The Dramatic Works of William Shakspeare

And I will take it as a sweet disgrace,
And make thee rich for doing me such wrong.
Mor. You are too great to be by me gain-To
said:

Your spirit is too true, your fears too certain. North. Yet, for all this, say not that Percy's dead.

I see a strange confession in thine eye:
Thou shak'st thy head, and hold'st it fear or sin,
To speak a truth. If he be slain, say so:
The tongue offends not, that reports his death:
And he doth sin, that doth belie the dead;
Not he, which says the dead is not alive.
Yet the first bringer of unwelcome news
Hath but a losing office; and his tongue
Sounds ever after as a sullen bell,
Remember'd knolling a departing friend.
Bard. I cannot think, my lord, your son is

dead.

Mor. I am sorry I should force you to be

lieve

That, which I would to heaven I had not seen: Bat these mine eyes saw him in bloody state, Read'ring faint quittance, wearied and outbreath'd

To Harry Monmouth: whose swift wrath beat down

The never-dannted Percy to the earth,
From whence with life he never more sprang

up.

In few, + his death (whose spirit lent a fire
Even to the dullest peasant in his camp,)
Being bruited once, took fire and heat away
From the best temper'd courage in his troops :
For from his metal was his party steel'd;
Which once in him abated, all the rest
Turn'd on themselves, like dull and heavy lead.
And as the thing that's heavy in itself,
Upon enforcement, flies with greatest speed;
So did our men, heavy in Hotspur's loss,
Lend to this weight such lightness with their
fear,

That arrows fled not swifter toward their aim,
Than did our soldiers, aiming at their safety,
Fly from the field: Then was that noble Wor-

cester

Too soon ta'en prisoner: and that furious Scot, The bloody Douglas, whose well-labouring sword Had three times slain the appearance of the king, 'Gan vail his stomach, and did grace the shame

his

Of those that turn'd their backs; and, in
flight,
Stumbling in fear, was took. The sum of all
Is, that the king hath won; and hath sent out
A speedy power to encounter you, my lord,
Under the conduct of young Lancaster,
And Westmoreland; this is the news at full.
North. For this I shall have time enough to

mourn.

In poison there is physic; and these news, Having been well, that would have made me sick,

Being sick, have in some measure made me well:
And as the wretch whose fever-weaken'd joints,
Like strengthless hinges, buckle under life,
Impatient of his fit, breaks like a fire
Out of his keeper's arms; even so my limbs,
Weaken'd with grief, being now enrag'd with
grief,
Are thrice themselves: heuce therefore, thou
nice crutch;

A sealy gauntlet now, with joints of steel,
Must glove this hand: and hence, thou sickly
quoit,¶
Thou art a guard too wanton for the head,
Which princes, flesh'd with conquest, aim to

bit.

Now bind my brows with iron; and approach

The ragged'st hour that time and spite dare bring,

frown upon the enrag'd Northumberland! Let heaven kiss earth! Now let not nature's hand

Keep the wild flood confin'd! let order die !
And let this world no longer be a stage,
To feed contention in a lingering act;
But let one spirit of the first-born Cain
Reign in all bosoms, that each heart being set
On bloody courses, the rude scene may end,
And darkness be the burier of the dead!
Tra. This strained passion doth you wrong,
my lord.

Bard. Sweet earl, divorce not wisdom from your honour.

Mor. The lives of all your loving complices Lean on your health; the which, if you give

o'er

To stormy passion, must perforce decay.
You cast the event of war, my noble lord,
And summ'd the account of chance, before you
said,-
Let us make head.
That in the dole

It was your presurmise,

of blows your son might

drop:

You knew he walk'd o'er perils, on an edge,
More likely to fall in, than to get o'er :
You were advis'd, his flesh was capable
Of wounds, and scars; and that his forward

spirits Would lift him where most trade of dauger rang'd;

Yet did you say,-Go forth; and none of this,
Though strongly apprehended, could restrain
The stiff-borne action: What hath then be-
fallen,

Or what hath this bold enterprize brought forth,
More than that being which was like to be?

