The Merry Wives of Windsor

Act III

Scene I

A meadow near Frogmore with a field-path and two stiles, one hard-by, the other at a distance.

	Enter Sir Hugh Evans* in doublet and hose; a drawn sword in one hand and an open book in the other. Simple on the look-out up a tree.*
Sir Hugh Evans	Calls. I pray you now, good Master Slender’s serving-man, and friend Simple by your name, which way have you looked for Master Caius, that calls himself doctor of physic?
Simple	Marry, sir, the pittie-ward, the park-ward, every way; old Windsor way, and every way but the town way.
Sir Hugh Evans	I most fehemently desire you you will also look that way.
Simple	I will, Sir.
Sir Hugh Evans	Pless my soul, how full of chollors I am, and trempling of mind! I shall be glad if he have deceived me. How melancholies I am! I will knog his urinals about his knave’s costard when I have goot opportunities for the ’ork: pless my soul! Sings.
	To shallow rivers, to whose falls Melodious birds sings madrigals; There will we make our peds of roses, And a thousand fragrant posies. To shallow⁠—
	Mercy on me! I have a great dispositions to cry. Sings.
	Melodious birds sing madrigals⁠— Whenas I sat in Pabylon⁠— And a thousand vagram posies. To shallow⁠—
Simple	Descending the tree. Yonder he is, coming this way, Sir Hugh.
Sir Hugh Evans	He’s welcome.
	Sings.
	To shallow rivers, to whose falls⁠—
	Heaven prosper the right!⁠—What weapons is he?
Simple	No weapons, sir. Points. There comes my master, Master Shallow, and another gentleman, from Frogmore, over the stile, this way.
Sir Hugh Evans	Pray you give me my gown; or else keep it in your arms. Reads in a book. Simple* takes up gown from ground.*
	Enter Page* and Justice Shallow over the near stile, with Slender following. At the same time Host, Doctor Caius, and Rugby are seen climbing the stile afar off.*
Justice Shallow	How now, Master Parson! Good morrow, good Sir Hugh. Keep a gamester from the dice, and a good student from his book, and it is wonderful.
Slender	Aside. Ah, sweet Anne Page!
Page	’Save you, good Sir Hugh!
Sir Hugh Evans	Pless you from his mercy sake, all of you!
Justice Shallow	What, the sword and the word! Do you study them both, Master Parson?
Page	And youthful still, in your doublet and hose, this raw rheumatic day!
Sir Hugh Evans	There is reasons and causes for it.
Page	We are come to you to do a good office, Master Parson.
Sir Hugh Evans	Fery well; what is it?
Page	Looks over Sir Hugh Evans’* shoulder.* Yonder is a most reverend gentleman, who, belike having received wrong by some person, is at most odds with his own gravity and patience that ever you saw.
Justice Shallow	I have lived fourscore years and upward; I never heard a man of his place, gravity, and learning, so wide of his own respect.
Sir Hugh Evans	What is he?
	Host, Doctor Caius, and Rugby approach.
Page	I think you know him: He turns. Master Doctor Caius, the renowned French physician.
