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ACT I, SCENE I.

London. The palace.

Enter KING HENRY, LORD JOHN OF LANCASTER, the EARL of WESTMORELAND, SIR WALTER BLUNT, and others

KING HENRY IV
001: So shaken as we are, so wan with care,
002: Find we a time for frighted peace to pant,
003: And breathe short-winded accents of new broils
004: To be commenced in strands afar remote.
005: No more the thirsty entrance of this soil
006: Shall daub her lips with her own children's blood;
007: Nor more shall trenching war channel her fields,
008: Nor bruise her flowerets with the armed hoofs
009: Of hostile paces: those opposed eyes,
010: Which, like the meteors of a troubled heaven,
011: All of one nature, of one substance bred,
012: Did lately meet in the intestine shock
013: And furious close of civil butchery
014: Shall now, in mutual well-beseeming ranks,
015: March all one way and be no more opposed
016: Against acquaintance, kindred and allies:
017: The edge of war, like an ill-sheathed knife,
018: No more shall cut his master. Therefore, friends,
019: As far as to the sepulchre of Christ,
020: Whose soldier now, under whose blessed cross
021: We are impressed and engaged to fight,
022: Forthwith a power of English shall we levy;
023: Whose arms were moulded in their mothers' womb
024: To chase these pagans in those holy fields
025: Over whose acres walk'd those blessed feet
026: Which fourteen hundred years ago were nail'd
027: For our advantage on the bitter cross.
028: But this our purpose now is twelve month old,
029: And bootless 'tis to tell you we will go:
030: Therefore we meet not now. Then let me hear
031: Of you, my gentle cousin Westmoreland,
032: What yesternight our council did decree
033: In forwarding this dear expedience.

WESTMORELAND
034: My liege, this haste was hot in question,
035: And many limits of the charge set down
036: But yesternight: when all athwart there came
037: A post from Wales loaden with heavy news;
038: Whose worst was, that the noble Mortimer,
039: Leading the men of Herefordshire to fight
040: Against the irregular and wild Glendower,
041: Was by the rude hands of that Welshman taken,
042: A thousand of his people butchered;
043: Upon whose dead corpse there was such misuse,
044: Such beastly shameless transformation,
045: By those Welshwomen done as may not be
046: Without much shame retold or spoken of.

KING HENRY IV
047: It seems then that the tidings of this broil
048: Brake off our business for the Holy Land.

WESTMORELAND
049: This match'd with other did, my gracious lord;
050: For more uneven and unwelcome news
051: Came from the north and thus it did import:
052: On Holy-rood day, the gallant Hotspur there,
053: Young Harry Percy and brave Archibald,
054: That ever-valiant and approved Scot,
055: At Holmedon met,
056: Where they did spend a sad and bloody hour,
057: As by discharge of their artillery,
058: And shape of likelihood, the news was told;
059: For he that brought them, in the very heat
060: And pride of their contention did take horse,
061: Uncertain of the issue any way.

KING HENRY IV
062: Here is a dear, a true industrious friend,
063: Sir Walter Blunt, new lighted from his horse.
064: Stain'd with the variation of each soil
065: Betwixt that Holmedon and this seat of ours;
066: And he hath brought us smooth and welcome news.
067: The Earl of Douglas is discomfited:
068: Ten thousand bold Scots, two and twenty knights,
069: Balk'd in their own blood did Sir Walter see
070: On Holmedon's plains. Of prisoners, Hotspur took
071: Mordake the Earl of Fife, and eldest son
072: To beaten Douglas; and the Earl of Athol,
073: Of Murray, Angus, and Menteith:
074: And is not this an honourable spoil?
075: A gallant prize? ha, cousin, is it not?

WESTMORELAND
076: In faith,
077: It is a conquest for a prince to boast of.

KING HENRY IV
078: Yea, there thou makest me sad and makest me sin
079: In envy that my Lord Northumberland
080: Should be the father to so blest a son,
081: A son who is the theme of honour's tongue;
082: Amongst a grove, the very straightest plant;
083: Who is sweet Fortune's minion and her pride:
084: Whilst I, by looking on the praise of him,
085: See riot and dishonour stain the brow
086: Of my young Harry. O that it could be proved
087: That some night-tripping fairy had exchanged
088: In cradle-clothes our children where they lay,
089: And call'd mine Percy, his Plantagenet!
090: Then would I have his Harry, and he mine.
091: But let him from my thoughts. What think you, coz,
092: Of this young Percy's pride? the prisoners,
093: Which he in this adventure hath surprised,
094: To his own use he keeps; and sends me word,
095: I shall have none but Mordake Earl of Fife.

WESTMORELAND
096: This is his uncle's teaching; this is Worcester,
097: Malevolent to you in all aspects;
098: Which makes him prune himself, and bristle up
099: The crest of youth against your dignity.

