Complete Plays, The

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Complete Plays, The Page 185

by William Shakespeare


  The unstained sword that you have used to bear;

  With this remembrance, that you use the same

  With the like bold, just and impartial spirit

  As you have done ’gainst me. There is my hand.

  You shall be as a father to my youth:

  My voice shall sound as you do prompt mine ear,

  And I will stoop and humble my intents

  To your well-practised wise directions.

  And, princes all, believe me, I beseech you;

  My father is gone wild into his grave,

  For in his tomb lie my affections;

  And with his spirit sadly I survive,

  To mock the expectation of the world,

  To frustrate prophecies and to raze out

  Rotten opinion, who hath writ me down

  After my seeming. The tide of blood in me

  Hath proudly flow’d in vanity till now:

  Now doth it turn and ebb back to the sea,

  Where it shall mingle with the state of floods

  And flow henceforth in formal majesty.

  Now call we our high court of parliament:

  And let us choose such limbs of noble counsel,

  That the great body of our state may go

  In equal rank with the best govern’d nation;

  That war, or peace, or both at once, may be

  As things acquainted and familiar to us;

  In which you, father, shall have foremost hand.

  Our coronation done, we will accite,

  As I before remember’d, all our state:

  And, God consigning to my good intents,

  No prince nor peer shall have just cause to say,

  God shorten Harry’s happy life one day!

  Exeunt

  SCENE III. GLOUCESTERSHIRE. SHALLOW’S ORCHARD.

  Enter Falstaff, Shallow, Silence, Davy, Bardolph, and the Page

  Shallow

  Nay, you shall see my orchard, where, in an arbour, we will eat a last year’s pippin of my own graffing, with a dish of caraways, and so forth: come, cousin Silence: and then to bed.

  Falstaff

  ’Fore God, you have here a goodly dwelling and a rich.

  Shallow

  Barren, barren, barren; beggars all, beggars all,

  Sir John: marry, good air. Spread, Davy; spread,

  Davy; well said, Davy.

  Falstaff

  This Davy serves you for good uses; he is your serving-man and your husband.

  Shallow

  A good varlet, a good varlet, a very good varlet, Sir John: by the mass, I have drunk too much sack at supper: a good varlet. Now sit down, now sit down: come, cousin.

  Silence

  Ah, sirrah! quoth-a, we shall

  Do nothing but eat, and make good cheer,

  Singing

  And praise God for the merry year;

  When flesh is cheap and females dear,

  And lusty lads roam here and there

  So merrily,

  And ever among so merrily.

  Falstaff

  There’s a merry heart! Good Master Silence, I’ll give you a health for that anon.

  Shallow

  Give Master Bardolph some wine, Davy.

  Davy

  Sweet sir, sit; I’ll be with you anon. most sweet sir, sit. Master page, good master page, sit. Proface! What you want in meat, we’ll have in drink: but you must bear; the heart’s all.

  Exit

  Shallow

  Be merry, Master Bardolph; and, my little soldier there, be merry.

  Silence

  Be merry, be merry, my wife has all;

  Singing

  For women are shrews, both short and tall:

  ’Tis merry in hall when beards wag all,

  And welcome merry Shrove-tide.

  Be merry, be merry.

  Falstaff

  I did not think Master Silence had been a man of this mettle.

  Silence

  Who, I? I have been merry twice and once ere now.

  Re-enter Davy

  Davy

  There’s a dish of leather-coats for you.

  To Bardolph

  Shallow

  Davy!

  Davy

  Your worship! I’ll be with you straight.

  To Bardolph

  A cup of wine, sir?

  Silence

  A cup of wine that’s brisk and fine,

  Singing

  And drink unto the leman mine;

  And a merry heart lives long-a.

  Falstaff

  Well said, Master Silence.

  Silence

  An we shall be merry, now comes in the sweet o’ the night.

  Falstaff

  Health and long life to you, Master Silence.

