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Dramatis Personae
RUMOUR, the Presenter
KING HENRY THE FOURTH
HENRY, PRINCE OF WALES, afterwards HENRY
PRINCE JOHN OF LANCASTER
PRINCE HUMPHREY OF GLOUCESTER
THOMAS, DUKE OF CLARENCE
Sons of Henry IV
SCROOP, ARCHBISHOP OF YORK
LORD MOWBRAY
LORD HASTINGS
LORD BARDOLPH
SIR JOHN COLVILLE
TRAVERS and MORTON, retainers of Northumberland
Opposites against King Henry IV
EARL OF WESTMORELAND
EARL OF SURREY
EARL OF KENT
GOWER
HARCOURT
BLUNT
Of the King's party
SERVANT, to Lord Chief Justice
EDWARD POINS
BARDOLPH
PISTOL
PETO
Irregular humourists
PAGE, to Falstaff
ROBERT SHALLOW and SILENCE, country Justices
DAVY, servant to Shallow
FANG and SNARE, Sheriff's officers
SIMON SHADOW
THOMAS WART
FRANCIS FEEBLE
PETER BULLCALF
Country soldiers
FRANCIS, a drawer
LADY PERCY, Percy's widow
HOSTESS QUICKLY, of the Boar's Head, Eastcheap
DOLL TEARSHEET
LORDS, Attendants, Porter, Drawers, Beadles, Grooms, Servants,
Speaker of the Epilogue
SCENE: England
INDUCTION
INDUCTION.
Warkworth. Before NORTHUMBERLAND'S Castle
Enter RUMOUR, painted full of tongues
RUMOUR. Open your ears; for which of you will stop
The vent of hearing when loud Rumour speaks?
I, from the orient to the drooping west,
Making the wind my post-horse, still unfold
The acts commenced on this ball of earth.
Upon my tongues continual slanders ride,
The which in every language I pronounce,
Stuffing the ears of men with false reports.
I speak of peace while covert emnity,
Under the smile of safety, wounds the world;
And who but Rumour, who but only I,
Make fearful musters and prepar'd defence,
Whiles the big year, swoln with some other grief,
Is thought with child by the stern tyrant war,
And no such matter? Rumour is a pipe
Blown by surmises, jealousies, conjectures,
And of so easy and so plain a stop
That the blunt monster with uncounted heads,
The still-discordant wav'ring multitude,
Can play upon it. But what need I thus
My well-known body to anatomize
Among my household? Why is Rumour here?
I run before King Harry's victory,
Who, in a bloody field by Shrewsbury,
Hath beaten down young Hotspur and his troops,
Quenching the flame of bold rebellion
Even with the rebels' blood. But what mean I
To speak so true at first? My office is
To noise abroad that Harry Monmouth fell
Under the wrath of noble Hotspur's sword,
And that the King before the Douglas' rage
Stoop'd his anointed head as low as death.
This have I rumour'd through the peasant towns
Between that royal field of Shrewsbury
And this worm-eaten hold of ragged stone,
Where Hotspur's father, old Northumberland,
Lies crafty-sick. The posts come tiring on,
And not a man of them brings other news
Than they have learnt of me. From Rumour's tongues
They bring smooth comforts false, worse than true wrongs.
Exit
ACT I. SCENE I.
Warkworth. Before NORTHUMBERLAND'S Castle
Enter LORD BARDOLPH
LORD BARDOLPH. Who keeps the gate here, ho?
The PORTER opens the gate
Where is the Earl?
PORTER. What shall I say you are?
LORD BARDOLPH. Tell thou the Earl
That the Lord Bardolph doth attend him here.
PORTER. His lordship is walk'd forth into the orchard.
Please it your honour knock but at the gate,
And he himself will answer.
Enter NORTHUMBERLAND
LORD BARDOLPH. Here comes the Earl. Exit PORTER
NORTHUMBERLAND. What news, Lord Bardolph? Every minute now
Should be the father of some stratagem.
The times are wild; contention, like a horse
Full of high feeding, madly hath broke loose
And bears down all before him.
LORD BARDOLPH. Noble Earl,
I bring you certain news from Shrewsbury.
NORTHUMBERLAND. Good, an God will!
LORD BARDOLPH. As good as heart can wish.