KING HENRY IV
100: But I have sent for him to answer this;
101: And for this cause awhile we must neglect
102: Our holy purpose to Jerusalem.
103: Cousin, on Wednesday next our council we
104: Will hold at Windsor; so inform the lords:
105: But come yourself with speed to us again;
106: For more is to be said and to be done
107: Than out of anger can be uttered.

WESTMORELAND
108: I will, my liege.

Exeunt

ACT I, SCENE II.

London. An apartment of the Prince's.

Enter the PRINCE OF WALES and FALSTAFF

FALSTAFF
001: Now, Hal, what time of day is it, lad?

PRINCE HENRY
002: Thou art so fat-witted, with drinking of old sack
003: and unbuttoning thee after supper and sleeping upon
004: benches after noon, that thou hast forgotten to
005: demand that truly which thou wouldst truly know.
006: What a devil hast thou to do with the time of the
007: day? Unless hours were cups of sack and minutes
008: capons and clocks the tongues of bawds and dials the
009: signs of leaping-houses and the blessed sun himself
010: a fair hot wench in flame-coloured taffeta, I see no
011: reason why thou shouldst be so superfluous to demand
012: the time of the day.

FALSTAFF
013: Indeed, you come near me now, Hal; for we that take
014: purses go by the moon and the seven stars, and not
015: by Phoebus, he,'that wandering knight so fair.' And,
016: I prithee, sweet wag, when thou art king, as, God
017: save thy grace,--majesty I should say, for grace
018: thou wilt have none,--

PRINCE HENRY
019: What, none?

FALSTAFF
020: No, by my troth, not so much as will serve to
021: prologue to an egg and butter.

PRINCE HENRY
022: Well, how then? come, roundly, roundly.

FALSTAFF
023: Marry, then, sweet wag, when thou art king, let not
024: us that are squires of the night's body be called
025: thieves of the day's beauty: let us be Diana's
026: foresters, gentlemen of the shade, minions of the
027: moon; and let men say we be men of good government,
028: being governed, as the sea is, by our noble and
029: chaste mistress the moon, under whose countenance we steal.

PRINCE HENRY
030: Thou sayest well, and it holds well too; for the
031: fortune of us that are the moon's men doth ebb and
032: flow like the sea, being governed, as the sea is,
033: by the moon. As, for proof, now: a purse of gold
034: most resolutely snatched on Monday night and most
035: dissolutely spent on Tuesday morning; got with
036: swearing 'Lay by' and spent with crying 'Bring in;'
037: now in as low an ebb as the foot of the ladder
038: and by and by in as high a flow as the ridge of the gallows.

FALSTAFF
039: By the Lord, thou sayest true, lad. And is not my
040: hostess of the tavern a most sweet wench?

PRINCE HENRY
041: As the honey of Hybla, my old lad of the castle. And
042: is not a buff jerkin a most sweet robe of durance?

FALSTAFF
043: How now, how now, mad wag! what, in thy quips and
044: thy quiddities? what a plague have I to do with a
045: buff jerkin?

PRINCE HENRY
046: Why, what a pox have I to do with my hostess of the tavern?

FALSTAFF
047: Well, thou hast called her to a reckoning many a
048: time and oft.

PRINCE HENRY
049: Did I ever call for thee to pay thy part?

FALSTAFF
050: No; I'll give thee thy due, thou hast paid all there.

PRINCE HENRY
051: Yea, and elsewhere, so far as my coin would stretch;
052: and where it would not, I have used my credit.

FALSTAFF
053: Yea, and so used it that were it not here apparent
054: that thou art heir apparent--But, I prithee, sweet
055: wag, shall there be gallows standing in England when
056: thou art king? and resolution thus fobbed as it is
057: with the rusty curb of old father antic the law? Do
058: not thou, when thou art king, hang a thief.

PRINCE HENRY
059: No; thou shalt.

FALSTAFF
060: Shall I? O rare! By the Lord, I'll be a brave judge.

PRINCE HENRY
061: Thou judgest false already: I mean, thou shalt have
062: the hanging of the thieves and so become a rare hangman.

FALSTAFF
063: Well, Hal, well; and in some sort it jumps with my
064: humour as well as waiting in the court, I can tell
065: you.

PRINCE HENRY
066: For obtaining of suits?

FALSTAFF
067: Yea, for obtaining of suits, whereof the hangman
068: hath no lean wardrobe. 'Sblood, I am as melancholy
069: as a gib cat or a lugged bear.

PRINCE HENRY
070: Or an old lion, or a lover's lute.

FALSTAFF
071: Yea, or the drone of a Lincolnshire bagpipe.

PRINCE HENRY
072: What sayest thou to a hare, or the melancholy of
073: Moor-ditch?

FALSTAFF
074: Thou hast the most unsavoury similes and art indeed
075: the most comparative, rascalliest, sweet young
076: prince. But, Hal, I prithee, trouble me no more
077: with vanity. I would to God thou and I knew where a
078: commodity of good names were to be bought. An old
079: lord of the council rated me the other day in the
080: street about you, sir, but I marked him not; and yet
081: he talked very wisely, but I regarded him not; and
082: yet he talked wisely, and in the street too.

