The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works

Home > Fiction > The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works > Page 385
The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works Page 385

by William Shakespeare

Enter MISTRESS PAGE.

  MISTRESS PAGE How now, sweetheart, who’s at home

  10

  besides yourself?

  MISTRESS FORD Why, none but mine own people.

  MISTRESS PAGE Indeed?

  MISTRESS FORD No, certainly. – [Whispers.] Speak

  louder.

  15

  MISTRESS PAGE Truly, I am so glad you have nobody

  here.

  MISTRESS FORD Why?

  MISTRESS PAGE Why, woman, your husband is in his old

  lines again: he so takes on yonder with my husband, so

  20

  rails against all married mankind, so curses all Eve’s

  daughters, of what complexion soever, and so buffets

  himself on the forehead, crying ‘peer out, peer out!’,

  that any madness I ever yet beheld seemed but

  tameness, civility and patience to this his distemper he

  25

  is in now. I am glad the fat knight is not here.

  MISTRESS FORD Why, does he talk of him?

  MISTRESS PAGE Of none but him, and swears he was

  carried out, the last time he searched for him, in a

  basket; protests to my husband he is now here, and

  30

  hath drawn him and the rest of their company from

  their sport, to make another experiment of his

  suspicion. But I am glad the knight is not here: now he

  shall see his own foolery.

  MISTRESS FORD How near is he, Mistress Page?

  35

  MISTRESS PAGE Hard by, at street end. He will be here

  anon.

  MISTRESS FORD I am undone: the knight is here.

  MISTRESS PAGE Why, then you are utterly shamed and

  he’s but a dead man. What a woman are you! Away

  40

  with him, away with him: better shame than murder.

  MISTRESS FORD Which way should he go? How should

  I bestow him? Shall I put him into the basket again?

  Enter FALSTAFF.

  FALSTAFF No, I’ll come no more i’the basket. May I not

  go out ere he come?

  45

  MISTRESS PAGE Alas, three of Master Ford’s brothers

  watch the door with pistols, that none shall issue out,

  otherwise you might slip away ere he came. – But what

  make you here?

  FALSTAFF What shall I do? I’ll creep up into the

  50

  chimney.

  MISTRESS FORD There they always use to discharge

  their birding-pieces.

  MISTRESS PAGE Creep into the kiln-hole.

  FALSTAFF Where is it?

  55

  MISTRESS FORD He will seek there, on my word.

  Neither press, coffer, chest, trunk, well, vault, but he

  hath an abstract for the remembrance of such places

  and goes to them by his note. There is no hiding you

  in the house.

  60

  FALSTAFF I’ll go out, then.

  MISTRESS PAGE If you go out in your own semblance

  you die, Sir John – unless you go out disguised.

  mistress ford How might we disguise him?

  mistress page Alas the day, I know not: there is no

  65

  woman’s gown big enough for him. Otherwise he

  might put on a hat, a muffler and a kerchief, and so

  escape.

  FALSTAFF Good hearts, devise something; any

  extremity rather than a mischief.

  70

  MISTRESS FORD My maid’s aunt, the fat woman of

  Brentford, has a gown above.

  MISTRESS PAGE On my word, it will serve him. She’s as

  big as he is – and there’s her thrummed hat and her

  muffler too. – Run up, Sir John.

  75

  MISTRESS FORD Go, go, sweet Sir John. Mistress Page

  and I will look some linen for your head.

  MISTRESS PAGE Quick, quick! We’ll come dress you

  straight; put on the gown the while. Exit Falstaff.

  MISTRESS FORD I would my husband would meet him

  80

  in this shape! He cannot abide the old woman of

  Brentford; he swears she’s a witch, forbade her my

  house and hath threatened to beat her.

  MISTRESS PAGE Heaven guide him to thy husband’s

  cudgel and the devil guide his cudgel afterwards.

  85

  MISTRESS FORD But is my husband coming?

  MISTRESS PAGE Ay, in good sadness is he, and talks of

  the basket too, howsoever he hath had intelligence.

  MISTRESS FORD We’ll try that; for I’ll appoint my men

  to carry the basket again to meet him at the door with

  90

  it, as they did last time.

  MISTRESS PAGE Nay, but he’ll be here presently. Let’s

  go dress him like the witch of Brentford.

  MISTRESS FORD I’ll first direct my men what they shall

  do with the basket. Go up, I’ll bring linen for him

  95

  straight.

  MISTRESS PAGE Hang him, dishonest varlet! We cannot

  misuse him enough. Exit Mistress Ford.

  We’ll leave a proof, by that which we will do,

  Wives may be merry and yet honest too.

  100

  We do not act that often jest and laugh;

  ’Tis old but true: ‘Still swine eats all the draff ‘. Exit.

  Enter MISTRESS FORD with JOHN and ROBERT.

  MISTRESS FORD Go, sirs, take the basket again on your

  shoulders. Your master is hard at door; if he bid you

  set it down, obey him. Quickly, dispatch. Exit.

  105

  JOHN Come, come, take it up.

  ROBERT Pray heaven it be not full of knight again.

  JOHN I hope not, I had as lief bear so much lead.

  Enter FORD, PAGE, SHALLOW, CAIUS and EVANS at

  one door, and JOHN and ROBERT go and fetch in the

  basket at another.

  FORD Ay, but if it prove true, Master Page, have you any

  way then to unfool me again? – Set down the basket,

  110

  villains. Somebody call my wife. Youth in a basket! O

  you panderly rascals, there’s a knot, a gin, a pack, a

  conspiracy against me. Now shall the devil be shamed.