The King is almost wounded to the death;
And, in the fortune of my lord your son,
Prince Harry slain outright; and both the Blunts
Kill'd by the hand of Douglas; young Prince John,
And Westmoreland, and Stafford, fled the field;
And Harry Monmouth's brawn, the hulk Sir John,
Is prisoner to your son. O, such a day,
So fought, so followed, and so fairly won,
Came not till now to dignify the times,
Since Cxsar's fortunes!
NORTHUMBERLAND. How is this deriv'd?
Saw you the field? Came you from Shrewsbury?
LORD BARDOLPH. I spake with one, my lord, that came from thence;
A gentleman well bred and of good name,
That freely rend'red me these news for true.
Enter TRAVERS
NORTHUMBERLAND. Here comes my servant Travers, whom I sent
On Tuesday last to listen after news.
LORD BARDOLPH. My lord, I over-rode him on the way;
And he is furnish'd with no certainties
More than he haply may retail from me.
NORTHUMBERLAND. Now, Travers, what good tidings comes with you?
TRAVERS. My lord, Sir John Umfrevile turn'd me back
With joyful tidings; and, being better hors'd,
Out-rode me. After him came spurring hard
A gentleman, almost forspent with speed,
That stopp'd by me to breathe his bloodied horse.
He ask'd the way to Chester; and of him
I did demand what news from Shrewsbury.
He told me that rebellion had bad luck,
And that young Harry Percy's spur was cold.
With that he gave his able horse the head
And, bending forward, struck his armed heels
Against the panting sides of his poor jade
Up to the rowel-head; and starting so,
He seem'd in running to devour the way,
Staying no longer question.
NORTHUMBERLAND. Ha! Again:
Said he young Harry Percy's spur was cold?
Of Hotspur, Coldspur? that rebellion
Had met ill luck?
LORD BARDOLPH. My lord, I'll tell you what:
If my young lord your son have not the day,
Upon mine honour, for a silken point
I'll give my barony. Never talk of it.
NORTHUMBERLAND. Why should that gentleman that rode by Travers
Give then such instances of loss?
LORD BARDOLPH. Who- he?
He was some hilding fellow that had stol'n
The horse he rode on and, upon my life,
Spoke at a venture. Look, here comes more news.
Enter Morton
NORTHUMBERLAND. Yea, this man's brow, like to a title-leaf,
Foretells the nature of a tragic volume.
So looks the strand whereon the imperious flood
Hath left a witness'd usurpation.
Say, Morton, didst thou come from Shrewsbury?
MORTON. I ran from Shrewsbury, my noble lord;
Where hateful death put on his ugliest mask
To fright our party.
NORTHUMBERLAND. How doth my son and brother?
Thou tremblest; and the whiteness in thy cheek
Is apter than thy tongue to tell thy errand.
Even such a man, so faint, so spiritless,
So dull, so dread in look, so woe-begone,
Drew Priam's curtain in the dead of night
And would have told him half his Troy was burnt;
But Priam found the fire ere he his tongue,
And I my Percy's death ere thou report'st it.
This thou wouldst say: 'Your son did thus and thus;
Your brother thus; so fought the noble Douglas'-
Stopping my greedy ear with their bold deeds;
But in the end, to stop my ear indeed,
Thou hast a sigh to blow away this praise,
Ending with 'Brother, son, and all, are dead.'
MORTON. Douglas is living, and your brother, yet;
But for my lord your son-
NORTHUMBERLAND. Why, he is dead.
See what a ready tongue suspicion hath!
He that but fears the thing he would not know
Hath by instinct knowledge from others' eyes
That what he fear'd is chanced. Yet speak, Morton;
Tell thou an earl his divination lies,
And I will take it as a sweet disgrace
And make thee rich for doing me such wrong.
MORTON. You are too great to be by me gainsaid;
Your spirit is too true, your fears too certain.
NORTHUMBERLAND. 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,
Rememb'red tolling a departing friend.
LORD BARDOLPH. I cannot think, my lord, your son is dead.
MORTON. I am sorry I should force you to believe
That which I would to God I had not seen;
But these mine eyes saw him in bloody state,
Rend'ring faint quittance, wearied and out-breath'd,
To Harry Monmouth, whose swift wrath beat down
The never-daunted Percy to the earth,
From whence with life he never more sprung 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 steeled;
Which once in him abated, an 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 Worcester
Too soon ta'en prisoner; and that furious Scot,
The bloody Douglas, whose well-labouring sword
Had three times slain th' appearance of the King,
Gan vail his stomach and did grace the shame
Of those that turn'd their backs, and in his 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.