PRINCE HENRY
083: Thou didst well; for wisdom cries out in the
084: streets, and no man regards it.

FALSTAFF
085: O, thou hast damnable iteration and art indeed able
086: to corrupt a saint. Thou hast done much harm upon
087: me, Hal; God forgive thee for it! Before I knew
088: thee, Hal, I knew nothing; and now am I, if a man
089: should speak truly, little better than one of the
090: wicked. I must give over this life, and I will give
091: it over: by the Lord, and I do not, I am a villain:
092: I'll be damned for never a king's son in
093: Christendom.

PRINCE HENRY
094: Where shall we take a purse tomorrow, Jack?

FALSTAFF
095: 'Zounds, where thou wilt, lad; I'll make one; an I
096: do not, call me villain and baffle me.

PRINCE HENRY
097: I see a good amendment of life in thee; from praying
098: to purse-taking.

FALSTAFF
099: Why, Hal, 'tis my vocation, Hal; 'tis no sin for a
100: man to labour in his vocation.
[Enter POINS]
101: Poins! Now shall we know if Gadshill have set a
102: match. O, if men were to be saved by merit, what
103: hole in hell were hot enough for him? This is the
104: most omnipotent villain that ever cried 'Stand' to
105: a true man.

PRINCE HENRY
106: Good morrow, Ned.

POINS
107: Good morrow, sweet Hal. What says Monsieur Remorse?
108: what says Sir John Sack and Sugar? Jack! how
109: agrees the devil and thee about thy soul, that thou
110: soldest him on Good-Friday last for a cup of Madeira
111: and a cold capon's leg?

PRINCE HENRY
112: Sir John stands to his word, the devil shall have
113: his bargain; for he was never yet a breaker of
114: proverbs: he will give the devil his due.

POINS
115: Then art thou damned for keeping thy word with the devil.

PRINCE HENRY
116: Else he had been damned for cozening the devil.

POINS
117: But, my lads, my lads, to-morrow morning, by four
118: o'clock, early at Gadshill! there are pilgrims going
119: to Canterbury with rich offerings, and traders
120: riding to London with fat purses: I have vizards
121: for you all; you have horses for yourselves:
122: Gadshill lies to-night in Rochester: I have bespoke
123: supper to-morrow night in Eastcheap: we may do it
124: as secure as sleep. If you will go, I will stuff
125: your purses full of crowns; if you will not, tarry
126: at home and be hanged.

FALSTAFF
127: Hear ye, Yedward; if I tarry at home and go not,
128: I'll hang you for going.

POINS
129: You will, chops?

FALSTAFF
130: Hal, wilt thou make one?

PRINCE HENRY
131: Who, I rob? I a thief? not I, by my faith.

FALSTAFF
132: There's neither honesty, manhood, nor good
133: fellowship in thee, nor thou camest not of the blood
134: royal, if thou darest not stand for ten shillings.

PRINCE HENRY
135: Well then, once in my days I'll be a madcap.

FALSTAFF
136: Why, that's well said.

PRINCE HENRY
137: Well, come what will, I'll tarry at home.

FALSTAFF
138: By the Lord, I'll be a traitor then, when thou art king.

PRINCE HENRY
139: I care not.

POINS
140: Sir John, I prithee, leave the prince and me alone:
141: I will lay him down such reasons for this adventure
142: that he shall go.

FALSTAFF
143: Well, God give thee the spirit of persuasion and him
144: the ears of profiting, that what thou speakest may
145: move and what he hears may be believed, that the
146: true prince may, for recreation sake, prove a false
147: thief; for the poor abuses of the time want
148: countenance. Farewell: you shall find me in Eastcheap.

PRINCE HENRY
149: Farewell, thou latter spring! farewell, All-hallown summer!

Exit Falstaff

POINS
150: Now, my good sweet honey lord, ride with us
151: to-morrow: I have a jest to execute that I cannot
152: manage alone. Falstaff, Bardolph, Peto and Gadshill
153: shall rob those men that we have already waylaid:
154: yourself and I will not be there; and when they
155: have the booty, if you and I do not rob them, cut
156: this head off from my shoulders.

PRINCE HENRY
157: How shall we part with them in setting forth?

POINS
158: Why, we will set forth before or after them, and
159: appoint them a place of meeting, wherein it is at
160: our pleasure to fail, and then will they adventure
161: upon the exploit themselves; which they shall have
162: no sooner achieved, but we'll set upon them.

PRINCE HENRY
163: Yea, but 'tis like that they will know us by our
164: horses, by our habits and by every other
165: appointment, to be ourselves.