Sir Hugh Evans	Got’s will and His passion of my heart! I had as lief you would tell me of a mess of porridge.
Page	Why?
Sir Hugh Evans	He has no more knowledge in Hibbocrates and Galen⁠—raises his voice and he is a knave besides; a cowardly knave as you would desires to be acquainted withal. Doctor Caius runs forward with rapier and dagger drawn.
Page	I warrant you, he’s the man should fight with him.
Slender	Aside. O, sweet Anne Page!
Justice Shallow	It appears so, by his weapons. Keep them asunder; here comes Doctor Caius. He crosses his path.
Page	Steps in front of Sir Hugh Evans. Nay, good Master Parson, keep in your weapon.
Justice Shallow	So do you, good Master Doctor.
Host	Disarm them, and let them question; let them keep their limbs whole and hack our English. They are disarmed.
Doctor Caius	I pray you, let-a me speak a word with your ear: verefore will you not meet-a me?
Sir Hugh Evans	Aside to Doctor Caius. Pray you use your patience; in good time.
Doctor Caius	By gar, you are de coward, de Jack dog, John ape.
Sir Hugh Evans	Aside to Doctor Caius. Pray you, let us not be laughing-stogs to other men’s humours; I desire you in friendship, and I will one way or other make you amends. Aloud. I will knog your urinals about your knave’s cogscomb for missing your meetings and appointments.
Doctor Caius	Diable!⁠—Jack Rugby⁠—mine Host de Jarretiere⁠—have I not stay for him to kill him? Have I not, at de place I did appoint?
Sir Hugh Evans	As I am a Christians soul, now, look you, this is the place appointed. I’ll be judgment by mine host of the Garter.
Host	Peace, I say, Gallia and Gaullia; French and Welsh, soul-curer and body-curer!
Doctor Caius	Ay, dat is very good; excellent!
Host	Peace, I say! Hear mine host of the Garter. Am I politic? am I subtle? am I a Machiavel? Shall I lose my doctor? No; he gives me the potions and the motions. Shall I lose my parson, my priest, my Sir Hugh? No; he gives me the proverbs and the no-verbs. Give me thy hand, terrestrial; so;⁠—give me thy hand, celestial; so. Joins their hands. Boys of art, I have deceived you both; I have directed you to wrong places; your hearts are mighty, your skins are whole, and let burnt sack be the issue. To Page* and Justice Shallow.* Come, lay their swords to pawn. Follow me, lads of peace; follow, follow, follow.
Justice Shallow	Trust me, a mad host!⁠—Follow, gentlemen, follow. He mounts the stile.
Slender	Aside. O, sweet Anne Page!
	Exeunt Justice Shallow, Slender, Page, and Host.
Doctor Caius	Ha, do I perceive dat? Have you make-a de sot of us, ha, ha?
Sir Hugh Evans	This is well; he has made us his vlouting-stog. I desire you that we may be friends; and let us knog our prains together to be revenge on this same scall, scurvy, cogging companion, the host of the Garter.
Doctor Caius	By gar, with all my heart. He promise to bring me where is Anne Page; by gar, he deceive me too.
Sir Hugh Evans	Well, I will smite his noddles. Pray you follow.
	Exeunt.