Bard. We all, that are engaged to this loss, Knew that we ventur'd on such dangerous

seas,

That, if we wrought out life, 'twas ten to one:
And yet we ventur'd, for the gain propos'd
Chok'd the respect of likely peril fear'd;
And, since we are o'erset, venture again.
Come, we will all put forth; body and goods.
Mor. 'Tis more than time: And, my most
noble lord,

I hear for certain, and do speak the truth,—
The gentle archbishop of York is up,
With well-appointed powers; he is a man,
Who with a double surety binds his followers.
My lord your son had only but the corps,
But shadows, and the shows of men, to fight:
For that same word, rebellion, did divide
The action of their bodies from their souls;
And they did fight with queasiness, constrain'd,
As men drink potions; that their weapons only
Seem'd on our side, but for their spirits and
souls,

This word, rebellion, it had froze them up,
As fish are in a pond: But now the bishop
Turns insurrection to religion :
Suppos'd sincere and holy in his thoughts,
He's follow'd both with body and with mind;
And doth enlarge bis rising with the blood
of fair king Richard, scrap'd from Pomfret

stones.

Derives from heaven his quarrel and his cause;
Tells them he doth bestride a bleeding land,
Gasping for life under great Bolingbroke ;
And more, † and less, do flock to follow him.
North. I knew of this before; but to speak
truth,

This present grief hath wip'd it from my mind.
Go in with me; and counsel every man
The aptest way for safety and revenge:
Get posts, and letters, and make friends with
speed;
Never so few, and never yet more need.

Distribution.

[Exeunt.

↑ Greater.

SCENE II.-London.-A Street.

Enter Sir JOHN FALSTAFF, with his PAGE bearing his Sword and Buckler.

Fal. Sirrah, you giant, what says the doctor to my water?

Page. He said, Sir, the water itself was a good healthy water: but, for the party that owed it, he might have more diseases than he knew for.

Fal. Men of all sorts take a pride to gird at me: The brain of this foolish-compounded clay, man, is not able to vent any thing that tends to laughter, more than I invent, or is invented on me: I am not only witty in myself,

but the cause that wit is in other men.
here walk before thee, like a sow, that hath
overwhelmed all her litter but one. If the
prince put thee into my service for any other
reason than to set me off, why then I have no
judgment. Thou whoreson mandrake, † thou
art fitter to be worn in my cap, than to wait at
my heels. I was never manned with an agate
till now but I will set you neither in gold nor
silver, but in vile apparel, and send you back
again to your master, for a jewel; the juvenal,
the prince your master, whose chin is not yet
fledged. I will sooner have a beard grow in the
palm of my hand, than he shall get one on his
cheek and yet he will not stick to say, his face
is a face-royal: God may finish it when he will,
it is not a hair amiss yet: he may keep it still
as a face-royal, for a barber shall never earn six-
pence out of it; and yet he will be crowing, as
if he had writ man ever since his father was a
bachelor. He may keep his own grace, but he
is almost out of mine. I can assure him. H
What said master Dumbleton about the satin for
my short cloak and slops?

Page. He said, Sir, you should procure him better assurance than Bardolph: he would not take his boud and your's; he liked not the security.

Atten. He, my lord: but he hath since done good service at Shrewsbury; and as I hear, is now going with some charge to the lord John of Lancaster.

Ch. Just. What, to York? Call him back again.

Attend. Sir John Falstaff!

Enter the LORD CHIEF JUSTICE and an
ATTENDANT.

Page. Sir, here comes the nobleman that committed the prince for striking him about Bardolph.

Ful. Wait close, I will not see him.
Ch. Just. What's he that goes there?
Atten. Falstaff, an't please your lordship.
Ch. Just. He that was in question for the
robbery?

Atten. I pray you, Sir, then set your knighthood and your soldiership aside; and give me leave to tell you, you lie in your throat, if you say I am any other than an honest man.

Fal. I give thee leave to tell me so! I lay aside that which grows to me! If thou get'st any leave of me, hang me: if thou takest leave, thou wert better be hanged: You hunt-counter, hence! avaunt!

