The Merry Wives of Windsor, William Shakespeare [the reading strategies book TXT] 📗

this pretty weathercock?

MRS. 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!

MRS. 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.

MRS. PAGE. By your leave, sir: I am sick till I see her.

[Exeunt MRS. 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, SHALLOW, SLENDER, HOST, SIR HUGH EVANS, CAIUS, and RUGBY.]

SHALLOW, PAGE, &c. Well met, Master Ford.

FORD. Trust me, a good knot; I have good cheer at home, and I pray you all go with me.

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.

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.

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.

SHALLOW. Well, fare you well; we shall have the freer wooing at Master Page's.

[Exeunt SHALLOW and SLENDER.]

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. Will you go, gentles?

ALL. Have with you to see this monster.

[Exeunt.]


SCENE 3. A room in FORD'S house.

[Enter MISTRESS FORD and MISTRESS PAGE.]

MRS. FORD. What, John! what, Robert!

MRS. PAGE. Quickly, quickly: - Is the buck-basket -

MRS. FORD. I warrant. What, Robin, I say!

[Enter SERVANTS with a basket.]

MRS. PAGE. Come, come, come.

MRS. FORD. Here, set it down.

MRS. PAGE. Give your men the charge; we must be brief.

MRS. 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.

MRS. PAGE. You will do it?

MRS. FORD. I have told them over and over; they lack no direction. Be gone, and come when you are called.

[Exeunt SERVANTS.]

MRS. PAGE. Here comes little Robin.

[Enter ROBIN.]

MRS. FORD. How now, my eyas-musket! what news with you?

ROBIN. My Master Sir John is come in at your back-door, Mistress Ford, and requests your company.

MRS. 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.

MRS. 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.

MRS. FORD. Do so. Go tell thy master I am alone.

[Exit ROBIN.]

Mistress Page, remember you your cue.

MRS. PAGE. I warrant thee; if I do not act it, hiss me.

[Exit.]

MRS. 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!

MRS. FORD. O, sweet Sir John!

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.

MRS. 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.

MRS. 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.

MRS. 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.

MRS. 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 lime-kiln.

MRS. FORD. Well, heaven knows how I love you; and you shall one day find it.

FALSTAFF. Keep in that mind; I'll deserve it.

MRS. FORD. Nay, I must tell you, so you do; 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.

MRS. FORD. Pray you, do so; she's a very tattling woman.

[FALSTAFF hides himself.]

[Re-enter MISTRESS PAGE and ROBIN.]

What's the matter? How now!

MRS. PAGE. O Mistress Ford, what have you done? You're shamed, you are overthrown, you are undone for ever!

MRS. FORD. What's the matter, good Mistress Page?

MRS. PAGE. O well-a-day, Mistress Ford! having an honest man to your husband, to give him such cause of suspicion!

MRS. FORD. What cause of suspicion?

MRS. PAGE. What cause of suspicion? Out upon you! how am I mistook in you!

MRS. FORD. Why, alas, what's the matter?

MRS. 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.

MRS. FORD. [Aside.] Speak louder. - 'Tis not so, I hope.

MRS. 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 for ever.

MRS. 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.

MRS. 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.

MRS. 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.

MRS. PAGE. What, Sir John Falstaff! Are these your letters, knight?

FALSTAFF. I love thee and none but thee; help me away: let me creep in here. I'll never -

[He gets into the basket; they cover him with foul linen.]

MRS. PAGE. Help to cover your master, boy. Call your men, Mistress Ford. You dissembling knight!

MRS. FORD. What, John! Robert! John!

[Exit ROBIN.]

[Re-enter SERVANTS.]

Go, take up these clothes here, quickly; where's the cowl-staff? Look how you drumble! Carry them to the laundress in Datchet-Mead; quickly, come.

[Enter FORD, PAGE, 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.

MRS. FORD. Why, what have you to do whither they bear it? You were best meddle with buck-washing.

FORD.