POINS
166: Tut! our horses they shall not see: I'll tie them
167: in the wood; our vizards we will change after we
168: leave them: and, sirrah, I have cases of buckram
169: for the nonce, to immask our noted outward garments.

PRINCE HENRY
170: Yea, but I doubt they will be too hard for us.

POINS
171: Well, for two of them, I know them to be as
172: true-bred cowards as ever turned back; and for the
173: third, if he fight longer than he sees reason, I'll
174: forswear arms. The virtue of this jest will be, the
175: incomprehensible lies that this same fat rogue will
176: tell us when we meet at supper: how thirty, at
177: least, he fought with; what wards, what blows, what
178: extremities he endured; and in the reproof of this
179: lies the jest.

PRINCE HENRY
180: Well, I'll go with thee: provide us all things
181: necessary and meet me to-morrow night in Eastcheap;
182: there I'll sup. Farewell.

POINS
183: Farewell, my lord.

Exit Poins

PRINCE HENRY
184: I know you all, and will awhile uphold
185: The unyoked humour of your idleness:
186: Yet herein will I imitate the sun,
187: Who doth permit the base contagious clouds
188: To smother up his beauty from the world,
189: That, when he please again to be himself,
190: Being wanted, he may be more wonder'd at,
191: By breaking through the foul and ugly mists
192: Of vapours that did seem to strangle him.
193: If all the year were playing holidays,
194: To sport would be as tedious as to work;
195: But when they seldom come, they wish'd for come,
196: And nothing pleaseth but rare accidents.
197: So, when this loose behavior I throw off
198: And pay the debt I never promised,
199: By how much better than my word I am,
200: By so much shall I falsify men's hopes;
201: And like bright metal on a sullen ground,
202: My reformation, glittering o'er my fault,
203: Shall show more goodly and attract more eyes
204: Than that which hath no foil to set it off.
205: I'll so offend, to make offence a skill;
206: Redeeming time when men think least I will.

Exit

ACT I, SCENE III.

London. The palace.

Enter the KING, NORTHUMBERLAND, WORCESTER, HOTSPUR, SIR WALTER BLUNT, with others

KING HENRY IV
001: My blood hath been too cold and temperate,
002: Unapt to stir at these indignities,
003: And you have found me; for accordingly
004: You tread upon my patience: but be sure
005: I will from henceforth rather be myself,
006: Mighty and to be fear'd, than my condition;
007: Which hath been smooth as oil, soft as young down,
008: And therefore lost that title of respect
009: Which the proud soul ne'er pays but to the proud.

EARL OF WORCESTER
010: Our house, my sovereign liege, little deserves
011: The scourge of greatness to be used on it;
012: And that same greatness too which our own hands
013: Have holp to make so portly.

NORTHUMBERLAND
014: My lord.--

KING HENRY IV
015: Worcester, get thee gone; for I do see
016: Danger and disobedience in thine eye:
017: O, sir, your presence is too bold and peremptory,
018: And majesty might never yet endure
019: The moody frontier of a servant brow.
020: You have good leave to leave us: when we need
021: Your use and counsel, we shall send for you.

Exit Worcester

KING HENRY IV [To North]
022: You were about to speak.

NORTHUMBERLAND
023: Yea, my good lord.
024: Those prisoners in your highness' name demanded,
025: Which Harry Percy here at Holmedon took,
026: Were, as he says, not with such strength denied
027: As is deliver'd to your majesty:
028: Either envy, therefore, or misprison
029: Is guilty of this fault and not my son.

HOTSPUR
030: My liege, I did deny no prisoners.
031: But I remember, when the fight was done,
032: When I was dry with rage and extreme toil,
033: Breathless and faint, leaning upon my sword,
034: Came there a certain lord, neat, and trimly dress'd,
035: Fresh as a bridegroom; and his chin new reap'd
036: Show'd like a stubble-land at harvest-home;
037: He was perfumed like a milliner;
038: And 'twixt his finger and his thumb he held
039: A pouncet-box, which ever and anon
040: He gave his nose and took't away again;
041: Who therewith angry, when it next came there,
042: Took it in snuff; and still he smiled and talk'd,
043: And as the soldiers bore dead bodies by,
044: He call'd them untaught knaves, unmannerly,
045: To bring a slovenly unhandsome corse
046: Betwixt the wind and his nobility.
047: With many holiday and lady terms
048: He question'd me; amongst the rest, demanded
049: My prisoners in your majesty's behalf.
050: I then, all smarting with my wounds being cold,
051: To be so pester'd with a popinjay,
052: Out of my grief and my impatience,
053: Answer'd neglectingly I know not what,
054: He should or he should not; for he made me mad
055: To see him shine so brisk and smell so sweet
056: And talk so like a waiting-gentlewoman
057: Of guns and drums and wounds,--God save the mark!--
058: And telling me the sovereign'st thing on earth
059: Was parmaceti for an inward bruise;
060: And that it was great pity, so it was,
061: This villanous salt-petre should be digg'd
062: Out of the bowels of the harmless earth,
063: Which many a good tall fellow had destroy'd
064: So cowardly; and but for these vile guns,
065: He would himself have been a soldier.
066: This bald unjointed chat of his, my lord,
067: I answer'd indirectly, as I said;
068: And I beseech you, let not his report
069: Come current for an accusation
070: Betwixt my love and your high majesty.

