The Merry Wives Of Windsor

1 Enter Host and Simple.
2 HOST.
3 What wouldst thou have, boor? What, thick-skin? Speak, breathe,
4 discuss; brief, short, quick, snap.
5 SIMPLE.
6 Marry, sir, I come to speak with Sir John Falstaff from Master Slender.
7 HOST.
8 There’s his chamber, his house, his castle, his standing-bed and
9 truckle-bed. ’Tis painted about with the story of the Prodigal, fresh
10 and new. Go, knock and call. He’ll speak like an Anthropophaginian unto
11 thee. Knock, I say.
12 SIMPLE.
13 There’s an old woman, a fat woman, gone up into his chamber. I’ll be so
14 bold as stay, sir, till she come down. I come to speak with her,
15 indeed.
16 HOST.
17 Ha? A fat woman? The knight may be robbed. I’ll call.—Bully knight!
18 Bully Sir John! Speak from thy lungs military. Art thou there? It is
19 thine host, thine Ephesian, calls.
20 FALSTAFF.
21 [_Above_.] How now, mine host?
22 HOST.
23 Here’s a Bohemian-Tartar tarries the coming down of thy fat woman. Let
24 her descend, bully, let her descend. My chambers are honourable. Fie!
25 Privacy? Fie!
26 Enter Falstaff.
27 FALSTAFF.
28 There was, mine host, an old fat woman even now with me, but she’s
29 gone.
30 SIMPLE.
31 Pray you, sir, was’t not the wise woman of Brentford?
32 FALSTAFF.
33 Ay, marry was it, mussel-shell. What would you with her?
34 SIMPLE.
35 My master, sir, my Master Slender, sent to her, seeing her go through
36 the streets, to know, sir, whether one Nym, sir, that beguiled him of a
37 chain, had the chain or no.
38 FALSTAFF.
39 I spake with the old woman about it.
40 SIMPLE.
41 And what says she, I pray, sir?
42 FALSTAFF.
43 Marry, she says that the very same man that beguiled Master Slender of
44 his chain cozened him of it.
45 SIMPLE.
46 I would I could have spoken with the woman herself. I had other things
47 to have spoken with her too, from him.
48 FALSTAFF.
49 What are they? Let us know.
50 HOST.
51 Ay, come. Quick.
52 SIMPLE.
53 I may not conceal them, sir.
54 FALSTAFF.
55 Conceal them, or thou diest.
56 SIMPLE.
57 Why, sir, they were nothing but about Mistress Anne Page, to know if it
58 were my master’s fortune to have her or no.
59 FALSTAFF.
60 ’Tis, ’tis his fortune.
61 SIMPLE.
62 What sir?
63 FALSTAFF.
64 To have her, or no. Go, say the woman told me so.
65 SIMPLE.
66 May I be bold to say so, sir?
67 FALSTAFF.
68 Ay, sir; like who more bold?
69 SIMPLE.
70 I thank your worship; I shall make my master glad with these tidings.
71 [_Exit Simple._]
72 HOST
73 Thou art clerkly, thou art clerkly, Sir John. Was there a wise woman
74 with thee?
75 FALSTAFF.
76 Ay, that there was, mine host; one that hath taught me more wit than
77 ever I learned before in my life; and I paid nothing for it neither,
78 but was paid for my learning.
79 Enter Bardolph.
80 BARDOLPH
81 Out, alas, sir, cozenage, mere cozenage!
82 HOST.
83 Where be my horses? Speak well of them, varletto.
84 BARDOLPH.
85 Run away, with the cozeners. For so soon as I came beyond Eton, they
86 threw me off from behind one of them, in a slough of mire, and set
87 spurs and away, like three German devils, three Doctor Faustuses.
88 HOST.
89 They are gone but to meet the Duke, villain, do not say they be fled.
90 Germans are honest men.
91 Enter Sir Hugh Evans.
92 EVANS
93 Where is mine host?
94 HOST.
95 What is the matter, sir?
96 EVANS.
97 Have a care of your entertainments. There is a friend of mine come to
98 town tells me there is three cozen-Germans that has cozened all the
99 hosts of Readings, of Maidenhead, of Colebrook, of horses and money. I
100 tell you for good will, look you. You are wise, and full of gibes and
101 vlouting-stocks, and ’tis not convenient you should be cozened. Fare
102 you well.
103 [_Exit Evans._]
104 Enter Doctor Caius.
105 CAIUS.
106 Vere is mine host de Jarteer?
107 HOST.
108 Here, Master Doctor, in perplexity and doubtful dilemma.
109 CAIUS.
110 I cannot tell vat is dat, but it is tell-a me dat you make grand
111 preparation for a Duke de Jamany. By my trot, dere is no duke that the
112 court is know to come. I tell you for good will. Adieu.
113 [_Exit Doctor Caius._]
114 HOST
115 Hue and cry, villain, go!—Assist me, knight, I am undone.—Fly, run, hue
116 and cry, villain, I am undone!
117 [_Exeunt Host and Bardolph._]
118 FALSTAFF.
119 I would all the world might be cozened, for I have been cozened and
120 beaten too. If it should come to the ear of the court how I have been
121 transformed, and how my transformation hath been washed and cudgelled,
122 they would melt me out of my fat drop by drop, and liquor fishermen’s
123 boots with me. I warrant they would whip me with their fine wits till I
124 were as crestfallen as a dried pear. I never prospered since I forswore
125 myself at primero. Well, if my wind were but long enough, I would
126 repent.
127 Enter Mistress Quickly.
128 Now, whence come you?
129 MISTRESS QUICKLY.
130 From the two parties, forsooth.
131 FALSTAFF.
132 The devil take one party and his dam the other, and so they shall be
133 both bestowed. I have suffered more for their sakes, more than the
134 villainous inconstancy of man’s disposition is able to bear.
135 MISTRESS QUICKLY.
136 And have not they suffered? Yes, I warrant, speciously one of them.
137 Mistress Ford, good heart, is beaten black and blue, that you cannot
138 see a white spot about her.
139 FALSTAFF.
140 What tellst thou me of black and blue? I was beaten myself into all the
141 colours of the rainbow, and was like to be apprehended for the witch of
142 Brentford. But that my admirable dexterity of wit, my counterfeiting
143 the action of an old woman, delivered me, the knave constable had set
144 me i’ the stocks, i’ the common stocks, for a witch.
145 MISTRESS QUICKLY.
146 Sir, let me speak with you in your chamber, you shall hear how things
147 go, and, I warrant, to your content. Here is a letter will say
148 somewhat. Good hearts, what ado here is to bring you together! Sure,
149 one of you does not serve heaven well, that you are so crossed.
150 FALSTAFF.
151 Come up into my chamber.
152 [_Exeunt._]