Henry IV - Part 2 The Hollow Crown

There thou makest me sad and makest me sin in envy

that my Lord Northumberland should be the father to so blest a son

Whilst I see riot and dishonour stain the brow of my young Harry.

He doth it as like one of these harlotry players as I ever see.

There is a virtuous man whom I've often noted in thy company,

but I know not his name.

ALL: Falstaff!

My liege, I did deny no prisoners.

Send me your prisoners by the speediest means

Or you shall hear in such a kind from us as will displease you.

I speak not this in estimation of what I think might be,

but what I know is ruminated, plotted and set down.

Why, it cannot choose but be a noble plot.

And then the power of Scotland and of York, to join with Mortimer.

I have a truant been to chivalry,

Yet this before my father's majesty,

I will, try fortune with him in a single fight.

Doomsday is near. Die all...

Die merrily!

I am the Prince of Wales and think not, Percy,

To share with me in glory any more.

There is Percy!

Percy I killed myself and saw thee dead.

Lord, lord, how this world is given to lying.

Sirrah, you giant.

What says the doctor to my water?

He said, sir, the water itself was a good healthy water but,

for the party that owned it, he might have more diseases than he knew for.

Men of all sorts take a pride to gird at me.

The brain of this foolish-compounded clay, man,

is not able to invent anything that tends to laughter,

more than I invent or is invented on me.

I am not only witty in myself, but the cause that wit is in other men.

Thou whoreson mandrake,

thou art fitter to be worn in my cap than to wait at my heels.

Where's Bardolph?

He's gone into Smithfield to buy your worship a horse.

An I could get me but a wife in the stews,

I were manned, horsed, and wived.

HORSE WHINNIES

Noble earl, I bring you certain news from Shrewsbury.

Good, and God will?

As good as heart can wish.

The king is almost wounded to the death

and, in the fortune of my lord your son, Prince Harry slain outright.

How is this derived? Saw you the field?

Came you from Shrewsbury?

I spake with one, my lord, that came from thence.

Here comes more news.

Yea, this man's brow, like to a title-leaf,

foretells the nature of the tragic volume.

Say, Hastings, didst thou come from Shrewsbury?

I ran from Shrewsbury, my noble lord,

Where hateful death put on his ugliest mask to fright our party.

How doth my son and brother?

Thou tremblest and the whiteness in thy cheek

Is apter than thy tongue to tell thy errand.

Douglas is living and your brother yet,

But for my lord your son...

Why, he is dead. See what a ready tongue suspicion hath.

You are too great to be by me gainsaid,

Your spirit is too true, your fears too certain.

Yet, for all this, say not that Percy's dead.

I see a strange confession in thine eye.

Thou shakest thy head and hold'st it fear or sin to speak a truth.

I cannot think, my lord, your son is dead.

I am sorry that I should force you to believe that which

I would to God I had not seen.

But these mine eyes saw him in bloody state.

His death, whose spirit lent a fire

even to the dullest peasant in his camp, being bruited once,

took fire and heat away from the best tempered courage in his troops.

So did our men, heavy in Hotspur's loss, fly from the field.

The sum of all Is that the king hath won

and hath sent out a speedy power to encounter you, my lord.

For this I shall have time enough to mourn.

Let heaven kiss earth!

Now let not nature's hand keep the wild flood confined!

Let order die and darkness be the burier of the dead!

Sweet earl, divorce not wisdom from your honour.

The lives of all your loving complices lean on your health,

the which, if you give o'er to stormy passion, must perforce decay.

We all that are engaged to this loss knew that we ventured on such

dangerous seas that if we wrought our life 'twas ten to one.

I hear for certain - and do speak the truth -

the gentle Archbishop of York is up with well appointed powers.

I knew of this before but, to speak truth,

this present grief had wiped it from my mind.

Sir John Falstaff!

Here comes that nobleman that committed the Prince to prison.

-Boy, tell him I'm deaf.

-Sir John.

You must speak louder, my master is deaf.

Sir John.

A young knave and begging? Is there not wars?

Is there not employment? Do not the rebels need soldiers?

You mistake me, sir.

Why, sir, did I say you were an honest man?

Setting my knighthood and my soldiership aside,

I'd lied in my throat, if I'd said so.

I pray you, sir, then set your knighthood

and our soldiership aside and give me leave to tell you,

you lie in your throat if you say I am any other than an honest man.

I give thee leave to tell me so. Hence, avaunt!

Sir, the Lord Chief Justice would speak with you.

My good lord. God give your lordship good time of day.

I'm glad to see your lordship abroad.

I heardsay your lordship was sick.

Your lordship, though not clean past your youth, hath yet some

smack of age in you, some relish of the saltness of time and I must

humbly beseech your lordship to have a reverent care of your health.

Sir John, I sent for you before your expedition to Shrewsbury.

An't please your lordship, I hear his majesty is returned with some discomfort.

I talk not of his majesty.

You would not come when I sent for you.

And I hear, moreover,

his highness is fallen into this same whoreson apoplexy.

Well, God mend him. I pray you, let me speak with you.

This apoplexy is, as I take it, a kind of lethargy,

an't please your lordship, a kind of sleeping in the blood,

a whoreson tingling.

What tell you me of it, be it as it is.

It hath its original from much grief,

from study and perturbation of the brain.

I've read the cause of his effects, a kind of deafness.

I think you are fallen into the disease,

for you hear not what I say to you.

Very well, my lord, very well.

Rather, an't please you, it is the disease of not listening,

the malady of not marking, that I am troubled withal.

I sent for you, when were matters against you for your life,

to come and speak with me.

As I was then advised by my learned counsel in the laws of soldiery,

I did not come.

Well, the truth is, Sir John, you live in great infamy.

He that buckles him in my belt cannot live in less.

You have misled the youthful prince.

The young prince hath misled me.

I'm the fellow with the great belly and he my dog.

Your day's service at Shrewsbury hath a little gilded over

your night's exploit of robbery.

You may thank the unquiet time for your quiet o'er-posting that action.

My lord?

Wake not the sleeping wolf.

To wake a wolf is as bad as to smell a fox.