Atten. Sir, my lord would speak with you. Ch. Just. Sir John Falstaff, a word with you. Fal. My good lord!-God give your lordship good time of day. I am glad to see your lordship abroad: I heard say, your lordship was sick; I hope your lordship goes abroad by advice. Your lordship, though not clean past your youth, hath yet some smack of age in you, some relish of the saltuess of time; and I most humbly beseech your bip, to have a reverend care of

now wear

Fal. Let him be damned like a glutton! may his tongue be botter !-A whoreson Achitophel! a rascally yea-forsooth knave! to bear a gentleman in hand, and then stand upon security! -The whoreson smooth-pates do nothing but high shoes, and bunches of keys at their girdles; and if a man is thorough with them in honest taking up, then they must stand -upon security. I had as lief they would put ratsbane in my mouth, as offer to stop it with security. I looked he should have sent me two and twenty yards of satin, as I am a true knight, and he sends me security. Well, he may sleep in security; for he hath the boin of abundance, and the lightness of his wife shines through it and yet cannot he see, though he have his own lantern to light him.--Where's Bardolph ?

Page. He's gone into Smithfield, to buy your worship a horse.

Fal. It hath its original from much grief:

Fal. I bought him in Paul's, and he'll buy me a horse in Smithfield: an I could get me have read the cause of his effects in Galen; it but a wife in the stews, I were manned, horsed, is a kind of deafness.

from study, and perturbation of the brain: 1

and wived.

your health.

Ch. Just. Sir John, I sent for you before your expedition to Shrewsbury.

Fa.. Ant please your lordship, I hear his majesty is returned with some discomfort from

Wales.

Ch. Just. I talk not of his majesty :-You would not come when I sent for you.

Fal. And I hear moreover, his highness is fallen into this same whoreson apoplexy.

Ch. Just. Well, heaven mend him! I pray, let me speak with you.

Ful. This apoplexy is, as I take it, a kind of lethargy, an't please your lordship; a kind of sleeping in the blood, a whoreson tingling.

Ch. Just. What tell you me of it? be it as

it is.

Ch. Just. I think, you are fallen into the disease; for you hear not what I say to you.

Fal. Very well, my lord, very well: rather, an't please you, it is the disease of not listening, the malady of not marking, that I am troubled

• Owned. † A root supposed to have the shape of a man. A little figure cut ia an agate. In their debt. Alluding to an old proverb: Who goes to Westminster for a wife, to St. Paul's for a man, and to Smithfield for a horse, may meet with a whore, a knave, and a jade. Sir William Gascoigne, Chief Justice of the King's Beuch.]

withal.

Ch. Just. To punish you by the heels, world amend the attention of your ears; and I care not, if I do become your physician.

Fal. I am as poor as Job, my lord, but not so patient: your lordship may minister the potion of imprisonment to me, in respect of poverty; but how I should be your patient to follow your prescriptions, the wise may make some dram of a scruple, or, indeed, a scruple itself.

bailiff.

Ch. Just. I sent for you, when there were | John of Lancaster, against the archbishop and matters against you for your life, to come speak the earl of Northumberland. with me.

Fal. Yea; I thank your pretty sweet wit for it. But look you pray, all you that kiss my lady peace at home, that our armies join not in a hot day! for, by the Lord I take but two shirts out with me, and I mean not to sweat extraordinarily if it be a hot day, an I brandish any thing but can-my bottle, I would I might never spit white again. There is not a dangerous action can peep out his head, but I am thrust upon it: Well, I cannot last ever: But it was always yet the trick of our English nation, if they have a good thing, to make it too common. If you will needs say, I am an old man, you should give me rest. I would to God, my name were not so terrible to the enemy as it is. I were better to be eaten to death with rust, than to be scoured to nothing with perpetual motion.

Ch. Just. Well, be honest, be honest; And God bless your expedition!

Fal. As I was then advised by my learned counsel in the laws of this land-service, I

did

you

not come.

Ch. Just. Well, the truth is, Sir John, live in great infamy.

Fal. He that buckles him in my belt, not live in less.

Ch. Just. Your means are very slender, and your waste is great.

Fal. I would it were otherwise; I would my means were greater, and my waist slenderer. Ch. Just. You have misled the youthful prince.

