTAFF Why, there is it: come sing me a bawdy song;
make me merry. I was as virtuously given as a gentleman
need to be; virtuous enough; swore little; diced not
above seven times a week; went to a bawdy-house once
in a quarter–of an hour; paid money that I
borrowed, three of four times; lived well and in
good compass: and now I live out of all order, out
of all compass.
BARDOLPH Why, you are so fat, Sir John,
that you must needs be out of all compass,
out of all reasonable compass, Sir John.
FALSTAFF Do thou amend thy face,
and I’ll amend my life: thou art our admiral, thou
bearest the lantern in the poop, but ’tis in the nose
of thee; thou art the Knight of the Burning Lamp.
BARDOLPH Why, Sir John, my face does you no harm.
FALSTAFF No,
I’ll be sworn; I make as good use of it as many
a man doth of a Death’s-head or a memento mori: I
never see thy face but I think upon hell-fire and
Dives that lived in purple; for there he is in his
robes, burning, burning. If thou wert any way
given to virtue, I would swear by thy face; my oath
should be ‘By this fire, that’s God’s angel:’ but
thou art altogether given over; and wert indeed, but
for the light in thy face, the son of utter
darkness. When thou rannest up Gadshill in the
night to catch my horse, if I did not think thou
hadst been an ignis fatuus or a ball of wildfire,
there’s no purchase in money. O, thou art a
perpetual triumph, an everlasting bonfire-light!
Thou hast saved me a thousand marks in links and
torches, walking with thee in the night betwixt
tavern and tavern: but the sack that thou hast
drunk me would have bought me lights as good cheap
at the dearest chandler’s in Europe. I have
maintained that salamander of yours with fire any
time this two and thirty years; God reward me for
it!
BARDOLPH ‘ Sblood,
I would my face were in your belly!
FALSTAFF God-a-mercy!
so should I be sure to be heart-burned.
[Enter Hostess]
How now, Dame Partlet the hen! have
you inquired yet who picked my pocket?
Hostess Why, Sir John, what do you think,
Sir John? do you think I keep thieves in my house?
I have searched, I have inquired, so has my husband,
man by man, boy by boy, servant by servant: the
tithe of a hair was never lost in my house before.
FALSTAFF Ye lie, hostess:
Bardolph was shaved and lost many a hair;
and I’ll be sworn my pocket was picked. Go
to, you are a woman, go.
Hostess Who, I? no; I defy thee: God’s light,
I was never called so in mine own house before.
FALSTAFF Go to, I know you well enough.
Hostess No, Sir John; You do not know me,
Sir John. I know you, Sir John: you owe me money,
Sir John; and now you pick a quarrel to beguile
me of it: I bought you a dozen of shirts to your back.
FALSTAFF Dowlas, filthy dowlas: I have given them away
to bakers’ wives, and they have made bolters of them.
Hostess Now, as I am a true woman, holland of eight
shillings an ell. You owe money here besides, Sir
John, for your diet and by-drinkings, and money lent
you, four and twenty pound.
FALSTAFF He had his part of it; let him pay.
Hostess He? alas, he is poor; he hath nothing.
FALSTAFF How! poor? look upon his face;
what call you rich? let them coin his nose,
let them coin his cheeks: Ill not pay a denier.
What, will you make a younker of me? shall I
not take mine case in mine inn but I shall have
my pocket picked? I have lost a seal-ring of my
grandfather’s worth forty mark.
Hostess O Jesu, I have heard the prince tell him,
I know not how oft, that ring was copper!
FALSTAFF How! the prince is a Jack, a sneak-cup:
‘sblood, an he were here, I would cudgel him like
a dog, if he would say so.
[Enter PRINCE HENRY and PETO, marching, and FALSTAFF
meets them playing on his truncheon like a life]
How now, lad! is the wind in that door,
i’ faith? must we all march?
BARDOLPH Yea, two and two, Newgate fashion.
Hostess My lord, I pray you, hear me.
PRINCE HENRY What sayest thou, Mistress Quickly?
How doth thy husband? I love him well; he is an
honest man.
Hostess Good my lord, hear me.
FALSTAFF Prithee, let her alone, and list to me.
PRINCE HENRY What sayest thou, Jack?
FALSTAFF The other night I fell asleep here behind
the arras and had my pocket picked: this house is
turned bawdy-house; they pick pockets.
PRINCE HENRY What didst thou lose, Jack?
FALSTAFF Wilt thou believe me, Hal?
three or four bonds of forty pound apiece,
and a seal-ring of my grandfather’s.
PRINCE HENRY A trifle, some eight-penny matter.
Hostess So I told him, my lord; and I said I heard your
grace say so: and, my lord, he speaks most vilely
of you, like a foul-mouthed man as he is; and said
he would cudgel you.
PRINCE HENRY What! he did not?
Hostess There’s neither faith, truth,
nor womanhood in me else.
FALSTAFF There’s no more faith in thee than in a
stewed prune. Go, you thing, go.
Hostess Say, what thing? what thing?
FALSTAFF What thing! why, a thing to thank God on.
Hostess I am no thing to thank God on, and,
setting thy knighthood aside, thou art a knave
to call me so.
FALSTAFF Setting thy womanhood aside,
thou art a beast to say otherwise.
Hostess Say, what beast, thou knave, thou?
FALSTAFF What beast! why, an otter.
PRINCE HENRY An otter, Sir John! Why an otter?
FALSTAFF Why, she’s neither fish nor flesh;
a man knows not where to have her.
Hostess Thou art an unjust man in saying so:
thou or any man knows where to have me,
thou knave, thou!
PRINCE HENRY Thou sayest true, hostess;
and he slanders thee most grossly. Charge an honest
woman with picking thy pocket! why, thou whoreson,
impudent, embossed rascal, if there were anything in
thy pocket but tavern-reckonings, memorandums of
bawdy-houses, and one poor penny-worth of
sugar-candy to make thee long-winded, if thy pocket
were enriched with any other injuries but these, I
am a villain.
FALSTAFF You confess then, you picked my pocket?
PRINCE HENRY It appears so by the story.
FALSTAFF Hostess, I forgive thee: go, make ready
breakfast; cherish thy guests. Nay, prithee, be gone.
[Exit Hostess]
Now Hal, to the news at court: for the robbery,
lad, how is that answered?
PRINCE HENRY O, my sweet beef, I must still be good
angel to thee: the money is paid back again.
FALSTAFF O, I do not like that paying back;
’tis a double labour.
PRINCE HENRY I am good friends with my
father and may do any thing.
FALSTAFF Rob me the exchequer the first thing
thou doest.
BARDOLPH Do, my lord.
PRINCE HENRY I have procured thee, Jack,
a charge of foot. Bardolph!
BARDOLPH My lord?
PRINCE HENRY Go bear this letter to Lord John
of Lancaster, to my brother John; this to my
Lord of Westmoreland.
[Exit Bardolph]
Jack, meet me to-morrow in the temple hall
at two o’clock in the afternoon.
There shalt thou know thy charge; and there receive
Money and order for their furniture.
The land is burning; Percy stands on high;
And either we or they must lower lie.
[Exit PRINCE HENRY]
FALSTAFF Rare words! brave world!
Hostess, my breakfast, come!
O, I could wish this tavern were my drum!
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