You follow the young prince up and down like his ill angel.

You that are old consider not the capacities of us that are young.

Do you set your name down in the scroll of youth,

that are written down old with all the characters of age?

My lord, I was born about three of the clock in the afternoon

with a white head and something a round belly.

For my voice, I have lost it with halloing and singing of anthems.

To approve my youth further, I will not.

The truth is I'm only old in judgment and understanding

and he that will caper with me for a thousand marks,

let him lend me the money and have at him.

Well, God send the prince a better companion.

God send the companion a better prince.

I cannot rid my hands of him.

Well, the king hath severed you and Prince Harry.

I hear you are going with Lord John of Lancaster

against the Archbishop and the Earl of Northumberland.

Yea. I thank your pretty sweet wit for it.

But look you pray, all you that kiss my lady Peace at home,

that our armies join not in a hot day for, by the Lord,

I take but two shirts out with me and I mean not to sweat extraordinarily.

Well, I cannot last ever.

But it was alway yet the trick of our English nation,

if they have a good thing, to make it too common.

If ye will needs say I am an old man, you should give me rest.

I would to God my name were not so terrible to the enemy as it is.

Well, be honest, be honest, and God bless your expedition.

Will your lordship lend me a thousand pound to furnish me forth?

Not a penny, not a penny.

-Boy.

-Sir?

What money's in my purse?

Seven groats and two pence.

I can get no remedy against this consumption of the purse.

Borrowing only lingers and lingers it out but disease is incurable.

HE MOANS WITH PAIN

A pox of this gout.

Or a gout of this pox.

For the one or the other plays the rogue with my great toe.

CHANTING IN LATIN

Thus have you heard our cause and know our means.

And, my most noble friends, I pray you all.

Speak plainly your opinions of our hopes.

And first, lord marshal, what say you to it?

I well allow the occasion of our arms,

But gladly would be better satisfied

How in our means we should advance ourselves

To look with forehead bold and big enough

Upon the power and puissance of the king.

Our present musters grow upon the file

To five and twenty thousand men of choice.

And our supplies live largely in the hope

Of great Northumberland, whose bosom burns

With an incensed fire of injuries.

The question then, Lord Hastings, standeth thus,

Whether our present five and twenty thousand

May hold up head without Northumberland?

-With him, we may.

-But if without him we be thought too feeble,

My judgment is, we should not step too far.

'Tis very true, Lord Coleville, for indeed

It was young Hotspur's case at Shrewsbury.

It was, my lord. He lined himself with hope,

Eating the air on promise of supply.

But, by your leave, it never yet did hurt

To lay down likelihoods and forms of hope.

When we mean to build,

We first survey the plot, then draw the model.

And when we see the figure of the house

Then must we rate the cost of the erection

Which if we find outweighs ability,

What do we then but draw anew the model

Or at last desist to build at all?

Much more, in this great work of ours,

Which is almost to pluck a kingdom down and set another up.

I think we are a body strong enough, even as we are,

to equal with the king.

What, is the king but five and twenty thousand?

To us no more. Nay, not so much, Lord Coleville.

For his divisions, as the times do brawl, are in three heads -

one power against the French, and one against Glendower.

Perforce a third must take up us

and his coffers sound with hollow poverty and emptiness.

That he should draw his several strengths together

and come against us in full puissance need not be dreaded.

If he should do so, he leaves his back unarmed, never fear that.

Who is it like should lead his forces hither?

The Duke of Lancaster and Westmoreland.

LAUGHTER

Let us away and publish the occasion of our arms.

Shall we go draw our numbers and set on?

We are time's subjects and time bids be gone.

Humphrey, son of Gloucester, Thomas, son of Clarence.

Where's the prince your brother?

I think he's gone to hunt, my lord, at Windsor.

How accompanied?

I do not know, my lord.

Is not his brother, John, with him?

No, my good lord, he is in presence here.

Ah.

What would my lord and father?

How chance thou art not with the prince thy brother?

He loves thee and thou dost neglect him, John.

Thou hast a better place in his affections than all thy brothers.

Cherish it, my boy,

And noble offices thou mayst effect of mediation after I am dead

Between his greatness and thy other brethren.

Therefore omit him not.

Blunt not his love,

Lose not the good advantage of his grace

By seeming cold or careless of his will.

I shall observe him with all care and love.

Why art thou not at Windsor with him, John?

He is not there today. He dines in London.

And...

..how accompanied, canst thou tell that?

With Poins and other his continual followers.

The foremost subject is the fattest soil to weeds,

And he, the noble image of my youth,

Is overspread with them.

Therefore my grief stretches itself beyond the hour of death.

The blood weeps from my heart when I do shape

In forms imaginary the unguided days and rotten times

that you shall look upon

When I am sleeping with my ancestors.

My gracious lord, you look beyond him quite:

The prince but studies his companions like a strange tongue,

wherein, to gain the language.

The prince will in the perfectness of time

Cast off his followers and their memory shall as a pattern or measure live,

By which his grace must mete the lives of others, Turning past evils to advantages.

'Tis seldom when the bee doth leave her comb

In the dead carrion.

Master Fang, where's your yeoman?

Is't a lusty yeoman? Will a' stand to 't?

Sirrah? Where's Snare?

O Lord, ay! Good Master Snare.

Here, here. Snare, we must arrest Sir John Falstaff.

It may chance cost some of us our lives, for he will stab.

He stabbed me in mine own house.

If his weapon be out, he will thrust like any devil.

If I can close with him, I care not for his thrust.

No, nor I neither. I'll be at your elbow.

And I but fist him once an a' come but within my vice.

I am undone by his going to the wars.

-How now?

-Whose mare's dead? What's the matter?

Sir John, I arrest you at the suit of Mistress Quickly.

Away, varlets! Draw, Bardolph, cut me off the villain's head.

Throw the quean in the channel.

I'll throw thee in the channel! Thou bastardly rogue!

Keep them off, Bardolph.

You fustilarian! I'll tickle your catastrophe.

Thou wo't, wo't thou? Thou wo't, wo't ta?

Do, do, thou rogue!

What is the matter? Keep the peace here!

Good my lord, be good to me. I beseech you, stand to me.

