Henry IV part two

London. The Boar's-head Tavern in Eastcheap.
 
[Enter two Drawers]
 
FIRST DRAWER
What the devil hast thou brought there? apple-johns? thou knowst Sir John cannot endure an apple-john.
 
SECOND DRAWER
Thou sayst true: the prince once set a dish of apple-johns before him, and told him there were five more Sir Johns: and, putting off his hat, said, I will now take my leave of these six dry, round, old withered knights. It angered him to the heart: but he hath forgot that.
 
FIRST DRAWER
Why then cover, and set them down: and see if thou canst find out Sneak's noise; Mistress Tearsheet would fain hear some music.
 
SECOND DRAWER
Sirrah, here will be the prince, and Master Poins, anon: and they will put on two of our jerkins, and aprons, and Sir John must not know of it: Bardolph hath brought word.
 
FIRST DRAWER
Then here will be old Utis: it will be an excellent stratagem.
 
SECOND DRAWER
I'll see if I can find out Sneak.
 
[Exit. Enter MISTRESS QUICKLY and DOLL TEARSHEET]
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Sweetheart, methinks now you are in an excellent good temperality: your pulsidge beats as extraordinarily, as heart would desire; and your color (I warrant you) is as red as any rose: But you have drunk too much canaries, and that's a marvellous searching wine; and it perfumes the blood, ere one can say what's this. How do you now?
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
Better than I was: hem.
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Why that was well said: a good heart's worth gold. Look, here comes Sir John.
 
[Enter FALSTAFF]
 
FALSTAFF [Singing]
When Arthur first in court-- (Empty the jordan) and was a worthy king: How now Mistress Doll?
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Sick of a calm: yea, good faith.
 
FALSTAFF
So is all her sect: if they be once in a calm, they are sick.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
You muddy rascal, is that all the comfort you give me?
 
FALSTAFF
You make fat rascals, Mistress Doll.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
I make them? gluttony and diseases make them, I make them not.
 
FALSTAFF
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.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
I marry, our chains, and our jewels.
 
FALSTAFF
Your brooches, pearls, and ouches: for to serve bravely, is to come halting off: you know, to come off the breach, with his pike bent bravely, and to surgery bravely; to venture upon the charged chambers bravely.
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Why this is the old fashion: you two never meet, but you fall to some discord: you are both (in good truth) as rheumatic as two dry toasts, you cannot one bear with another's confirmities. What the good-year? One must bear, and that must be you: you are the weaker vessel; as they say, the emptier vessel.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
Can a weak empty vessel bear such a huge full hogshead? There's a whole merchant's venture of Bourdeaux stuff in him: you have not seen a hulk better stuffed in the hold. 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.
 
[Enter First Drawer]
 
FIRST DRAWER
Sir, Ancient Pistol is below, and would speak with you.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
Hang him, swaggering rascal, let him not come hither: it is the foul-mouthedst rogue in England.
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
If he swagger, let him not come here: I must live among my neighbors, I'll no swaggerers: I am in good name, and fame, with the very best: shut the door, there comes no swaggerers here: I have not lived all this while, to have swaggering now: shut the door, I pray you.
 
FALSTAFF
Dost thou hear, hostess?
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Pray you pacify yourself (Sir John) there comes no swaggerers here.
 
FALSTAFF
Dost thou hear? it is mine ancient.
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Tilly-fally (Sir John) never tell me, your ancient swaggerer comes not in my doors. I was before Master Tisick the deputy, the other day; and as he said to me, 'twas no longer ago than Wednesday last: Neighbor Quickly (says he;) Master Dumbe, our minister, was by then: neighbor Quickly (says he) receive those that are civil; for (said he) you are in an ill name: now he said so, I can tell whereupon: for (says he) you are an honest woman, and well thought on; therefore take heed what guests you receive: receive (says he) no swaggering companions. There comes none here. You would bless you to hear what he said. no, I'll no swaggerers.
 
FALSTAFF
He's no swaggerer (hostess) a tame cheater, he: you may stroke him as gently, as a puppy greyhound: he will not swagger with a Barbary hen, if her feathers turn back in any show of resistance. Call him up (drawer).
 
[Exit First Drawer]
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Cheater, call you him? I will bar no honest man my house, nor no cheater: but I do not love swaggering; I am the worse when one says, swagger: feel masters, how I shake: look you, I warrant you.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
So you do, hostess.
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Do I? yea, in very truth do I, if it were an aspen leaf: I cannot abide swaggerers.
 