Scene II

A street in Windsor.

	Enter Mistress Page* and Robin; he pauses.*
Mistress Page	Nay, keep your way, little gallant: you were wont to be a follower, but now you are a leader. Whether had you rather lead mine eyes, or eye your master’s heels?
Robin	I had rather, forsooth, go before you like a man than follow him like a dwarf.
Mistress Page	O! you are a flattering boy: now I see you’ll be a courtier.
	Enter Ford.
Ford	Well met, Mistress Page. Whither go you?
Mistress Page	Truly, sir, to see your wife. Is she at home?
Ford	Ay; and as idle as she may hang together, for want of company. I think, if your husbands were dead, you two would marry.
Mistress Page	Be sure of that⁠—two other husbands.
Ford	Where had you this pretty weathercock?
Mistress Page	I cannot tell what the dickens his name is my husband had him of. What do you call your knight’s name, sirrah?
Robin	Sir John Falstaff.
Ford	Sir John Falstaff!
Mistress Page	He, he; I can never hit on’s name. There is such a league between my good man and he! Is your wife at home indeed?
Ford	Indeed she is.
Mistress Page	Curtsies. By your leave, sir: I am sick till I see her.
	Exeunt Mistress Page* and Robin.*
Ford	Has Page any brains? Hath he any eyes? Hath he any thinking? Sure, they sleep; he hath no use of them. Why, this boy will carry a letter twenty mile as easy as a cannon will shoot point-blank twelve score. He pieces out his wife’s inclination; he gives her folly motion and advantage; and now she’s going to my wife, and Falstaff’s boy with her. A man may hear this shower sing in the wind: and Falstaff’s boy with her! Good plots! They are laid; and our revolted wives share damnation together. Well; I will take him, then torture my wife, pluck the borrowed veil of modesty from the so seeming Mistress Page, divulge Page himself for a secure and wilful Actaeon; and to these violent proceedings all my neighbours shall cry aim. Clock strikes. The clock gives me my cue, and my assurance bids me search; there I shall find Falstaff. I shall be rather praised for this than mocked; for it is as positive as the earth is firm that Falstaff is there. I will go.
	Enter Page, Justice Shallow, Slender, Host, Sir Hugh Evans, Doctor Caius, and Rugby.
Shallow, Page, etc.	Well met, Master Ford.
Ford	Trust me, a good knot; I have good cheer at home, and I pray you all go with me.
Justice Shallow	I must excuse myself, Master Ford.
Slender	And so must I, sir; we have appointed to dine with Mistress Anne, and I would not break with her for more money than I’ll speak of.
Justice Shallow	We have lingered about a match between Anne Page and my cousin Slender, and this day we shall have our answer.
Slender	I hope I have your good will, father Page.
Page	You have, Master Slender; I stand wholly for you. But my wife, Master doctor, is for you altogether.
Doctor Caius	Ay, be-gar; and de maid is love-a me: my nursh-a Quickly tell me so mush.
Host	What say you to young Master Fenton? He capers, he dances, he has eyes of youth, he writes verses, he speaks holiday, he smells April and May; he will carry’t, he will carry’t; ’tis in his buttons; he will carry’t.
Page	Not by my consent, I promise you. The gentleman is of no having: he kept company with the wild Prince and Pointz; he is of too high a region, he knows too much. No, he shall not knit a knot in his fortunes with the finger of my substance; if he take her, let him take her simply; the wealth I have waits on my consent, and my consent goes not that way.
Ford	I beseech you, heartily, some of you go home with me to dinner: besides your cheer, you shall have sport; I will show you a monster. Master Doctor, you shall go; so shall you, Master Page; and you, Sir Hugh.
Justice Shallow	Well, fare you well; we shall have the freer wooing at Master Page’s.
	Exeunt Justice Shallow* and Slender.*
Doctor Caius	Go home, John Rugby; I come anon.
	Exit Rugby.
Host	Farewell, my hearts; I will to my honest knight Falstaff, and drink canary with him.
	Exit Host.
Ford	Aside. I think I shall drink in pipe-wine first with him. I’ll make him dance.
	Aloud. Will you go, gentles?
All	Have with you to see this monster.
	Exeunt.

Scene III

A room in Ford’s house, hung with arras; stairs leading to a gallery; a large open hearth; three doors, one with windows right and left opening into the street.