SIR WALTER BLUNT
071: The circumstance consider'd, good my lord,
072: Whate'er Lord Harry Percy then had said
073: To such a person and in such a place,
074: At such a time, with all the rest retold,
075: May reasonably die and never rise
076: To do him wrong or any way impeach
077: What then he said, so he unsay it now.

KING HENRY IV
078: Why, yet he doth deny his prisoners,
079: But with proviso and exception,
080: That we at our own charge shall ransom straight
081: His brother-in-law, the foolish Mortimer;
082: Who, on my soul, hath wilfully betray'd
083: The lives of those that he did lead to fight
084: Against that great magician, damn'd Glendower,
085: Whose daughter, as we hear, the Earl of March
086: Hath lately married. Shall our coffers, then,
087: Be emptied to redeem a traitor home?
088: Shall we but treason? and indent with fears,
089: When they have lost and forfeited themselves?
090: No, on the barren mountains let him starve;
091: For I shall never hold that man my friend
092: Whose tongue shall ask me for one penny cost
093: To ransom home revolted Mortimer.

HOTSPUR
094: Revolted Mortimer!
095: He never did fall off, my sovereign liege,
096: But by the chance of war; to prove that true
097: Needs no more but one tongue for all those wounds,
098: Those mouthed wounds, which valiantly he took
099: When on the gentle Severn's sedgy bank,
100: In single opposition, hand to hand,
101: He did confound the best part of an hour
102: In changing hardiment with great Glendower:
103: Three times they breathed and three times did
104: they drink,
105: Upon agreement, of swift Severn's flood;
106: Who then, affrighted with their bloody looks,
107: Ran fearfully among the trembling reeds,
108: And hid his crisp head in the hollow bank,
109: Bloodstained with these valiant combatants.
110: Never did base and rotten policy
111: Colour her working with such deadly wounds;
112: Nor could the noble Mortimer
113: Receive so many, and all willingly:
114: Then let not him be slander'd with revolt.

KING HENRY IV
115: Thou dost belie him, Percy, thou dost belie him;
116: He never did encounter with Glendower:
117: I tell thee,
118: He durst as well have met the devil alone
119: As Owen Glendower for an enemy.
120: Art thou not ashamed? But, sirrah, henceforth
121: Let me not hear you speak of Mortimer:
122: Send me your prisoners with the speediest means,
123: Or you shall hear in such a kind from me
124: As will displease you. My Lord Northumberland,
125: We licence your departure with your son.
126: Send us your prisoners, or you will hear of it.

Exeunt King Henry, Blunt, and train

HOTSPUR
127: An if the devil come and roar for them,
128: I will not send them: I will after straight
129: And tell him so; for I will ease my heart,
130: Albeit I make a hazard of my head.

NORTHUMBERLAND
131: What, drunk with choler? stay and pause awhile:
132: Here comes your uncle.

Re-enter WORCESTER

HOTSPUR
133: Speak of Mortimer!
134: 'Zounds, I will speak of him; and let my soul
135: Want mercy, if I do not join with him:
136: Yea, on his part I'll empty all these veins,
137: And shed my dear blood drop by drop in the dust,
138: But I will lift the down-trod Mortimer
139: As high in the air as this unthankful king,
140: As this ingrate and canker'd Bolingbroke.

NORTHUMBERLAND
141: Brother, the king hath made your nephew mad.

EARL OF WORCESTER
142: Who struck this heat up after I was gone?

HOTSPUR
143: He will, forsooth, have all my prisoners;
144: And when I urged the ransom once again
145: Of my wife's brother, then his cheek look'd pale,
146: And on my face he turn'd an eye of death,
147: Trembling even at the name of Mortimer.

EARL OF WORCESTER
148: I cannot blame him: was not he proclaim'd
149: By Richard that dead is the next of blood?

NORTHUMBERLAND
150: He was; I heard the proclamation:
151: And then it was when the unhappy king,
152: --Whose wrongs in us God pardon!--did set forth
153: Upon his Irish expedition;
154: From whence he intercepted did return
155: To be deposed and shortly murdered.

EARL OF WORCESTER
156: And for whose death we in the world's wide mouth
157: Live scandalized and foully spoken of.

HOTSPUR
158: But soft, I pray you; did King Richard then
159: Proclaim my brother Edmund Mortimer
160: Heir to the crown?

NORTHUMBERLAND
161: He did; myself did hear it.

