FALSTAFF What disease hast thou?
BULLCALF A whoreson cold, sir, a cough, sir, which I caught
with ringing in the king’s affairs upon his coronation day, sir.
FALSTAFF Come, thou shalt go to the wars in a gown . We will
have away thy cold, and I will take such order that thy
friends shall ring for thee .— Is here all?
SHALLOW There is two more called than your number. You
must have but fourx here, sir, and so I pray you go in with me
to dinner.
FALSTAFF Come, I will go drink with you, but I cannot tarry
dinner. I am glad to see you, in good troth, Master Shallow.
SHALLOW O, Sir John, do you remember since we lay all night
in the Windmill in St George’s Field?
FALSTAFF No more of that, good Master Shallow, no more of
that.
SHALLOW Ha, it was a merry night. And is Jane Nightwork
alive?
FALSTAFF She lives, Master Shallow.
SHALLOW She never could away with me.
FALSTAFF Never, never. She would always say she could not
abide Master Shallow.
SHALLOW I could anger her to the heart. She was then a bona-
roba. Doth she hold her own well?
FALSTAFF Old, old, Master Shallow.
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.
SILENCE That’s fifty-five years ago.
SHALLOW Ha, cousin Silence, that thou hadst seen that that
this knight and I have seen! Ha, Sir John, said I well?
FALSTAFF We have heard the chimes at midnight, Master
Shallow.
SHALLOW That we have, that we have, in faith, Sir John, we
have. Our watch-word was ‘Hem boys!’ Come, let’s to dinner;
come, let’s to dinner. O, the days that we have seen! Come,
come.
[Exeunt Falstaff and the Justices]
BULLCALF Good Master Corporate Bardolph, stand my friend,
and here is four Harry ten shillings in French
Gives money to Bardolph
crowns for you. In very truth, sir, I had as lief be
hanged, sir, as go. And yet, for mine own part, sir, I do not
care; but rather, because I am unwilling, and for mine own
part, have a desire to stay with my friends. Else, sir, I did not
care, for mine own part, so much.
BARDOLPH Go to . Stand aside.
MOULDY And, good master corporal captain, for my old
dame’s sake, stand my friend: she hath nobody to do
anything about her when I am gone, and she is old, and
cannot help herself. You shall have forty, sir.
Gives money
BARDOLPH Go to. Stand aside.
FEEBLE I care not. A man can die but once: we owe a death.
I will never bear a base mind. If it be my destiny, so : if it be
not, so. No man is too good to serve his prince, and let it go
which way it will, he that dies this year is quit for the next.
BARDOLPH Well said. Thou art a good fellow.
FEEBLE Nay, I will bear no base mind.
[Enter Falstaff and the Justices]
FALSTAFF Come, sir, which men shall I have?
SHALLOW Four of which you please.
BARDOLPH Sir, a word with you: I have three pound to free
Mouldy and Bullcalf.
FALSTAFF Go to, well.
SHALLOW Come, Sir John, which four will you have?
FALSTAFF Do you choose for me.
SHALLOW Marry, then, Mouldy, Bullcalf, Feeble and Shadow.
FALSTAFF Mouldy and Bullcalf: for you, Mouldy, stay at home
till you are past service .— And for your part, Bullcalf, grow
till you come unto it . I will none of you.
SHALLOW Sir John, Sir John, do not yourself wrong. They are
your likeliest men, and I would have you served with the best.
FALSTAFF Will you tell me, Master Shallow, how to choose a
man? Care I for the limb, the thews, the stature, bulk, and big
assemblance of a man? Give me the spirit, Master Shallow.
Where’s Wart? You see what a ragged appearance it is. He
shall charge you and discharge you with the motion of a
pewterer’s hammer , come off and on swifter than he that
gibbets on the brewer’s bucket . And this same half-faced .
fellow, Shadow, give me this man: he presents no mark to the
enemy. The foeman may with as great aim level at the edge of
a penknife. And for a retreat, how swiftly will this Feeble, the
me the great ones. Put me a caliver into Wart’s hand,
Bardolph.
BARDOLPH Hold, Wart, traverse . Thus, thus, thus.
Gives Wart a caliver
FALSTAFF Come, manage me your caliver. So, very
well, go to, very good, exceeding good. O, give me always a
little, lean, old, chopped, bald shot. Well said, Wart. Thou art
a good scab . Hold, there is a tester for thee.
Gives money
SHALLOW He is not his craft’s master. He doth not do it right. I
remember at Mile-End Green, when I lay at Clement’s Inn—
I was then Sir Dagonet in Arthur’s show —there was a little
quiver fellow, and he would manage you his piece thus.
