The Merry Wives of Windsor The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [9 vols.] · William Shakespeare
SCENE II. _A room in the Garter Inn._
_Enter FALSTAFF and PISTOL._ _Fal._ I will not lend thee a penny. _Pist._ Why, then the world’s mine oyster, Which I with sword will open. _Fal._ Not a penny. I have been content, sir, you should lay my countenance to pawn: I have grated upon 5 my good friends for three reprieves for you and your coach-fellow Nym; or else you had looked through the grate, like a geminy of baboons. I am damned in hell for swearing to gentlemen my friends, you were good soldiers and tall fellows; and when Mistress Bridget lost the handle of 10 her fan, I took’t upon mine honour thou hadst it not. _Pist._ Didst not thou share? hadst thou not fifteen pence? _Fal._ Reason, you rogue, reason: thinkest thou I’ll endanger my soul gratis? At a word, hang no more about 15 me, I am no gibbet for you. Go. A short knife and a throng!--To your manor of Pickt-hatch! Go. You’ll not bear a letter for me, you rogue! you stand upon your honour! Why, thou unconfinable baseness, it is as much as I can do to keep the terms of my honour precise: I, I, I 20 myself sometimes, leaving the fear of God on the left hand, and hiding mine honour in my necessity, am fain to shuffle, to hedge, and to lurch; and yet you, rogue, will ensconce your rags, your cat-a-mountain looks, your red-lattice phrases, and your bold-beating oaths, under the shelter of 25 your honour! You will not do it, you!
_Quick._ Marry, this is the short and the long of it; you 55 have brought her into such a canaries as ’tis wonderful. The best courtier of them all, when the court lay at Windsor, could never have brought her to such a canary. Yet there has been knights, and lords, and gentlemen, with their coaches; I warrant you, coach after coach, letter after letter, 60 gift after gift; smelling so sweetly, all musk, and so rushling, I warrant you, in silk and gold; and in such alligant terms; and in such wine and sugar of the best and the fairest, that would have won any woman’s heart; and, I warrant you, they could never get an eye-wink of her: I 65 had myself twenty angels given me this morning; but I defy all angels--in any such sort, as they say--but in the way of honesty: and, I warrant you, they could never get her so much as sip on a cup with the proudest of them all: and yet there has been earls, nay, which is more, pensioners; 70 but, I warrant you, all is one with her. _Fal._ But what says she to me? be brief, my good she-Mercury. _Quick._ Marry, she hath received your letter; for the which she thanks you a thousand times; and she gives you 75 to notify, that her husband will be absence from his house between ten and eleven.
_Fal._ Sayest thou so, old Jack? go thy ways; I’ll make more of thy old body than I have done. Will they yet look after thee? Wilt thou, after the expense of so much money, be now a gainer? Good body, I thank thee. Let them say ’tis grossly done; so it be fairly done, no matter. 130 _Enter BARDOLPH._ _Bard._ Sir John, there’s one Master Brook below would fain speak with you, and be acquainted with you; and hath sent your worship a morning’s draught of sack. _Fal._ Brook is his name? _Bard._ Ay, sir. 135 _Fal._ Call him in. [_Exit Bardolph._] Such Brooks are welcome to me, that o’erflow such liquor. Ah, ha! Mistress Ford and Mistress Page have I encompassed you? go to; via! _Re-enter BARDOLPH, with FORD disguised._ _Ford._ Bless you, sir! _Fal._ And you, sir! Would you speak with me? 140 _Ford._ I make bold to press with so little preparation upon you. _Fal._ You’re welcome. What’s your will?--Give us leave, drawer. [_Exit Bardolph._ _Ford._ Sir, I am a gentleman that have spent much; 145 my name is Brook. _Fal._ Good Master Brook, I desire more acquaintance of you. _Ford._ Good Sir John, I sue for yours: not to charge you; for I must let you understand I think myself in better 150 plight for a lender than you are: the which hath something emboldened me to this unseasoned intrusion; for they say, if money go before, all ways do lie open.