NORTHUMBERLAND. 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-weak'ned 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,
Weak'ned with grief, being now enrag'd with grief,
Are thrice themselves. Hence, therefore, thou nice crutch!
A scaly gauntlet now with joints of steel
Must glove this hand; and hence, thou sickly coif!
Thou art a guard too wanton for the head
Which princes, flesh'd with conquest, aim to hit.
Now bind my brows with iron; and approach
The ragged'st hour that time and spite dare bring
To frown upon th' 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 ling'ring 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!
LORD BARDOLPH. This strained passion doth you wrong, my lord.
MORTON. Sweet Earl, divorce not wisdom from your honour.
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 th' event of war, my noble lord,
And summ'd the account of chance before you said
'Let us make head.' It was your pre-surmise
That in the dole 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 spirit
Would lift him where most trade of danger rang'd;
Yet did you say 'Go forth'; and none of this,
Though strongly apprehended, could restrain
The stiff-borne action. What hath then befall'n,
Or what hath this bold enterprise brought forth
More than that being which was like to be?
LORD BARDOLPH. We all that are engaged to this loss
Knew that we ventured 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 put forth, body and goods.
MORTON. 'Tis more than time. And, my most noble lord,
I hear for certain, and dare speak the truth:
The gentle Archbishop of York is up
With well-appointed pow'rs. He is a man
Who with a double surety binds his followers.
My lord your son had only but the corpse,
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 his 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.
NORTHUMBERLAND. I knew of this before; but, to speak truth,
This present grief had 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. Exeunt
SCENE II.
London. A street
Enter SIR JOHN FALSTAFF, with his PAGE bearing his sword and buckler
FALSTAFF. 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 moe diseases than he
knew for.
FALSTAFF. Men of all sorts take a pride to gird at me. The brain of
this foolish-compounded clay, man, is not able to invent anything
that intends 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. I do here walk before thee like a sow that hath
overwhelm'd 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 mann'd with
an agate till now; but I will inset 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 fledge. I will sooner have a beard grow in the
palm of my hand than he shall get one off his cheek; and yet he
will not stick to say his face is a face-royal. God may finish it
when he will, 'tis not a hair amiss yet. He may keep it still at
a face-royal, for a barber shall never earn sixpence out of it;
and yet he'll be crowing as if he had writ man ever since his
father was a bachelor. He may keep his own grace, but he's almost
out of mine, I can assure him. What said Master Dommelton about
the satin for my short cloak and my slops?
PAGE. He said, sir, you should procure him better assurance than
Bardolph. He would not take his band and yours; he liked not the
security.
FALSTAFF. Let him be damn'd, like the Glutton; pray God his tongue
be hotter! A whoreson Achitophel! A rascal-yea-forsooth knave, to
bear a gentleman in hand, and then stand upon security! The
whoreson smooth-pates do now wear nothing but high shoes, and
bunches of keys at their girdles; and if a man is through 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 look'd 'a 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 horn of
abundance, and the lightness of his wife shines through it; and
yet cannot he see, though he have his own lanthorn to light him.
Where's Bardolph?
PAGE. He's gone into Smithfield to buy your worship horse.
FALSTAFF. I bought him in Paul's, and he'll buy me a horse in
Smithfield. An I could get me but a wife in the stews, I were
mann'd, hors'd, and wiv'd.
Enter the LORD CHIEF JUSTICE and SERVANT
PAGE. Sir, here comes the nobleman that committed the
Prince for striking him about Bardolph.
FALSTAFF. Wait close; I will not see him.
CHIEF JUSTICE. What's he that goes there?
SERVANT. Falstaff, an't please your lordship.
CHIEF JUSTICE. He that was in question for the robb'ry?
SERVANT. 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.
CHIEF JUSTICE. What, to York? Call him back again.
SERVANT. Sir John Falstaff!
FALSTAFF. Boy, tell him I am deaf.
PAGE. You must speak louder; my master is deaf.
CHIEF JUSTICE. I am sure he is, to the hearing of anything good.
Go, pluck him by the elbow; I must speak with him.
SERVANT. Sir John!