And he would about and about, and come you in and come
you in. ‘Ra, ta, ta s’, would he say. ‘Bounce ’, would he say, and
away again would he go, and again would he come. I shall
never see such a fellow.
FALSTAFF These fellows will do well, Master Shallow. Farewell,
Master Silence. I will not use many words with you. Fare you
well, gentlemen both. I thank you. I must a dozen mile
tonight. Bardolph, give the soldiers coats.
SHALLOW Sir John, heaven bless you and prosper your affairs,
and send us peace! As you return, visit my house. Let our old
acquaintance be renewed. Peradventure I will with you to
the court.
FALSTAFF I would you would, Master Shallow.
SHALLOW Go to. I have spoke at a word . Fare you well.
Exit
FALSTAFF Fare you well, gentle gentlemen.— On, Bardolph.
Lead the men away.
[Exeunt Bardolph, Mouldy, Shadow, Wart, Feeble and Bullcalf]
As I return, I will fetch off these justices. I do see the bottom
of Justice Shallow. How subject we old men are to this vice of
lying! This same starved justice hath done nothing but prate
to me of the wildness of his youth, and the feats he hath
done about Turnbull Street, and every third word a lie, duer
paid to the hearer than the Turk’s tribute. I do remember
him at Clement’s Inn like a man made after supper of a
cheese-paring . When he was naked, he was, for all the world,
like a forked radish, with a head fantastically carved upon it
with a knife. He was so forlorn, that his dimensions to any
thick sight were invincible . He was the very genius of
famine. He came ever in the rearward of the fashion. And
now is this Vice’s dagger become a squire, and talks as
familiarly of John of Gaunt as if he had been sworn brother
to him, and I’ll be sworn he never saw him but once in the
Tilt-yard, and then he burst his head for crowding among
the marshal’s men . I saw it, and told John of G
aunt he beat
his own name, for you might have trussed him and all his
apparel into an eel-skin, the case of a treble hautboy was a
mansion for him, a court. And now hath he land and beefs .
Well, I will be acquainted with him, if I return, and it shall go
hard but I will make him a philosopher’s two stones to me. If
the young dace be a bait for the old pike, I see no reason in
the law of nature but I may snap at him. Let time shape , and
there an end.
Exit
Act 4 Scene 1
running scene 10
Location: Gaultree Forest, north of York
Enter the Archbishop, Mowbray, Hastings
ARCHBISHOP OF YORK What is this forest called?
HASTINGS ’Tis Gaultree Forest, an’t shall please your grace.
ARCHBISHOP OF YORK Here stand, my lords, and send discoverers
forth
To know the numbers of our enemies.
HASTINGS We have sent forth already.
ARCHBISHOP OF YORK ’Tis well done.
My friends and brethren in these great affairs,
I must acquaint you that I have received
New-dated letters from Northumberland.
Their cold intent, tenor and substance, thus:
Here doth he wish his person, with such powers
As might hold sortance with his quality,
The which he could not levy, whereupon
He is retired, to ripe his growing fortunes,
To Scotland; and concludes in hearty prayers
That your attempts may overlive the hazard
And fearful meeting of their opposite .
MOWBRAY Thus do the hopes we have in him touch ground
And dash themselves to pieces.
Enter a Messenger
HASTINGS Now, what news?
MESSENGER West of this forest, scarcely off a mile,
In goodly form comes on the enemy.
And by the ground they hide, I judge their number
Upon or near the rate of thirty thousand.
MOWBRAY The just proportion that we gave them out .
Let us sway on and face them in the field.
Enter Westmorland
ARCHBISHOP OF YORK What well-appointed leader fronts us here?
MOWBRAY I think it is my lord of Westmorland.
WESTMORLAND Health and fair greeting from our general,
The prince, L ord John and Duke of Lancaster.
ARCHBISHOP OF YORK Say on, my lord of Westmorland, in peace:
What doth concern your coming?
WESTMORLAND Then, my lord,
Unto your grace do I in chief address
The substance of my speech. If that rebellion
Came like itself, in base and abject routs ,
Led on by bloody youth, guarded with rage,
And countenanced by boys and beggary,
I say, if damned commotion so appeared,
In his true, native and most proper shape,
You, reverend father, and these noble lords
Had not been here to dress the ugly form
Of base and bloody insurrection
With your fair honours. You, lord archbishop,
Whose see is by a civil peace maintained,
Whose beard the silver hand of peace hath touched,
Whose learning and good letters peace hath tutored,
Whose white investments figure innocence,
The dove and very blessèd spirit of peace,
Wherefore do you so ill translate yourself
Out of the speech of peace that bears such grace,
Into the harsh and boisterous tongue of war,
Turning your books to graves, your ink to blood,
Your pens to lances and your tongue divine
To a loud trumpet and a point of war?