How now, Sir John. What are you brawling here?

Doth this become your place, your time and business?

You should have been well on your way to York.

Stand from him, fellow.

Wherefore hang'st upon him?

O most worshipful lord, an't please your grace,

I am a poor widow of Eastcheap and he is arrested at my suit.

For what sum?

It is more than for some, my lord, it is for all, all I have.

He hath eaten me out of house and home.

How comes this, Sir John?

Are you not ashamed to enforce a poor widow

to so rough a course to come by her own?

What is the gross sum that I owe thee?

Marry, if thou wert an honest man, thyself and the money too -

thou didst swear to me upon a parcel-gilt goblet

sitting in my Dolphin-chamber at the round table by a sea-coal fire

upon Wednesday in Wheeson week when the prince broke thy head for liking

his father to a singing-man of Windsor, thou didst swear to me then

as I was washing thy wound to marry me and make me my lady thy wife.

My lord, this is a poor mad soul and she says up and down the town

that her eldest son is like you.

Poverty hath distracted her.

Sir John, Sir John, I am well acquainted

with your manner of wrenching the true cause the false way.

You have, as it appears to me,

practised upon the easy-yielding spirit of this woman,

made her serve your uses both in purse and in person.

Aye, in good truth, my lord.

Pray thee, peace.

Pay her the debt you owe her and unpay the villany you have done her.

My lord, I will not undergo this sneap without reply.

I say to you, I do desire deliverance from these officers,

being upon hasty employment in the king's affairs.

You speak as having power to do wrong.

But answer in the effect of your reputation

and satisfy this poor woman.

Come hither.

Now, Master Gower, what news?

The king, my lord, and Harry Prince of Wales are near at hand.

The rest the paper tells.

As I am a gentleman.

Faith, you said so before.

As I am a gentleman. Come, no more words of this.

Come, an 'twere not for thy humours,

there's not a better wench in England.

Go, wash thy face, and draw the action.

Come, thou must not be in this humour with me.

Dost not know me?

Come, come, I know thou wast set on to this.

Pray thee, Sir John, let it be but twenty nobles.

I' faith, I am loath to pawn my plate, so God save me, la.

Let it alone, I'll make other shift. You'll be a fool still.

Well, you shall have it, though I pawn my gown.

I hope you'll come to supper. You'll pay me all together?

Will I live? Come.

With her, with her. Hook on, hook on.

Will you have Doll Tearsheet meet you at supper?

No more words, let's have her.

I have heard better news.

What's the news, my lord?

Come all his forces back?

-No.

-Fifteen hundred foot, five hundred horse, are marched up

with my lord of Lancaster, against Northumberland and the Archbishop.

-You shall have letters of me presently.

-My lord.

What's the matter?

Master Gower, shall I entreat you with me to dinner?

I must wait upon my good lord here, I thank you, good Sir John.

Sir John, you loiter here too long,

being you are to take soldiers up in counties as you go.

Will you sup with me, Master Gower?

What foolish master taught you these manners, Sir John?

Master Gower, if they become me not, he was a fool that taught them me.

Now the Lord lighten thee, thou art a great fool.

Before God, I am exceeding weary.

Is't come to that?

I had thought weariness durst not have attached one of so high blood.

Come faith, it does me,

though it discolours the complexion of my greatness to acknowledge it.

Doth it not show vilely in me to desire small beer?

Why, a prince should not be so loosely studied as to remember so weak a composition.

Belike then my appetite was not princely got,

for, by my troth, I do now remember the poor creature, "small beer".

But, indeed, these humble considerations make me

out of love with my greatness.

What a disgrace is it to me to remember thy name.

Or to know thy face tomorrow.

How ill it follows after you have laboured so hard,

you should talk so idly.

Tell me, how many good young princes would do so,

their fathers being so sick as yours at this time is?

Shall I tell thee one thing, Poins?

Yes, faith, let it be an excellent good thing.

It shall serve among wits of no higher breeding than thine.

Go to.

I stand the push of your one thing that you will tell.

Marry, I tell thee, it is not meet that I should be sad,

now my father is sick.

Albeit I could tell thee, as to one it pleases me,

for fault of a better, to call my friend,

I could be sad and sad indeed too.

Very hardly upon such a subject.

I tell thee, my heart bleeds inwardly that my father is so sick

and keeping such vile company as thou art

hath in reason taken from me all ostentation of sorrow.

-The reason?

-What wouldst thou think of me if I should weep?

I would think thee a most princely hypocrite.

It would be every man's thought and thou art a blessed fellow

to think as every man thinks. Every man would think me an hypocrite indeed.

And what accites your most worshipful thought to think so?

Why, because you have been so lewd and so much engraffed to Falstaff.

And to thee.

By this light, I am well spoke on. I can hear it with my own ears.

By the mass, here comes Bardolph.

And the boy that I gave Falstaff.

God save your grace.

And yours, most noble Bardolph.

Come, you virtuous ass, you bashful fool, must you be blushing?

E' calls me e'en now, my lord, through a red lattice window

and I could discern no part of his face.

Me thought he had made two holes in a red petticoat

and so peeped through.

THEY LAUGH

Away, you whoreson upright rabbit, away!

How doth your master, Bardolph?

Well, my lord.

He heard of your grace's coming to town, there's a letter for you.

I do allow this wen to be as familiar with me as my dog,

for look you how he writes.

"Sir John Falstaff, knight, to the son of the king,

"nearest his father, Harry Prince of Wales, greeting."

Why, this is a certificate.

Peace!

"I will imitate... Oh, I will imitate to the honourable Romans in brevity.

"Be not too familiar with Poins.

"He misuses thy favours so much,

"that he swears thou art to marry his sister Nell.

"Repent at idle times as thou mayest, and so, farewell."

My lord, I'll steep this letter in sack and make him eat it.

Must I marry your sister?

God send the wench no worse fortune but I never said so.

Well, thus we play the fools with the time

and the spirits of the wise sit in the clouds and mock us.

-Is your master here in London?

-Yea, my lord.

Where sups he?

At the old place, my lord, in Eastcheap.

Sup any women with him?