FALSTAFF. What! a young knave, and begging! Is there not wars? Is
there not employment? Doth not the King lack subjects? Do not the
rebels need soldiers? Though it be a shame to be on any side but
one, it is worse shame to beg than to be on the worst side, were
it worse than the name of rebellion can tell how to make it.
SERVANT. You mistake me, sir.
FALSTAFF. Why, sir, did I say you were an honest man? Setting my
knighthood and my soldiership aside, I had lied in my throat if I
had said so.
SERVANT. I pray you, sir, then set your knighthood and your
soldiership aside; and give me leave to tell you you in your
throat, if you say I am any other than an honest man.
FALSTAFF. 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
tak'st leave, thou wert better be hang'd. You hunt counter.
Hence! Avaunt!
SERVANT. Sir, my lord would speak with you.
CHIEF JUSTICE. Sir John Falstaff, a word with you.
FALSTAFF. 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 saltness of time; and I most
humbly beseech your lordship to have a reverend care of your
health.
CHIEF JUSTICE. Sir John, I sent for you before your expedition to
Shrewsbury.
FALSTAFF. An't please your lordship, I hear his Majesty is return'd
with some discomfort from Wales.
CHIEF JUSTICE. I talk not of his Majesty. You would not come when I
sent for you.
FALSTAFF. And I hear, moreover, his Highness is fall'n into this
same whoreson apoplexy.
CHIEF JUSTICE. Well God mend him! I pray you let me speak with you.
FALSTAFF. This apoplexy, as I take it, is a kind of lethargy, an't
please your lordship, a kind of sleeping in the blood, a whoreson
tingling.
CHIEF JUSTICE. What tell you me of it? Be it as it is.
FALSTAFF. It hath it original from much grief, from study, and
perturbation of the brain. I have read the cause of his effects
in Galen; it is a kind of deafness.
CHIEF JUSTICE. I think you are fall'n into the disease, for you
hear not what I say to you.
FALSTAFF. 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 withal.
CHIEF JUSTICE. To punish you by the heels would amend the attention
of your ears; and I care not if I do become your physician.
FALSTAFF. 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.
CHIEF JUSTICE. I sent for you, when there were matters against you
for your life, to come speak with me.
FALSTAFF. As I was then advis'd by my learned counsel in the laws
of this land-service, I did not come.
CHIEF JUSTICE. Well, the truth is, Sir John, you live in great
infamy.
FALSTAFF. He that buckles himself in my belt cannot live in less.
CHIEF JUSTICE. Your means are very slender, and your waste is
great.
FALSTAFF. I would it were otherwise; I would my means were greater
and my waist slenderer.
CHIEF JUSTICE. You have misled the youthful Prince.
FALSTAFF. The young Prince hath misled me. I am the fellow with the
great belly, and he my dog.
CHIEF JUSTICE. Well, I am loath to gall a new-heal'd wound. Your
day's service at Shrewsbury hath a little gilded over your
night's exploit on Gadshill. You may thank th' unquiet time for
your quiet o'erposting that action.
FALSTAFF. My lord-
CHIEF JUSTICE. But since all is well, keep it so: wake not a
sleeping wolf.
FALSTAFF. To wake a wolf is as bad as smell a fox.
CHIEF JUSTICE. What! you are as a candle, the better part burnt
out.
FALSTAFF. A wassail candle, my lord- all tallow; if I did say of
wax, my growth would approve the truth.
CHIEF JUSTICE. There is not a white hair in your face but should
have his effect of gravity.
FALSTAFF. His effect of gravy, gravy,
CHIEF JUSTICE. You follow the young Prince up and down, like his
ill angel.
FALSTAFF. Not so, my lord. Your ill angel is light; but hope he
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 costermongers' times that true valour is
turn'd berod; pregnancy is made a tapster, and 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
gooseberry. You that are old consider not the capacities of us
that are young; you do measure the heat of our livers with the
bitterness of your galls; and we that are in the vaward of our
youth, must confess, are wags too.
CHIEF JUSTICE. 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 moist 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, fie, fie, Sir John!
FALSTAFF. 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 hallooing 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
a thousand marks, let him lend me the money, and have at him. For
the box of the ear that the Prince gave you- he gave it like a
rude prince, and you took it like a sensible lord. I have check'd
him for it; and the young lion repents- marry, not in ashes and
sackcloth, but in new silk and old sack.
CHIEF JUSTICE. Well, God send the Prince a better companion!