Fal. The young prince hath am the fellow with the great belly, dog.

misled me: I
and he my

Ch. Just. Well, I am loath to gail a newbealed wound; your day's service at Shrewsbary bath a little gilded over your night's exploit on Gads-hill: you may thank the unquiet time for your quiet o'er-posting that action. Fal. My lord?

Ch. Just. But since all is well, keep it so: wake not a sleeping wolf.

Fal. To wake a wolf, is as bad as to smell a fox.

Ch. Just. What! you are as a candle, the ter part burnt out.

Fal. A wassel candle, my lord; all tallow: if I did say of wax, my growth would approve the truth.

Exeunt CHIEF JUSTICE and ATTENDANT. Fal. If I do, fillip me with a three-man beetle. A man can no more separate age and bet-covetousness, than he can part young limbs and lechery: but the gout galls the one, and the pox pinches the other; and so both the degrees prevent my curses.-Boy!-

Fal. Will your lordship lend me a thousand pound, to furnish me forth?

Ch. Just. There is not a white hair on your face, but should have his effect of gravity.

Fal. His effect of gravy, gravy, gravy. Ch. Just. You follow the young prince up and down, like bis ill angel.

Fal. Not so, my lord; your ill angel light; but, I hope, be that looks upon me, will take me without weighing: and yet, in some respects, I grant, I cannot go, I cannot tell Virtue is of so little regard in these costermonger times, that true valour is turned bear-herd: Pregnancy is made a tapster, and bath his quick wit wasted in giving reckonings: all the other gifts appertinent to man, as the malice of this age shapes them, are not worth a goose berry. You, that are old, consider not the capacities of us that are young you measure the beat of our livers with the bitterness of your calls and we that are in the vaward of our youth, I must confess, are wags too.

Ch. Just. Not a penny, not a penny; you are too impatient to bear crosses. Fare you well: Commend me to my cousin Westmoreland.

Page. Sir?

Fal. What money is in my purse?
Page. Seven groats and twopence.

Fal. I can get no remedy against this con-
sumption of the purse: borrowing only lingers
and lingers it out, but the disease is incurable.
is-Go, bear this letter to my lord of Lancaster ;
this to the prince; this to the earl of Westmore-
land; and this to old mistress Ursula, whom I
have weekly sworn to marry since I perceived the
first white hair on my chin: About it; you know
where to find me. [Exit PAGE.] A pox of
this gout! or, a gout of this pox! for the one
or the other plays the rogue with my great toe.
It is no matter, if I do halt; I have the wars
for my colour, and my pension shall seem the
more reasonable: A good wit will make use of
any thing; I will turn diseases to commodity.
[Exit.
SCENE III.-York.-A Room in the Arch-
bishop's Palace.

Ch. Just. Do you set down your name in the scroll of youth, that are written down old With all the characters of age? Have you not a Beist eye? a dry hand? a yellow cheek? a white beard? a decreasing leg? an increasing belly is not your voice broken? your wind short? your chin double? your wit single? and every part about you blasted with antiquity? and Will you yet call yourself young? Fie, fle, fie, Sir John!

Enter the ARCHBISHOP OF YORK, the Lords
HASTINGS, MOWBRAY, and BARDOLPH.
Arch. Thus have you heard our cause, and
known our means;

And, my most noble friends, I pray you all,
Speak plainly your opinions of our hopes:
And first, lord marshal, what say you to it?

Mowb. I well allow the occasion of our arms;
But gladly would be better satisfied,
How, in our means, we should advance our-
selves

file

To look with forehead bold and big enough
Upon the power and puissance of the king.
Hast. Our present musters grow upon the
To five and twenty thousand men of choice;
And our supplies live largely in the hope
Of great Northumberland, whose bosom burns
With an incensed fire of injuries.

Bard. The question then, lord Hastings,
standeth thus :-
Whether our present five and twenty thou

sand

Ful. My lord, I was born about three of the clock in the afternoon, with a white head, and something a round belly. For my voice,-I have lost it with bollaing, and singing of anthems. To approve my youth further, I will not: the truth is, I am only old in judgment and understanding; and he that will caper with me for z thousand marks, let him lend me the money, and have at him. For the box o'the ear that the prince gave you, he gave it like a rude prince, and you took it like a sensible lord. have checked him for it; and the young lion repents: marry, not in ashes and sackcloth; but in pew silk and old sack.

