Obrázky na stránke
PDF
ePub

Shal. He will make you a hundred and fifty pounds jointure.
Anne. Good mafter Shallow, let him woo for himself.

Shal. Marry, I thank you for it; I thank you for that. Good comfort; fhe calls you, coz: I'll leave you.

Anne. Now, mafter Slender.

Slen. Now, good mistress Anne.

Anne. What is

your will?

Slen. My will? odd's-heart-lings, that's a pretty jeft, indeed! I ne'er made my will yet, I thank heav'n; I am not fuch a fickly creature, I give heav'n praise.

Anne. I mean, mafter Slender, what would you with me?

Slen. Truly, for my own part, I would little or nothing with you; your father and my uncle have made motions; if it be my luck, fo; if not, happy man be his dole! they can tell you how things go better than I can; you may ask your father; here he

comes.

SCENE XIV.

Enter Page, and miftrefs Page.

Page. Now, mafter Slender: love him, daughter Anne.
-Why, how now! what does mafter Fenton here?

You wrong me, fir, thus ftill to haunt

my house:

I tell you, fir, my daughter is difpos'd of.

Fent. Nay, mafter Page, be not impatient.

Mrs. Page. Good mafter Fenton, come not to my child.
Page. She is no match for you.

Fent. Sir, will you hear me?

Page. No, good master Fenton

Come, mafter Shallow; come, fon Stender, in.

Knowing my mind, you wrong me, mafter Fenton.

[Exeunt Page, Shallow, and Slender.

Quic. Speak to miftrefs Page.

Fent. Good miftrefs Page, for that I love your daughter
In fuch a righteous fashion as I do,

Perforce, against all checks, rebukes, and manners,
muft advance the colours of my love,

[ocr errors]

And

And not retire. Let me have your good will.

Anne. Good mother, do not marry me to yon fool..
Mrs. Page. I mean it not; I feek you a better husband.
Quic. That's my master, master doctor.

Anne. Alas, I had rather be fet quick i' th' earth,

And bowl'd to death with turnips.

Mrs. Page. Come, trouble not yourself, good master Fenton, I will not be friend nor enemy:

your

My daughter will I question how she loves you,
And as I find her, fo am I affected.

'Till then, farewel, fir; fhe must needs go in,
Her father will be angry.

[Ex. miftrefs Page, and Anne.

Fent. Farewel, gentle miftrefs; farewel, Nan.

Quic. This is my doing now. Nay, faid I, will you caft away your child on a fool, or a phyfician? look on master Fenton: this is my doing.

Fent. I thank thee; and, I pray thee, once to-night Give my fweet Nan this ring: there's for thy pains.

Exit.

Quic. Now heav'n fend thee good fortune! A kind heart he hath; a woman would run through fire and water for such a kind heart. But yet, I would, my master had mistress Anne; or I would, mafter Slender had her; or, in footh, I would, mafter Fenton had her. I will do what I can for them all three; for fo I have promis'd, and I'll be as good as my word, but fpeciously for master Fenton. Well, I must of another errand to fir John Falstaff from my two miftreffes; what a beaft am I to flack it!

[Exit.

[blocks in formation]

The Garter-Inn.

Enter Falstaff, and Bardolph.

ARDOLPH, I fay.

B4 Bard Here, fir.

Fal. Go, fetch me a quart of fack; put a toaft in't. [Ex. Bard.]

Have I liv'd to be carry'd in a basket, like a barrow of butchers offal, and to be thrown into the Thames? well, if I be ferv'd fuch another trick, I'll have my brains ta'en out, and butter'd, and give them to a dog for a new-year's gift. The rogues flighted me into the river with as little remorfe as they would have drown'd a bitch's blind puppies, fifteen i' th' litter; and you may know by my fize that I have a kind of alacrity in finking: if the bottom were as deep as hell, I fhould down. I had been drown'd, but that the shore was shelvy and fhallow; a death that I abhor; for the water swells a man: and what a thing fhould I have been when I had been fwell'd! I fhould have been a mountain of mummy. [Enter Bard.]-Now, is the fack brew'd?

Bard. Here's miftrefs Quickly, fir, to fpeak with you.

Fal. Come, let me pour in fome fack to the Thames'- water; for my belly's as cold as if I had swallow'd snow-balls for pills to cool the reins. Call her in.

Bard. Come in, woman.