	Enter Mistress Ford* and Mistress Page.*
Mistress Ford	Calls. What, John! what, Robert!
Mistress Page	Quickly, quickly:⁠—Is the buck-basket⁠—
Mistress Ford	I warrant. What, Robin, I say!
	Enter Servants* with a basket.*
Mistress Page	Impatient. Come, come, come.
Mistress Ford	Here, set it down. They do so.
Mistress Page	Give your men the charge; we must be brief.
Mistress Ford	Marry, as I told you before, John and Robert, be ready here hard by in the brew-house; and when I suddenly call you, come forth, and, without any pause or staggering, take this basket on your shoulders: that done, trudge with it in all haste, and carry it among the whitsters in Datchet-Mead, and there empty it in the muddy ditch close by the Thames side.
Mistress Page	You will do it?
Mistress Ford	I have told them over and over; they lack no direction. Be gone, and come when you are called.
	Exeunt Servants.
Mistress Page	Here comes little Robin.
	Enter Robin.
Mistress Ford	How now, my eyas-musket! what news with you?
Robin	My Master Sir John is come in at your backdoor, Mistress Ford, and requests your company.
Mistress Page	You little Jack-a-Lent, have you been true to us?
Robin	Ay, I’ll be sworn. My master knows not of your being here, and hath threatened to put me into everlasting liberty, if I tell you of it; for he swears he’ll turn me away.
Mistress Page	Thou’rt a good boy; this secrecy of thine shall be a tailor to thee, and shall make thee a new doublet and hose. I’ll go hide me.
Mistress Ford	Do so. Go tell thy master I am alone.
	Exit Robin.
	Mistress Page, remember you your cue.
Mistress Page	I warrant thee; if I do not act it, hiss me.
	Exit Mistress Page, leaving door ajar.
Mistress Ford	Go to, then; we’ll use this unwholesome humidity, this gross watery pumpion; we’ll teach him to know turtles from jays.
	Enter Falstaff.
Falstaff	“Have I caught thee, my heavenly jewel?” Why, now let me die, for I have lived long enough: this is the period of my ambition: O this blessed hour!
Mistress Ford	O, sweet Sir John! They embrace.
Falstaff	Mistress Ford, I cannot cog, I cannot prate, Mistress Ford. Now shall I sin in my wish; I would thy husband were dead. I’ll speak it before the best lord, I would make thee my lady.
Mistress Ford	I your lady, Sir John! Alas, I should be a pitiful lady.
Falstaff	Let the court of France show me such another. I see how thine eye would emulate the diamond; thou hast the right arched beauty of the brow that becomes the ship-tire, the tire-valiant, or any tire of Venetian admittance.
Mistress Ford	A plain kerchief, Sir John; my brows become nothing else; nor that well neither.
Falstaff	By the Lord, thou art a traitor to say so: thou wouldst make an absolute courtier; and the firm fixture of thy foot would give an excellent motion to thy gait in a semi-circled farthingale. I see what thou wert, if Fortune thy foe were not, Nature thy friend. Come, thou canst not hide it.
Mistress Ford	Believe me, there’s no such thing in me.
Falstaff	What made me love thee? Let that persuade thee there’s something extraordinary in thee. Come, I cannot cog and say thou art this and that, like a many of these lisping hawthorn-buds that come like women in men’s apparel, and smell like Bucklersbury in simple-time; I cannot; but I love thee, none but thee; and thou deservest it.
Mistress Ford	Do not betray me, sir; I fear you love Mistress Page.
Falstaff	Thou mightst as well say I love to walk by the Counter-gate, which is as hateful to me as the reek of a limekiln.
Mistress Ford	Well, heaven knows how I love you; with meaning and you shall one day find it.
Falstaff	Keep in that mind; I’ll deserve it.