None, my lord, but old Mistress Quickly and Mistress Doll Tearsheet.

Shall we steal upon them, Ned, at supper?

I am your shadow, my lord, I'll follow you.

Sirrah, you boy, and Bardolph,

no word to your master that I am yet come to town.

There's for your silence.

I have no tongue, sir.

And for mine, sir, I'll govern it.

Fare you well, go.

Might we see Falstaff bestow himself tonight in his true colours

and not ourselves be seen?

I pray thee, loving wife and gentle daughter,

give even way unto my rough affairs.

I have given over, I will speak no more.

Do what you will, your wisdom be your guide.

Alas, sweet wife, my honour is at pawn

And, but my going, nothing can redeem it.

O yet, for God's sake, go not to these wars.

The time was, father, that you broke your word

When you were more endeared to it than now, When your own Percy,

when my heart's dear Harry,

Threw many a northward look to see his father bring up his powers.

Beshrew your heart, fair daughter, you do draw my spirits from me

With new lamenting ancient oversights.

Fly to Scotland, till that the nobles and the armed commons

Have of their puissance made a little taste.

If they get ground and vantage of the king

Then join you with them like a rib of steel to make strength stronger

but, for all our loves, first let them try themselves.

So did your son. He was so suffered.

So came I a widow and never will have length of life enough

To rain upon remembrance with mine eyes.

I will resolve for Scotland.

There am I, till time and vantage crave my company.

Go call the Earls of Westmoreland and Warwick.

But, ere they come, bid them o'er-read these letters,

And well consider of them.

Make good speed.

How many thousand of my poorest subjects are at this hour asleep?

O sleep, O gentle sleep,

Nature's soft nurse,

how have I frighted thee, That thou no more wilt

weigh my eyelids down

and steep my senses in forgetfulness?

Why rather, sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs,

Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee and hushed with buzzing

night-flies to thy slumber, than in the perfumed chambers

of the great, under the canopies of costly state,

And lulled

with sounds of sweetest melody?

O thou dull god, why liest thou with the vile

In loathsome beds and leavest the kingly couch

A watch-case or a common 'larum-bell?

Wilt thou upon the high and giddy mast

Seal up the ship-boy's eyes and rock his brains

In cradle of the rude imperious surge And in the visitation of the winds

Who take the ruffian billows by the top,

Curling their monstrous heads and hanging them with deafening clamour

in the slippery clouds, that, with the hurly, death itself awakes?

BELL TOLLS

Canst thou, O partial sleep, give thy repose

To the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude

And in the calmest and most stillest night

With all appliances and means to boot

Deny it to a king?

Then happy low, lie down.

Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.

The room where they supped is too hot. They'll come in straight.

Sirrah, here will be the prince and Master Poins anon

and Sir John must not know of it.

Bardolph hath brought word.

It will be an excellent stratagem. Dispatch.

I'll see if I can find out Sneak.

I' faith, sweetheart, methinks now you're in an excellent good temperality.

Your colour, I warrant you, is as red as any rose, in good truth, la,

but i' faith you have drunk too much canaries

and that is a marvellous searching wine and it perfumes the blood

ere one can say "What's this?" How do you now?

-Better than I was.

-Why, that's well said. A good heart's worth gold.

-"When Arthur first in court... "

-Lo, here comes Sir John.

Empty the jordan. "And was a worthy king." How now, Mistress Doll.

-Sick of a calm, yea, good faith.

-So is all her sect -

maybe once in a calm, they are sick.

You muddy rascal, is that all the comfort you give me?

You make fat rascals, Doll.

I make them? Gluttony and diseases make them, I make them not.

If the cook help to make the gluttony,

you help to make the diseases, Doll.

We catch of you, Doll, we catch of you.

Grant that, my poor virtue, grant that.

Hang yourself, you muddy conger, hang yourself!

By my troth, this is the old fashion.

You two never meet but you fall to some discord.

You are both, i' good truth, as rheumatic as two dry toasts.

You cannot one bear with another's confirmities.

Come, I'll be friends with thee, Jack.

Thou art going to the wars

and whether I shall ever see thee again or no, there is nobody cares.

Sir, Ancient Pistol's below, and would speak with you.

Hang him, swaggering rascal.

Let him not come hither, he is the foul-mouthed'st rogue in England.

If he swagger, let him not come here. No, by my faith. I must live

among my neighbours. I'll no swaggerers.

-Dost thou hear, hostess?

-Pacify yourself, Sir John, there comes no swaggerers here.

Dost thou hear? It's mine ancient.

Tilly-fally, Sir John, ne'er tell me,

your ancient swaggerer comes not in my doors.

He's no swaggerer, hostess. A tame cheater, i'faith.

You may stroke him as gently as a puppy greyhound.

-Call him up, drawer.

-Cheater, call you him?

Feel, masters, how I shake, look you, I warrant you.

-So you do, hostess.

-Do I?

Yea, in very truth, do I, an 'twere an aspen leaf.

I cannot abide swaggerers.

God save you, Sir John!

Welcome, Ancient Pistol.

Here, Pistol, I charge you with a cup of sack.

Do you discharge upon mine hostess.

I will discharge upon her, Sir John, with two bullets.

She is Pistol-proof, sir.

I'll drink no proofs nor no bullets.

I'll drink no more than will do me good, for no man's pleasure, I.

Then to you, Mistress Dorothy. I will charge you.

Charge me? I scorn you, scurvy companion.

What? You poor, base, rascally, cheating, lack-linen mate.

Away, you mouldy rogue, away.

-I am meat for your master.

-I know you, Mistress Dorothy.

Away, you cut-purse rascal, you filthy bung, away!

By this wine, I'll thrust my knife in your mouldy chaps

an you play the saucy cuttle with me.

God let me not live but I'll murder your ruff for this.

No more, Pistol. I would not have you go off here. Discharge yourself of our company, Pistol.

Captain? Thou abominable damned cheater, art thou not ashamed to be called captain?

An captains were of my mind, they would truncheon you out

for taking their names upon you before you have earned them.

You a captain? You slave - for what?

For tearing a poor whore's ruff in a bawdy-house? He a captain?

