MISTRESS QUICKLY By my troth, this is the old fashion. You two never meet but you fall to some discord. You are both, i’ good truth, as rheumatic as two dry toasts; you cannot one bear with another’s confirmities. What the goodyear, one must bear, (to Doll) and that must be you. You are the weaker vessel, as they say, the emptier vessel.
DOLL TEARSHEET Can a weak empty vessel bear such a huge full hogshead? There’s a whole merchant’s venture of Bordeaux stuff in him; you have not seen a hulk better stuffed in the hold.—Come, I’ll be friends with thee, Jack. Thou art going to the wars, and whether I shall ever see thee again or no there is nobody cares.
Enter a Drawer
DRAWER Sir, Ensign Pistol’s below, and would speak with you.
DOLL TEARSHEET Hang him, swaggering rascal, let him not come hither. It is the foul-mouthedest rogue in England.
MISTRESS QUICKLY If he swagger, let him not come here. No, by my faith! I must live among my neighbours; I’ll no swaggerers. I am in good name and fame with the very best. Shut the door; there comes no swaggerers here. I have not lived all this while to have swaggering now. Shut the door, I pray you.
SIR JOHN Dost thou hear, hostess?
MISTRESS QUICKLY Pray ye pacify yourself, Sir John. There comes no swaggerers here.
SIR JOHN Dost thou hear? It is mine ensign.
MISTRESS QUICKLY Tilly-fally, Sir John, ne‘er tell me. Your ensign-swaggerer comes not in my doors. I was before Master Tisick the debuty t’other day, and, as he said to me—’twas no longer ago than Wed‘sday last, i’ good faith—‘Neighbour Quickly,’ says he—Master Dumb our minister was by then—‘Neighbour Quickly,’ says he, ‘receive those that are civil, for,’ said he, ‘you are in an ill name.’ Now a said so, I can tell whereupon. ‘For,’ says he, ‘you are an honest woman, and well thought on; therefore take heed what guests you receive. Receive,‘ says he, ‘no swaggering companions.’ There comes none here. You would bless you to hear what he said. No, I’ll no swaggerers.
SIR JOHN He’s no swaggerer, hostess—a tame cheater, i’faith. You may stroke him as gently as a puppy greyhound. He’ll not swagger with a Barbary hen, if her feathers turn back in any show of resistance.—Call him up, drawer. ⌈Exit Drawer⌉
MISTRESS QUICKLY Cheater call you him? I will bar no honest man my house, nor no cheater, but I do not love swaggering, by my troth, I am the worse when one says ‘swagger’. Feel, masters, how I shake, look you, I warrant you.
DOLL TEARSHEET So you do, hostess.
MISTRESS QUICKLY Do I? Yea, in very truth do I, an ’twere an aspen leaf. I cannot abide swaggerers.
Enter Pistol, Bardolph, and the Page
PISTOL God save you, Sir John.
SIR JOHN Welcome, Ensign Pistol. Here, Pistol, I charge you with a cup of sack. Do you discharge upon mine hostess.
PISTOL I will discharge upon her, Sir John, with two bullets.
SIR JOHN She is pistol-proof, sir, you shall not hardly offend her.
MISTRESS QUICKLY Come, I’ll drink no proofs, nor no bullets. I’ll drink no more than will do me good, for no man’s pleasure, I.
PISTOL Then to you, Mistress Dorothy! I will charge you.
DOLL TEARSHEET Charge me? I scorn you, scurvy companion. What, you poor, base, rascally, cheating, lack-linen mate! Away, you mouldy rogue, away! I am meat for your master.
PISTOL I know you, Mistress Dorothy.
DOLL TEARSHEET Away, you cutpurse rascal, you filthy bung, away! By this wine, I’ll thrust my knife in your mouldy chaps an you play the saucy cuttle with me!
⌈She brandishes a knife⌉
Away, you bottle-ale rascal, you basket-hilt stale juggler, you!
⌈Pistol draws his sword⌉
Since when, I pray you, sir? God’s light, with two points on your shoulder! Much!
PISTOL God let me not live, but I will murder your ruff for this.
MISTRESS QUICKLY No, good Captain Pistol; not here, sweet captain.