  Silence

  Fill the cup, and let it come;

  Singing

  I’ll pledge you a mile to the bottom.

  Shallow

  Honest Bardolph, welcome: if thou wantest any thing, and wilt not call, beshrew thy heart. Welcome, my little tiny thief.

  To the Page

  And welcome indeed too. I’ll drink to Master

  Bardolph, and to all the cavaleros about London.

  Davy

  I hove to see London once ere I die.

  Bardolph

  An I might see you there, Davy,—

  Shallow

  By the mass, you’ll crack a quart together, ha!

  Will you not, Master Bardolph?

  Bardolph

  Yea, sir, in a pottle-pot.

  Shallow

  By God’s liggens, I thank thee: the knave will stick by thee, I can assure thee that. A’ will not out; he is true bred.

  Bardolph

  And I’ll stick by him, sir.

  Shallow

  Why, there spoke a king. Lack nothing: be merry.

  Knocking within

  Look who’s at door there, ho! who knocks?

  Exit Davy

  Falstaff

  Why, now you have done me right.

  To Silence, seeing him take off a bumper

  Silence

  [Singing]

  Do me right,

  And dub me knight: Samingo.

  Is’t not so?

  Falstaff

  ’Tis so.

  Silence

  Is’t so? Why then, say an old man can do somewhat.

  Re-enter Davy

  Davy

  An’t please your worship, there’s one Pistol come from the court with news.

  Falstaff

  From the court! let him come in.

  Enter Pistol

  How now, Pistol!

  Pistol

  Sir John, God save you!

  Falstaff

  What wind blew you hither, Pistol?

  Pistol

  Not the ill wind which blows no man to good. Sweet knight, thou art now one of the greatest men in this realm.

  Silence

  By’r lady, I think a’ be, but goodman Puff of Barson.

  Pistol

  Puff!

  Puff in thy teeth, most recreant coward base!

  Sir John, I am thy Pistol and thy friend,

  And helter-skelter have I rode to thee,

  And tidings do I bring and lucky joys

  And golden times and happy news of price.

  Falstaff

  I pray thee now, deliver them like a man of this world.

  Pistol

  A foutre for the world and worldlings base!

  I speak of Africa and golden joys.

  Falstaff

  O base Assyrian knight, what is thy news?

  Let King Cophetua know the truth thereof.

  Silence

  And Robin Hood, Scarlet, and John.

  Singing

  Pistol

  Shall dunghill curs confront the Helicons?

  And shall good news be baffled?

  Then, Pistol, lay thy head in Furies’ lap.

  Silencer />
  Honest gentleman, I know not your breeding.

  Pistol

  Why then, lament therefore.

  Shallow

  Give me pardon, sir: if, sir, you come with news from the court, I take it there’s but two ways, either to utter them, or to conceal them. I am, sir, under the king, in some authority.

  Pistol

  Under which king, Besonian? speak, or die.

  Shallow

  Under King Harry.

  Pistol

  Harry the Fourth? or Fifth?

  Shallow

  Harry the Fourth.

  Pistol

  A foutre for thine office!

  Sir John, thy tender lambkin now is king;

  Harry the Fifth’s the man. I speak the truth:

  When Pistol lies, do this; and fig me, like

  The bragging Spaniard.

  Falstaff

  What, is the old king dead?

  Pistol

  As nail in door: the things I speak are just.

  Falstaff

  Away, Bardolph! saddle my horse. Master Robert

  Shallow, choose what office thou wilt in the land,

  ’tis thine. Pistol, I will double-charge thee with dignities.

  Bardolph

  O joyful day!

  I would not take a knighthood for my fortune.

  Pistol

  What! I do bring good news.

  Falstaff

  Carry Master Silence to bed. Master Shallow, my Lord Shallow,— be what thou wilt; I am fortune’s steward — get on thy boots: we’ll ride all night. O sweet Pistol! Away, Bardolph!