HOTSPUR
162: Nay, then I cannot blame his cousin king,
163: That wished him on the barren mountains starve.
164: But shall it be that you, that set the crown
165: Upon the head of this forgetful man
166: And for his sake wear the detested blot
167: Of murderous subornation, shall it be,
168: That you a world of curses undergo,
169: Being the agents, or base second means,
170: The cords, the ladder, or the hangman rather?
171: O, pardon me that I descend so low,
172: To show the line and the predicament
173: Wherein you range under this subtle king;
174: Shall it for shame be spoken in these days,
175: Or fill up chronicles in time to come,
176: That men of your nobility and power
177: Did gage them both in an unjust behalf,
178: As both of you--God pardon it!--have done,
179: To put down Richard, that sweet lovely rose,
180: An plant this thorn, this canker, Bolingbroke?
181: And shall it in more shame be further spoken,
182: That you are fool'd, discarded and shook off
183: By him for whom these shames ye underwent?
184: No; yet time serves wherein you may redeem
185: Your banish'd honours and restore yourselves
186: Into the good thoughts of the world again,
187: Revenge the jeering and disdain'd contempt
188: Of this proud king, who studies day and night
189: To answer all the debt he owes to you
190: Even with the bloody payment of your deaths:
191: Therefore, I say--

EARL OF WORCESTER
192: Peace, cousin, say no more:
193: And now I will unclasp a secret book,
194: And to your quick-conceiving discontents
195: I'll read you matter deep and dangerous,
196: As full of peril and adventurous spirit
197: As to o'er-walk a current roaring loud
198: On the unsteadfast footing of a spear.

HOTSPUR
199: If he fall in, good night! or sink or swim:
200: Send danger from the east unto the west,
201: So honour cross it from the north to south,
202: And let them grapple: O, the blood more stirs
203: To rouse a lion than to start a hare!

NORTHUMBERLAND
204: Imagination of some great exploit
205: Drives him beyond the bounds of patience.

HOTSPUR
206: By heaven, methinks it were an easy leap,
207: To pluck bright honour from the pale-faced moon,
208: Or dive into the bottom of the deep,
209: Where fathom-line could never touch the ground,
210: And pluck up drowned honour by the locks;
211: So he that doth redeem her thence might wear
212: Without corrival, all her dignities:
213: But out upon this half-faced fellowship!

EARL OF WORCESTER
214: He apprehends a world of figures here,
215: But not the form of what he should attend.
216: Good cousin, give me audience for a while.

HOTSPUR
217: I cry you mercy.

EARL OF WORCESTER
218: Those same noble Scots
219: That are your prisoners,--

HOTSPUR
220: I'll keep them all;
221: By God, he shall not have a Scot of them;
222: No, if a Scot would save his soul, he shall not:
223: I'll keep them, by this hand.

EARL OF WORCESTER
224: You start away
225: And lend no ear unto my purposes.
226: Those prisoners you shall keep.

HOTSPUR
227: Nay, I will; that's flat:
228: He said he would not ransom Mortimer;
229: Forbad my tongue to speak of Mortimer;
230: But I will find him when he lies asleep,
231: And in his ear I'll holla 'Mortimer!'
232: Nay,
233: I'll have a starling shall be taught to speak
234: Nothing but 'Mortimer,' and give it him
235: To keep his anger still in motion.

EARL OF WORCESTER
236: Hear you, cousin; a word.

HOTSPUR
237: All studies here I solemnly defy,
238: Save how to gall and pinch this Bolingbroke:
239: And that same sword-and-buckler Prince of Wales,
240: But that I think his father loves him not
241: And would be glad he met with some mischance,
242: I would have him poison'd with a pot of ale.

EARL OF WORCESTER
243: Farewell, kinsman: I'll talk to you
244: When you are better temper'd to attend.

NORTHUMBERLAND
245: Why, what a wasp-stung and impatient fool
246: Art thou to break into this woman's mood,
247: Tying thine ear to no tongue but thine own!

HOTSPUR
248: Why, look you, I am whipp'd and scourged with rods,
249: Nettled and stung with pismires, when I hear
250: Of this vile politician, Bolingbroke.
251: In Richard's time,--what do you call the place?--
252: A plague upon it, it is in Gloucestershire;
253: 'Twas where the madcap duke his uncle kept,
254: His uncle York; where I first bow'd my knee
255: Unto this king of smiles, this Bolingbroke,--
256: 'Sblood!--
257: When you and he came back from Ravenspurgh.

NORTHUMBERLAND
258: At Berkley castle.

HOTSPUR
259: You say true:
260: Why, what a candy deal of courtesy
261: This fawning greyhound then did proffer me!
262: Look,'when his infant fortune came to age,'
263: And 'gentle Harry Percy,' and 'kind cousin;'
264: O, the devil take such cozeners! God forgive me!
265: Good uncle, tell your tale; I have done.

EARL OF WORCESTER
266: Nay, if you have not, to it again;
267: We will stay your leisure.

HOTSPUR
268: I have done, i' faith.