DOLL TEARSHEET Captain? Thou abominable damned cheater, art thou not ashamed to be called ‘captain’? An captains were of my mind, they would truncheon you out, for taking their names upon you before you have earned them. You a captain? You slavel For what? For tearing a poor whore’s ruff in a bawdy-house! He a captain? Hang him, rogue, he lives upon mouldy stewed prunes and dried cakes. A captain? God’s light, these villains will make the word ’captain’ odious; therefore captains had need look to’t.
BARDOLPH Pray thee, go down, good ensign.
SIR JOHN Hark thee hither, Mistress Doll.
He takes her aside
PISTOL Not II I tell thee what, Corporal Bardolph, I could tear her! I’ll be revenged of her.
PAGE Pray thee, go down.
PISTOL I’ll see her damned first
To Pluto’s damned lake, by this hand,
To th’infernal deep,
Where Erebus, and tortures vile also.
‘Hold hook and line!’ say I.
Down, down, dogs; down, Fates.
Have we not Hiren here?
MISTRESS QUICKLY Good Captain Pizzle, be quiet. ‘Tis very late, i’faith. I beseek you now, aggravate your choler.
PISTOL These be good humours indeed!
Shall pack-horses
And hollow pampered jades of Asia,
Which cannot go but thirty mile a day,
Compare with Caesars and with cannibals,
And Trojan Greeks?
Nay, rather damn them with King Cerberus,
And let the welkin roar. Shall we fall foul for toys?
MISTRESS QUICKLY By my troth, captain, these are very bitter words.
BARDOLPH Be gone, good ensign; this will grow to a brawl anon.
PISTOL
Die men like dogs! Give crowns like pins!
Have we not Hiren here?
MISTRESS QUICKLY O’ my word, captain, there’s none such here. What the goodyear, do you think I would deny her? For God’s sake, be quiet.
PISTOL
Then feed and be fat, my fair Calipolis.
Come, give’s some sack.
Si fortune me tormente, sperato me contento.
Fear we broadsides? No; let the fiend give fire!
Give me some sack; and, sweetheart, lie thou there.
⌈He lays down his sword⌉
Come we to full points here? And are etceteras nothings?
⌈He drinks⌉
SIR JOHN Pistol, I would be quiet.
PISTOL Sweet knight, I kiss thy neaf. What, we have seen the seven stars!
DOLL TEARSHEET For God’s sake, thrust him downstairs. I cannot endure such a fustian rascal.
PISTOL Thrust him downstairs? Know we not Galloway nags?
SIR JOHN Quoit him down, Bardolph, like a shove-groat shilling. Nay, an a do nothing but speak nothing, a shall be nothing here.
BARDOLPH (to Pistol) Come, get you downstairs.
PISTOL ⌈taking up his sword⌉
What, shall we have incision? Shall we imbrue?
Then death rock me asleep, abridge my doleful days.
Why then, let grievous, ghastly, gaping wounds
Untwine the Sisters Three. Come, Atropos, I say!
MISTRESS QUICKLY Here’s goodly stuff toward!
SIR JOHN Give me my rapier, boy.
DOLL TEARSHEET I pray thee, Jack, I pray thee, do not draw.
SIR JOHN (taking his rapier and speaking to Pistol) Get you downstairs.
Sir John, Bardolph, and Pistol brawl
MISTRESS QUICKLY Here’s a goodly tumult! I’ll forswear keeping house afore I’ll be in these tirrits and frights!
⌈Sir John thrusts at Pistol⌉
So!
⌈Pistol thrusts at Sir John⌉
Murder, I warrant now! Alas, alas, put up your naked
weapons, put up your naked weapons!
Exit Pistol, pursued by Bardolph
DOLL TEARSHEET I pray thee, Jack, be quiet; the rascal’s gone. Ah, you whoreson little valiant villain, you!
MISTRESS QUICKLY (to Sir John) Are you not hurt i’th’ groin? Methought a made a shrewd thrust at your belly.
Enter Bardolph
SIR JOHN Have you turned him out o’doors?
BARDOLPH Yea, sir. The rascal’s drunk. You have hurt him, sir, i’th’ shoulder.
SIR JOHN A rascal, to brave me!
DOLL TEARSHEET Ah, you sweet little rogue, you! Alas, poor ape, how thou sweatest! Come, let me wipe thy face; come on, you whoreson chops. Ah rogue, i’faith, I love thee. Thou art as valorous as Hector of Troy, worth five of Agamemnon, and ten times better than the Nine Worthies. Ah, villain!
