PRINCE. Well, come what will, I'll tarry at home. FALSTAFF. I'll be a traitor, then, when thou art king. PRINCE. I care not. POINS. Sir John, I prithee, leave the prince and me alone; I will lay him down such reasons for this adventure, that he shall go. FALSTAFF. Well, may'st thou have the spirit of persuasion, and he the ears of profiting, that what thou speakest may move, and what he hears may be believed, that the true prince may, for recreation sake,1 prove a false thief; for the poor abuses of the time want countenance. Farewell; you shall find me in Eastcheap. PRINCE. Farewell, thou latter spring! Farewell, Allhallown summer! 2 [Exit FALSTAFF. POINS. Now, my good sweet honey lord, ride with us to-morrow. I have a jest to execute that I can not manage alone. Falstaff, Bardolph, Peto, and Gadshill shall rob those men that we have already waylaid; yourself and I will not be there; and when they have the booty, if you and I do not rob them, cut this head from my shoulders.3 PRINCE. But how shall we part with them in setting forth? POINS. Why, we will set forth before or after them, 1 for recreation sake. The possessive inflection is dropped. This often happens when either the noun in the possessive ends with the sound of s, or the following noun begins with s; and especially when the following noun is "sake." 2 All-hallown summer: like "latter spring," summer as at Allhallows day, or All-saints' day, the first day of November. 3 Now... shoulders. Of the three sentences in this speech, which is complex? and appoint them a place of meeting, wherein it is at our pleasure to fail: and then will they adventure upon the exploit themselves; which they shall have no sooner achieved but we'll set upon them. PRINCE. Ay, but 'tis like that they will know us, by our horses, by our habits,1 and by every other appointment, to be ourselves. POINS. Tut! our horses they shall not see: I'll tie them in the wood; our vizards we will change after we leave them; and, sirrah, I have cases of buckram 2 for the nonce,3 to immask our noted 5 outward gar ments. 4 PRINCE. But I doubt they will be too hard for us. 6 POINS. Well, for two of them, I know them to be as true-bred cowards as ever turned back; and for the third, if he fight longer than he sees reason, I'll forswear arms. The virtue of this jest will be the incomprehensible lies that this same fat rogue will tell us when we meet at supper: how thirty, at least, he fought with; what wards, what blows, what extremities he endured;9 and in the reproof of this lies the jest. PRINCE. Well, I'll go with thee; provide us all things necessary, and meet me to-night in Eastcheap; there I'll sup. Farewell. POINS. Farewell, my lord. 1 habits, clothes, garments. 2 buckram, coarse linen cloth stiffened with glue. 3 for the nonce, for this once. 6 turned back. "Back" is a noun, not an adverb, here. 7 fat rogue. Whom? 8 wards, postures of defense in sword-practice. 9 endured, suffered. 2. FALSTAFF'S VALOR. PRINCE HENRY and POINS in the Boar's Head Tavern. Enter FALSTAFF, GADSHILL, BARDOLPH, and PETO. POINS. Welcome, Jack. Where hast thou been? FALSTAFF. A plague of all cowards, I say, and a vengeance, too! marry, and amen!-Give me a cup of sack,2 boy.-Ere I lead this life long, I'll sew netherstocks, and mend them, and foot them too. A plague of all cowards! - Give me a cup of sack, rogue. — Is there no virtue extant? (He drinks, and then continues.) You rogue, here's lime in this sack, too; there is nothing but roguery to be found in villainous man: yet a coward is worse than a cup of sack with lime in it; a villainous coward!- Go thy ways, old Jack; die when thou wilt: if manhood, good manhood, be not forgot upon the face of the earth, then am I a shotten herring. There live not three good men unhanged in England; and one of them is fat, and grows old. I would I were a weaver; I could sing psalms, or any thing. A plague of all cowards! I say still. PRINCE. HOW, now, woolsack? what mutter you? FALSTAFF. A king's son! If I do not beat thee out of thy kingdom with a dagger of lath, and drive all thy subjects afore thee like a flock of wild geese, I'll never wear hair on my face more. You, Prince of Wales! 1 marry, an exclamation. 2 sack, the generic name for Spanish wines. 3 nether-stocks= stockings. 4 shotten herring, a lean herring. PRINCE. Why, you villainous round man! what's the matter? FALSTAFF. Are you not a coward? answer me to that; and Poins there? POINS. Zounds! ye fat paunch, an ye call me coward, I'll stab thee. FALSTAFF. I call thee coward! I'll see thee hanged ere I call thee coward: but I would give a thousand pound I could run as fast as thou canst. You are straight enough in the shoulders, you care not who sees your back: call you that backing of your friends? A plague upon such backing! give me them that will face me. Give me a cup of sack: I am a rogue if I drunk to-day. PRINCE. O villain! thy lips are scarce wiped since thou drunkest last. FALSTAFF. All's one for that. (He drinks.) A plague of all cowards, still say I. PRINCE. What's the matter? FALSTAFF. What's the matter! there be four of us here have ta'en a thousand pound this morning. PRINCE. Where is it, Jack? where is it? FALSTAFF. Where is it! taken from us it is: a hundred upon poor four of us. PRINCE. What, a hundred, man? FALSTAFF. I am a rogue if I were not at half-sword 1 with a dozen of them two hours together. I have scaped 2 by miracle. I am eight times thrust through the doublet; four, through the hose; my buckler 3 1 at half-sword, in close fight. 2 scaped escaped. 8 doublet, coat. cut through and through; my sword hacked like a hand-saw; Ecce signum!1 I never dealt better since I was a man; all would not do. A plague of all cowards! Let them speak (pointing to GADSHILL, BARDOLPH, and PETO); if they speak more or less than truth, they are villains and the sons of darkness. PRINCE. Speak, sirs: how was it? GADSHILL. We four set upon some dozen — GADSHILL. And bound them. PETO. No, no, they were not bound. FALSTAFF. You rogue, they were bound, every man of them; or I am a Jew, else an Ebrew Jew.2 GADSHILL. As we were sharing, some six or seven fresh men set upon us FALSTAFF. And unbound the rest; and then come 3 in the other.4 PRINCE. What! fought ye with them all? FALSTAFF. All? I know not what ye call all; but if I fought not with fifty of them, I am a bunch of radish if there were not two or three and fifty upon poor old Jack, then I am no two-legged creature. PRINCE, Pray Heaven, you have not murdered some of them. FALSTAFF. Nay, that's past praying for; I have peppered two of them; two I am sure I have paid; two 1 Ecce signum! (Lat.) "Behold | seems to think there is considerthe token!" Falstaff presents his able force in the qualification sword, that they may see with their "Ebrew." own eyes how it has suffered. 2 Ebrew = Hebrew. Falstaff 3 come. 4 other == The historical present. others. |