FALSTAFF. God send the companion a better prince! I cannot rid my
hands of him.
CHIEF JUSTICE. Well, the King hath sever'd you. I hear you are
going with Lord John of Lancaster against the Archbishop and the
Earl of Northumberland.
FALSTAFF. 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, and I brandish anything but a 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 alway yet the trick of our English nation, if they
have a good thing, to make it too common. If ye 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 a rust than to be scoured to nothing with
perpetual motion.
CHIEF JUSTICE. Well, be honest, be honest; and God bless your
expedition!
FALSTAFF. Will your lordship lend me a thousand pound to furnish me
forth?
CHIEF JUSTICE. Not a penny, not a penny; you are too impatient to
bear crosses. Fare you well. Commend me to my cousin
Westmoreland.
Exeunt CHIEF JUSTICE and SERVANT
FALSTAFF. If I do, fillip me with a three-man beetle. A man can no
more separate age and covetousness than 'a 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!
PAGE. Sir?
FALSTAFF. What money is in my purse?
PAGE. Seven groats and two pence.
FALSTAFF. I can get no remedy against this consumption of the
purse; borrowing only lingers and lingers it out, but the disease
is incurable. Go bear this letter to my Lord of Lancaster; this
to the Prince; this to the Earl of Westmoreland; and this to old
Mistress Ursula, whom I have weekly sworn to marry since I
perceiv'd the first white hair of 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. 'Tis 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 anything. I will turn diseases to commodity.
Exit
SCENE III.
York. The ARCHBISHOP'S palace
Enter the ARCHBISHOP, THOMAS MOWBRAY the EARL MARSHAL, LORD HASTINGS,
and LORD BARDOLPH
ARCHBISHOP. 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?
MOWBRAY. I well allow the occasion of our amis;
But gladly would be better satisfied
How, in our means, we should advance ourselves
To look with forehead bold and big enough
Upon the power and puissance of the King.
HASTINGS. Our present musters grow upon the file
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.
LORD BARDOLPH. The question then, Lord Hastings, standeth thus:
Whether our present five and twenty thousand
May hold up head without Northumberland?
HASTINGS. With him, we may.
LORD BARDOLPH. Yea, marry, there's the point;
But if without him we be thought too feeble,
My judgment is we should not step too far
Till we had his assistance by the hand;
For, in a theme so bloody-fac'd as this,
Conjecture, expectation, and surmise
Of aids incertain, should not be admitted.
ARCHBISHOP. 'Tis very true, Lord Bardolph; for indeed
It was young Hotspur's case at Shrewsbury.
LORD BARDOLPH. It was, my lord; who lin'd himself with hope,
Eating the air and promise of supply,
Flatt'ring himself in project of a power
Much smaller than the smallest of his thoughts;
And so, with great imagination
Proper to madmen, led his powers to death,
And, winking, leapt into destruction.
HASTINGS. But, by your leave, it never yet did hurt
To lay down likelihoods and forms of hope.
LORD BARDOLPH. Yes, if this present quality of war-
Indeed the instant action, a cause on foot-
Lives so in hope, as in an early spring
We see th' appearing buds; which to prove fruit
Hope gives not so much warrant, as despair
That frosts will bite them. When we mean to build,
We first survey the plot, then draw the model;
And when we see the figure of the house,
Then we must rate the cost of the erection;
Which if we find outweighs ability,
What do we then but draw anew the model
In fewer offices, or at least desist
To build at all? Much more, in this great work-
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 in 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, half through,
Gives o'er and leaves his part-created cost
A naked subject to the weeping clouds
And waste for churlish winter's tyranny.
HASTINGS. Grant that our hopes- yet likely of fair birth-
Should be still-born, and that we now possess'd
The utmost man of expectation,
I think we are so a body strong enough,
Even as we are, to equal with the King.
LORD BARDOLPH. What, is the King but five and twenty thousand?
HASTINGS. To us no more; nay, not so much, Lord Bardolph;
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 unfirm King
In three divided; and his coffers sound
With hollow poverty and emptiness.
ARCHBISHOP. That he should draw his several strengths together
And come against us in full puissance
Need not be dreaded.
HASTINGS. If he should do so,
He leaves his back unarm'd, the French and Welsh
Baying at his heels. Never fear that.
LORD BARDOLPH. Who is it like should lead his forces hither?