Hang him!

Good Captain Peesel, be quiet. 'Tis very late, i'faith.

Down, down, dogs! Down, faitors!

I beseek you now, aggravate your choler.

Be gone, good ancient.

Die men like dogs! Give crowns like pins!

Have we not iron here?

O' my word, captain, there's none such here.

Do you think I would deny her? For God's sake, be quiet.

Then feed and be fat, my fair Calipolis.

Come, give us some sack.

"Si fortune me tormente, sperato me contento."

Fear we broadsides?

Give me some sack and sweetheart, lie thou there.

Well, come we to full points here and are etceteras nothing?

Pistol, I would be quiet.

Sweet knight, I kiss thy neaf.

What? We have seen the seven stars.

Ah, for God's sake, thrust him down stairs.

I cannot endure such a fustian rascal.

Thrust him down stairs? Know we not Galloway nags?

What? Shall we have incision? Shall we imbrue?

Then death rock me asleep, abridge my doleful days!

Give me my rapier, boy.

Get you downstairs!

I pray thee, Jack, do not draw! Do not draw!

Get you down stairs.

I pray thee, Jack, be quiet. The rascal's gone.

Oh, you whoreson little valiant villain, you.

Are you not hurt i' the groin?

Me thought a' made a shrewd thrust at your belly.

You sweet little rogue, you.

Alas, poor ape, how thou sweatest.

Come, let me wipe thy face.

Come on, you whoreson chops.

Ah, rogue, i'faith, I love thee.

Thou art as valorous as Hector of Troy. Ah, villain.

A rascally slave. I'll toss the rogue in a blanket.

Do, an thou darest for thy heart.

An thou dost, I'll canvass thee between a pair of sheets.

The music is come, sir.

Let him play.

HE PLAYS MELANCHOLY SONG

Sit on my knee, Doll.

He's a rascal bragging slave.

The rogue fled from me like quicksilver.

Thou whoreson little tidy Bartholomew boar-pig!

THEY LAUGH

When wilt thou leave fighting o' days and foining o' nights

and begin to patch up thine old body for heaven?

Peace, good Doll.

Do not speak like a death's-head,

do not bid me remember mine end.

Sirrah, what humour's the prince of?

A good, shallow young fellow.

He'd have made a good pantler, he'd ha' chipp'd bread well.

They say Poins has a good wit.

He a good wit?

Hang him, baboon.

His wit is thick as Tewksbury mustard.

DOLL GIGGLES

Why does the prince love him so, then?

Because...

..their legs are both of a bigness and...

..he plays at quoits well, and...

..eats conger and fennel

and rides the wild-mare with the boys

and swears with a good grace and wears his boots very smooth and...

..breeds no bate with telling of discreet stories.

And such other gambol faculties he hath

that show a weak mind and an able body

For the which the prince admits him

for the prince himself is such another.

(HE WHISPERS) Would not this nave have his ears cut off?

(HE WHISPERS) Let's beat him before his whore.

FALLSTAFF SIGHS CONTENTEDLY

HE GROANS

-HE GROANS

-Kiss me, Doll.

DOLL GIGGLES

Look, whether the withered elder hath not his poll

clawed like a parrot.

Is it not strange that desire should so many years outlive performance?

Thou dost give me flattering busses.

I kiss thee with a most constant heart.

-I'm old.

-THEY LAUGH

I'm old.

I love thee better than I love e'er a scurvy young boy of them all.

What stuff wilt have a gown of?

I shall receive money o' Thursday.

Shalt have a cap to-morrow?

A merry song, come.

-It grows late.

-HE PLAYS LUTE

Thou'lt forget me when I'm gone.

By my troth, thou'lt set me a-weeping an thou sayest so.

Prove that ever I dress myself handsome till thy return.

Well, harken at the end.

(FALSTAFF SHOUTS) Some sack! >

Francis!

-Anon, anon, sir!

-CRASHING DOLL SCREAMS

-Anon, anon, sir.

-Anon, anon, sir.

A bastard son of the king's?

And art not thou Poins, his brother?

Why, thou globe of sinful continents,

what a life dost thou lead.

O the Lord, preserve thy good grace.

By my troth, welcome to London.

Now, the Lord bless that sweet face of thine.

Thou whoreson mad compound of majesty.

By this light flesh and corrupt blood, thou art welcome.

How, you fat fool, I scorn you.

My lord, he will drive you out of your revenge

and turn all to a merriment unless you take not the heat.

You whoreson candle-mine you,

how vilely did you speak of me even now

before this honest, virtuous, civil gentlewoman.

God's blessing of your good heart and so she is, by my troth.

Confess the wilful abuse and then I know how to handle you.

No abuse, Hal, o' mine honour, no abuse.

No?

Not to dispraise me and call me pantler and bread-chipper

and I know not what?

No abuse, Hal.

No abuse?

No abuse, Ned,

i' the world honest Ned, none.

I dispraised him before the wicked,

that the wicked might not fall in love with him.

In which doing, I've done the part of a careful friend

and a true subject and thy father is to give me thanks for it.

No abuse, Hal.

None, Ned, none. No.

Faith, boys, none.

LAUGHTER AND CHATTER

Peto, how now, what news?

The king, your father, is at Westminster.

And there are twenty weak and wearied posts

come from the north

and, as I came along,

I met and overtook a dozen captains,

Bare-headed, sweating, knocking at the taverns,

Asking for Sir John Falstaff.

By heaven, Poins, I feel me much to blame.

So idly to profane the precious time

When tempest of commotion, like the south

Borne with black vapour, doth begin to melt

And drop upon our bare unarmed heads.

Falstaff.

Good night.

THEY SIGH

Now comes in the sweetest morsel of the night

and we must hence and leave it unpicked.

-KNOCK AT DOOR

-How now?

What's the matter?

You must away to court, sir.

A dozen captains stay at the door for you.

Pay the musicians, sirrah.

Farewell, hostess.

-Farewell, Doll.

-DOLL WHIMPERS

Now you see, my good wenches,

how men of merit are sought after.

Farewell good wenches.

If I be not sent away post,

I'll see you again ere I go.

I cannot speak.