Mistress Ford	Nay, I must tell you, so you do; with meaning or else I could not be in that mind.
Robin	Within. Mistress Ford! Mistress Ford! here’s Mistress Page at the door, sweating and blowing and looking wildly, and would needs speak with you presently.
Falstaff	She shall not see me; I will ensconce me behind the arras.
Mistress Ford	Pray you, do so; she’s a very tattling woman.
	Falstaff hides himself.
	Reenter Mistress Page* and Robin.*
	What’s the matter? How now!
Mistress Page	Seeming breathless. O Mistress Ford, what have you done? You’re shamed, you are overthrown, you are undone forever!
Mistress Ford	What’s the matter, good Mistress Page?
Mistress Page	O well-a-day, Mistress Ford! having an honest man to your husband, to give him such cause of suspicion!
Mistress Ford	What cause of suspicion?
Mistress Page	What cause of suspicion? Out upon you! how am I mistook in you!
Mistress Ford	Why, alas, what’s the matter?
Mistress Page	Your husband’s coming hither, woman, with all the officers in Windsor, to search for a gentleman that he says is here now in the house, by your consent, to take an ill advantage of his absence: you are undone.
Mistress Ford	Aside. Speak louder. ’Tis not so, I hope.
Mistress Page	Pray heaven it be not so that you have such a man here! but ’tis most certain your husband’s coming, with half Windsor at his heels, to search for such a one. I come before to tell you. If you know yourself clear, why, I am glad of it; but if you have a friend here, convey, convey him out. Be not amazed; call all your senses to you; defend your reputation, or bid farewell to your good life forever.
Mistress Ford	What shall I do?⁠—There is a gentleman, my dear friend; and I fear not mine own shame as much as his peril: I had rather than a thousand pound he were out of the house.
Mistress Page	For shame! never stand “you had rather” and “you had rather”: your husband’s here at hand; bethink you of some conveyance; in the house you cannot hide him. O, how have you deceived me! Look, here is a basket; if he be of any reasonable stature, he may creep in here; and throw foul linen upon him, as if it were going to bucking: or⁠—it is whiting-time⁠—send him by your two men to Datchet-Mead.
Mistress Ford	He’s too big to go in there. What shall I do?
Falstaff	Coming forward. Let me see’t, let me see’t. O, let me see’t! I’ll in, I’ll in; follow your friend’s counsel; I’ll in.
Mistress Page	What, Sir John Falstaff! In his ear. Are these your letters, knight?
Falstaff	I love thee and none but thee; help me away: let me creep in here. I’ll never⁠—
	Voices heard in the street without. He gets into the basket; they cover him with foul linen.
Mistress Page	Help to cover your master, boy. Call your men, Mistress Ford. You dissembling knight!
Mistress Ford	Calling. What, John! Robert! John!
	Robin hastily thrusts the remainder of the linen into the basket and runs off.
	Reenter Servants.
	Go, take up these clothes here, quickly; where’s the cowl-staff? Look how you drumble! They pass a pole through the handle of the basket. Carry them to the laundress in Datchet-Mead; they hoist the basket, staggering quickly, come.
	Enter Ford, Page, Doctor Caius, and Sir Hugh Evans.
Ford	Pray you come near. If I suspect without cause, why then make sport at me, then let me be your jest; I deserve it. How now, whither bear you this?
Servant	To the laundress, forsooth.
Mistress Ford	Why, what have you to do whither they bear it? You were best meddle with buck-washing.
Ford	Buck! I would I could wash myself of the buck! Buck, buck, buck! ay, buck; I warrant you, buck; and of the season too, it shall appear.
	Exeunt Servants* with the basket.*
