Warkworth. Before Northumberland's castle. Enter Rumour, painted full of tongues. Rum. Open your ears; For which of you will stop The vent of hearing, when loud Rumour speaks? Hath beaten down young Hotspur, and his troops, To noise abroad,-that Harry Monmouth fell (1) Northumberland's castle. Mouldy, Shadow, Wart, Feeble, and Bullcalf, recruits. Fang and Snare, sheriff's officers. A Dancer, speaker of the Epilogue. Lady Northumberland. Lady Percy. Lords and other attendants; officers, soldiers, mes- This have I rumour'd through the peasant towns They bring smooth comforts false, worse than true [Exit. wrongs. And, in the fortune of my lord your son, North. How is this deriv'd? Saw you the field? came you from Shrewsbury? Bard. I spake with one, my lord, that came from thence; A gentleman well bred, and of good name, On Tuesday last to listen after news. Bard. My lord, I over-rode him on the way; Enter Travers. North. Now, Travers, what good tidings come with you? Tra. My lord, sir John Umfrevile turn'd me back With joyful tidings; and, being better hors'd, Out-rode me. After him, came, spurring hard, A gentleman almost forspent' with speed, That stopp'd by me to breathe his bloodied horse: He ask'd the way to Chester; and of him I did demand, what news from Shrewsbury. He told me, that rebellion had bad luck, And that young Harry Percy's spur was cold: With that, he gave his able horse the head, And, bending forward, struck his armed heels Against the panting sides of his poor jude Up to the rowel-head; and, starting so, He seem'd in running to devour the way, Staving no longer question. North. Ha!--Again. Said he, young Harry Percy's spur was cold? Bard. My lord, I'll tell you what Unon mine honour, for a silken point2 If my young lord your son has not the day, I'll give my barony: never talk of it. Drew Priam's curtain in the dead of night, Your brother, thus; so fought the noble Douglas ; Why, he is dead. See, what a ready tongue suspicion hath! I North. Yet, for all this, say not that Percy's dead. see a strange confession in thine eye: Thou shak'st thy head, and hold'st it fear, or sin, To speak a truth. If he be slain, say so: The tongue offends not, that reports his death: And he doth sin, that doth belie the dead; Not he, which says the dead is not alive. Yet the first bringer of unwelcome news Hath but a losing office; and his tongue Sounds ever after as a sullen bell, Remember'd knolling a departed friend. Bard. I cannot think, my lord, your son is dead. Mor. I am sorry, I should force you to believe That, which I would to heaven I had not seen: But these mine eyes saw him in bloody state, Rend'ring faint quittance, wearied and outbreath'd, To Harry Monmouth: whose swift wrath beat down The never-daunted Percy to the earth, C From whence with life he never more sprung up. North. Why should the gentleman, that rode by Turn'd on themselves, like dull and heavy lead. Travers, Give then such instances of loss? Bard. Who, he? He was some hilding fellow, that had stol'n The horse he rode on; and, upon my life, Speke at a venture. Look, here comes more news. Enter Morton. North. Yea, this man's brow, like to a title-leaf, (1) Exhausted. (2) Lace tagged. And as the thing that's heavy in itself, North. For this I shall have time enough to mourn. In poison there is physic; and these news, Having been well, that would have made me sick, Being sick, have in some measure made me well: And as the wretch, whose fever-weaken'd joints, Like strengthless hinges, buckle under life Out of his keeper's arms; even so my limbs, A scaly gauntlet now, with joints of steel, Tra. This strained passion doth you wrong, my lord. Bard. Sweet earl, divorce not wisdom from your Mor. The lives of all your loving complices Let us make head. It was your presurmise, Bard. We all, that are engaged to this loss, I hear for certain, and do speak the truth,- Suppos'd sincere and holy in his thoughts, 2 Derives from heaven his quarrel, and his cause; Fal. Sirrah, you giant, what says the doctor to my water? Page. He said, sir, the water itself was a good healthy water: but, for the party that owed it, he might have more diseases than he knew for. 9 am not Fal. Men of all sorts take a pride to gird at me; The brain of this foolish-compounded clay, man, is not able to vent any thing