EARL OF WORCESTER
269: Then once more to your Scottish prisoners.
270: Deliver them up without their ransom straight,
271: And make the Douglas' son your only mean
272: For powers in Scotland; which, for divers reasons
273: Which I shall send you written, be assured,
274: Will easily be granted. You, my lord,
[To Northumberland]
275: Your son in Scotland being thus employ'd,
276: Shall secretly into the bosom creep
277: Of that same noble prelate, well beloved,
278: The archbishop.

HOTSPUR
279: Of York, is it not?

EARL OF WORCESTER
280: True; who bears hard
281: His brother's death at Bristol, the Lord Scroop.
282: I speak not this in estimation,
283: As what I think might be, but what I know
284: Is ruminated, plotted and set down,
285: And only stays but to behold the face
286: Of that occasion that shall bring it on.

HOTSPUR
287: I smell it: upon my life, it will do well.

NORTHUMBERLAND
288: Before the game is afoot, thou still let'st slip.

HOTSPUR
289: Why, it cannot choose but be a noble plot;
290: And then the power of Scotland and of York,
291: To join with Mortimer, ha?

EARL OF WORCESTER
292: And so they shall.

HOTSPUR
293: In faith, it is exceedingly well aim'd.

EARL OF WORCESTER
294: And 'tis no little reason bids us speed,
295: To save our heads by raising of a head;
296: For, bear ourselves as even as we can,
297: The king will always think him in our debt,
298: And think we think ourselves unsatisfied,
299: Till he hath found a time to pay us home:
300: And see already how he doth begin
301: To make us strangers to his looks of love.

HOTSPUR
302: He does, he does: we'll be revenged on him.

EARL OF WORCESTER
303: Cousin, farewell: no further go in this
304: Than I by letters shall direct your course.
305: When time is ripe, which will be suddenly,
306: I'll steal to Glendower and Lord Mortimer;
307: Where you and Douglas and our powers at once,
308: As I will fashion it, shall happily meet,
309: To bear our fortunes in our own strong arms,
310: Which now we hold at much uncertainty.

NORTHUMBERLAND
311: Farewell, good brother: we shall thrive, I trust.

HOTSPUR
312: Uncle, Adieu: O, let the hours be short
313: Till fields and blows and groans applaud our sport!

Exeunt

ACT II, SCENE I.

Rochester. An inn yard.

Enter a Carrier with a lantern in his hand

First Carrier
001: Heigh-ho! an it be not four by the day, I'll be
002: hanged: Charles' wain is over the new chimney, and
003: yet our horse not packed. What, ostler!

Ostler [Within]
004: Anon, anon.

First Carrier
005: I prithee, Tom, beat Cut's saddle, put a few flocks
006: in the point; poor jade, is wrung in the withers out
007: of all cess.

Enter another Carrier

Second Carrier
008: Peas and beans are as dank here as a dog, and that
009: is the next way to give poor jades the bots: this
010: house is turned upside down since Robin Ostler died.

First Carrier
011: Poor fellow, never joyed since the price of oats
012: rose; it was the death of him.

Second Carrier
013: I think this be the most villanous house in all
014: London road for fleas: I am stung like a tench.

First Carrier
015: Like a tench! by the mass, there is ne'er a king
016: christen could be better bit than I have been since
017: the first cock.

Second Carrier
018: Why, they will allow us ne'er a jordan, and then we
019: leak in your chimney; and your chamber-lie breeds
020: fleas like a loach.

First Carrier
021: What, ostler! come away and be hanged!

Second Carrier
022: I have a gammon of bacon and two razors of ginger,
023: to be delivered as far as Charing-cross.

First Carrier
024: God's body! the turkeys in my pannier are quite
025: starved. What, ostler! A plague on thee! hast thou
026: never an eye in thy head? canst not hear? An
027: 'twere not as good deed as drink, to break the pate
028: on thee, I am a very villain. Come, and be hanged!
029: hast thou no faith in thee?

Enter GADSHILL

GADSHILL
030: Good morrow, carriers. What's o'clock?

First Carrier
031: I think it be two o'clock.

GADSHILL
032: I pray thee lend me thy lantern, to see my gelding
033: in the stable.

First Carrier
034: Nay, by God, soft; I know a trick worth two of that, i' faith.

GADSHILL
035: I pray thee, lend me thine.

Second Carrier
036: Ay, when? can'st tell? Lend me thy lantern, quoth
037: he? marry, I'll see thee hanged first.

GADSHILL
038: Sirrah carrier, what time do you mean to come to London?

Second Carrier
039: Time enough to go to bed with a candle, I warrant
040: thee. Come, neighbour Mugs, we'll call up the
041: gentleman: they will along with company, for they
042: have great charge.

Exeunt carriers

GADSHILL
043: What, ho! chamberlain!

Chamberlain [Within]
044: At hand, quoth pick-purse.