	Gentlemen, I have dreamed tonight; I’ll tell you my dream. Here, here, here be my keys: ascend my chambers; search, seek, find out. I’ll warrant we’ll unkennel the fox. Goes to outer door. Let me stop this way first. Locking the door. So, now uncape.
Page	Good Master Ford, be contented: you wrong yourself too much.
Ford	True, Master Page. Up, gentlemen, you shall see sport anon⁠ ⁠… Mounts the stairs. Follow me, gentlemen.
	They hesitate. Exit Ford.
Sir Hugh Evans	This is fery fantastical humours and jealousies.
Doctor Caius	By gar, ’tis no the fashion of France; it is not jealous in France.
Page	Nay, follow him, gentlemen; see the issue of his search.
	Exeunt Sir Hugh Evans, Page, and Doctor Caius.
Mistress Page	Is there not a double excellency in this?
Mistress Ford	I know not which pleases me better, that my husband is deceived, or Sir John.
Mistress Page	What a taking was he in when your husband asked who was in the basket!
Mistress Ford	I am half afraid he will have need of washing; so throwing him into the water will do him a benefit.
Mistress Page	Hang him, dishonest rascal! I would all of the same strain were in the same distress.
Mistress Ford	I think my husband hath some special suspicion of Falstaff’s being here, for I never saw him so gross in his jealousy till now.
Mistress Page	I will lay a plot to try that, and we will yet have more tricks with Falstaff: his dissolute disease will scarce obey this medicine.
Mistress Ford	Shall we send that foolish carrion, Mistress Quickly, to him, and excuse his throwing into the water, and give him another hope, to betray him to another punishment?
Mistress Page	We will do it; let him be sent for tomorrow eight o’clock, to have amends.
	Reenter Ford, Page, Doctor Caius, and Sir Hugh Evans.
Ford	I cannot find him: may be the knave bragged of that he could not compass.
Mistress Page	Aside to Mistress Ford. Heard you that?
Mistress Ford	Aside to Mistress Page. Ay, ay, peace.⁠—
	You use me well, Master Ford, do you?
Ford	Ay, I do so.
Mistress Ford	Heaven make you better than your thoughts!
Ford	Amen!
Mistress Page	You do yourself mighty wrong, Master Ford.
Ford	Ay, ay; I must bear it.
Sir Hugh Evans	If there be any pody in the house, and in the chambers, and in the coffers, and in the presses, heaven forgive my sins at the day of judgment!
Doctor Caius	Be gar, nor I too; there is no bodies.
Page	Fie, fie, Master Ford, are you not ashamed? What spirit, what devil suggests this imagination? I would not ha’ your distemper in this kind for the wealth of Windsor Castle.
Ford	’Tis my fault, Master Page: I suffer for it.
Sir Hugh Evans	You suffer for a pad conscience. Your wife is as honest a ’omans as I will desires among five thousand, and five hundred too.
Doctor Caius	By gar, I see ’tis an honest woman.
Ford	Well, I promised you a dinner. Come, come, walk in the Park: I pray you pardon me; I will hereafter make known to you why I have done this. Come, wife, come, Mistress Page; I pray you pardon me; takes their hands pray heartily, pardon me.
	Exeunt Mistress Ford* and Mistress Page.*
Page	To the others. Let’s go in, gentlemen; but, trust me, we’ll mock him. I do invite you tomorrow morning to my house to breakfast; after, we’ll a-birding together; I have a fine hawk for the bush. Shall it be so?
Ford	Anything.
Sir Hugh Evans	If there is one, I shall make two in the company.
Doctor Caius	If there be one or two, I shall make-a the turd.
Ford	Pray you go, Master Page.
	Exeunt Ford* and Page.*
Sir Hugh Evans	I pray you now, remembrance tomorrow on the lousy knave, mine host.
Doctor Caius	Dat is good; by gar, with all my heart.
Sir Hugh Evans	A lousy knave! to have his gibes and his mockeries!
	Exeunt.