_Ford._ I have long loved her, and, I protest to you, bestowed much on her; followed her with a doting observance; engrossed opportunities to meet her; fee’d every slight occasion that could but niggardly give me sight of her; not only bought many presents to give her, but have given largely to 180 many to know what she would have given; briefly, I have pursued her as love hath pursued me; which hath been on the wing of all occasions. But whatsoever I have merited, either in my mind or in my means, meed, I am sure, I have received none; unless experience be a jewel that I have 185 purchased at an infinite rate, and that hath taught me to say this: ‘Love like a shadow flies when substance love pursues; Pursuing that that flies, and flying what pursues.’ _Fal._ Have you received no promise of satisfaction at 190 her hands? _Ford._ Never. _Fal._ Have you importuned her to such a purpose? _Ford._ Never. _Fal._ Of what quality was your love, then? 195 _Ford._ Like a fair house built on another man’s ground; so that I have lost my edifice by mistaking the place where I erected it. _Fal._ To what purpose have you unfolded this to me? _Ford._ When I have told you that, I have told you all. 200 Some say, that though she appear honest to me, yet in other places she enlargeth her mirth so far that there is shrewd construction made of her. Now, Sir John, here is the heart of my purpose: you are a gentleman of excellent breeding, admirable discourse, of great admittance, authentic 205 in your place and person, generally allowed for your many war-like, court-like, and learned preparations.
_Fal._ O, sir! _Ford._ Believe it, for you know it. There is money; spend it, spend it; spend more; spend all I have; only 210 give me so much of your time in exchange of it, as to lay an amiable siege to the honesty of this Ford’s wife: use your art of wooing; win her to consent to you: if any man may, you may as soon as any. _Fal._ Would it apply well to the vehemency of your 215 affection, that I should win what you would enjoy? Methinks you prescribe to yourself very preposterously. _Ford._ O, understand my drift. She dwells so securely on the excellency of her honour, that the folly of my soul dares not present itself: she is too bright to be looked 220 against. Now, could I come to her with any detection in my hand, my desires had instance and argument to commend themselves: I could drive her then from the ward of her purity, her reputation, her marriage-vow, and a thousand other her defences, which now are too, too strongly 225 embattled against me. What say you to’t, Sir John? _Fal._ Master Brook, I will first make bold with your money; next, give me your hand; and last, as I am a gentleman, you shall, if you will, enjoy Ford’s wife.
_Ford._ O good sir! 230 _Fal._ I say you shall. _Ford._ Want no money, Sir John; you shall want none. _Fal._ Want no Mistress Ford, Master Brook; you shall want none. I shall be with her, I may tell you, by her own appointment; even as you came in to me, her assistant, 235 or go-between, parted from me: I say I shall be with her between ten and eleven; for at that time the jealous rascally knave her husband will be forth. Come you to me at night; you shall know how I speed. _Ford._. I am blest in your acquaintance. Do you know 240 Ford, sir? _Fal._ Hang him, poor cuckoldly knave! I know him not: --yet I wrong him to call him poor; they say the jealous wittolly knave hath masses of money; for the which his wife seems to me well-favoured. I will use her as the key of the 245 cuckoldly rogue’s coffer; and there’s my harvest-home. _Ford._ I would you knew Ford, sir, that you might avoid him, if you saw him. _Fal._ Hang him, mechanical salt-butter rogue! I will stare him out of his wits; I will awe him with my cudgel: 250 it shall hang like a meteor o’er the cuckold’s horns. Master Brook, thou shalt know I will predominate over the peasant, and thou shalt lie with his wife. --Come to me soon at night. Ford’s a knave, and I will aggravate his style; thou, Master Brook, shalt know him for knave and 255 cuckold. Come to me soon at night. [_Exit._
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