Ch. Just. Well, heaven send the prince a better companion!

Fal. Heaven send the companion a better prince! I cannot rid my hands of him.

Ch. Just. Well, the king hath severed you and A large wooden hammer so heavy as to require Prince Harry: I hear you are going with lord, three men to wield it. ↑ Anticipate.

May hold up head without Northumberland.
Hast. With him, we inay.

(Which is, almost, to pluck a kingdom down,
And set another up,) should we survey
The plot of situation, and the model;
Consent upon a sure foundation;
Question surveyors; know our own estate,
How able such a work to undergo,
To weigh against his opposite; or else,
We fortify paper, and in figures,
Using the names of men, instead of men :
Like one, that draws the model of a house
Beyond his power to build it; who,
through,

Gives o'er, and leaves his part created cost
A naked subject to the weeping clouds,
And waste for churlish winter's tyranny.

Hos

Hast. Grant that our hopes (yet likely for staff. fair birth,) Should be still-born, and that we now postered sess'd

The utmost man of expectation;

I think we are a body strong enough,

Even as we are, to equal with the king.

Bard. What is the king but five and twenty

thousand?

Hast. To us, no more; nay, not so much,
lord Bardolph.

After t

Cry'st
And to

Past, a

Mou

Hus

For his divisions, as the times do brawl,

Are in three heads: one power against the

French,

And one against Glendower; perforce, a third
Must take up us: So is the unürm king
In three divided; and his coffers sound
With hollow poverty and emptiness.
Arch. That he should draw
strengths together,

And come against us in full puissance,
Need not be dreaded.

Enter

half yeoma

Fan

Hos

Sna

Fan

Baying him at the heels: never fear that.

Bard. Who is it like should lead his forces
hither?

Hast. The duke of Lancaster, and West-
moreland:
Against the Welsh, himself and Harry Mon-
mouth :

Hos

action

Fan
Hos

Sna

lives,

Hos

stabbe

beastly

chief

foin

man, Fan

his thi

Hos

Fan

but wi Hos

his several you,

Good

ter Sn

tinuan hoods.

Hast. If he should do so,

He leaves his back unarm'd, the French and dinner

Welsh

to ma

since

openly

in to

12, 0 this re

loan for a poor lone woman to bear: and I have borne, and borne, and borne; and have been fubbed off, and fubbed off, and fubbed off, from this day to that day, that it is a shame to be thought on. There is no honesty in such dealing; unless a woman should be made an ass, and a beast, to bear every knave's wrong.-it, if thou canst.

Eater Sir Joux Falstaff, Page, and Bar

DOLPH,

Yonder he comes; and that arrant malinseyhose knave, Bardolph, with him. Do your offices, do your offices, master Fang, and master Suare; do me, do me, do me your oflices. Fal. How now? whose mare's dead? what's the matter?

Fang. Sir John, I arrest you at the suit of mistress Quickly.

Fal. Away, varlets!-Draw, Bardolph; cut me off the villain's bead; throw the quean in the chaunel.

Host. Throw me in the channel? I'll throw thee in thee chaunel. Wilt thou? wilt thou? thou bastardly rogue-Murder, murder! O thon honey-suckle villain! wilt thou kill God's officers, and the king's? O thoa honey-seed + rogue! thou art a honey-seed; a man-queller, and a woman-queller.

Fal. Keep them off, Bardolph.
Fang. A rescue! a rescue!

Host. Good people, bring a rescue or two.Thou wo't, wo't thou? thou we't, wo't thou? do, do, thou rogue! do, thou hemp-seed!

Fal. Away, you scullion! you rampallian! you fustilarian! I'll tickle your catastrophe.

Enter the Lord CHIEF JUSTICE, attended. Ch. Just. What's the matter? keep the peace here, bo!