[Enter PISTOL, BARDOLPH, and Page]
 
PISTOL
Save you, Sir John.
 
FALSTAFF
Welcome Ancient Pistol. Here (Pistol) I charge you with a cup of sack: do you discharge upon mine hostess.
 
PISTOL
I will discharge upon her (Sir John) with two bullets.
 
FALSTAFF
She is Pistol-proof (sir) you shall hardly offend her.
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Come, I'll drink no proofs, nor no bullets: I'll drink no more than will do me good, for no man's pleasure, I.
 
PISTOL
Then to you (Mistress Dorothy) I will charge you.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
Charge me? I scorn you (scurvy companion) What? you poor, base, rascally, cheating, lack-linen mate: away you moldy rogue, away: I am meat for your master.
 
PISTOL
I know you, Mistress Dorothy.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
Away you cut-purse rascal, you filthy bung, away: by this wine, I'll thrust my knife in your moldy chaps, if you play the saucy cuttle with me. Away you bottle-ale rascal! you basket-hilt stale juggler, you. Since when, I pray you, sir? What, with two points on your shoulder? much.
 
PISTOL
I will murder your ruff, for this.
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
No, good Captain Pistol: not here, sweet captain.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
Captain? thou abominable damned cheater, art thou not ashamed to be called captain? If 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 rogue, he lives upon moldy stewed prunes, and dried cakes. A captain? These villains will make the word Captain odious: therefore captains had need look to it.
 
BARDOLPH
Pray thee go down, good ancient.
 
FALSTAFF
Hark thee hither, Mistress Doll.
 
PISTOL
Not I: I tell thee what, Corporal Bardolph, I could tear her: I'll be revenged of her.
 
PAGE
Pray thee go down.
 
PISTOL
I'll see her damned first: to Pluto's damned lake, by this hand, to the infernal deep, with Erebus and tortures vile also. Hold hook and line, say I: Down: down dogs, down fates: Have we not Hiren here?
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Good Captain Peesel be quiet, 'tis very late: I beseek you now, aggravate your choler.
 
PISTOL
These be good humors indeed. Shall pack-horses, and hollow pampered jades of Asia, which cannot go but thirty miles a day, compare with Caesars, and with Cannibals, and Trojan Greeks? nay, rather damn them with King Cerberus, and let the welkin roar: Shall we fall foul for toys?
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
By my troth captain, these are very bitter words.
 
BARDOLPH
Be gone, good ancient: this will grow to a brawl anon.
 
PISTOL
Die men, like dogs; give crowns like pins: Have we not Heren here?
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
On my word (captain) there's none such here. What the good-year, do you think I would deny her? I pray be quiet.
 
PISTOL
Then feed, and be fat (my fair Calipolis). Come, give me some sack, Si fortune me tormente, sperato me contento. Fear we broadsides? no, let the fiend give fire: Give me some sack: and, sweetheart lie thou there. Come we to full points here, and are etceteras nothing?
 
FALSTAFF
Pistol, I would be quiet.
 
PISTOL
Sweet knight, I kiss thy neaf: what? we have seen the seven stars.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
Thrust him down stairs, I cannot endure such a fustian rascal.
 
PISTOL
Thrust him down stairs? know we not Galloway nags?
 
FALSTAFF
Quoit him down (Bardolph) like a shove-groat shilling: nay, an he do nothing but speak nothing, he shall be nothing here.
 
BARDOLPH
Come, get you down stairs.
 
PISTOL
What? shall we have incision? shall we imbrue? Then death rock me asleep, abridge my doleful days: Why then let grievous, ghastly, gaping wounds, untwine the Sisters Three: Come Atropos, I say!
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Here's goodly stuff toward.
 
FALSTAFF
Give me my rapier, boy.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
I prithee Jack, I prithee do not draw.
 
FALSTAFF
Get you down stairs.
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Here's a goodly tumult: I'll forswear keeping house, afore I'll be in these tirrits, and frights. So: murder I warrant now. Alas, alas, put up your naked weapons, put up your naked weapons.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
I prithee Jack be quiet, the rascal is gone: Ah, you whoreson little valiant villain, you.
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Are you not hurt in the groin? methought he made a shrewd thrust at your belly.
 
FALSTAFF
Have you turned him out of doors?
 
BARDOLPH
Yes sir: the rascal's drunk: you have hurt him (sir) in the shoulder.
 
