The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works
Page 377
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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 bruised
my shin th’other day with playing at sword and dagger
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with a master of fence – three venues for a dish of
stewed prunes – and, by my troth, I cannot abide the
smell of hot meat since. – Why do your dogs bark so?
Be there bears i’the town?
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ANNE I think there are, sir; I heard them talked 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.
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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 shrieked at it that it passed. But women, indeed,
cannot abide ‘em: they are very ill-favoured rough
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things.
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,
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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.
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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, Slender leading.
1.2 Enter Sir Hugh EVANS and SIMPLE, from dinner.
EVANS Go your ways, and ask of Doctor Caius’ house,
which is the way. And there dwells one Mistress
Quickly, which is in the manner of his nurse, or his dry
nurse, or his cook, or his laundry, his washer and his
wringer.
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SIMPLE Well, sir.
EVANS Nay, it is petter yet: give her this letter. For it is
a ‘oman that altogether’s acquaintance with Mistress
Anne Page, and the letter is to desire, and require her,
to solicit your master’s desires to Mistress Anne Page.
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I pray you be gone; I will make an end of my dinner,
there’s pippins and cheese to come. Exeunt.
1.3 Enter FALSTAFF, HOST, BARDOLPH, NIM, PISTOL and ROBIN.
FALSTAFF Mine host of the Garter –
HOST What says my bully rook? Speak scholarly and
wisely.
FALSTAFF Truly, mine host, I must turn away some of
my followers.
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HOST Discard, bully Hercules, cashier! Let them wag;
trot, trot!
FALSTAFF I sit at ten pounds a week.
HOST Thou’rt an emperor – Caesar, Kaiser and Vizier.
I will entertain Bardolph: he shall draw, he shall tap.
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Said I well, bully Hector?
FALSTAFF Do so, good mine host.
HOST I have spoke, let him follow. – Let me see thee
froth and lime. I am at a word, follow. Exit.
FALSTAFF Bardolph, follow him. A tapster is a good
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trade: an old cloak makes a new jerkin; a withered
servingman, a fresh tapster. Go, adieu.
BARDOLPH It is a life that I have desired. I will thrive.
Exit.
PISTOL O base Hungarian wight, wilt thou the spigot
wield?
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NIM He was gotten in drink. Is not the humour
conceited?
FALSTAFF I am glad I am so acquit of this tinderbox.
His thefts were too open: his filching was like an
unskilful singer, he kept not time.
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NIM The good humour is to steal at a minute’s rest.
PISTOL ‘Convey’, the wise it call. ‘Steal’? Foh! A fico for
the phrase!
FALSTAFF Well, sirs, I am almost out at heels.
PISTOL Why then, let kibes ensue.
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FALSTAFF There is no remedy, I must cony-catch, I
must shift.
PISTOL Young ravens must have food.
FALSTAFF Which of you know Ford of this town?
PISTOL I ken the wight, he is of substance good.
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FALSTAFF My honest lads, I will tell you what I am
about.
PISTOL Two yards, and more.
FALSTAFF No quips now, Pistol. – Indeed I am in the
waist two yards about, but I am now about no waste: I
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am about thrift. Briefly, I do mean to make love to
Ford’s wife. I spy entertainment in her: she discourses,
she carves, she gives the leer of invitation. I can
construe the action of her familiar style, and the
hardest voice of her behaviour – to be Englished
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rightly – is: ‘I am Sir John Falstaff ‘s’.
PISTOL He hath studied her well, and translated her
will – out of honesty into English.
NIM The anchor is deep: will that humour pass?
FALSTAFF Now, the report goes she has all the rule of
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her husband’s purse: he hath a legion of angels.
PISTOL As many devils attend her! And ‘To her, boy!’
say I.
NIM The humour rises: it is good. Humour me the
angels.
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FALSTAFF I have writ me here a letter to her; and here
another to Page’s wife, who even now gave me good
eyes too, examined my parts with most judicious
oeillades. Sometimes the beam of her view gilded my
foot, sometimes my portly belly.
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PISTOL Then did the sun on dunghill shine.
NIM I thank thee for that humour.
FALSTAFF O, she did so course o’er my exteriors, with
such a greedy intention, that the appetite of her eye
did seem to scorch me up like a burning glass. Here’s
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another letter to her. She bears the purse too: she is a
region in Guiana, all gold and bounty. I will be
cheaters to them both, and they shall be exchequers to
me. They shall be my East and West Indies, and I will
trade to them both. [to Nim] Go, bear thou this letter
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to Mistress Page; [to Pistol] and thou this to Mistress
Ford. – We will thrive, lads, we will thrive.