that tends to laughter, more than I invent, or is invented on me : only witty in myself, but the cause that wit is in other men. I do here walk before thee, like a sow, that hath o'erwhelmed all her litter but one. If the prince put thee into my service for any other reason than to set me off, why then I have no judgment. Thou whoreson mandrake, thou art fitter to be worn in my cap, than to wait at my heels. I was never manned with an agate 10 till now: but I will set you neither in gold nor silver, but in vile apparel, and send you back again to your master, for a jewel; the juvenal, the prince your master, whose chin is not yet fledged. I will sooner have a beard grow in the palm of my hand, than he shall get one on his cheek; and yet he will not stick to say, his face is a face royal: God may finish it when he will, it is not a hair amiss yet: he may keep it still as a face-royal, for a barber shall never earn sixpence out of it; and yet he will be crowing, as if he had writ man ever since his father was a bachelor. He may keep his own grace, but he is almost out of mine, I can assure him.--What said master Dumbleton about the satin, for my short cloak, and slops? Page. He said, sir, you should procure him better assurance than Bardolph: he would not take his bond and yours; he liked not the security. Fal. Let him be damned like a glutton! may his tongue be hotter!-A whoreson Achitophel! a rascally yea-forsooth knave! to bear a gentleman in hand, and then stand upon security!-The whoreson smooth-pates do now wear nothing but high shoes, and bunches of keys at their girdles; and if a man is thorough" with them in honest taking up, then they must stand upon--security. I had as lief they would put ratsbane in my mouth, as offer to stop it with security. I looked he should have sent me two and twenty yards of satin, as I am a true knight, and he sends me security. Well, he may sleep in security; for he hath the horn of abundance, and the lightness of his wife shines through it: and yet cannot he see, though he' have his own lantern to light him.--Where's Bardolph? Page. He's gone into Smithfield, to buy your worship a horse. Fal. I bought him in Paul's, and he'll buy me a horse in Smithfield: an I could get me but a wife (9) A root supposed to have the shape of a man, in the stews, I were manned, horsed, and wived.'| Ch. Just. I think, you are fallen into the disease; for you hear not what I say to you. Fal. 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. Ch. Just. To punish you by the heels, would amend the attention of your ears; and I care not, if I become your physician. Ch. Just. He that was in question for the robbery? Fal. I am as poor as Job, my lord; but not so Atten. He, my lord: but he hath since done patient: your lordship may minister the potion of good service at Shrewsbury; and, as I hear, is imprisonment to me, in respect of poverty; but now going with some charge to the lord John of how I should be your patient to follow your pre Lancaster. scriptions, the wise may make some dram of a Ch. Just. What, to York? Call him back again. scruple, or, indeed, a scruple itself. Atten. Sir John Falstaff! Fal. Boy, tell him, I am deaf. Page. You must speak louder, my master is deaf. Ch. Just. I am sure, he is, to the hearing of any thing good.-Go, pluck him by the elbow; I must speak with him. Atten. Sir John,—— Ch. Just. I sent for you, when there were matters against you for your life, to come speak with me. Fal. As I was then advised by my learned coun sel in the laws of this land-service, I did not come. Ch. Just. Well, the truth is, sir John, you live in great infamy. Ful. What! a young knave, and beg! Is there not wars? is there not employment? Doth not the king lack subjects? do not the rebels nced soldiers? Though it be a shame to be on any side your waste is great. but one, it is worse shame to beg than to be on the worst side, were it worse than the name of rebel-means were greater, and my waist slenderer. lion can tell how to make it. Fal. He that buckles him in my belt, cannot live in less. Ch. Just. Your means are very slender, and Alten. You mistake me, sir. Fal. Why, sir, did I say you were an honest man? setting my knighthood and my soldiership aside, I had lied in my throat if I had said so. Alten. I pray you, sir, then