The Merry Wives of Windsor (7 page)

see: ‘Ask me no reason why I love you, for though

Love use Reason for his
precisian
⁴
, he admits him not for his

counsellor
⁵
. You are not young, no more am I: go to then,

there’s
sympathy
⁶
. You are merry, so am I: ha, ha, then there’s

more sympathy. You love
sack
⁷
, 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
¹⁸
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
²⁰
behaviour hath this

Flemish
²¹
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
²³

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
²⁵

down of men. How shall I be revenged on him? For revenged

I will be, as sure as his guts are made of
puddings
²⁷
.

MISTRESS FORD
    Mistress Page,
trust me
²⁸
, I was going to your

house.

MISTRESS PAGE
    And, trust me, I was coming to you. You look

very
ill
³¹
.

MISTRESS FORD
    Nay, I’ll ne’er believe that; I
have
³²
to show to the

contrary.

MISTRESS PAGE
    Faith, but you do, in my mind.

MISTRESS FORD
    Well, I do then: yet I say I could show you to the

contrary. O Mistress Page, give me some counsel!

MISTRESS PAGE
    What’s the matter, woman?

MISTRESS FORD
    O woman, if it were not for one trifling
respect
³⁸
,

I could come to such honour!

MISTRESS PAGE
    Hang the trifle, woman, take the honour. What

is it? Dispense with trifles: what is it?

MISTRESS FORD
    If I would but
go to hell
⁴²
for an eternal moment

or so, I could be knighted.

MISTRESS PAGE
    What? Thou liest! Sir Alice Ford? These knights

will
hack
, and so thou shouldst not alter the
article of thy
⁴⁵

gentry.

MISTRESS FORD
    We
burn daylight
⁴⁷
. 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
⁴⁹

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
⁵²
, that I would have

sworn his disposition would have
gone to the truth of
⁵³
his

words. But they do no more adhere and keep place together

than the hundred Psalms to the tune of
‘Greensleeves’
⁵⁵
.

What tempest, I trow, threw this whale — with so many
tuns
⁵⁶

of oil in his belly — ashore at Windsor? How shall I be

revenged on him? I think the best way were to
entertain
⁵⁸
him

with hope, till the wicked fire of lust have melted him in his

own grease. Did you ever hear the like?

MISTRESS PAGE
    Letter for letter, but that the name of Page and

Ford differs. To thy great comfort in this mystery of
ill
⁶²

opinions, here’s the twin-brother of thy letter.

But let thine
inherit
⁶⁴
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
⁶⁸
, 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
⁷⁰

ere
⁷¹
one chaste man.

MISTRESS FORD
    Why, this is the very same: the

very
hand
⁷³
, the very words. What doth he think

of us?

MISTRESS PAGE
    Nay, I know not. It makes me almost ready to

wrangle with mine own honesty
. I’ll
entertain
⁷⁶
myself like

one that I am not acquainted withal: for, sure, unless he

know some
strain
⁷⁸
in me that I know not myself, he would

never have
boarded
me in this
fury
⁷⁹
.

MISTRESS FORD
    ‘Boarding’, call you it? I’ll be sure to keep him

above deck
⁸¹
.

MISTRESS PAGE
    So will I: if he
come
under my
hatches
⁸²
, 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
⁸⁴
and lead him

on with a
fine-baited
⁸⁵
delay, till he hath pawned his horses to

mine host of the Garter.

MISTRESS FORD
    Nay, I will consent to act any villainy against

him that may not sully the
chariness
⁸⁸
of our honesty. O, that

my husband saw this letter! It would give eternal food to his

jealousy.

MISTRESS PAGE
    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.

MISTRESS FORD
    You are the happier woman.

MISTRESS PAGE
    Let’s consult together against this greasy knight.

Come hither.

FORD
    Well, I hope it be not so.

PISTOL
    Hope is a
curtal
⁹⁸
dog in some affairs.

Sir John
affects
⁹⁹
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
¹⁰³
.

FORD
    Love my wife?

PISTOL
    With
liver
burning hot.
Prevent
¹⁰⁵
,

Or go thou like Sir
Actaeon
¹⁰⁶
, he

With
Ringwood
at
thy
¹⁰⁷
heels.

O, odious is
the name
¹⁰⁸
!

FORD
    What name, sir?

PISTOL
    The horn, I say. Farewell.

Take heed, have open eye, for thieves do
foot
¹¹¹
by night.

Take heed, ere summer comes, or
cuckoo-birds
¹¹²
do sing.

Away
¹¹³
, Sir Corporal Nim!

Believe it, Page, he speaks sense.

FORD
    I will be patient. I will find out this.

NIM
    And this is true, I like not the humour

of lying. He hath wronged me in some humours: I
should
¹¹⁷

have borne the humoured letter to her, but I have a sword,

and it shall bite
upon my necessity
¹¹⁹
. He loves your wife:

there’s the short and the long. My name is Corporal Nim. I

speak and I avouch ’tis true: my name is Nim, and Falstaff

loves your wife. Adieu. I love not the humour of
bread and
¹²²

cheese. Adieu.

PAGE
    ‘The humour of it’,
quoth a
¹²⁴
! Here’s a fellow frights

English out of
his
¹²⁵
wits.

FORD
    I will seek out Falstaff.

PAGE
    I never heard such a drawling,
affecting
¹²⁷
rogue.

FORD
    If I do find
it
¹²⁸
— well.

PAGE
    I will not believe such a
Cataian
,
though
¹²⁹
the priest

o’th’town commended him for a true man.

FORD
    ’Twas a good sensible fellow — well.

PAGE
    How now, Meg?

MISTRESS PAGE
    Whither go you, George?

Hark you.

MISTRESS FORD
    How now, sweet Frank, why art thou melancholy?

FORD
    I melancholy? I am not melancholy. Get you

home, go.

MISTRESS FORD
    Faith, thou hast some
crotchets
¹³⁸
in thy head

now.— Will you go, Mistress Page?

MISTRESS PAGE
    
Have with you
¹⁴⁰
.— You’ll come to dinner,

George?—

Look who comes yonder: she shall be our messenger to this

paltry knight.

MISTRESS FORD
    Trust me, I thought on her: she’ll
fit it
¹⁴⁴
.

MISTRESS PAGE
    You are come to see my daughter

Anne?

MISTRESS QUICKLY
    Ay, forsooth, and I pray how does good

Mistress Anne?

MISTRESS PAGE
    Go in with us and see. We have an hour’s talk

with you.

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
¹⁵⁶
it. But these that accuse him in his intent towards our

wives are a
yoke
¹⁵⁷
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
¹⁶¹
at the

Garter?

PAGE
    Ay, marry, does he. If he should intend this
voyage
¹⁶³

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
¹⁶⁵
.

FORD
    I do not
misdoubt
¹⁶⁶
my wife, but I would be loath to

turn them
¹⁶⁷
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
¹⁶⁹
host of the Garter comes:

there is either liquor in his
pate
¹⁷⁰
or money in his purse, when

he looks so merrily.

How now, mine host?

HOST
    How now, bully-rook? Thou’rt a gentleman.