SIR JOHN A rascally slave! I will toss the rogue in a blanket.
DOLL TEARSHEET Do, an thou darest for thy heart. An thou dost, I’ll canvas thee between a pair of sheets.
Enter musicians
PAGE The music is come, sir.
SIR JOHN Let them play.—Play, sirs!
⌈Music plays⌉
Sit on my knee, Doll. A rascal bragging slave! The rogue fled from me like quicksilver.
DOLL TEARSHEET I‘faith, and thou followed’st him like a church. Thou whoreson little tidy Bartholomew boar-pig, when wilt thou leave fighting o‘days, and foining o’nights, and begin to patch up thine old body for heaven?
Enter Prince Harry and Poins, disguised as drawers
SIR JOHN Peace, good Doll, do not speak like a death’s-head, do not bid me remember mine end.
DOLL TEARSHEET Sirrah, what humour’s the Prince of?
SIR JOHN A good shallow young fellow. A would have made a good pantler; a would ha’ chipped bread well.
DOLL TEARSHEET They say Poins has a good wit.
SIR JOHN He a good wit? Hang him, baboon! His wit’s as thick as Tewkesbury mustard; there’s no more conceit in him than is in a mallet.
DOLL TEARSHEET Why does the Prince love him so, then?
SIR JOHN Because their legs are both of a bigness, and a plays at quoits well, and eats conger and fennel, and drinks off candles’ ends for flap-dragons, and rides the wild mare with the boys, and jumps upon joint-stools, and swears with a good grace, and wears his boot very smooth like unto the sign of the leg, and breeds no bate with telling of discreet stories, and such other gambol faculties a has that show a weak mind and an able body; for the which the Prince admits him; for the Prince himself is such another—the weight of a hair will turn the scales between their avoirdupois.
PRINCE HARRY (aside to Poins) Would not this nave of a wheel have his ears cut off?
POINS Let’s beat him before his whore.
PRINCE HARRY Look whe’er the withered elder hath not his poll clawed like a parrot.
POINS Is it not strange that desire should so many years outlive performance?
SIR JOHN Kiss me, Doll.
They kiss
PRINCE HARRY (aside to Poins) Saturn and Venus this year in conjunction! What says th’almanac to that?
POINS And look whether the fiery Trigon his man be not lisping to his master’s old tables, his note-book, his counsel-keeper!
SIR JOHN (to Doll) Thou dost give me flattering busses.
DOLL TEARSHEET By my troth, I kiss thee with a most constant heart.
SIR JOHN I am old, I am old.
DOLL TEARSHEET I love thee better than I love e’er a scurvy young boy of them all.
SIR JOHN What stuff wilt have a kirtle of? I shall receive money o’Thursday; shalt have a cap tomorrow.—A merry song!
⌈The music plays again⌉
Come, it grows late; we’ll to bed. Thou’lt forget me when I am gone.
DOLL TEARSHEET By my troth, thou‘lt set me a-weeping an thou sayst so. Prove that ever I dress myself handsome till thy return—well, hearken a’th’ end.
SIR JOHN Some sack, Francis.
PRINCE and POINS (coming forward) Anon, anon, sir.
SIR JOHN Ha, a bastard son of the King’s !—And art not thou Poins his brother?
PRINCE HARRY Why, thou globe of sinful continents, what a life dost thou lead!
SIR JOHN A better than thou: I am a gentleman, thou art a drawer.
PRINCE HARRY Very true, sir, and I come to draw you out by the ears.
MISTRESS QUICKLY O, the Lord preserve thy grace! By my troth, welcome to London! Now the Lord bless that sweet face of thine! O Jesu, are you come from Wales?
SIR JOHN (to Prince Harry) Thou whoreson mad compound of majesty! By this light—flesh and corrupt blood, thou art welcome.
DOLL TEARSHEET How, you fat fool? I scorn you.
POINS (to Prince Harry) My lord, he will drive you out of your revenge and turn all to a merriment, if you take not the heat.
PRINCE HARRY (to Sir John) You whoreson candlemine you, how vilely did you speak of me now, before this honest, virtuous, civil gentlewoman!
MISTRESS QUICKLY God’s blessing of your good heart, and so she is, by my troth!
SIR JOHN (to Prince Harry) Didst thou hear me?
PRINCE HARRY Yea, and you knew me as you did when you ran away by Gads Hill; you knew I was at your back, and spoke it on purpose to try my patience.