  Exit Bardolph

  Come, Pistol, utter more to me; and withal devise something to do thyself good. Boot, boot, Master Shallow: I know the young king is sick for me. Let us take any man’s horses; the laws of England are at my commandment. Blessed are they that have been my friends; and woe to my lord chief-justice!

  Pistol

  Let vultures vile seize on his lungs also!

  ‘Where is the life that late I led?’ say they:

  Why, here it is; welcome these pleasant days!

  Exeunt

  SCENE IV. LONDON. A STREET.

  Enter Beadles, dragging in Hostess Quickly and Doll Tearsheet

  Mistress Quickly

  No, thou arrant knave; I would to God that I might die, that I might have thee hanged: thou hast drawn my shoulder out of joint.

  First Beadle

  The constables have delivered her over to me; and she shall have whipping-cheer enough, I warrant her: there hath been a man or two lately killed about her.

  Doll Tearsheet

  Nut-hook, nut-hook, you lie. Come on; I ’ll tell thee what, thou damned tripe-visaged rascal, an the child I now go with do miscarry, thou wert better thou hadst struck thy mother, thou paper-faced villain.

  Mistress Quickly

  O the Lord, that Sir John were come! he would make this a bloody day to somebody. But I pray God the fruit of her womb miscarry!

  First Beadle

  If it do, you shall have a dozen of cushions again; you have but eleven now. Come, I charge you both go with me; for the man is dead that you and Pistol beat amongst you.

  Doll Tearsheet

  I’ll tell you what, you thin man in a censer, I will have you as soundly swinged for this,— you blue-bottle rogue, you filthy famished correctioner, if you be not swinged, I’ll forswear half-kirtles.

  First Beadle

  Come, come, you she knight-errant, come.

  Mistress Quickly

  O God, that right should thus overcome might!

  Well, of sufferance comes ease.

  Doll Tearsheet

  Come, you rogue, come; bring me to a justice.

  Mistress Quickly

  Ay, come, you starved blood-hound.

  Doll Tearsheet

  Goodman death, goodman bones!

  Mistress Quickly

  Thou atomy, thou!

  Doll Tearsheet

  Come, you thin thing; come you rascal.

  First Beadle

  Very well.

  Exeunt

  SCENE V. A PUBLIC PLACE NEAR WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

  Enter two Grooms, strewing rushes

  First Groom

  More rushes, more rushes.

  Second Groom

  The trumpets have sounded twice.

  First Groom

  ’Twill be two o’clock ere they come from the coronation: dispatch, dispatch.

  Exeunt

  Enter Falstaff, Shallow, Pistol, Bardolph, and Page

  Falstaff

  Stand here by me, Master Robert Shallow; I will make the king do you grace: I will leer upon him as a’ comes by; and do but mark the countenance that he will give me.

  Pistol

  God bless thy lungs, good knight.

  Falstaff

  Come here, Pistol; stand behind me. O, if I had had time to have made new liveries, I would have bestowed the thousand pound I borrowed of you. But ’tis no matter; this poor show doth better: this doth infer the zeal I had to see him.

  Shallow

  It doth so.

  Falstaff

  It shows my earnestness of affection,—

  Shallow

  It doth so.

  Falstaff

  My devotion,—

  Shallow

  It doth, it doth, it doth.

  Falstaff

  As it were, to ride day and night; and not to deliberate, not to remember, not to have patience to shift me,—

  Shallow

  It is best, certain.

  Falstaff

  But to stand stained with travel, and sweating with desire to see him; thinking of nothing else, putting all affairs else in oblivion, as if there were nothing else to be done but to see him.

  Pistol

  ’Tis ‘semper idem,’ for ‘obsque hoc nihil est:’

  ’tis all in every part.

  Shallow

  ’Tis so, indeed.

  Pistol

  My knight, I will inflame thy noble liver,

  And make thee rage.