set your knighthood and your 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. Fal. I give thee leave to tell me so! I lay aside that which grows to me! If thou gett'st any leave of me, hang me; if thou takest leave, thou wert better be hanged: You hunt-counter,2 hence! avaunt! Allen. Sir, my lord would speak with you. Fal. I would it were otherwise; I would my Ch. Just. You have misled the youthful prince. Fal. The young prince hath misled me: I am the fellow with the great belly, and he my dog. Ch. Just. Well, I am loath to gall a new-healed wound; your day's service at Shrewsbury hath a little gilded over your night's exploit on Gads-hill. you may thank the unquiet time for your quiet o'erposting that action. I Fal. My lord? Ch. Just. But since all is well, keep it so: wake not a sleeping wolf. Ful. To wake a wolf, is as bad as to smell a fox. Ch. Just. What! you are as a candle, the better part burnt out. Fal. A wassel' candle, my lord; all tallow: if did say of wax, my growth would approve the truth. Ch. Just. There is not a white hair on your face, but should have his effect of gravity. Fal. His effect of gravy, gravy, gravy. Ch. Just. You follow the young prince up and down, like his ill angel. Ch. Just. Sir John Falstaff, a word with you. Fal. My good lord!-God give your lordship good time of day. I am glad to see your lordship! abroad: I heard say, your lordship was sick: 1 hope your lordship goes abroad by advice. 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 most humbly beseech your Fal. Not so, my lord; your ill angel is light; lordship, to have a reverend care of your health. but, I hope, he that looks upon me, will take me Ch. Just. Sir John, I sent for you before your without weighing: and yet, in some respects, I expedition to Shrewsbury. grant, I cannot go, I cannot tell: Virtue is of so Fal. An't please your lordship, I hear, his ma- little regard in these coster-monger times, that true esty is returned with some discomfort from Wales. valour is turned bear-herd: Pregnancy is made a Ch. Just. I talk not of his majesty:-You would tapster, and hath his quick wit wasted in giving not come when I sent for you. reckonings: all the other gifts appertinent to man, Fal. And I hear moreover, his highness is fallen as the malice of this age shapes them, are not into this same whoreson apoplexy. worth a gooseberry. You, that are old, consider Ch. Just. Well, heaven mend him! I pray, let not the capacities of us that are young: you me speak with you. measure the heat of our livers with the bitterness of Fal. This apoplexy is, as I take it, a kind of your galls: and we that are in the vaward" of our lethargy, an't please your lordship; a kind of sleep-youth, I must confess, are wags too. ing in the blood, a whoreson tingling. Ch. Just. Do you set down your name in the Ch. Just. What tell you me of it? be it as it is. scroll of youth, that are written down old with all Fal. It hath its original from much grief; from the characters of age? Have you not a moist eye? study, and perturbation of the brain: I have read a dry hand? a yellow cheek? a white beard? a the cause of his effects in Galen; it is a kind of decreasing leg? an increasing belly? Is not your deafness. voice broken? your wind short? your chin double? (1) Alluding to an old proverb: Who goes to Westminster for a wife, to St. Paul's for a man, and to Smithfield for a horse, may meet with a whore, a knave, and a jade. (2) A catch-pole or bum-bailiff. (5) Pass current, (7) Forepart, your wit single?' and every part about you blasted wit will make use of any thing; I will turn_dis. with antiquity? and will you yet call yourself eases to commodity. young? Fie, fie, fie, sir John! [Exit. SCENE III.-York. A room in the archbishop's palace. Enter the archbishop of York, the lords Hastings, Mowbray, and Bardolph. Arch. Thus have you heard our cause, and known our means; Fal. 