FALSTAFF
A rascal to brave me.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
Ah, you sweet little rogue, you: alas, poor ape, how thou sweatst? come, let me wipe thy face: come on, you whoreson chops: ah rogue, I love thee: thou art as valorous as Hector of Troy, worth five of Agamemnon, and ten times better than the Nine Worthies: ah villain.
 
FALSTAFF
A rascally slave, I will toss the rogue in a blanket.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
Do, and thou darst for thy heart: if thou dost, I'll canvass thee between a pair of sheets.
 
[Enter Music]
 
PAGE
The music is come, sir.
 
FALSTAFF
Let them play: Play sirs. Sit on my knee, Doll. A rascal, bragging slave: the rogue fled from me like quicksilver.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
And thou followedst him like a church: Thou whoreson little tidy Bartholomew boar-pig, when wilt thou leave fighting on days, and foining on nights, and begin to patch up thine old body for heaven?
 
[Enter, behind, PRINCE HENRY and POINS, disguised]
 
FALSTAFF
Peace (good Doll) do not speak like a death's-head: do not bid me remember mine end.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
Sirrah, what humor is the prince of?
 
FALSTAFF
A good shallow young fellow: he would have made a good pantler, he would have chipped bread well.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
They say Poins has a good wit.
 
FALSTAFF
He a good wit? hang him baboon, his wit is as thick as Tewksbury mustard: there is no more conceit in him, than is in a mallet.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
Why does the prince love him so then?
 
FALSTAFF
Because their legs are both of a bigness: and he plays at quoits well, and eats conger and fennel, and drinks off candles' ends for flap-dragons, and rides the wild-mare with the boys, and jumps upon joined-stools, and swears with a good grace, and wears his boot very smooth, like unto the sign of the leg; 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: the weight of a hair will turn the scales between their avoirdupois.
 
PRINCE HENRY
Would not this nave of a wheel have his ears cut off?
 
POINS
Let's beat him before his whore.
 
PRINCE HENRY
Look, if the withered elder hath not his poll clawed like a parrot.
 
POINS
Is it not strange, that desire should so many years outlive performance?
 
FALSTAFF
Kiss me Doll.
 
PRINCE HENRY
Saturn and Venus this year in conjunction? what says the almanac to that?
 
POINS
And look whether the fiery Trigon, his man, be not lisping to his master's old tables, his note-book, his counsel-keeper?
 
FALSTAFF
Thou dost give me flattering busses.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
Nay truly, I kiss thee with a most constant heart.
 
FALSTAFF
I am old, I am old.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
I love thee better, than I love ere a scurvy young boy of them all.
 
FALSTAFF
What stuff wilt have a kirtle of? I shall receive money on Thursday: shalt have a cap tomorrow. A merry song, come: it grows late, we'll to bed. Thou wilt forget me, when I am gone.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
Thou wilt set me a-weeping, if thou sayst so: prove that ever I dress myself handsome, till thy return: well, harken at the end.
 
FALSTAFF
Some sack, Francis.
 
PRINCE HENRY POINS
Anon, anon, sir.
 
FALSTAFF
Ha? a bastard son of the king's? And art not thou Poins, his brother?
 
PRINCE HENRY
Why thou globe of sinful continents, what a life dost thou lead?
 
FALSTAFF
A better than thou: I am a gentleman, thou art a drawer.
 
PRINCE HENRY
Very true, sir: and I come to draw you out by the ears.
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Oh, the Lord preserve thy good grace: welcome to London. Now heaven bless that sweet face of thine: what, are you come from Wales?
 
FALSTAFF
Thou whoreson mad compound of majesty: by this light flesh, and corrupt blood, thou art welcome.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
How? you fat fool, I scorn you.
 
POINS
My lord, he will drive you out of your revenge, and turn all to a merriment, if you take not the heat.
 
PRINCE HENRY
You whoreson candle-mine you, how vilely did you speak of me even now, before this honest, virtuous, civil gentlewoman?
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
God's blessing of your good heart, and so she is by my troth.
 
FALSTAFF
Didst thou hear me?
 
PRINCE HENRY
Yes: and you knew me, as you did when you ran away by Gad's-hill: you knew I was at your back, and spoke it on purpose, to try my patience.
 
FALSTAFF
No, no, no: not so: I did not think, thou wast within hearing.
 