PISTOL Shall I Sir Pandarus of Troy become,
And by my side wear steel? Then Lucifer take all!
NIM I will run no base humour. Here, take the humour-
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letter – I will keep the ‘haviour of reputation.
FALSTAFF [to Robin]
Hold, sirrah, bear you these letters titely,
Sail like my pinnace to these golden shores. –
Rogues, hence, avaunt! Vanish like hailstones, go!
Trudge, plod away o’th’ hoof, seek shelter, pack!
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Falstaff will learn the humour of this age:
French thrift, you rogues – myself and skirted page!
Exit with Robin.
PISTOL
Let vultures gripe thy guts! For gourd a
nd fullam holds,
And high and low beguiles the rich and poor.
Tester I’ll have in pouch when thou shalt lack,
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Base Phrygian Turk!
NIM I have operations
In my head, which be humours of revenge.
PISTOL Wilt thou revenge?
NIM By welkin and her stars!
PISTOL With wit, or steel?
NIM With both the humours, I.
I will discuss the humour of this love to Ford.
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PISTOL And I to Page shall eke unfold
How Falstaff, varlet vile,
His dove will prove, his gold will hold,
And his soft couch defile.
NIM My humour shall not cool: I will incense Ford to
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deal with poison, I will possess him with yellowness,
for this revolt of mine is dangerous. That is my true
humour.
PISTOL Thou art the Mars of malcontents. I second
thee – troop on. Exeunt.
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1.4 Enter Mistress QUICKLY and SIMPLE.
QUICKLY What, John Rugby!
Enter RUGBY.
I pray thee go to the casement, and see if you can see my
master, Master Doctor Caius, coming. If he do, i’faith,
and find anybody in the house, here will be an old
abusing of God’s patience and the King’s English.
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RUGBY I’ll go watch.
QUICKLY Go; and we’ll have a posset for’t soon at night,
in faith, at the latter end of a sea-coal fire.
Exit Rugby.
An honest, willing, kind fellow, as ever servant shall
come in house withal; and I warrant you, no tell-tale,
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nor no breed-bate. His worst fault is that he is given to
prayer; he is something peevish that way, but nobody
but has his fault. But let that pass. – Peter Simple, you
say your name is?
SIMPLE Ay, for fault of a better.
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QUICKLY And Master Slender’s your master?
SIMPLE Ay, forsooth.
quickly Does he not wear a great round beard, like a
glover’s paring-knife?
SIMPLE No, forsooth, he hath but a little wee face, with
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a little yellow beard: a Cain-coloured beard.
QUICKLY A softly-sprighted man, is he not?
SIMPLE Ay, forsooth. But he is as tall a man of his hands,
as any is between this and his head. He hath fought
with a warrener.
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QUICKLY How, say you? – O, I should remember him:
does he not hold up his head, as it were, and strut in
his gait?
SIMPLE Yes, indeed, does he.
QUICKLY Well, heaven send Anne Page no worse
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fortune. Tell Master Parson Evans I will do what I can
for your master. Anne is a good girl, and I wish –
Enter RUGBY.
RUGBY Out, alas! Here comes my master! Exit.
QUICKLY We shall all be shent. Run in here, good young
man, go into this closet – he will not stay long. [Simple
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steps into the closet.] What, John Rugby! John! What,
John, I say! Go, John, go inquire for my master. I
doubt he be not well, that he comes not home.
[Sings.] And down, down, adown-a (etc.)
Enter Doctor CAIUS.
CAIUS Vat is you sing? I do not like dese toys. Pray you
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go and vetch me in my closet une boîtine verte – a box,
a green-a-box. Do intend vat I speak? A green-a-box.
QUICKLY Ay, forsooth, I’ll fetch it you. – [aside] I am
glad he went not in himself: if he had found the young
man he would have been horn-mad.
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CAIUS Fe, fe, fe, fe, ma foi, il fait fort chaud. Je m’en vais
voir à la cour la grande affaire.
QUICKLY Is it this, sir?
CAIUS Oui, mette-le au mon pocket. Dépêche quickly.
Vere is dat knave Rugby?
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QUICKLY What, John Rugby! John!
Enter RUGBY.
RUGBY Here, sir.
CAIUS You are John Rugby, and you are Jack Rugby.
Come take-a your rapier, and come after my heel to
the court.
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RUGBY ’Tis ready, sir, here in the porch.
CAIUS By my trot, I tarry too long. ‘Od’s me, qu’ai-je
oublié! Dere is some simples in my closet dat I will not
for the varld I shall leave behind.
QUICKLY Ay me, he’ll find the young man there, and
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be mad!