READ STUDY GUIDE: Act II, Scene i |
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Act II, Scene i:
Before PAGE'S house
Before PAGE'S house
| [Enter MISTRESS PAGE, with a letter.] |
| MRS: |
| What! have I scaped love-letters in the holiday-time |
| of my beauty, and am I now a subject for them? Let me see. |
| 'Ask me no reason why I love you; for though Love use |
| Reason for his precisian, he admits him not for his counsellor. |
| You are not young, no more am I; go to, then, there's |
| sympathy: you are merry, so am I; ha! ha! then there's |
| more sympathy; you love sack, and so do I; would you |
| desire better sympathy? Let it suffice thee, Mistress Page |
| at the least, if the love of soldier can suffice, that I love |
| thee. I will not say, pity me: 'tis not a soldier-like phrase; |
| but I say, Love me. By me, |
 Thine own true knight, |
| By day or night, |
| Or any kind of light, |
| With all his might, |
| For thee to fight, |
| JOHN FALSTAFF.' |
| What a Herod of Jewry is this! O wicked, wicked world! |
| One that is well-nigh worn to pieces with age to show |
| himself a young gallant. What an unweighed behaviour |
| hath this Flemish drunkard picked, with the devil's name! |
| out of my conversation, that he dares in this manner |
| assay me? Why, he hath not been thrice in my company! |
| What should I say to him? I was then frugal of my mirth:— |
| Heaven forgive me! Why, I'll exhibit a bill in the parliament |
| for the putting down of men. How shall I be revenged on him? |
| for revenged I will be, as sure as his guts are made of |
| puddings. |
| [Enter MISTRESS FORD.] |
| MRS: |
| Mistress Page! trust me, I was going to your house. |
| MRS: |
| And, trust me, I was coming to you. You look |
| very ill. |
| MRS: |
| Nay, I'll ne'er believe that; I have to show to |
| the contrary. |
| MRS: |
| Faith, but you do, in my mind. |
| MRS: |
| Well, I do, then; yet, I say, I could show you to |
| the contrary. O, Mistress Page! give me some counsel. |
| MRS: |
| What's the matter, woman? |
| MRS: |
| O woman, if it were not for one trifling respect, |
| I could come to such honour! |
| MRS: |
| Hang the trifle, woman; take the honour. What |
| is it?—Dispense with trifles;—what is it? |
| MRS: |
| If I would but go to hell for an eternal moment |
| or so, I could be knighted. |
| MRS: |
| What? thou liest. Sir Alice Ford! These knights |
| will hack; and so thou shouldst not alter the article of thy |
| gentry. |
| MRS: |
| We burn daylight: here, read, read; perceive |
| how I might be knighted. I shall think the worse of fat |
| men as long as I have an eye to make difference of men's |
| liking: and yet he would not swear; praised women's |
| modesty; and gave such orderly and well-behaved reproof |
| to all uncomeliness that I would have sworn his disposition |
| would have gone to the truth of his words; but they do no |
| more adhere and keep place together than the Hundredth |
| Psalm to the tune of 'Greensleeves.' What tempest, I trow, |
| threw this whale, with so many tuns of oil in his belly, |
| ashore at Windsor? How shall I be revenged on him? I |
| think the best way were to entertain him with hope, till |
| the wicked fire of lust have melted him in his own grease. |
| Did you ever hear the like? |
| MRS: |
| Letter for letter, but that the name of Page and |
| Ford differs. To thy great comfort in this mystery of ill |
| opinions, here's the twin-brother of thy letter; but let thine |
| inherit first, for, I protest, mine never shall. I warrant he |
| hath a thousand of these letters, writ with blank space for |
| different names, sure, more, and these are of the second |
| edition. He will print them, out of doubt; for he cares not |