If my heart be not read to burst.

Well, sweet Jack,

have a care of thyself.

Farewell.

I have known thee these twenty-nine years, come peascod-time,

but an honester and truer-hearted man...

..well, fare thee well.

(BARDOLPH SHOUTS) Mistress Tearsheet! >

What's the matter?

Good Mistress Tearsheet, come to my master!

O, run, Doll, run. Run, good Doll. She comes blubbered.

Doll, will you come!

Many good morrows to your majesty.

Is it...

..good morrow, lords?

'Tis one o'clock and past.

Ah.

Well, then.

Good morrow to you all, my lords.

You have read o'er the letters that I sent you?

We have, my liege.

Then you perceive the body of our kingdom

How foul it is,

with what rank diseases grow

And with what danger, near the heart of it.

It is but as a body yet distempered

Which to his former strength may be restored

With good advice and little medicine.

My Lord Northumberland will soon be cooled.

Ah.

O God!

That one might read the book of fate

And see the revolution of the times,

Make mountains level and the continent,

Weary of solid firmness,

melt itself into the sea.

How chances mocks

And changes fill the cup of alteration

With divers liquors.

HE CHUCKLES

O...

..if this were seen,

The happiest youth, viewing his progress through,

What perils past, what crosses to ensue

Would shut the book and sit him down and die.

'Tis not 'ten years gone

Since Richard and Northumberland,

great friends,

Did feast together.

Which of you was by?

You, cousin Warwick, as I may remember,

When Richard, with his eye brimful of tears,

Did speak these words, now proved a prophecy.

"Northumberland, thou ladder by the which

"My cousin Bolingbroke ascends my throne."

Though then,

God knows, I had no such intent

"The time shall come,"

HE LAUGHS WEAKLY Thus did he follow it,

"The time will come,

"that foul sin, gathering head,

"Shall break into corruption."

So went on,

Foretelling this same time's condition

And the division of our amity.

Such things become the hatch and brood of time.

And by the necessary form of this

King Richard might create a perfect guess

That great Northumberland,

then false to him,

Would of that seed grow to a greater falseness

Which should not find a ground to root upon

Unless on you.

And that same word even now cries out on us.

They say the bishop and Northumberland

-Are fifty thousand strong.

-It cannot be, my lord.

Rumour doth double like the voice and echo

The numbers of the feared.

Please it your grace To go to bed.

Upon my soul, my lord,

The powers that you already have sent forth

Shall bring this prize in very easily.

Your majesty hath been this fortnight ill.

I take your counsel.

HE SHAKES GUARDS OFF

SHALLOW: An early stirrer, by the rood >

And how doth my good cousin Silence?

(HE STAMMERS) Good morrow, good cousin Sh-shallow.

And how doth my cousin, your bedfellow?

And my god-daughter, Ellen?

I dare say my cousin William is become a good scholar.

He is at Oxford still, is he not?

Indeed, sir, to my c-cost.

A' must, then, to the inns o' court shortly.

I was once of Clement's Inn,

where I think they will talk of Mad Shallow yet.

You were called L-Lusty Shallow then, cousin.

By the mass, I was called any thing

and I would have done any thing indeed, too.

We knew where the bona robas were.

Then was Jack Falstaff, now Sir John, a boy.

This Sir John that comes hither anon about the s-s-soldiers?

The same Sir John, the very same.

Jesu, Jesu, the mad days that I have spent!

And to see how many of my old acquaintance are dead.

We shall all follow, cousin.

Certain, 'tis certain, very sure, very sure.

Death, as the Psalmist saith,

is certain to all.

All shall die.

Death is certain.

And is old Double of your town living yet?

D-d-d-d-dead, sir.

Jesu, Jesu, dead.

A' drew a good bow and dead.

A' shot a fine shoot.

John a Gaunt loved him well

and betted much money on his head. HE CHUCKLES

Dead.

And is old Double dead?

Here come two of Sir John Falstaff's men, as I think.

BARDOLOPH: Good morrow, honest gentlemen.

I beseech you, which is Justice Shallow?

I am Robert Shallow, sir, a poor esquire of this county

and one of the king's justices of the peace.

What is your good pleasure with me?

My captain, sir, commends him to you

my captain, Sir John Falstaff,

a most gallant leader.

He greets me well, sir.

I knew him a good backsword man.

How doth the good knight?

And how...may I ask, how my lady, his wife, doth?

Sir, pardon, a soldier is better accommodated than with a wife.

Better accommodated?

It is good. Yea, indeed, is it.

Accommodated.

It comes of 'accommodo'. Very good.

A good phrase.

Look, here comes good Sir John.

Give me your good hand, give me your worship's good hand!

Welcome, good Sir John.

I'm glad to see you well, good Master Robert Shallow.

Master Surecard, as I think?

No, Sir John, this is my cousin Silence, in commission with me.

Good Master Silence, it well befits

-you should be of the peace.

-HE SNIGGERS

Your good w-w-worship is welcome.

Fie! It's hot weather, gentlemen.

HE FEIGNS COUGH

Have you provided me half a dozen sufficient men?

Marry, have we, sir!

Let's see them, I beseech you.

Sit.

Will you sit?

Where's the roll? Where's the roll?

Let me see, let me see,

let me see. So, so.

Yea, marry.

Ralph Mouldy!

Let them appear as I call.

Let them do so, let them do so.

COW MOOS

Where's Mouldy?

Here, an't please you.

What think you, Sir John?

A good-limbed fellow.

Young, strong, and of good friends.

Is thy name Mouldy?

Yea, an't please you.

'Tis the more time thou wert used.

HE CHUCKLES

Most excellent, i' faith.

Things that are mouldy lack use.

Very singular good.

In faith, well said, Sir John, very well said.

Prick him.

I was pricked well enough before an you could have let me alone.

My old dame will be undone now

for one to do her husbandry and her drudgery.

Go to. Peace, Mouldy, you shall go.

-Mouldy, it is time you were spent.

-Spent?

Peace, fellow, peace. Stand aside. Know you where you are?

For the other, Sir John, let me see.

Simon Shadow!

Yea, marry, let me have him to sit under.