PRINCE HENRY
I shall drive you then to confess the wilful abuse, and then I know how to handle you.
 
FALSTAFF
No abuse (Hal) on mine honor, no abuse.
 
PRINCE HENRY
Not to dispraise me? and call me pantier, and bread-chipper, and I know not what?
 
FALSTAFF
No abuse (Hal).
 
POINS
No abuse?
 
FALSTAFF
No abuse (Ned) in 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 have 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 boys, none.
 
PRINCE HENRY
See now whether pure fear, and entire cowardice, doth not make thee wrong this virtuous gentlewoman, to close with us? Is she of the wicked? Is thine hostess here, of the wicked? Or is the boy of the wicked? Or honest Bardolph (whose zeal burns in his nose) of the wicked?
 
POINS
Answer thou dead elm, answer.
 
FALSTAFF
The fiend hath pricked down Bardolph irrecoverable, and his face is Lucifer's privy-kitchen, where he doth nothing but roast malt-worms: For the boy, there is a good angel about him, but the devil outbids him too.
 
PRINCE HENRY
For the women?
 
FALSTAFF
For one of them, she is in hell already, and burns poor souls: for the other, I owe her money; and whether she be damned for that, I know not.
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
No, I warrant you.
 
FALSTAFF
No, I think thou art not: I think thou art quit for that. Marry, there is another indictment upon thee, for suffering flesh to be eaten in thy house, contrary to the law, for the which I think thou wilt howl.
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
All victuallers do so: what's a joint of mutton, or two, in a whole Lent?
 
PRINCE HENRY
You, gentlewoman.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
What says your grace?
 
FALSTAFF
His grace says that, which his flesh rebels against.
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Who knocks so loud at door? Look to the door there, Francis?
 
[Enter PETO]
 
PRINCE HENRY
Peto, how now? what news?
 
PETO
            ,          ,        ,        ,   ,
      The king,| your fath|er, is | at West|minster,
       ,                ,       ,         ,         ,
      And there | are twen|ty weak | and wear|ied posts,
        ,               ,          ,       ,       ,
      Come from | the north:| and as | I came | along,
         ,        ,      ,       ,      ,        ->
      I met,| and ov|ertook | a doz|en cap||tains,
        ,    ,         ,          ,         ,        ,
      Bare-|headed,| sweating,| knocking | at the | taverns,
           ,      ,       ,         ,      T   T   T
      And ask|ing ev|ery one | for Sir | John Falstaff.  (hex with prev)
 
PRINCE HENRY
          ,         ,         ,         ,         ,
      By heav|en (Poins)| I feel | me much | to blame,
          ,     ,        ,         ,          ,
      So id|ly to | profane | the pre|cious time,
            ,        ,       ,         ,          ,
      When temp|est of | commo|tion, like | the south,
        ,            T    Tx      T       ,         ,
      Borne with | black vapor, doth | begin | to melt,
            ,      ,          ,       ,       ,
      And drop | upon | our bare | unarm|ed heads.
        ,    2       ,            T
      Give me my | sword, and | cloak:
                                        T   T            ,
                                       Falstaff,| good^night.
 
[Exeunt PRINCE HENRY, POINS, PETO and BARDOLPH]
 
FALSTAFF
Now comes in the sweetest morsel of the night, and we must hence, and leave it unpicked. More knocking at the door? How now? what's the matter?
 
BARDOLPH
       ,      2   ,         T     T     T      ,
      You must a|way to | court, sir, pres|ently,
         ,       ,         ,         ,         ,
      A doz|en capt|ains stay | at door | for you.
 
FALSTAFF
Pay the musicians, sirrah: Farewell hostess, farewell Doll. You see (my good wenches) how men of merit are sought after: the undeserver may sleep, when the man of action is called on. Farewell good wenches: if I be not sent away post, I will see you again, ere I go.
 
DOLL TEARSHEET
I cannot speak: if my heart be not read to burst-- well (sweet Jack) have a care of thyself.
 
FALSTAFF
Farewell, farewell.
 
[Exeunt FALSTAFF and BARDOLPH]
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Well, fare thee well: I have known thee these twenty-nine years, come peascod-time: but an honester, and truer-hearted man-- well, fare thee well.
 
BARDOLPH [Within]
Mistress Tearsheet.
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
What's the matter?
 
BARDOLPH [Within]
Good Mistress Tearsheet come to my master.
 
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Oh run Doll, run: run, good Doll.
 
[Exeunt]