HASTINGS. The Duke of Lancaster and Westmoreland;
Against the Welsh, himself and Harry Monmouth;
But who is substituted against the French
I have no certain notice.
ARCHBISHOP. Let us on,
And publish the occasion of our arms.
The commonwealth is sick of their own choice;
Their over-greedy love hath surfeited.
An habitation giddy and unsure
Hath he that buildeth on the vulgar heart.
O thou fond many, with what loud applause
Didst thou beat heaven with blessing Bolingbroke
Before he was what thou wouldst have him be!
And being now trimm'd in thine own desires,
Thou, beastly feeder, art so full of him
That thou provok'st thyself to cast him up.
So, so, thou common dog, didst thou disgorge
Thy glutton bosom of the royal Richard;
And now thou wouldst eat thy dead vomit up,
And howl'st to find it. What trust is in these times?
They that, when Richard liv'd, would have him die
Are now become enamour'd on his grave.
Thou that threw'st dust upon his goodly head,
When through proud London he came sighing on
After th' admired heels of Bolingbroke,
Criest now 'O earth, yield us that king again,
And take thou this!' O thoughts of men accurs'd!
Past and to come seems best; things present, worst.
MOWBRAY. Shall we go draw our numbers, and set on?
HASTINGS. We are time's subjects, and time bids be gone.
Exeunt
ACT II. SCENE I.
London. A street
Enter HOSTESS with two officers, FANG and SNARE
HOSTESS. Master Fang, have you ent'red the action?
FANG. It is ent'red.
HOSTESS. Where's your yeoman? Is't a lusty yeoman? Will 'a stand
to't?
FANG. Sirrah, where's Snare?
HOSTESS. O Lord, ay! good Master Snare.
SNARE. Here, here.
FANG. Snare, we must arrest Sir John Falstaff.
HOSTESS. Yea, good Master Snare; I have ent'red him and all.
SNARE. It may chance cost some of our lives, for he will stab.
HOSTESS. Alas the day! take heed of him; he stabb'd me in mine own
house, and that most beastly. In good faith, 'a cares not what
mischief he does, if his weapon be out; he will foin like any
devil; he will spare neither man, woman, nor child.
FANG. If I can close with him, I care not for his thrust.
HOSTESS. No, nor I neither; I'll be at your elbow.
FANG. An I but fist him once; an 'a come but within my vice!
HOSTESS. I am undone by his going; I warrant you, he's an
infinitive thing upon my score. Good Master Fang, hold him sure.
Good Master Snare, let him not scape. 'A comes continuantly to
Pie-corner- saving your manhoods- to buy a saddle; and he is
indited to dinner to the Lubber's Head in Lumbert Street, to
Master Smooth's the silkman. I pray you, since my exion is
ent'red, and my case so openly known to the world, let him be
brought in to his answer. A hundred mark is a long one for a poor
lone woman to bear; and I have borne, and borne, and borne; and
have been fubb'd off, and fubb'd off, and fubb'd 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.
Enter SIR JOHN FALSTAFF, PAGE, and BARDOLPH
Yonder he comes; and that arrant malmsey-nose knave, Bardolph,
with him. Do your offices, do your offices, Master Fang and
Master Snare; do me, do me, do me your offices.
FALSTAFF. How now! whose mare's dead? What's the matter?
FANG. Sir John, I arrest you at the suit of Mistress Quickly.
FALSTAFF. Away, varlets! Draw, Bardolph. Cut me off the villian's
head. Throw the quean in the channel.
HOSTESS. Throw me in the channel! I'll throw thee in the channel.
Wilt thou? wilt thou? thou bastardly rogue! Murder, murder! Ah,
thou honeysuckle villain! wilt thou kill God's officers and the
King's? Ah, thou honey-seed rogue! thou art a honey-seed; a
man-queller and a woman-queller.
FALSTAFF. Keep them off, Bardolph.
FANG. A rescue! a rescue!
HOSTESS. Good people, bring a rescue or two. Thou wot, wot thou!
thou wot, wot ta? Do, do, thou rogue! do, thou hemp-seed!
PAGE. Away, you scullion! you rampallian! you fustilarian!
I'll tickle your catastrophe.
Enter the LORD CHIEF JUSTICE and his men
CHIEF JUSTICE. What is the matter? Keep the peace here, ho!
HOSTESS. Good my lord, be good to me. I beseech you, stand to me.
