vengeance too, marry and amen! Give me a cup of
sack, boy. Ere I lead this life long, I’ll sew nether-
stocks, and mend them and foot them too. A plague of
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all cowards! Give me a cup of sack, rogue; is there no
virtue extant? [He drinketh.]
PRINCE Didst thou never see Titan kiss a dish of butter
(pitiful-hearted Titan!), that melted at the sweet tale
of the sun’s? If thou didst, then behold that
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compound.
FALSTAFF 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
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when thou wilt – if manhood, good manhood, be not
forgot upon the face of the earth, then am I a shotten
herring: there lives not three good men unhanged in
England, and one of them is fat, and grows old, God
help the while, a bad world I say. I would I were a
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weaver; I could sing psalms, or anything. A plague of
all cowards, I say still.
PRINCE How now, wool-sack, 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
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subjects afore thee like a flock of wild geese, I’ll never
wear hair on my face more. You, Prince of Wales!
PRINCE Why, you whoreson round man, what’s the
matter?
FALSTAFF Are not you a coward? Answer me to that –
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and Poins there?
POINS ‘Zounds, ye fat paunch, and ye call me coward by
the Lord I’ll stab thee.
FALSTAFF I call thee coward? I’ll see thee damned ere I
call thee coward, but I would give a thousand pound I
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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 today.
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PRINCE O villain! Thy lips are scarce wiped since thou
drunk’st last.
FALSTAFF All is one for that. [He drinketh.] A plague
of all cowards, still say I.
PRINCE What’s the matter?
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FALSTAFF What’s the matter? There be four of us here
have ta’en a thousand pound this day 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.
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PRINCE What, a hundred, man?
FALSTAFF I am a rogue if I were not at half-sword with
a dozen of them two hours together. I have scaped by
miracle. I am eight times thrust through the doublet,
four through the hose, my buckler cut through and
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through, my sword hacked like a handsaw – ecce
signum! I never dealt better since I was a man: all
would not do. A plague of all cowards! Let them speak
– if they speak more or less than truth, they are
villains, and the sons of darkness.
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PRINCE Speak, sirs, how was it?
GADSHILL We four set upon some dozen –
FALSTAFF Sixteen at least, my lord.
GADSHILL And bound them.
PETO No, no, they were not bound.
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FALSTAFF You rogue, they were bound, every man of
them, or I am a Jew else: an Ebrew Jew.
GADSHILL As we were sharing, some six or seven fresh
men set upon us –
FALSTAFF And unbound the rest, and then come in the
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other.
PRINCE What, fought you with them all?
FALSTAFF All? I know not what you 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
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Jack, then am I no two-legg’d creature.
PRINCE Pray God 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 rogues in
buckram suits. I tell thee what, Hal, if I tell thee a lie,
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spit in my face, call me horse. Thou knowest my old
ward – here I lay, and thus I bore my point. Four
rogues in buckram let drive at me –
PRINCE What, four? Thou saidst but two even now.
FALSTAFF Four, Hal, I told thee four.
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POINS Ay, ay, he said four.
FALSTAFF These four came all afront, and mainly thrust
at me; I made me no more ado, but took all their seven
points in my target, thus!
PRINCE Seven? Why, there were but four even now.
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FALSTAFF In buckram?
POINS Ay, four, in buckram suits.
FALSTAFF Seven, by these hilts, or I am a villain else.
PRINCE Prithee let him alone, we shall have more anon.
FALSTAFF Dost thou hear me, Hal?
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PRINCE Ay, and mark thee too, Jack.
FALSTAFF Do so, for it is worth the listening to. These
nine in buckram that I told thee of –
PRINCE So, two more already.
FALSTAFF Their points being broken –
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POINS Down fell their hose.
FALSTAFF Began to give me ground; but I followed me
close, came in, foot and hand, and, with a thought,
seven of the eleven I paid.
PRINCE O monstrous! Eleven buckram men grown out
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of two!
FALSTAFF But as the devil would have it, three
misbegotten knaves in Kendal green came at my back
and let drive at me, for it was so dark, Hal, that thou
couldst not see thy hand.
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PRINCE These lies are like their father that begets them,
gross as a mountain, open, palpable. Why, thou clay-
brained guts, thou knotty-pated fool, thou whoreson
obscene greasy tallow-catch, –
FALSTAFF What, art thou mad? art thou mad? Is not the
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truth the truth?
PRINCE Why, how couldst thou know these men in
Kendal green when it was so dark thou couldst not see
thy hand? Come, tell us your reason. What sayest thou
to this?
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POINS Come, your reason, Jack, your reason.
