we have a hot venison pasty to dinner: come, gentlemen, I hope we shall drink down all unkindness.

[Exeunt all but SHALLOW, SLENDER, and EVANS. Slen. I had rather than forty shillings, I had my book of songs and sonnets here.

Enter SIMPLE.

How now, Simple! Where have you been? I must wait on myself, must I? You have not the book of riddles about you, have you?

Sim. Book of riddles! why, did you not lend it to Alice Shortcake upon Allhallowmas last, a fortnight afore Michaelmas?

A

Shal. Come, coz; come, coz; we stay for you. word with you, coz; marry, this, coz: there is, as 't were, a tender, a kind of tender, made afar off by sir Hugh here do you understand me?

Slen. Ay, sir, you shall find me reasonable: if it be so, I shall do that that is reason.

Shal. Nay, but understand me.

Slen. So I do, sir.

Eva. Give ear to his motions, master Slender. I will description the matter to you, if you be capacity of it.

Slen. Nay, I will do as my cousin Shallow says. I pray you, pardon me; he's a justice of peace in his country, simple though I stand here.

Eva. But that is not the question: the question is concerning your marriage.

Shal. Ay, there's the point, sir.

Eva. Marry, is it, the very point of it; to mistress Anne Page.

Slen. Why, if it be so, I will marry her upon any

reasonable demands.

Eva. But can you affection the 'oman? Let us demand' to know that of your mouth, or of your lips; for divers philosophers hold, that the lips is parcel of the mouth therefore, precisely, can you carry your good will to the maid?

Shal. Cousin Abraham Slender, can you love her? Slen. I hope, sir, I will do, as it shall become one that would do reason.

Eva. Nay, Got's lords and his ladies, you must speak possitable, if you can carry her your desires towards her.

1 command: in f. e.

Shal. That you must. Will you, upon good dowry, marry her?

Slen. I will do a greater thing than that, upon your request, cousin, in any reason.

Shal. Nay, conceive me, conceive me, sweet co: what I do, is to pleasure you, coz. Can you love the

maid?

Slen. I will marry her, sir, at your request; but if there be no great love in the beginning, yet heaven may decrease it upon better acquaintance, when we are married, and have more occasion to know one another. I hope, upon familiarity will grow more contempt: but if you say, “marry her," I will marry her; that I am freely dissolved, and dissolutely.

Eva. It is a fery discretion answer; save, the fault is in the 'ort dissolutely: the 'ort is, according to our meaning, resolutely. His meaning is good.

Shal. Ay, I think my cousin meant well.

Slen. Ay, or else I would I might be hanged, la.
Re-enter ANNE PAGE.

Shal. Here comes fair mistress Anne.-Would I were young, for your sake, mistress Anne!

Anne. The dinner is on the table; my father desires your worship's company.

Shal. I will wait on him, fair mistress Anne. Eva. Od's plessed will! I will not be absence at the grace. [Exeunt SHALLOW and EVANS. Anne. Will 't please your worship to come in, sir? Slen. No, I thank you, forsooth, heartily; I am very well.

Anne. The dinner attends you, sir.

Slen. I am not a-hungry, I thank you, forsooth.-Go, sirrah, for all you are my man, go, wait upon my cousin Shallow. [Exit SIMPLE.] A justice of peace sometime may be beholding to his friend for a man.-I keep but three men and a boy yet, till my mother be dead; but what though? yet I live like a poor gentleman born.

Anne. I may not go in without your worship: they will not sit, till you come.

Slen. I' faith, I'll eat nothing; I thank you as much as though I did.

Anne. I pray you, sir, walk in.

Slen. I had rather walk here, I thank you. I bruised my shin the other day with playing at sword and dagger

with a master of fence, (three veneys for a dish of stewed prunes) and, by my troth, I cannot abide the smell of hot meat since. Why do your dogs bark so? be there bears i' the town?

[Dogs bark. Anne. I think, there are, sir; I heard them talked of. Slen. I love the sport well; but I shall as soon quarrel at it as any man in England. You are afraid, if you see the bear loose, are you not?

Anne. Ay, indeed, sir.

Slen. That's meat and drink to me, now: I have seen Sackerson loose, twenty times, and have taken him by the chain; but, I warrant you, the women have so cried and shriek'd at it, that it pass'd3: but women, indeed, cannot abide 'em; they are very ill-favoured rough things.

Re-enter PAGE.

Page. Come, gentle master Slender, come; we stay for you.

Slen. I'll eat nothing, I thank you, sir.

Page. By cock and pye, you shall not choose, sir. Come, come.

Slen. Nay; pray you, lead the way.

Page. Come on, sir.

Slen. Mistress Anne, yourself shall go first.