He's like to be a cold soldier.

Where's Shadow?

Here, sir.

Shadow, whose son art thou?

My mother's son, sir.

Thy mother's son? Like enough.

And thy father's shadow.

Do you like him, Sir John?

Shadow will serve for summer.

Prick him, for we have a number of shadows to fill up the muster-book.

Thomas Wart!

Where's he?

Here, sir.

-Ugh!

-THEY SNIGGER

Is thy name Wart?

Yea, sir.

Thou art a very ragged wart!

Shall I prick him down, Sir John?

It were superfluous, for his apparel is built upon his back

and the whole frame stands upon pins.

Prick him no more.

You can do it, sir, you can do it.

I commend you well.

Francis Feeble!

Here, sir.

What trade art thou, Feeble?

A woman's tailor, sir.

FALSTAFF FEIGNS A SQUEAL

Shall I prick him, sir?

You may, but if he had been a man's tailor, he'ld ha' pricked you.

Wilt thou make as many holes in an enemy's battle

as thou hast done in a woman's petticoat?

I will do my good will, sir,

you can have no more.

Well said.

Well said, courageous Feeble.

Prick the woman's tailor.

I would Wart might have gone, sir.

I would thou wert a man's tailor that thou mightst mend him

and make him fit to go.

I am bound to thee, Reverend Feeble. Who's next?

Peter Bullcalf o' the green.

Yea, marry, let's see Bullcalf.

(HE YELLS) Here, sir!

'Fore God, a likely fellow!

Come, prick me, Bullcalf, till he roar again.

(HE YELLS) O Lord!

Good my lord captain!

What, dost thou roar before thou art pricked?

O Lord, sir,

I am a diseased man.

What disease hast thou?

A whoreson cold, sir,

a cough, sir, which I caught

with ringing in the king's affairs

upon his coronation day, sir.

Come, thou shalt go to the wars in a gown.

We wilt have away thy cold

and I will take such order that my friends shall ring for thee.

Is here all?

Here is more called than your number.

You must have but three here, sir.

And so, I pray you, go in with me to dinner.

Come, I will go drink with you,

but I cannot tarry dinner.

I'm glad to see you, by my troth, Master Shallow.

(HE YELLS) Good Master Corporate Bardolph!

Shhh!

(HE SPEAKS MORE SOFTLY) Stand my friend

and here's four Harry ten shillings for you.

In very truth, sir, I had as lief be hanged, sir, as go sir.

-(HE CHUCKLES) Go to. Stand aside.

-HE DROPS COINS ON TABLE

Good master corporal captain,

for my old dame's sake, stand my friend.

You shall have forty, sir.

(HE CHUCKLES) Go to. Stand aside.

By my troth, I care not.

A man can die but once.

We owe God a death. I'll ne'er bear a base mind.

An't be my destiny, so.

An't be not, so.

He that dies this year is quit for the next.

Well said.

Thou'rt an honest fellow.

O, Sir John, do you remember

since we lay all night in the windmill in Saint George's field?

No more of that, Master Shallow, no more of that.

Ha, 'twas a merry night!

And is Jane Nightwork alive?

She lives, Master Shallow.

She never could...

away with me.

Never, never. She would always say

she could not abide Master Shallow.

By the mass, I could anger her to the heart.

She was then a bona-roba.

Doth she hold her own well?

Old, old, Master Shallow.

Nay, she must be old, she cannot choose but be old.

Certain she's old

and had Robin Nightwork by old Nightwork

before I came to Clement's Inn.

That's f-fifty-five year ago.

Ha, cousin Silence,

that thou hadst seen that this knight

and I have seen.

Ha, Sir John, said I well?

We have heard the chimes at midnight, Master Shallow.

That we have.

That we have.

In faith, Sir John, we have.

Our watch-word was "Hem boys!"

Jesus,

the days that we have seen.

I think it is my Lord of Westmoreland.

Health and fair greeting from our general, the prince,

Lord John and Duke of Lancaster.

What doth concern your coming?

You, Lord Archbishop,

Wherefore do you so ill translate ourself

Out of the speech of peace that bears such grace,

Into the harsh and boisterous tongue of war?

I have in equal balance justly weighed

What wrongs our arms may do,

What wrongs we suffer,

And find our griefs outweigh our offences

Which long ere this we offered to the king.

When we are wronged and would unfold our griefs

We are denied access unto his person.

Whenever yet was your appeal denied?

My brother General, the commonwealth,

I make my quarrel in particular.

There is no need of any such redress.

Or if there were, it not belongs to you.

Why not to him in part and to us all

That feel the bruises of the days before.

You speak, Lord Mowbray, now you know not what.

Here come I from our princely general to say that

his grace will give you audience

And wherein that your demands are just,

You shall enjoy them.

Hath the Prince John a full commission

To hear and absolutely to determine

Of what conditions we shall stand upon?

I muse you make so slight a question.

There is a thing within my bosom tells me

That no conditions of our peace can stand.

The prince is here at hand.

Pleaseth your lordship

To meet his grace.

In God's name then, set forward.

My Lord of York, it better showed with you

When that your flock encircled you to hear

Your exposition on the holy text

Than now to see you here an iron man,

Cheering a rout of rebels with your drum.

I sent your grace

The parcels and particulars of our griefs,

The which hath been with scorn

shoved from the court,

Whereon this Hydra son of war is born,

Whose dangerous eyes may well be charmed asleep

With grant of our just and right desires.

And true obedience, of this madness cured,

Stoop tamely to the foot of majesty.

If not, we ready are to try our fortunes to the last man.

And though we here fall down, we have supplies

to second our attempt.

If they miscarry, theirs shall second them.

You're too shallow, Hastings,

much too shallow,

To sound the bottom of the after-times.

Pleaseth your grace to answer them directly

How far forth you do like their articles.

I like them all and do allow them well,

And swear here by the honour of my blood,

My father's purposes have been mistook.

My lord, these griefs shall be with speed redressed

Upon my soul, they shall.

If this may please you,

Discharge your powers unto their several counties,

As we will ours

and here between the armies

Let's drink together friendly and embrace.

I take your princely word for these redresses.

