It will be two o'clock ere they come
from the coronation: Dispatch, dispatch.
[Exeunt Grooms.Enter Falstaff, Shallow, Pistol, Bardolph, and the Boy.
Fal.
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.
Pist.
'Bless thy lungs, good knight!
Fal.
Come here, Pistol; stand behind me.—O, if I
had had time to have made new liveries, I would have
bestow'd the thousand pound I borrow'd of you. [To Shallow.]But 'tis no matter; this poor show doth
better: this doth infer the zeal I had to see him.
As it were, to ride day and night; and not to
deliberate, not to remember, not to have patience to
shift me.
Shal.
It is most certain.
Fal.
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.
Pist.
My knight, I will enflame thy noble liver,
And make thee rage.
Thy Doll, and Helen of thy noble thoughts,
Is in base durance, and contagious prison;
Haul'd thither
By most mechanical and dirty hand:—
Rouze up revenge from ebon den with fell Alecto's snake,
For Doll is in; Pistol speaks nought but truth.
Fal.
I will deliver her.
Pist.
There roar'd the sea, and trumpet-clangor sounds. The trumpets sound. Enter the King, and his train.
Fal.
God save thy grace, king Hal! my royal Hal1note!
King.
My lord chief justice, speak to that vain man.
Ch. Just.
Have you your wits? know you what 'tis you speak?
Fal.
My king! my Jove! I speak to thee, my heart!
King.
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 3noteprofane;
But, being awake, I do despise my dream.
Make less thy body, hence, and more thy grace;
Leave gormandizing; 4note
know, the grave doth gape
-- 608 --
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 heaven 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,—
5note
Not to come near our person by ten miles.
-- 609 --
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 strength, and qualities,—
Give you advancement.—Be it your charge, my lord,
To see perform'd the tenor of our word.—
Set on.
[Exit King, &c.
Fal.
Master Shallow, I owe you a thousand pound.
Shal.
Ay, marry, sir John; which I beseech you to
let me have home with me.
Fal.
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 advancement; I will be the man yet, that shall
make you great.
Shal.
I cannot perceive how; unless you give me
your doublet, and stuff me out with straw. I beseech
you, good sir John, let me have five hundred of my
thousand.
Fal.
Sir, I will be as good as my word: this that
you heard, was but a colour.
Shal.
A colour, I fear, that you will die in, sir
John.
-- 610 --
Fal.
Fear no colours; go with me to dinner.
Come, lieutenant Pistol;—come, Bardolph:—I shall
be sent for soon at night.
Re-enter the Chief Justice, Prince John, &c.
Ch. Just. 1noteGo, carry sir John Falstaff to the fleet;
Take all his company along with him.
Fal.
My lord, my lord,—
Ch. Just.
I cannot now speak: I will hear you soon.
Take them away.
Pist. Si fortuna me tormenta, spero me contenta.[Exeunt.Manent Lancaster, and Chief Justice.
Lan.
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.
Ch. Just.
And so they are.
Lan.
The king hath call'd his parliament, my lord.
Ch. Just.
He hath.
Lan.
I will lay odds,—that, ere this year expire,
We bear our civil swords, and native fire,
As far as France: I heard a bird so sing2note
,
Whose musick, to my thinking, pleas'd the king.
Come, will you hence3note
First, my fear; then, my court'sy: last, my speech.
My fear is, your displeasure; my court'sy, my duty;
and my speech, to beg your pardons. If you look for a good
speech now, you undo me: for what I have to say, is of
mine own making; and what, indeed, I should say, will,
I doubt, prove mine own marring. But to the purpose,
and so to the venture.—Be it known to you (as it is very
well) I was lately here in the end of a displeasing play, to
pray your patience for it, and to promise you a better.
I did mean, indeed, to pay you with this; which if, like
an ill venture, it come unluckily home, I break, and you,
my gentle creditors, lose. Here, I promised you, I would
be, and here I commit my body to your mercies: bate me
some, and I will pay you some, and, as most debtors do,
promise you infinitely.
If my tongue cannot entreat you to acquit me, will you
command me to use my legs? and yet that were but light
payment,—to dance out of your debt. But a good conscience
will make any possible satisfaction, and so will I. 5noteAll
the gentlewomen here have forgiven me; if the gentlemen
will not, then the gentlemen do not agree with the
gentlewomen, which was never seen before in such an
assembly.
One word more, I beseech you. If you be not too much
cloy'd with fat meat, our humble author will continue
the story, with Sir John in it, and make you merry with
-- --
fair Katharine of France6note: where, for any thing I know,
Falstaff shall die of a sweat, unless already he be kill'd with
your hard opinions; 7note
for Oldcastle died a martyr, and this
is not the man. My tongue is weary; when my legs are
too, I will bid you good night: and so kneel down before
you;—but, indeed, to pray for the queen8note
