and you took it like a sensible lord. I have checked him for it, and the young lion repents; marry, not in ashes, and sackcloth, but in new silk, and old sack.

Ch. Just. Well, God send the prince a better companion!

Fal. God send the companion a better prince! I cannot rid my hands of him.

Ch. Just. Well, the king hath severed you and prince Harry. I hear, you are going with lord John of Lancaster against the archbishop, and the earl of Northumberland.

Fal. 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 any thing but my bottle, I would I might never spit white again3. 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 always yet the trick of our English nation, if they have a good thing, to make it too common. If you 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 rust, than to be scoured to nothing with perpetual motion".]

Ch. Just. Well, be honest, be honest; and God bless your expedition.

6

and prince Harry:] These words are only in the folio: they are not absolutely necessary.

7

- I take but two shirts-] The folio inserts if before "I take."

8 - I would I might never SPIT WHITE again.] Steevens thus explains this expression :-"May I never have my stomach inflamed again with liquor; for, to spit white is the consequence of inward heat." It may however be doubted, whether Falstaff would wish to "spit white," that being the result of disease; and the expression may merely have reference to his exertions and wounds in the expected conflict, which might compel him to spit blood.

9

than to be scoured to nothing with perpetual motion.] The passage within brackets, ending with these words, is not in the folio.

Fal. Will your lordship lend me a thousand pound to furnish me forth?

Ch. Just. Not a penny, not a penny: you are too impatient to bear crosses'. Fare Fare you well: commend me to my cousin Westmoreland.

[Exeunt Chief Justice and Attendant.

Fal. If I do, fillip me with a three-man beetle'. A man can no more separate age and covetousness, than he 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?

Fal. What money is in my purse?

Page. Seven groats and two-pence.

of my chin1.

Fal. 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 perceived the first white hair you know where to find me. this gout! or, a gout of this other, plays the rogue with 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 any thing; I will turn diseases to commodity.

1

[Exit Page.]

About it: A pox of pox! for the one, or the my great toe. "Tis no

[Exit.

you are too impatient to bear CROSSES.] We have had the same pun in "Love's Labour's Lost," Vol. ii. p. 94. Crosses were pieces of money.

2 If I do, fillip me with a THREE-MAN BEETLE.] A beetle is a large wooden mallet, and "a three-man beetle" is a beetle with three handles, so heavy that it required three men to use it.

3

both the degrees PREVENT my curses.] i. e. come before, or anticipate my curses. Pope uses the word in this sense, and it was its most usual meaning of old.

since I perceived the first white hair or my chin.] "Of" was frequently used for on in the time of Shakespeare. The quarto, 1600, has " of," and the folio, 1623, on. See Vol. iii. pp. 165. 196. 267. 384. In "Twelfth Night," Vol. iii. p. 352, we have " on "used for of in the line,

"And I, poor monster, fond as much on him."

SCENE III.

York. A Room in the Archbishop's Palace.

Enter the Archbishop of YORK, the Lords HASTINGS, MOWBRAY, Earl Marshal, and BARDOLPH.

Arch. 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?

Mowb. I well allow the occasion of our arms;
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.

Hast. 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.

Bard. The question then, lord Hastings, standeth

thus:

Whether our present five and twenty thousand

May hold up head without Northumberland.
Hast. With him, we may.

Bard.

Ay, 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 admitted3.

Of aids incertain should not be admitted.] This and the three preceding

lines are only in the folio.

Arch. Tis very true, lord Bardolph; for, indeed, It was young Hotspur's case at Shrewsbury.

Bard. It was, my lord; who lin'd himself with hope,

Eating the air on promise of supply,

Flattering himself with 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 leap'd into destruction.

Hast. But, by your leave, it never yet did hurt,
To lay down likelihoods, and forms of hope.
Bard. 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 must we 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,

Eating the air on promise of supply,] The quarto, 1600, reads and for "on," which last, from the folio, seems preferable. In the next line, the quarto has in, and the folio "with."

7 Yes, if this present quality of war,] This and the nineteen lines following are only to be found in the folio.

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.

Hast. 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 a body strong enough,

Even as we are, to equal with the king.

Bard. What is the king but five-and-twenty thousand?

Hast. 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.

Arch. That he should draw his several strengths together,

And come against us in full puissance,

Need not be dreaded.

Hast.

If he should do so,

He leaves his back unarm'd, the French and Welsh
Baying him at the heels: never fear that'.

Bard. Who, is it like, should lead his forces hither?
Hast. The duke of Lancaster, and Westmoreland:

8 I think we are a body strong enough,] The quarto has so for "a," an error of the press. Possibly the line originally ran thus :

"I think we 're so a body strong enough."

9 ARE in three heads :] The quarto, 1600, “And in three heads."

1

never fear that.] This speech is given in the folio as we have printed it. As Capel observed, there is an omission of a preposition in the quarto, to having probably dropped out: with that deficiency supplied, it runs intelligibly thus in prose, although meant for verse :-" If he should do so, [to] French and Welsh he leaves his back unarmed, they baying him at the heels: never fear that."