I give it you I will maintain my word.

And thereupon I drink unto your grace.

Go, Coleville, and deliver to the army

This news of peace.

Let them have pay and part.

I know it will well please them.

Hie thee, Coleville.

To you, my noble Lord of Westmoreland.

I pledge your grace and, if you knew

what pains I have bestowed to breed this present peace,

You would drink freely.

You wish me health in very happy season.

For I am on the sudden something ill.

SOLDIERS CHEER

WESTMORLAND CHUCKLES

The word of peace is rendered. Hark, how they shout.

This had been cheerful after victory.

A peace is of the nature of a conquest.

For then both parties nobly are subdued,

And neither party loser.

Go, my lord,

And let our army be discharged too.

And, good my lord, so please you, let our trains

March by us that we may peruse the men

-We should have coped withal.

-Go, good Lord Hastings,

And, ere they be dismissed, let them march by.

INAUDIBLE

Now, cousin, wherefore stands our army still?

The leaders, having charge from you to stand,

Will not go off until they hear you speak.

They know their duties.

My lord, our armies have dispersed already.

Like youthful steers unyoked,

they take their courses

East, west, north, south.

Or, like a school broke up,

Each hurries toward his home

and sporting-place.

Good tidings, my Lord of Hastings, for the which

I do arrest thee, traitor, of high treason.

And you, Lord Archbishop,

and you, Lord Mowbray,

Of capitol treason I attach you both.

Is this proceeding just and honourable?

Is your assembly so?

Will you thus break your faith?

I pawned thee none.

THEY SCREAM IN PAIN

What's your name, sir?

Of what condition are you and what place, I pray?

I'm a knight, sir,

and my name is Coleville of the Dale.

Well, then, Coleville is your name, a knight is your degree,

and your place the dale.

Coleville shall bestill your name, a traitor your degree,

and the dungeon your place,

so shall you be still Coleville of the Dale.

Are not you Sir John Falstaff?

Do ye yield, sir?

I think you are Sir John Falstaff

and in that thought yield me.

I have a whole school of tongues in this belly of mine

and not a tongue of them all speaks any other word but my name.

< LANCASTER: Now, Falstaff, where have you been all this while?

When everything is ended, then you come.

I have speeded hither with the very extremest inch of possibility

and here, travel-tainted as I am,

taken Sir John Coleville of the Dale,

a most furious knight and valorous enemy.

He saw me and yielded.

That I may justly say,

with the hook-nosed fellow of Rome, "I came, saw, and overcame."

It was more of his courtesy than your deserving.

I beseech your grace, let it be booked

with the rest of this day's deeds

or, by the Lord, I'll have it in a particular ballad else,

with mine own picture on the top of it,

Coleville kissing my foot.

Is thy name Coleville?

It is, my lord.

A famous rebel art thou, Coleville?

A famous true subject took him.

Have you left pursuit?

WESTMORELAND: Retreat is made and execution stayed.

Send Coleville with his confederates

To York to present execution.

And now dispatch we toward the court, my lord.

Our news shall go before us to his majesty,

Which, cousin, you shall bear to comfort him.

My lord, give me leave to go

Through Gloucestershire and, when you come to court,

Stand my good lord, pray, in your good report.

Fare you well, Falstaff. I, in my condition,

Shall better speak of you than you deserve.

I would you had but the wit.

THEY WHISPER

Oh, Westmoreland.

Prince John,

your son doth kiss your grace's hand.

Mowbray, the Archbishop, Hastings and all

Are brought to the correction of your law.

There is not now a rebel sword unsheathed.

O Westmoreland, thou art a summer bird,

Which ever in the haunch of winter sings

The lifting up of day.

THEY LAUGH

And wherefore does this good news make me sick?

Oh.

I should rejoice now at this happy news.

And now my sight fails

and my brain...

HE GASPS AND WHEEZES

Comfort, your majesty!

-O, my royal father!

-My sovereign lord,

-you should cheer up yourself, look up!

-Be patient, princes.

You do know, these fits

Are with his highness very ordinary.

Stand from him. Give him air.

He'll straight be well.

THE KING GASPS

No, he cannot long hold out these pangs.

This apoplexy will certain be his end.

Speak lower, princes,

for the king recovers.

HE GASPS AND CHOKES

I pray thee, take me up,

and bear me hence

Into some other chamber.

Softly, pray!

HE PANTS AND STRUGGLES

Let there be no noise made, my gentle friends,

Unless...

..some dull and favourable hand

Might whisper music to my weary spirit.

Call for music in the other room.

Set me the crown on my pillow here.

SOFT MUSIC PLAYS

His eye is hollow and he changes much.

Less noise,

less noise.

< HAL: Who saw the Duke of Clarence?

I'm here, brother,

full of heaviness.

How now, rain within doors and none abroad?

How doth the king?

Exceeding ill.

Not so much noise, my lords.

Sweet prince, speak low.

The king, your father, is disposed to sleep.

Will it please your grace to go along with us?

No,

I will sit and watch here by the king.

Why doth the crown lie there upon his pillow,

Being so troublesome a bedfellow?

O majesty,

When thou dost pinch thy bearer thou dost sit

Like a rich armour worn in the heat of day,

That scalds with safety.

My gracious lord.

My father.

By his gates of breath,

There lies a downy feather which stirs not.

This sleep is sound indeed,

this is a sleep

That from this golden rigol hath divorced

So many English kings.

Thy due from me

Is tears and heavy sorrows of the blood,

Which nature, love,

and filial tenderness

Shall, O dear father,

pay thee plenteously

My due from thee is this imperial crown

Which God shall guard

and put the world's whole strength

Into one giant arm, it shall not force

This lineal honour from me.

Warwick! Gloucester! Clarence!

Clarence! >

-What would your majesty?

-Why did you leave me here alone?

We left the prince, my brother here, my liege.

The Prince of Wales? He's not here.

He undertook to sit and watch by you.

Where is the crown?

Who took it from my pillow?

I never thought to hear you speak again!

Thy wish was father, Harry, to that thought.

I stay too long by thee, I weary thee.

What, dost thou so hunger for mine empty chair