| what he puts into the press, when he would put us two: I |
| had rather be a giantess and lie under Mount Pelion. Well, |
| I will find you twenty lascivious turtles ere one chaste |
| man. |
| MRS: |
| Why, this is the very same; the very hand, the |
| very words. What doth he think of us? |
| MRS: |
| Nay, I know not; it makes me almost ready to |
| wrangle with mine own honesty. I'll entertain myself like |
| one that I am not acquainted withal; for, sure, unless he |
| know some strain in me that I know not myself, he would |
| never have boarded me in this fury. |
| MRS: |
| 'Boarding' call you it? I'll be sure to keep him |
| above deck. |
| MRS: |
| So will I; if he come under my hatches, I'll never |
| to sea again. Let's be revenged on him; let's appoint him a |
| meeting, give him a show of comfort in his suit, and lead |
| him on with a fine-baited delay, till he hath pawned his |
| horses to mine host of the Garter. |
| MRS: |
| Nay, I will consent to act any villainy against |
| him that may not sully the chariness of our honesty. O, |
| that my husband saw this letter! It would give eternal food |
| to his jealousy. |
| MRS: |
| Why, look where he comes; and my good man |
| too: he's as far from jealousy as I am from giving him |
| cause; and that, I hope, is an unmeasurable distance. |
| MRS: |
| You are the happier woman. |
| MRS: |
| Let's consult together against this greasy knight. Come hither. |
| [They retire.] |
| [Enter FORD, PISTOL, and PAGE and NYM.] |
| FORD: |
| Well, I hope it be not so. |
| PISTOL: |
| Hope is a curtal dog in some affairs: |
| Sir John affects thy wife. |
| FORD: |
| Why, sir, my wife is not young. |
| PISTOL: |
| He woos both high and low, both rich and poor, |
| Both young and old, one with another, Ford; |
| He loves the gallimaufry. Ford, perpend. |
| FORD: |
| Love my wife! |
| PISTOL: |
| With liver burning hot: prevent, or go thou, |
| Like Sir Actaeon he, with Ringwood at thy heels.— |
| O! odious is the name! |
| FORD: |
| What name, sir? |
| PISTOL: |
| The horn, I say. Farewell: |
| Take heed; have open eye, for thieves do foot by night; |
| Take heed, ere summer comes, or cuckoo birds do sing. |
| Away, Sir Corporal Nym. |
| Believe it, Page; he speaks sense. |
| [Exit.] |
| FORD: |
| [Aside] I will be patient: I will find out this. |
| NYM: |
| [To PAGE] And this is true; I like not the humour of |
| lying. He hath wronged me in some humours: I should |
| have borne the humoured letter to her; but I have a sword, |
| and it shall bite upon my necessity. He loves your wife; |
| there's the short and the long. My name is Corporal Nym; |
| I speak, and I avouch 'tis true. My name is Nym, and |
| Falstaff loves your wife. Adieu. I love not the humour |
| of bread and cheese; and there's the humour of it. Adieu. |
| [Exit Nym.] |
| PAGE: |
| [Aside.] 'The humour of it,' quoth 'a! Here's a fellow |
| frights English out of his wits. |
| FORD: |
| I will seek out Falstaff. |
| PAGE: |
| I never heard such a drawling, affecting rogue. |
| FORD: |
| If I do find it: well. |
| PAGE: |
| I will not believe such a Cataian, though the priest o' |
| the town commended him for a true man. |
| FORD: |
| 'Twas a good sensible fellow: well. |
| PAGE: |
| How now, Meg! |
| MRS: |
| Whither go you, George?—Hark you. |
| MRS: |
| How now, sweet Frank! why art thou melancholy? |
| FORD: |
| I melancholy! I am not melancholy. Get you home, go. |
| MRS: |
| Faith, thou hast some crotchets in thy head now. |
| Will you go, Mistress Page? |
| MRS: |
| Have with you. You'll come to dinner, George? |
| [Aside to MRS. FORD] Look who comes yonder: she shall |
| be our messenger to this paltry knight. |
| MRS: |
| [Aside to MRS. PAGE] Trust me, I thought on |