Host. Good my lord, be good to me! I beseech you, stand to me!

wound? And didst thou not, when she was gone down stairs, desire me to be no more, so fami. liarity with such poor people; saying, that ere long they should call ine madam? And didst thou not kiss me, and bid me fetch thee thirty shillings? I put thee now to thy book,oath; deny

Fal. I think, I am as like to ride the mare, if I have any vantage of ground to get up.

Ch. Just. How comes this, Sir John? Fie! what man of good temper would endure this tempest of exclamation? Are you not ashamed, to enforce a poor widow to so rough a course to come by her own?

Ch. Just. How now, Sir John? what, are you brawling here?

Doth this become your place, your time, and business?

You should have been well on your way to

York.

Stand from him, fellow; Wherefore bang'st thon on him?

Host. O my most worshipful lord, an't please your grace, I am a poor widow of Eastcheap, and he is arrested at my suit.

Ch. Just. For what sum ?

Host. It is more than for some, my lord: it is for all, all I have: he hath eaten me out of boase and home; he hath put all my substance into that fat belly of his but I will have some of it out again, or I'll ride thee o'nights, like the

mare.

Fal. My lord, this is a poor mad soul; aud sire says, up and down the town, that her eldest son is like you: she hath been in good case, and the truth is, poverty bath distracted her. But for these foolish officers, I beseech you, I may have redress against them.

: Party gilt.

Fel. What is the gross sum that I owe thee? Host. Marry, if thou wert an honest man, thyself and the money too. Thou didst swear to me upon a parcel-gilt i goblet, sitting in my Dolphin chamber, at the round table, by a seacal fire, upon Wednesday in Whitsun-week, when the prince broke thy head for liking his father to a singing-man of Windsor: thou didst swear to me then, as I was washing thy wound, to marry me, and make me my lady thy wife. Canst thou deny it? Did not goodwife Keech, The batcher's wife, come in then, and call me gossip Quickly? coming in to borrow a mess of vinegar; telling us, she had a good dish of prawas: whereby thou didst desire to eat some; whereby I told thee, they were ill for a green

• Homicidal.

+ Homicide.

Ch. Just. Sir John, Sir John, I am well acquainted with your manner of wrenching the true cause the false way. It is not a confident brew, nor the throng of words that come with such more than impudent sauciness from you, can thrust me from a level consideration: you have, as it ap pears to me, practised upon the easy-yielding spirit of this woman, and made ber serve your uses both in purse and person.

Host. Yea, in troth, my lord.

Ch. Just. Pr'ythee, peace-Pay her the debt you owe her, and upay the villainy you have done with her the one you may do with sterling money, and the other with current repentance.

Fal. My lord, I will not undergo this sneap * without reply. You call honourable holdness, impudent sauciness: if a man will make court'sy, and say nothing, he is virtuous: No, my lord, my bumble duty remembered, I will not be your suitor; I say to you, I do desire deliverance from these officers, being upon hasty employment in the king's attairs.

Ch. Just, You speak as having power to do wroug: but answer in the effect of your reputation, and satisfy the poor woman. Fal. Come hither, hostess.

Taking her aside.

Enter GowER.

Ch. Just. Now, master Gower; What news? Gow. The king, my lord, and Harry prince of Wales,

Are near at hand: the rest the paper tells. Fal. As I am a gentlemau ;→→→

Host. Nay, you said so before.

Fal. As I am a gentleman;-Come, no more words of it.

Host. By this heavenly ground I tread on, I must be faim to pawn both my plate, and the tapestry of my dining-chambers.

Fal. Glasses, glasses, is the only drinking: and for thy walls,-a pretty slight drollery, or the story of the prodigal, or the German hunting in water-work, is worth a thousand of these bed-bangings, and these fly-bitten tapestries. Let it be ten pound, if thou canst. Come, an it were not for thy humours, there is not a better wench in England. Go, wash thy face, and 'draw thy aetion: Come, thou must not be in this humour with me; dost not know me? Come, come, I know thou wast set on to this.

Host. Pray thee, Sir John, let it be but twenty nobles; i'faith I ain loath to pawn my plate, in good earnest, la.

Fal. Let it alone; I'll make other shift: you'll be a fool still.

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The Dramatic Works of William Shakspeare: With Glossarial Notes, a Sketch of ...