Scene IV

A room in Page’s house.

	Enter Fenton* and Anne Page.*
Fenton	I see I cannot get thy father’s love; Therefore no more turn me to him, sweet Nan.
Anne Page	Alas! how then?
Fenton	Why, thou must be thyself. He doth object, I am too great of birth; And that my state being gall’d with my expense, I seek to heal it only by his wealth. Besides these, other bars he lays before me, My riots past, my wild societies; And tells me ’tis a thing impossible I should love thee but as a property.
Anne Page	May be he tells you true.
Fenton	No, heaven so speed me in my time to come! Albeit I will confess thy father’s wealth Was the first motive that I wooed thee, Anne: Yet, wooing thee, I found thee of more value Than stamps in gold, or sums in sealèd bags; And ’tis the very riches of thyself That now I aim at.
Anne Page	Gentle Master Fenton, Yet seek my father’s love; still seek it, sir. If opportunity and humblest suit Cannot attain it, why then⁠—hark you hither.
	They converse apart.
	Enter Justice Shallow, Slender, and Mistress Quickly.
Justice Shallow	Break their talk, Mistress Quickly: my kinsman shall speak for himself. She draws near the lovers.
Slender	Pale. I’ll make a shaft or a bolt on’t. ’Slid, ’tis but venturing.
Justice Shallow	Be not dismayed.
Slender	No, she shall not dismay me. I care not for that, but that I am afeard.
Mistress Quickly	To Anne Page. Hark ye; Master Slender would speak a word with you.
Anne Page	I come to him. Aside. This is my father’s choice. O, what a world of vile ill-favour’d faults Looks handsome in three hundred pounds a year!
Mistress Quickly	Steps between them. And how does good Master Fenton? Pray you, a word with you. Anne moves away.
Justice Shallow	She’s coming; to her, coz. O boy, thou hadst a father!
Slender	I had a father, Mistress Anne; my uncle can tell you good jests of him. Pray you, uncle, tell Mistress Anne the jest how my father stole two geese out of a pen, good uncle.
Justice Shallow	Mistress Anne, my cousin loves you.
Slender	Ay, that I do; as well as I love any woman in Gloucestershire.
Justice Shallow	He will maintain you like a gentlewoman.
Slender	Ay, that I will come cut and long-tail, under the degree of a squire.
Justice Shallow	He will make you a hundred and fifty pounds jointure.
Anne Page	Good Master Shallow, let him woo for himself.
Justice Shallow	Marry, I thank you for it; I thank you for that good comfort. She calls you, coz; I’ll leave you. He stands aside.
Anne Page	Now, Master Slender.
Slender	Plucking his beard. Now, good Mistress Anne.⁠—
Anne Page	What is your will?
Slender	My will! ’od’s heartlings, that’s a pretty jest indeed! I ne’er made my will yet, I thank heaven; I am not such a sickly creature, I give heaven praise.
Anne Page	I mean, Master Slender, what would you with me?
Slender	Casting down his eyes. Truly, for mine own part I would little or nothing with you. Your father and my uncle hath made motions; if it be my luck, so; if not, happy man be his dole! They can tell you how things go better than I can. You may ask your father; here he comes.
	Enter Page* and Mistress Page.*
Page	Now, Master Slender: love him, daughter Anne. Why, how now! what does Master Fenton here? You wrong me, sir, thus still to haunt my house: I told you, sir, my daughter is dispos’d of.
Fenton	Nay, Master Page, be not impatient.
Mistress Page	Good Master Fenton, come not to my child.
Page	She is no match for you.
Fenton	Sir, will you hear me?
Page	No, good Master Fenton. Come, Master Shallow; come, son Slender, in. Knowing my mind, you wrong me, Master Fenton.
	Exeunt Page, Justice Shallow, and Slender.
Mistress Quickly	Speak to Mistress Page.
Fenton	Good Mistress Page, for that I love your daughter In such a righteous fashion as I do, Perforce, against all checks, rebukes, and manners, I must advance the colours of my love And not retire: let me have your good will.
Anne Page	Good mother, do not marry me to yond fool.
Mistress Page	I mean it not; I seek you a better husband.
Mistress Quickly	That’s my master, Master doctor.
Anne Page	Alas! I had rather be set quick i’ the earth. And bowl’d to death with turnips.
Mistress Page	Come, trouble not yourself. Good Master Fenton, I will not be your friend, nor enemy; My daughter will I question how she loves you, And as I find her, so am I affected. Till then, farewell, sir: she must needs go in; Her father will be angry.
	Exeunt Mistress Page.* Anne Page follows, turning at the door.*
Fenton	Farewell, gentle mistress. Farewell, Nan.
	The door closes.
Mistress Quickly	This is my doing now: “Nay,” said I, “will you cast away your child on a fool, and a physician? Look on Master Fenton.” This is my doing.
Fenton	I thank thee; and I pray thee, once tonight Give my sweet Nan this ring. There’s for thy pains.
	Fenton thrusts money in her hands and exits.
Mistress Quickly	Now Heaven send thee good fortune! A kind heart he hath; a woman would run through fire and water for such a kind heart. But yet I would my master had Mistress Anne; or I would Master Slender had her; or, in sooth, I would Master Fenton had her; I will do what I can for them all three, for so I have promised, and I’ll be as good as my word; but speciously for Master Fenton. Well, I must of another errand to Sir John Falstaff from my two mistresses: what a beast am I to slack it!
	Exit.