SIR JOHN No, no, no, not so, I did not think thou wast within hearing.
PRINCE HARRY I shall drive you, then, to confess the wilful abuse, and then I know how to handle you.
SIR JOHN No abuse, Hal; o’mine honour, no abuse.
PRINCE HARRY Not? To dispraise me, and call me ‘pantler’ and ‘bread-chipper’ and I know not what?
SIR JOHN No abuse, Hal.
POINS No abuse?
SIR JOHN No abuse, Ned, i’th’ world, honest Ned, none. I dispraised him before the wicked, that the wicked might not fall in love with him; (to Prince Harry) in which doing I have done the part of a careful friend and a true subject, and thy father is to give me thanks for it. No abuse, Hal; none, Ned, none; no, faith, boys, none.
PRINCE HARRY See now whether pure fear and entire cowardice doth not make thee wrong this virtuous gentlewoman to close with us. Is she of the wicked? Is thine hostess here of the wicked? Or is thy boy of the wicked? Or honest Bardolph, whose zeal burns in his nose, of the wicked?
POINS (to Sir John) Answer, thou dead elm, answer.
SIR JOHN The fiend hath pricked down Bardolph irrecoverable, and his face is Lucifer’s privy kitchen, where he doth nothing but roast malt-worms. For the boy, there is a good angel about him, but the devil outbids him, too.
PRINCE HARRY For the women?
SIR JOHN For one of them, she’s in hell already, and burns poor souls. For th’other, I owe her money, and whether she be damned for that I know not.
MISTRESS QUICKLY No, I warrant you.
SIR JOHN No, I think thou art not; I think thou art quit for that. Marry, there is another indictment upon thee, for suffering flesh to be eaten in thy house, contrary to the law, for the which I think thou wilt howl.
MISTRESS QUICKLY All victuallers do so. What’s a joint of mutton or two in a whole Lent?
PRINCE HARRY You, gentlewoman—
DOLL TEARSHEET What says your grace?
SIR JOHN His grace says that which his flesh rebels against.
Peto knocks at door within
MISTRESS QUICKLY Who knocks so loud at door? (Calls)
Look to th’ door there, Francis.
Enter Peto
PRINCE HARRY Peto, how now, what news?
PETO
The King your father is at Westminster;
And there are twenty weak and wearied posts
Come from the north; and as I came along
I met and overtook a dozen captains,
Bareheaded, sweating, knocking at the taverns,
And asking every one for Sir John Falstaff.
PRINCE HARRY
By heaven, Poins, I feel me much to blame
So idly to profane the precious time,
When tempest of commotion, like the south
Borne with black vapour, doth begin to melt
And drop upon our bare unarmed heads.—
G
ive me my sword and cloak.—Falstaff, good night.
Exeunt Prince Harry and Poins
SIR JOHN Now comes in the sweetest morsel of the night,
and we must hence and leave it unpicked. 371
Knocking within. ⌈Exit Bardolph⌉
More knocking at the door!
Enter Bardolph
How now, what’s the matter?
BARDOLPH
You must away to court, sir, presently.
A dozen captains stay at door for you.
SIR JOHN ⌈to the Page⌉ Pay the musicians, sirrah. Farewell, hostess; farewell, Doll. You see, my good wenches, how men of merit are sought after. The undeserver may sleep, when the man of action is called on. Farewell, good wenches. If I be not sent away post, I will see you again ere I go. ⌈Exeunt musicians⌉
DOLL TEARSHEET ⌈weeping⌉ I cannot speak. If my heart be not ready to burst—well, sweet Jack, have a care of thyself.
SIR JOHN Farewell, farewell! 385
Exit ⌈with Bardolph, Peto, and the Page⌉
MISTRESS QUICKLY Well, fare thee well. I have known thee these twenty-nine years come peascod-time, but an honester and truer-hearted man—well, fare thee well.
⌈Enter Bardolph⌉
BARDOLPH Mistress Tearsheet!
MISTRESS QUICKLY What’s the matter? 390
BARDOLPH Bid Mistress Tearsheet come to my master.
⌈Exit⌉
MISTRESS QUICKLY O run, Doll; run, run, good Doll!
Exeunt ⌈Doll at one door, Mistress Quickly at another door⌉
3.1 Enter King Henry in his nightgown, with a page
The Oxford Shakespeare: The Complete Works Page 182
