SCENE XVII.
Enter Ford.
Ford.
Bless you, Sir.
Fal.
Now, master Brook, you come to know what
hath pass'd between me and Ford's wife.
Ford.
That, indeed, Sir John, is my business.
Fal.
Master Brook, I will not lie to you; I was at
her house the hour she appointed me.
Ford.
And you sped, Sir?
Fal.
Very ill-favour'dly, master Brook.
Ford.
How, Sir, did she change her determination?
Fal.
No, master Brook; but the peaking cornuto her
husband, master Brook, dwelling in a continul larum of
jealousie, comes me in the instant 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
instigated by his distemper, and, forsooth, to search his
house for his wife's love.
-- 317 --
Ford.
What, while you was there?
Fal.
While I was there.
Ford.
And did he search for you, and could not
find you?
Fal.
You shall hear. As good luck would have it,
comes in one mistress Page, gives intelligence of Ford's
approach, and 8 noteby 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
shirts and smocks, socks, foul stockings, and greasie
napkins; that, master Brook, there was the rankest compound
of villainous smell, that ever offended nostril.
Ford.
And how long lay you there?
Fal.
Nay, you shall hear, master 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 cloaths to Datchet-lane; they
took me on their shoulders, met the jealous knave
their master in the door, who ask'd them once or twice
what they had in their basket; I quak'd for fear, lest
the lunatick knave would have search'd it; but fate,
ordaining he should be a cuckold, held his hand.
Well, on went he for a search, and away went I for
foul cloaths; but mark the sequel, master Brook; I
suffer'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 stopt in, like a strong distillation,
with stinking cloaths that freted in their own
grease: think of that, a man of my kidney; think of
-- 318 --
that, that am as subject to heat as butter; a man of
continual dissolution and thaw; it was a miracle to
'scape suffocation. And in the height of this bath, when
I was more than half stew'd in grease, like a Dutch dish,
to be thrown into the Thames, and cool'd glowing hot,
in that surge, like a horse-shoe; think of that; hissing
hot; think of that, master Brook.
Ford.
In good sadness, Sir, I am sorry that for my
sake you suffer'd all this. My suit is then desperate;
you'll undertake her no more?
Fal.
Master Brook, I will be thrown into Etna, as I
have been into Thames, ere I will leave her thus. Her
husband is this morning gone a birding; I have receiv'd
from her another embassie of meeting; 'twixt
eight and nine is the hour, master Brook.
Ford.
'Tis past eight already, Sir.
Fal.
Is it? I will then address me to my appointment.
Come to me at your convenient leisure, and
you shall know how I speed; and the conclusion shall
be crown'd with your enjoying her; adieu, you shall
have her, master Brook; master Brook, you shall
cuckold Ford.
[Exit.
Ford.
Hum! ha! is this a vision? is this a dream? do
I sleep? master Ford, awake; awake, master Ford;
there's a hole made in your best coat, master Ford;
this 'tis to be married! this 'tis to have linnen and buck-baskets!
well, I will proclaim my self what I am; I
will now take the leacher; he is at my house; he cannot
'scape me; 'tis impossible, he should; he cannot
creep into a half-penny purse, nor into a pepper-box.
But, lest the devil that guides him should aid him, I
will search impossible places; tho' what I am I cannot
avoid, yet to be what I would not, shall not make me
tame: if I have horns to make one mad, let the proverb
go with me, I'll be horn-mad.
[Exit.
-- 319 --
Alexander Pope [1747], The works of Shakespear in eight volumes. The Genuine Text (collated with all the former Editions, and then corrected and emended) is here settled: Being restored from the Blunders of the first Editors, and the Interpolations of the two Last: with A Comment and Notes, Critical and Explanatory. By Mr. Pope and Mr. Warburton (Printed for J. and P. Knapton, [and] S. Birt [etc.], London) [word count] [S11301].