Scene V

A room in the Garter Inn

	Enter Falstaff* from his chamber.*
Falstaff	Bardolph, I say⁠—
	Enter Bardolph.
Bardolph	Here, sir.
Falstaff	Go fetch me a quart of sack; put a toast in’t.
	Exit Bardolph.
	Sits. Have I lived to be carried in a basket, and to be thrown in the Thames like a barrow of butcher’s offal? Well, if I be served such another trick, I’ll have my brains ta’en out and buttered, and give them to a dog for a new year’s gift. The rogues slighted me into the river with as little remorse as they would have drowned a blind bitch’s puppies, fifteen i’ the litter; and you may know by my size that I have a kind of alacrity in sinking; if the bottom were as deep as hell I should down. I had been drowned but that the shore was shelvy and shallow; a death that I abhor, for the water swells a man; and what a thing should I have been when had been swelled! I should have been a mountain of mummy.
	Reenter Bardolph, with two cups of sack.
Bardolph	Here’s Mistress Quickly, sir, to speak with you. He sets cups down.
Falstaff	Takes one. Come, let me pour in some sack to the Thames water; for my belly’s as cold as if I had swallowed snowballs for pills to cool the reins. He drains the cup. Call her in.
Bardolph	Opening the door. Come in, woman.
	Enter Mistress Quickly.
Mistress Quickly	Curtsies. By your leave. I cry you mercy. Give your worship good morrow.
Falstaff	Empties the second cup. Take away these chalices. Go, brew me a pottle of sack finely.
Bardolph	Takes up the cups. With eggs, sir?
Falstaff	Simple of itself; I’ll no pullet-sperm in my brewage.
	Exit Bardolph.
	How now!
Mistress Quickly	Marry, sir, I come to your worship from Mistress Ford.
Falstaff	Mistress Ford! I have had ford enough; I was thrown into the ford; I have my belly full of ford.
Mistress Quickly	Alas the day! good heart, that was not her fault: she does so take on with her men; they mistook their erection.
Falstaff	So did I mine, to build upon a foolish woman’s promise.
Mistress Quickly	Well, she laments, sir, for it, that it would yearn your heart to see it. Her husband goes this morning a-birding; she desires you once more to come to her between eight and nine; I must carry her word quickly. She’ll make you amends, I warrant you.
Falstaff	Well, I will visit her. Tell her so; and bid her think what a man is; let her consider his frailty, and then judge of my merit.
Mistress Quickly	I will tell her.
Falstaff	Do so. Between nine and ten, sayest thou?
Mistress Quickly	Eight and nine, sir.
Falstaff	Well, be gone; I will not miss her.
Mistress Quickly	Peace be with you, sir.
	Exit Mistress Quickly.
Falstaff	I marvel I hear not of Master Brook; he sent me word to stay within. I like his money well. O! here he comes.
	Enter Ford* disguised as Brook.*
Ford	Bless you, sir!
Falstaff	Now, Master Brook, you come to know what hath passed between me and Ford’s wife?
Ford	That, indeed, Sir John, is my business.
Falstaff	Master Brook, I will not lie to you: I was at her house the hour she appointed me.
Ford	And how sped you, sir?
Falstaff	Very ill-favouredly, Master Brook.
Ford	How so, sir? did she change her determination?
Falstaff	No. Master Brook; but the peaking cornuto her husband, Master Brook, dwelling in a continual ’larum of jealousy, comes me in the instant of our encounter, after we had embraced, kissed, protested, and, as it were, spoke the prologue of our comedy; and at his heels a rabble of his companions, thither provoked and instigated by his distemper, and, forsooth, to search his house for his wife’s love.
Ford	What! while you were there?
Falstaff	While I was there.
Ford	And did he search for you, and could not find you?
Falstaff	You shall hear. As good luck would have it, comes in one Mistress Page; gives intelligence of Ford’s approach; and, in her invention and Ford’s wife’s distraction, they conveyed me into a buck-basket.
Ford	A buck-basket!
Falstaff	By the Lord, a buck-basket! rammed me in with foul shirts and smocks, socks, foul stockings, greasy napkins, that, Master Brook, there was the rankest compound of villainous smell that ever offended nostril.
Ford	And how long lay you there?
Falstaff	Nay, you shall hear, Master Brook, what I have suffered to bring this woman to evil for your good. Being thus crammed in the basket, a couple of Ford’s knaves, his hinds, were called forth by their mistress to carry me in the name of foul clothes to Datchet-lane; they took me on their shoulders; met the jealous knave their master in the door; who asked them once or twice what they had in their basket. I quaked for fear lest the lunatic knave would have searched 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 clothes. But mark the sequel, Master Brook: I suffered the pangs of three several deaths: first, an intolerable fright to be detected with a jealous rotten bellwether; next, to be compassed like a good bilbo in the circumference of a peck, hilt to point, heel to head; and then, to be stopped in, like a strong distillation, with stinking clothes that fretted in their own grease: think of that; a man of my kidney, think of 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 stewed in grease, like a Dutch dish, to be thrown into the Thames, and cooled, glowing hot, in that surge, like a horseshoe; think of that, hissing hot, think of that, Master Brook!
Ford	In good sadness, sir, I am sorry that for my sake you have suffered all this. My suit, then, is desperate; you’ll undertake her no more.
Falstaff	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 received from her another embassy of meeting; ’twixt eight and nine is the hour, Master Brook.
Ford	’Tis past eight already, sir.
Falstaff	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 crowned with your enjoying her: adieu. You shall have her, Master Brook; Master Brook, you shall cuckold Ford.
	Exit Falstaff.
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 linen and buck-baskets! Well, I will proclaim myself what I am; I will now take the lecher; he is at my house. He cannot scape me; ’tis impossible he should; he cannot creep into a halfpenny purse, nor into a pepper box; but, lest the devil that guides him should aid him, I will search impossible places. Though 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.