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 with hollaing, and singing of anthems. To approve my youth further, I will not: the truth is, I am only old in judgment and understanding | And, my most noble friends, I pray you all, and he that will caper with me for a thousand Speak plainly your opinions of our hopes:marks, let him lend me the money, and have at And first, lord marshal, what say you to it? him. For the box o'the ear that the prince gave Mowb. I well allow the occasion of our arms: you, he gave it like a rude prince, and you took But gladly would be better satisfied, it like a sensible lord. I have check'd him for it; and the young lion repents: marry, not in ashes, and sackcloth; but in new silk, and old sack. Ch. Just. Well, heaven send the prince a better companion! Fal. Heaven send the companion a better prince! I cannot rid my hands of him. Ch. Just. 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. How, in our means, we should advance ourselves Bard. The question then, lord Hastings, stand- Whether our present five and twenty thousand Fal. 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, But, if without him we be thought too feeble, Ay, marry, there's the point : and I mean not to sweat extraordinarily: if it be My judgment is, we should not step too far a hot day, an I brandish any thing but my bottle, Till we had his assistance by the hand: I would I might never spit white again. There is For, in a theme so bloody-fac'd as this, not a dangerous action can peep out his head, but Conjecture, expectation, and surmise I am thrust upon it: Well, I cannot last ever: Of aids uncertain, should not be admitted. But it was always yet the trick of our English naArch. 'Tis very true, lord Bardolph; for, indeed, tion, if they have a good thing, to make it too com- It was young Hotspur's case at Shrewsbury. mon. If you will needs say, I am an old man, you Bard. It was, my lord; who lin'd himself with should give me rest. I would to God, my name hope, were not so terrible to the enemy as it is. I were Eating the air on promise of supply, better to be eaten to death with rust, than to be Flattering himself with project of a power scoured to nothing with perpetual motion. Much smaller than the smallest of his thoughts: Ch. Just. Well, be honest, be honest; And God And so, with great imagination, bless your expedition! Fal. Will your lordship lend me a thousand pound, to furnish me forth? Ch. Just. Not a penny, not a penny; you are too impatient to bear crosses. Fare you well: Commend me to my cousin Westmoreland. Proper to madmen, led his powers to death, Hast. But, by your leave it never yet did hurt, Bard. Yes, in this present quality of war ;Indeed the instant action (a cause on foot,) [Exeunt Chief Justice and Attendant. Lives so in hope, as in an carly spring Fal. If I do, fillip me with a three-man beetle. We see the appearing buds; which, to prove fruit, A man can no more separate age and covetous-Hope gives not so much warrant, as despair, ness, than he can part young limbs and lechery: That frosts will bite them. When we mean to build, but the gout galls the one, and the pox pinches the We first survey the plot, then draw the model; other; and so both the degrees prevent my And when we see the figure of the house, curses.-Boy! Page. Sir? Fal. What money is in my purse? Then must we rate the cost of the erection : Fal. I can get no remedy against this consump-To build at all? Much more, in this great work tion of the purse: borrowing only lingers and (Which is, almost, to pluck a kingdom down, lingers it out, but the disease is incurable.-Go, And set another up,) should we survey bear this letter to my lord of Lancaster; this to The plot of situation, and the model; the prince; this to the earl of Westmoreland; and Consents upon a sure foundation; this to old mistress Ursula, whom I have weekly Question surveyors; know our own estate, sworn to marry since I perceived the first white How able such a work to undergo, hair on my chin: About it; you know where to To weigh against his opposite; or else, find me. [Exit Page.] A pox of this gout! or, a We fortify in paper, and in figures, gout of this pox! for the one, or the other, plays Using the names of men, instead of men: the rogue with my great toe. It is no matter, if I Like one, that draws the model of a house do halt; I have the wars for my colour, and my Beyond his power to build it; who, half through, pensions shall seem the more reasonable: A good Gives o'er, and leaves his part-created cost A naked subject to the weeping clouds, And waste for churlish winter's tyranny. (1) Small. (2) Old age. (3) A large wooden hammer so heavy as to require three men to wield it. |