SCENE XVI.

Enter mistress Quickly.

Quic. By your leave: I cry you mercy. Give your worship good-morrow.

Fal. Take away these chalices: go, brew me a pottle of fack finely.

Bard. With eggs, fir?

Fal. Simple of itself: I'll no pullet-fperm in my brewage. How now?

in

Quic. Marry, fir, I come to your worship from mistress Ford. Fal. Miftrefs Ford? I have had ford enough; I was thrown to the ford; I have my belly full of ford.

Quic. Alas the day! good heart, that was not her fault: fhe does fo take on with her men; they mistook their erection.

Fal. So did I mine, to build on a foolish woman's promife. Quic. Well, the laments, fir, for it, that it would yern your heart to fee it. Her husband goes this morning a birding; the

defires

defires you once more to come to her between eight and nine. I muft carry her word quickly; fhe'll make you amends, I

warrant you.

Fal. Well, I will vifit her; tell her fo, and bid her think what a man is: let her confider his frailty, and then judge of my merit. Quic. I will tell her.

Fal. Do fo. Between nine and ten, fay'ft thou?

Quic. Eight and nine, fir.

Fal. Well, be gone; I will not miss her.

Quic. Peace be with you, fir.

[Exit.

Fal. I marvel, I hear not of mafter Brook; he sent me word

to stay within: I like his money well. O, here he comes.

SCENE XVII.

Ford. 'Bless you, fir.

Enter Ford.

Fal. Now, mafter Brook, you come to know what hath pass'd between me and Ford's wife?

Ford. That, indeed, fir John, is my business.

Fal. Master Brook, I will not lie to you; I was at her house the hour fhe appointed me.

Ford. And you sped, fir?

Fal. Very ill-favour'dly, mafter Brook.

Ford. How, fir! did the change her determination ?

Fal. No, master Brook; but the peaking cornuto her husband, mafter Brook, dwelling in a continual larum of jealoufy, comes in the inftant of our encounter, after we had embrac'd, kiss'd, protested, and, as it were, spoke the prologue of our comedy; and at his heels a rabble of his companions, thither provok'd and inftigated by his diftemper, and, forfooth, to fearch his house for his wife's love.

Ford. What, while you were there?

Fal. While I was there.

Ford. And did he search for you, and could not find you? Fal. You fhall hear. As good luck would have it, comes in

one

one mistress Page, gives intelligence of Ford's approach, and by her invention, and Ford's wife's direction, they convey'd me into a buck-basket.

Ford. A buck-basket?

Fal. Yea, a buck-basket; ramm'd me in with foul fhirts and fmocks, focks, foul stockings, and greafy napkins; that, master Brook, there was the rankeft compound of villanous smells that ever offended noftril.

Ford. And how long lay you there?

Fal. Nay, you fhall hear, mafter Brook, what I have suffer'd, to bring this woman to evil for your good. Being thus cramm'd in the basket, a couple of Ford's knaves, his hinds, were call'd forth by their mistress to carry me in the name of foul cloths to Datchet-lane; they took me on their shoulders, met the jealous knave their master in the door, who afk'd them once or twice what they had in their basket; I quak'd for fear, left the lunatick knave would have fearch'd it; but fate, ordaining he should be a cuckold, held his hand. Well, on went he for a fearch, and away went I for foul cloths; but mark the sequel, master Brook; I fuffer'd the pangs of three egregious deaths: first, an intolerable fright, to be detected by a jealous rotten bell-weather; next, to be compass'd Like a good bilbo, in the circumference of a peck, hilt to point, heel to head; and then, to be stop'd in, like a strong diftillation, with ftinking cloths that fretted in their own greafe: think of that, a man of my kidney; think of that, that am as fubject to heat as butter; a man of continual diffolution and thaw; it was

a

miracle to 'scape fuffocation. And in the height of this bath, when I was more than half stew'd in greafe like a Dutch difh, to be thrown into the Thames, and cool'd glowing hot in that furge, lie a horse-shoe; think of that; hiffing hot; think of that, after Brook.

m

Ford. In good fadness, fir, I am forry that for my fake you fuffer'd all this. My fuit is then desperate; you'll undertake her

no more?

Fal. Mafter Brook, I will be thrown into Etna as I have been into Thames, ere I will leave her thus. Her husband is this

VOL. I.

L1

morning

« PredošláPokračovať »