ARCHBISHOP OF YORK Wherefore do I this? So the question stands.
Briefly to this end: we are all diseased,
And with our surfeiting and wanton hours
Have brought ourselves into a burning fever,
And we must bleed for it, of which disease
Our late King Richard, being infected, died.
But, my most noble lord of Westmorland,
I take not on me here as a physician,
Nor do I as an enemy to peace
Troop in the throngs of military men,
But rather show awhile like fearful war,
To diet rank minds sick of happiness
And purge th’obstructions which begin to stop
Our very veins of life. Hear me more plainly.
I have in equal balance justly weighed
What wrongs our arms may do, what wrongs we suffer,
And find our griefs heavier than our offences.
We see which way the stream of time doth run,
And are enforced from our most quiet there
By the rough torrent of occasion,
And have the summary of all our griefs,
When time shall serve, to show in articles;
Which long ere this we offered to the king,
And might by no suit gain our audience.
When we are wronged and would unfold our griefs,
We are denied access unto his person
Even by those men that most have done us wrong.
The dangers of the days but newly gone,
Whose memory is written on the earth
With yet appearing blood, and the examples
Of every minute’s instance, present now,
Hath put us in these ill-beseeming arms,
Not to break peace or any branch of it,
But to establish here a peace indeed,
Concurring both in name and quality.
WESTMORLAND Whenever yet was your appeal denied?
Wherein have you been gallèd by the king?
What peer hath been suborned to grate on you,
That you should seal this lawless bloody book
Of forged rebellion with a seal divine?
ARCHBISHOP OF YORK My brother general, the commonwealth,
I make my quarrel in particular.
WESTMORLAND There is no need of any such redress,
Or if there were, it not belongs to you.
MOWBRAY Why not to him in part, and to us all
That feel the bruises of the days before,
And suffer the condition of these times
To lay a heavy and unequal hand
Upon our honours?
WESTMORLAND O, my good lord Mowbray,
Construe the times to their necessities,
And you shall say indeed, it is the time,
And not the king, that doth you injuries.
Yet for your part, it not appears to me
Either from the king or in the present time
That you should have an inch of any ground
To build a grief on. Were you not restored
To all the Duke of Norfolk’s signories,
Your noble and right well rememb’red father’s?
MOWBRAY What thing, in honour, had my father lost,
That need to be revived and breathed in me?
The king that loved him, as the state stood then,
Was force perforce compelled to banish him,
And then that Henry Bullingbrook and he,
Being mounted and both rousèd in their seats,
Their neighing coursers daring of the spur,
Their armèd staves in charge, their beavers down,
Their eyes of fire sparkling through sights of steel
And the loud trumpet blowing them together,
Then, then, when there was nothing could have stayed
My father from the breast of Bullingbrook,
O, when the king did throw his warder down—
His own life hung upon the staff he threw—
Then threw he down himself and all their lives
That by indictment and by dint of sword
Have since miscarried under Bullingbrook.
WESTMORLAND You speak, Lord Mowbray, now you know not
what.
The Earl of Hereford was reputed then
In England the most valiant gentleman.
Who knows on whom fortune would then have smiled?
But if your father had been victor there,
He ne’er had borne it out of Coventry,
For all the country in a general voice
Cried hate upon him, and all their prayers and love
Were set on Hereford, whom they doted on
And blessed and graced and did more than the king—
But this is mere digression from my purpose.
Here come I from our princely general
To know your griefs; to tell you from his grace
That he will give you audience, and wherein
It shall appear that your demands are just,
You shall enjoy them, everything set off,
That might so much as think you enemies.
MOWBRAY But he hath forced us to compel this offer,
And it proceeds from policy, not love.
WESTMORLAND Mowbray, you overween to take it so.
This offer comes from mercy, not from fear.
For, lo, within a ken our army lies,
Upon mine honour, all too confident
To give admittance to a thought of fear.
Our battle is more full of names than yours,
Our men more perfect in the use of arms,
Our armour all as strong, our cause the best;
Then reason will our hearts should be as good.
Say you not then our offer is compelled.
MOWBRAY Well, by my will, we shall admit no parley.
WESTMORLAND That argues but the shame of your offence:
A rotten case abides no handling .
HASTINGS Hath the Prince John a full commission,
In very ample virtue of his father,
To hear and absolutely to determine
Of what conditions we shall stand upon?
WESTMORLAND That is intended in the general’s name.
I muse you make so slight a question.
ARCHBISHOP OF YORK Then take, my lord of Westmorland, this
schedule ,
Gives paper
For this contains our general grievances:
Each several article herein redressed,
All members of our cause, both here and hence ,
That are insinewed to this action,
Acquitted by a true substantial form
And present execution of our wills