Anne. Not I, sir; pray you, keep on.

Slen. Truly, I will not go first: truly, la, I will not

do you that wrong.

Anne. I pray you, sir.

Slen. I'll rather be unmannerly, than troublesome. You do yourself wrong, indeed, la.

SCENE II.-The Same.

Enter Sir HUGH EVANS and SIMPLE.

[Exeunt.

Eva. Go your ways, and ask of doctor Caius' house, which is the way; and there dwells one mistress Quickly, which is in the manner of his nurse, or his dry nurse, or his cook, or his laundry, his washer, and his wringer.

Sim. Well, sir.

Eva. Nay, it is petter yet.-Give her this letter; for it is a 'oman that altogether's acquaintance with mistress Anne Page: and the letter is, to desire and require

Not in f. e. 2 A famous bear, often baited at Paris Garden. 3 expression.

her to solicit your master's desires to mistress Anne Page: pray you, be gone. I will make an end of my dinner there's pippins and cheese to come. [Exeunt.

SCENE III.-A Room in the Garter Inn.

Enter FALSTAFF, Host, BARDOLPH, NYм, PISTOL, and ROBIN.

Fal. Mine host of the Garter!

Host. What says my bully-rook1? Speak scholarly, and wisely.

Fal. Truly, mine host, I must turn away some of my followers.

Host. Discard, bully Hercules; cashier: let them wag; trot, trot.

Fal. I sit at ten pounds a-week.

Host. Thou 'rt an emperor, Cæsar, Keisar, and Pheazar. I will entertain Bardolph: he shall draw, he shall tap said I well, bully Hector?

:

Fal. Do so, good mine host.

Host. I have spoke; let him follow.-Let me see thee froth, and lime2: I am at a word; follow.

[Exit Host. Fal. Bardolph, follow him. A tapster is a good trade: an old cloak makes a new jerkin; a withered servingman, a fresh tapster. Go; adieu.

Bard. It is a life that I have desired. I will thrive. [Exit BARDOLPH. Pist. O base Gongarian3 wight! wilt thou the spigot wield?

Nym. He was gotten in drink: is not the humou conceited? His mind is not heroic, and there's the humour of it.

Fal. I am glad I am so acquit of this tinder-box: his thefts were too open; his filching was like an un skilful singer, he kept not time.

Nym. The good humour is to steal at a minim's rest. Pist. Convey the wise it call. Steal? foh! a ficc for the phrase!

Fal. Well, sirs, I am almost out at heels.

Pist. Why then, let kibes ensue.

Fal. There is no remedy; I must coney-catch, I must shift.

1 A sharper. 2 Froth beer by putting in soap, adding lime to sack to make it foam. 3 Some read: Hungarian, i. e., Bohemian or gipsy. minute's in f.e

Pist. Young ravens must have food.

Fal. Which of you know Ford of this town?
Pist. I ken the wight: he is of substance good.
Fal. My honest lads, I will tell you what I am about.
Pist. Two yards, and more.

Fal. No quips now, Pistol. Indeed I am in the waist two yards about; but I am now about no waste; I am about thrift. Briefly, I do mean to make love to Ford's wife I spy entertainment in her; she discourses, she craves,' she gives the leer of invitation: I can construe the action of her familiar style; and the hardest voice of her behaviour, to be Englished rightly, is, "I am sir John Falstaff's."

Pist. He hath studied her will, and translated her well; out of honesty into English.

Nym. The anchor is deep will that humour pass? Fal. Now, the report goes, she has all the rule of her husband's purse; he hath a legion of angels. Pist. As many devils entertain, and "To her, boy," say I.

Nym. The humour rises; it is good: humour me the angels.

Fal. I have writ me here a letter to her; and here another to Page's wife, who even now gave me good eyes too, examin'd my parts with most judicious œiliads sometimes the beam of her view gilded my foot, sometimes my portly belly.

Pist. Then did the sun on dunghill shine.
Nym. I thank thee for that humour.

Fal. O! she did so course o'er my exteriors with such a greedy intention, that the appetite of her eye did seem to scorch me up like a burning glass. Here's another letter to her: she bears the purse too; she is a region in Guiana, all gold and beauty. I will be cheaters to them both, and they shall be exchequers to me they shall be my East and West Indies, and I will trade to them both. Go, bear thou this letter to mistress Page; and thou this to mistress Ford. We will thrive, lads, we will thrive.

Pist. Shall I sir Pandarus of Troy become, And by my side wear steel? then, Lucifer take all ! Nym. I will run no base humour: here, take the

1 carves in f. e. 2 will in f. e. 3 An old coin. bounty: in f. e. Escheator, an office of the Exchequer.