CHIEF JUSTICE. 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 hang'st thou upon him?
HOSTESS. O My most worshipful lord, an't please your Grace, I am a
poor widow of Eastcheap, and he is arrested at my suit.
CHIEF JUSTICE. For what sum?
HOSTESS. It is more than for some, my lord; it is for all- all I
have. He hath eaten me out of house 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 will ride thee a nights like a mare.
FALSTAFF. I think I am as like to ride the mare, if I have any
vantage of ground to get up.
CHIEF JUSTICE. 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?
FALSTAFF. What is the gross sum that I owe thee?
HOSTESS. Marry, if thou wert an honest man, thyself and the money
too. Thou didst swear to me upon a parcel-gilt goblet, sitting in
my Dolphin chamber, at the round table, by a sea-coal fire, upon
Wednesday in Wheeson week, when the Prince broke thy head for
liking his father to 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
butcher'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
prawns, whereby thou didst desire to eat some, whereby I told
thee they were ill for green wound? And didst thou not, when she
was gone down stairs, desire me to be no more so familiarity with
such poor people, saying that ere long they should call me madam?
And didst thou not kiss me, and bid me fetch the thirty
shillings? I put thee now to thy book-oath. Deny it, if thou
canst.
FALSTAFF. My lord, this is a poor mad soul, and she says up and
down the town that her eldest son is like you. She hath been in
good case, and, the truth is, poverty hath distracted her. But
for these foolish officers, I beseech you I may have redress
against them.
CHIEF JUSTICE. Sir John, Sir John, I am well acquainted with your
manner of wrenching the true cause the false way. It is not a
confident brow, 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 appears to me, practis'd upon the
easy yielding spirit of this woman, and made her serve your uses
both in purse and in person.
HOSTESS. Yea, in truth, my lord.
CHIEF JUSTICE. Pray thee, peace. Pay her the debt you owe her, and
unpay the villainy you have done with her; the one you may do
with sterling money, and the other with current repentance.
FALSTAFF. My lord, I will not undergo this sneap without reply. You
call honourable boldness impudent sauciness; if a man will make
curtsy and say nothing, he is virtuous. No, my lord, my humble
duty rememb'red, 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 affairs.
CHIEF JUSTICE. You speak as having power to do wrong; but answer in
th' effect of your reputation, and satisfy the poor woman.
FALSTAFF. Come hither, hostess.
Enter GOWER
CHIEF JUSTICE. Now, Master Gower, what news?
GOWER. The King, my lord, and Harry Prince of Wales
Are near at hand. The rest the paper tells. [Gives a letter]
FALSTAFF. As I am a gentleman!
HOSTESS. Faith, you said so before.
FALSTAFF. As I am a gentleman! Come, no more words of it.
HOSTESS. By this heavenly ground I tread on, I must be fain to pawn
both my plate and the tapestry of my dining-chambers.
FALSTAFF. 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-hangers and these fly-bitten tapestries. Let it be ten pound,
if thou canst. Come, and 'twere not for thy humours, there's not
a better wench in England. Go, wash thy face, and draw the
action. Come, thou must not be in this humour with me; dost not
know me? Come, come, I know thou wast set on to this.
HOSTESS. Pray thee, Sir John, let it be but twenty nobles;
i' faith, I am loath to pawn my plate, so God save me, la!
FALSTAFF. Let it alone; I'll make other shift. You'll be a fool
still.
HOSTESS. Well, you shall have it, though I pawn my gown.
I hope you'll come to supper. you'll pay me all together?
FALSTAFF. Will I live? [To BARDOLPH] Go, with her, with her; hook
on, hook on.
HOSTESS. Will you have Doll Tearsheet meet you at supper?
FALSTAFF. No more words; let's have her.
Exeunt HOSTESS, BARDOLPH, and OFFICERS
CHIEF JUSTICE. I have heard better news.
FALSTAFF. What's the news, my lord?
CHIEF JUSTICE. Where lay the King to-night?
GOWER. At Basingstoke, my lord.
FALSTAFF. I hope, my lord, all's well. What is the news, my lord?
CHIEF JUSTICE. Come all his forces back?
GOWER. No; fifteen hundred foot, five hundred horse,
Are march'd up to my Lord of Lancaster,
Against Northumberland and the Archbishop.
FALSTAFF. Comes the King back from Wales, my noble lord?
CHIEF JUSTICE. You shall have letters of me presently.