  Thy Doll, and Helen of thy noble thoughts,

  Is in base durance and contagious prison;

  Haled thither

  By most mechanical and dirty hand:

  Rouse up revenge from ebon den with fell

  Alecto’s snake,

  For Doll is in. Pistol speaks nought but truth.

  Falstaff

  I will deliver her.

  Shouts within, and the trumpets sound

  Pistol

  There roar’d the sea, and trumpet-clangor sounds.

  Enter King Henry V and his train, the Lord Chief- Justice among them

  Falstaff

  God save thy grace, King Hal! my royal Hal!

  Pistol

  The heavens thee guard and keep, most royal imp of fame!

  Falstaff

  God save thee, my sweet boy!

  King Henry IV

  My lord chief-justice, speak to that vain man.

  Lord Chief-Justice

  Have you your wits? know you what ’tis to speak?

  Falstaff

  My king! my Jove! I speak to thee, my heart!

  King Henry IV

  I know thee not, old man: fall to thy prayers;

  How ill white hairs become a fool and jester!

  I have long dream’d of such a kind of man,

  So surfeit-swell’d, so old and so profane;

  But, being awaked, I do despise my dream.

  Make less thy body hence, and more thy grace;

  Leave gormandizing; know the grave doth gape

  For thee thrice wider than for other men.

  Reply not to me with a fool-born jest:

  Presume not that I am the thing I was;

  For God doth know, so shall the world perceive,

  That I have turn’d away my former self;

  So will I those that kept me company.

  When thou dost hear I am as I
have been,

  Approach me, and thou shalt be as thou wast,

  The tutor and the feeder of my riots:

  Till then, I banish thee, on pain of death,

  As I have done the rest of my misleaders,

  Not to come near our person by ten mile.

  For competence of life I will allow you,

  That lack of means enforce you not to evil:

  And, as we hear you do reform yourselves,

  We will, according to your strengths and qualities,

  Give you advancement. Be it your charge, my lord,

  To see perform’d the tenor of our word. Set on.

  Exeunt King Henry V, & c

  Falstaff

  Master Shallow, I owe you a thousand pound.

  Shallow

  Yea, marry, Sir John; which I beseech you to let me have home with me.

  Falstaff

  That can hardly be, Master Shallow. Do not you grieve at this; I shall be sent for in private to him: look you, he must seem thus to the world: fear not your advancements; I will be the man yet that shall make you great.

  Shallow

  I cannot well perceive how, unless you should give me your doublet and stuff me out with straw. I beseech you, good Sir John, let me have five hundred of my thousand.

  Falstaff

  Sir, I will be as good as my word: this that you heard was but a colour.

  Shallow

  A colour that I fear you will die in, Sir John.

  Falstaff

  Fear no colours: go with me to dinner: come, Lieutenant Pistol; come, Bardolph: I shall be sent for soon at night.

  Re-enter Prince John of Lancaster, the Lord Chief-Justice; Officers with them

  Lord Chief-Justice

  Go, carry Sir John Falstaff to the Fleet:

  Take all his company along with him.

  Falstaff

  My lord, my lord,—

  Lord Chief-Justice

  I cannot now speak: I will hear you soon.

  Take them away.

  Pistol

  Si fortune me tormenta, spero contenta.

  Exeunt all but Prince John and the Lord Chief-Justice

  Lancaster

  I like this fair proceeding of the king’s:

  He hath intent his wonted followers

  Shall all be very well provided for;

  But all are banish’d till their conversations

  Appear more wise and modest to the world.

  Lord Chief-Justice

  And so they are.

  Lancaster

  The king hath call’d his parliament, my lord.

  Lord Chief-Justice

  He hath.

  Lancaster

  I will lay odds that, ere this year expire,

  We bear our civil swords and native fire

  As far as France: I beard a bird so sing,

  Whose music, to my thinking, pleased the king.

  Come, will you hence?

  Exeunt

  EPILOGUE

  Spoken by a Dancer

 

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