  – What, wife, I say! Come, come forth: behold what

  honest clothes you send forth to bleaching!

  115

  PAGE Why, this passes, Master Ford! You are not to go

  loose any longer, you must be pinioned.

  EVANS Why, this is lunatics, this is mad as a mad dog.

  SHALLOW Indeed, Master Ford, this is not well indeed.

  FORD So say I too, sir.

  120

  Enter MISTRESS FORD.

  Come hither, Mistress Ford – Mistress Ford, the

  honest woman, the modest wife, the virtuous creature

  that hath the jealous fool to her husband! I suspect

  without cause, mistress, do I?

  MISTRESS FORD God be my witness you do, if you

  125

  suspect me in any dishonesty.

  FORD Well said, brazen-face, hold it out! – Come forth,

  sirrah! [Pulls clothes from the basket.]

  PAGE This passes.

  MISTRESS FORD Are you not ashamed? Let the clothes

  130

  alone.

  FORD I shall find you anon.

  EVANS ’Tis unreasonable! Will you take up your wife’s

  clothes? Come, away!

  FORD Empty the basket, I say.

  135

  PAGE Why, man, why?

  FORD Master Page, as I am a man, there was one

  conveyed out of my house yesterday in this b
asket.

  Why may not he be there again? In my house I am sure

  he is: my intelligence is true, my jealousy is reasonable.

  140

  – Pluck me out all the linen.

  MISTRESS FORD If you find a man there, he shall die a

  flea’s death. [They empty the basket.]

  PAGE Here’s no man.

  SHALLOW By my fidelity, this is not well, Master Ford,

  145

  this wrongs you.

  EVANS Master Ford, you must pray, and not follow the

  imaginations of your own heart: this is jealousies.

  FORD Well, he’s not here I seek for.

  PAGE No, nor nowhere else but in your brain.

  150

  FORD Help to search my house this one time. If I find

  not what I seek, show no colour for my extremity, let

  me for ever be your table-sport. Let them say of me

  ‘As jealous as Ford, that searched a hollow walnut for

  his wife’s leman’. Satisfy me once more, once more

  155

  search with me. Exeunt John and Robert with basket.

  MISTRESS FORD What ho, Mistress Page, come you and

  the old woman down; my husband will come into the

  chamber.

  FORD Old woman? What old woman’s that?

  160

  MISTRESS FORD Why, it is my maid’s aunt of Brentford.

  FORD A witch, a quean, an old cozening quean! Have I

  not forbid her my house? She comes of errands, does

  she? We are simple men, we do not know what’s

  brought to pass under the profession of fortune-telling.

  165

  She works by charms, by spells, by the figure, and such

  daubery as this is, beyond our element: we know

  nothing. – Come down, you witch, you hag, you! Come

  down, I say!

  MISTRESS FORD Nay, good sweet husband – good

  170

  gentlemen, let him not strike the old woman.

  Enter FALSTAFF, disguised like an old woman,

  and MISTRESS PAGE.

  MISTRESS PAGE Come, mother Prat, come, give me your

  hand.

  FORD I’ll prat her! [Beats him.] Out of my door, you

  witch, you rag, you baggage, you polecat, you runnion,

  175

  out, out! I’ll conjure you, I’ll fortune-tell you!

  Exit Falstaff.

  MISTRESS PAGE Are you not ashamed? I think you have

  killed the poor woman.

  MISTRESS FORD Nay, he will do it. ’Tis a goodly credit

  for you!

  180

  FORD Hang her, witch!

  EVANS By yea and no, I think the ‘oman is a witch

  indeed. I like not when a ‘oman has a great peard – I

  spy a great peard under her muffler.

  FORD Will you follow, gentlemen? I beseech you, follow,

  185

  see but the issue of my jealousy. If I cry out thus upon

  no trail, never trust me when I open again.

  PAGE Let’s obey his humour a little further. Come,

  gentlemen.

  Exeunt all but Mistress Ford and Mistress Page.

  MISTRESS PAGE By my troth, he beat him most pitifully.

  190

  MISTRESS FORD Nay, by th’mass, that he did not: he

  beat him most unpitifully, methought.

  MISTRESS PAGE I’ll have the cudgel hallowed and hung

  o’er the altar: it hath done meritorious service.

  MISTRESS FORD What think you? May we, with the

  195

  warrant of womanhood and the witness of a good

  conscience, pursue him with any further revenge?

  MISTRESS PAGE The spirit of wantonness is sure scared

  out of him. If the devil have him not in fee-simple,

  with fine and recovery, he will never, I think, in the

  200

  way of waste, attempt us again.

  MISTRESS FORD Shall we tell our husbands how we have

  served him?

  MISTRESS PAGE Yes, by all means, if it be but to scrape

  the figures out of your husband’s brains. If they can

  205

  find in their hearts the poor unvirtuous fat knight

  shall be any further afflicted, we two will still be the

  ministers.

  MISTRESS FORD I’ll warrant they’ll have him publicly

  shamed, and methinks there would be no period to the

  210

  jest should he not be publicly shamed.

  MISTRESS PAGE Come, to the forge with it, then shape

  it: I would not have things cool. Exeunt.

  4.3 Enter HOST and BARDOLPH.

  BARDOLPH Sir, the German desires to have three of

  your horses. The Duke himself will be tomorrow at

  court, and they are going to meet him.

  HOST What duke should that be comes so secretly? I

  hear not of him in the court. Let me speak with the

 

‹ Prev