Come, go along with me, good Master Gower.
FALSTAFF. My lord!
CHIEF JUSTICE. What's the matter?
FALSTAFF. Master Gower, shall I entreat you with me to dinner?
GOWER. I must wait upon my good lord here, I thank you, good Sir
John.
CHIEF JUSTICE. Sir John, you loiter here too long, being you are to
take soldiers up in counties as you go.
FALSTAFF. Will you sup with me, Master Gower?
CHIEF JUSTICE. What foolish master taught you these manners, Sir
John?
FALSTAFF. Master Gower, if they become me not, he was a fool that
taught them me. This is the right fencing grace, my lord; tap for
tap, and so part fair.
CHIEF JUSTICE. Now, the Lord lighten thee! Thou art a great fool.
Exeunt
SCENE II.
London. Another street
Enter PRINCE HENRY and POINS
PRINCE. Before God, I am exceeding weary.
POINS. Is't come to that? I had thought weariness durst not have
attach'd one of so high blood.
PRINCE. Faith, it does me; though it discolours the complexion of
my greatness to acknowledge it. Doth it not show vilely in me to
desire small beer?
POINS. Why, a prince should not be so loosely studied as to
remember so weak a composition.
PRINCE. Belike then my appetite was not-princely got; for, by my
troth, I do now remember the poor creature, small beer. But
indeed these humble considerations make me out of love with my
greatness. What a disgrace is it to me to remember thy name, or
to know thy face to-morrow, or to take note how many pair of silk
stockings thou hast- viz., these, and those that were thy
peach-colour'd ones- or to bear the inventory of thy shirts- as,
one for superfluity, and another for use! But that the
tennis-court-keeper knows better than I; for it is a low ebb of
linen with thee when thou keepest not racket there; as thou hast
not done a great while, because the rest of thy low countries
have made a shift to eat up thy holland. And God knows whether
those that bawl out of the ruins of thy linen shall inherit his
kingdom; but the midwives say the children are not in the fault;
whereupon the world increases, and kindreds are mightily
strengthened.
POINS. How ill it follows, after you have laboured so hard, you
should talk so idly! Tell me, how many good young princes would
do so, their fathers being so sick as yours at this time is?
PRINCE. Shall I tell thee one thing, Poins?
POINS. Yes, faith; and let it be an excellent good thing.
PRINCE. It shall serve among wits of no higher breeding than thine.
POINS. Go to; I stand the push of your one thing that you will
tell.
PRINCE. Marry, I tell thee it is not meet that I should be sad, now
my father is sick; albeit I could tell to thee- as to one it
pleases me, for fault of a better, to call my friend- I could be
sad and sad indeed too.
POINS. Very hardly upon such a subject.
PRINCE. By this hand, thou thinkest me as far in the devil's book
as thou and Falstaff for obduracy and persistency: let the end
try the man. But I tell thee my heart bleeds inwardly that my
father is so sick; and keeping such vile company as thou art hath
in reason taken from me all ostentation of sorrow.
POINS. The reason?
PRINCE. What wouldst thou think of me if I should weep?
POINS. I would think thee a most princely hypocrite.
PRINCE. It would be every man's thought; and thou art a blessed
fellow to think as every man thinks. Never a man's thought in the
world keeps the road-way better than thine. Every man would think
me an hypocrite indeed. And what accites your most worshipful
thought to think so?
POINS. Why, because you have been so lewd and so much engraffed to
Falstaff.
PRINCE. And to thee.
POINS. By this light, I am well spoke on; I can hear it with mine
own ears. The worst that they can say of me is that I am a second
brother and that I am a proper fellow of my hands; and those two
things, I confess, I cannot help. By the mass, here comes
Bardolph.
Enter BARDOLPH and PAGE
PRINCE. And the boy that I gave Falstaff. 'A had him from me
Christian; and look if the fat villain have not transform'd him
ape.
BARDOLPH. God save your Grace!
PRINCE. And yours, most noble Bardolph!
POINS. Come, you virtuous ass, you bashful fool, must you be
blushing? Wherefore blush you now? What a maidenly man-at-arms
are you become! Is't such a matter to get a pottle-pot's
maidenhead?
PAGE. 'A calls me e'en now, my lord, through a red lattice, and I
could discern no part of his face from the window. At last I
spied his eyes; and methought he had made two holes in the