FALSTAFF What, upon compulsion? ‘Zounds, and I
were at the strappado, or all the racks in the world, I
would not tell you on compulsion. Give you a reason
on compulsion? If reasons were as plentiful as
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blackberries, I would give no man a reason upon
compulsion, I.
PRINCE I’ll be no longer guilty of this sin. This sanguine
coward, this bed-presser, this horse-back-breaker, this
huge hill of flesh, –
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FALSTAFF ‘Sblood, you starveling, you eel-skin, you
dried neat’s-tongue, you bull’s-pizzle, you stock-fish –
O for breath to utter what is like thee! – you tailor’s-
yard, you sheath, you bow-case, you vile standing
>
tuck!
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PRINCE Well, breathe awhile, and then to it again, and
when thou hast tired thyself in base comparisons hear
me speak but this.
POINS Mark, Jack.
PRINCE We two saw you four set on four, and bound
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them and were masters of their wealth – mark now
how a plain tale shall put you down. Then did we two
set on you four, and, with a word, out-faced you from
your prize, and have it, yea, and can show it you here
in the house: and Falstaff you carried your guts away
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as nimbly, with as quick dexterity, and roared for
mercy, and still run and roared, as ever I heard bull-
calf. What a slave art thou to hack thy sword as thou
hast done, and then say it was in fight! What trick,
what device, what starting-hole canst thou now find
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out, to hide thee from this open and apparent shame?
POINS Come, let’s hear, Jack, what trick hast thou now?
FALSTAFF By the Lord, I knew ye as well as he that
made ye. Why, hear you, my masters, was it for me to
kill the heir-apparent? should I turn upon the true
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prince? Why, thou knowest I am as valiant as
Hercules: but beware instinct – the lion will not touch
the true prince; instinct is a great matter. I was now a
coward on instinct: I shall think the better of myself,
and thee, during my life – I for a valiant lion, and thou
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for a true prince. But by the Lord, lads, I am glad you
have the money. Hostess, clap to the doors! Watch
tonight, pray tomorrow! – Gallants, lads, boys, hearts
of gold, all the titles of good fellowship come to you!
What, shall we be merry, shall we have a play
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extempore?
PRINCE Content, and the argument shall be thy running
away.
FALSTAFF Ah, no more of that, Hal, and thou lovest me.
Enter Hostess.
HOSTESS O Jesu, my lord the Prince!
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PRINCE How now, my lady the hostess, what say’st thou
to me?
HOSTESS Marry, my lord, there is a nobleman of the
court at door would speak with you: he says he comes
from your father.
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PRINCE Give him as much as will make him a royal man,
and send him back again to my mother.
FALSTAFF What manner of man is he?
HOSTESS An old man.
FALSTAFF What doth gravity out of his bed at
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midnight? Shall I give him his answer?
PRINCE Prithee do, Jack.
FALSTAFF Faith, and I’ll send him packing. Exit.
PRINCE Now, sirs: by’r lady, you fought fair, so did you,
Peto, so did you, Bardolph; you are lions too, you ran
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away upon instinct, you will not touch the true prince,
no, fie!
BARDOLPH Faith, I ran when I saw others run.
PRINCE Faith, tell me now in earnest, how came
Falstaff ‘s sword so hacked?
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PETO Why, he hacked it with his dagger, and said he
would swear truth out of England but he would make
you believe it was done in fight, and persuaded us to
do the like.
BARDOLPH Yea, and to tickle our noses with spear-grass,
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to make them bleed, and then to beslubber our
garments with it, and swear it was the blood of true
men. I did that I did not this seven year before, I
blushed to hear his monstrous devices.
PRINCE O villain, thou stolest a cup of sack eighteen
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years ago, and wert taken with the manner, and ever
since thou hast blushed extempore. Thou hadst fire
and sword on thy side, and yet thou ran’st away – what
instinct hadst thou for it?
BARDOLPH My lord, do you see these meteors? do you
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behold these exhalations?
PRINCE I do.
BARDOLPH What think you they portend?
PRINCE Hot livers, and cold purses.
BARDOLPH Choler, my lord, if rightly taken.
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PRINCE No, if rightly taken, halter.
Re-enter FALSTAFF.
Here comes lean Jack, here comes bare-bone. How
now, my sweet creature of bombast, how long is’t ago,
Jack, since thou sawest thine own knee?
FALSTAFF My own knee? When I was about thy years,
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Hal, I was not an eagle’s talon in the waist, I could
have crept into any alderman’s thumb-ring: a plague
of sighing and grief, it blows a man up like a bladder.
The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works Page 158