| her: she'll fit it. |
| [Enter MISTRESS QUICKLY.] |
| MRS: |
| You are come to see my daughter Anne? |
| QUICKLY: |
| Ay, forsooth; and, I pray, how does good Mistress Anne? |
| MRS: |
| Go in with us and see; we'd have an hour's talk with you. |
| [Exeunt MISTRESS PAGE, MISTRESS FORD, and MISTRESS QUICKLY.] |
| PAGE: |
| How now, Master Ford! |
| FORD: |
| You heard what this knave told me, did you not? |
| PAGE: |
| Yes; and you heard what the other told me? |
| FORD: |
| Do you think there is truth in them? |
| PAGE: |
| Hang 'em, slaves! I do not think the knight would offer it; |
| but these that accuse him in his intent towards our |
| wives are a yoke of his discarded men; very rogues, now |
| they be out of service. |
| FORD: |
| Were they his men? |
| PAGE: |
| Marry, were they. |
| FORD: |
| I like it never the better for that. Does he lie at the |
| Garter? |
| PAGE: |
| Ay, marry, does he. If he should intend this voyage |
| toward my wife, I would turn her loose to him; and what |
| he gets more of her than sharp words, let it lie on my head. |
| FORD: |
| I do not misdoubt my wife; but I would be loath to |
| turn them together. A man may be too confident. I would |
| have nothing 'lie on my head': I cannot be thus satisfied. |
| PAGE: |
| Look where my ranting host of the Garter comes. |
| There is either liquor in his pate or money in his purse |
| when he looks so merrily. |
| [Enter HOST and SHALLOW.] |
| How now, mine host! |
| HOST: |
| How now, bully-rook! Thou'rt a gentleman. |
| Cavaliero-justice, I say! |
| SHALLOW: |
| I follow, mine host, I follow. Good even and |
| twenty, good Master Page! Master Page, will you go with |
| us? We have sport in hand. |
| HOST: |
| Tell him, cavaliero-justice; tell him, bully-rook. |
| SHALLOW: |
| Sir, there is a fray to be fought between Sir Hugh |
| the Welsh priest and Caius the French doctor. |
| FORD: |
| Good mine host o' the Garter, a word with you. |
| HOST: |
| What say'st thou, my bully-rook? |
| [They go aside.] |
| SHALLOW: |
| [To PAGE.] Will you go with us to behold it? My |
| merry host hath had the measuring of their weapons; and, |
| I think, hath appointed them contrary places; for, believe |
| me, I hear the parson is no jester. Hark, I will tell you |
| what our sport shall be.[They converse apart.] |
| HOST: |
| Hast thou no suit against my knight, my guest-cavaliero. |
| FORD: |
| None, I protest: but I'll give you a pottle of burnt |
| sack to give me recourse to him, and tell him my name is |
| Brook, only for a jest. |
| HOST: |
| My hand, bully; thou shalt have egress and regress; |
| said I well? and thy name shall be Brook. It is a merry |
| knight. Will you go, mynheers? |
| SHALLOW: |
| PAGE: |
| I have heard, the Frenchman hath good skill in his |
| rapier. |
| SHALLOW: |
| Tut, sir! I could have told you more. In these |
| times you stand on distance, your passes, stoccadoes, and |
| I know not what: 'tis the heart, Master Page; 'tis here, |
| 'tis here. I have seen the time with my long sword I would |
| have made you four tall fellows skip like rats. |
| HOST: |
| Here, boys, here, here! Shall we wag? |
| PAGE: |
| Have with you. I had rather hear them scold than fight. |
| [Exeunt HOST, SHALLOW, and PAGE.] |
| FORD: |
| Though Page be a secure fool, and stands so firmly on |
| his wife's frailty, yet I cannot put off my opinion so |
| easily. She was in his company at Page's house, and what |
| they made there I know not. Well, I will look further into |
| 't; and I have a disguise to sound Falstaff. If I find her |
| honest, I lose not my labour; if she be otherwise, 'tis labour |
| well bestowed. |
| [Exit.] |
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