GADSHILL
045: That's even as fair as--at hand, quoth the
046: chamberlain; for thou variest no more from picking
047: of purses than giving direction doth from labouring;
048: thou layest the plot how.

Enter Chamberlain

Chamberlain
049: Good morrow, Master Gadshill. It holds current that
050: I told you yesternight: there's a franklin in the
051: wild of Kent hath brought three hundred marks with
052: him in gold: I heard him tell it to one of his
053: company last night at supper; a kind of auditor; one
054: that hath abundance of charge too, God knows what.
055: They are up already, and call for eggs and butter;
056: they will away presently.

GADSHILL
057: Sirrah, if they meet not with Saint Nicholas'
058: clerks, I'll give thee this neck.

Chamberlain
059: No, I'll none of it: I pray thee keep that for the
060: hangman; for I know thou worshippest St. Nicholas
061: as truly as a man of falsehood may.

GADSHILL
062: What talkest thou to me of the hangman? if I hang,
063: I'll make a fat pair of gallows; for if I hang, old
064: Sir John hangs with me, and thou knowest he is no
065: starveling. Tut! there are other Trojans that thou
066: dreamest not of, the which for sport sake are
067: content to do the profession some grace; that would,
068: if matters should be looked into, for their own
069: credit sake, make all whole. I am joined with no
070: foot-land rakers, no long-staff sixpenny strikers,
071: none of these mad mustachio purple-hued malt-worms;
072: but with nobility and tranquillity, burgomasters and
073: great oneyers, such as can hold in, such as will
074: strike sooner than speak, and speak sooner than
075: drink, and drink sooner than pray: and yet, zounds,
076: I lie; for they pray continually to their saint, the
077: commonwealth; or rather, not pray to her, but prey
078: on her, for they ride up and down on her and make
079: her their boots.

Chamberlain
080: What, the commonwealth their boots? will she hold
081: out water in foul way?

GADSHILL
082: She will, she will; justice hath liquored her. We
083: steal as in a castle, cocksure; we have the receipt
084: of fern-seed, we walk invisible.

Chamberlain
085: Nay, by my faith, I think you are more beholding to
086: the night than to fern-seed for your walking invisible.

GADSHILL
087: Give me thy hand: thou shalt have a share in our
088: purchase, as I am a true man.

Chamberlain
089: Nay, rather let me have it, as you are a false thief.

GADSHILL
090: Go to; 'homo' is a common name to all men. Bid the
091: ostler bring my gelding out of the stable. Farewell,
092: you muddy knave.

Exeunt

ACT II, SCENE II.

The highway, near Gadshill.

Enter PRINCE HENRY and POINS

POINS
001: Come, shelter, shelter: I have removed Falstaff's
002: horse, and he frets like a gummed velvet.

PRINCE HENRY
003: Stand close.

Enter FALSTAFF

FALSTAFF
004: Poins! Poins, and be hanged! Poins!

PRINCE HENRY
005: Peace, ye fat-kidneyed rascal! what a brawling dost
006: thou keep!

FALSTAFF
007: Where's Poins, Hal?

PRINCE HENRY
008: He is walked up to the top of the hill: I'll go seek him.

FALSTAFF
009: I am accursed to rob in that thief's company: the
010: rascal hath removed my horse, and tied him I know
011: not where. If I travel but four foot by the squier
012: further afoot, I shall break my wind. Well, I doubt
013: not but to die a fair death for all this, if I
014: 'scape hanging for killing that rogue. I have
015: forsworn his company hourly any time this two and
016: twenty years, and yet I am bewitched with the
017: rogue's company. If the rascal hath not given me
018: medicines to make me love him, I'll be hanged; it
019: could not be else: I have drunk medicines. Poins!
020: Hal! a plague upon you both! Bardolph! Peto!
021: I'll starve ere I'll rob a foot further. An 'twere
022: not as good a deed as drink, to turn true man and to
023: leave these rogues, I am the veriest varlet that
024: ever chewed with a tooth. Eight yards of uneven
025: ground is threescore and ten miles afoot with me;
026: and the stony-hearted villains know it well enough:
027: a plague upon it when thieves cannot be true one to another!
[They whistle]
028: Whew! A plague upon you all! Give me my horse, you
029: rogues; give me my horse, and be hanged!

PRINCE HENRY
030: Peace, ye fat-guts! lie down; lay thine ear close
031: to the ground and list if thou canst hear the tread
032: of travellers.

FALSTAFF
033: Have you any levers to lift me up again, being down?
034: 'Sblood, I'll not bear mine own flesh so far afoot
035: again for all the coin in thy father's exchequer.
036: What a plague mean ye to colt me thus?

PRINCE HENRY
037: Thou liest; thou art not colted, thou art uncolted.

FALSTAFF
038: I prithee, good Prince Hal, help me to my horse,
039: good king's son.

PRINCE HENRY
040: Out, ye rogue! shall I be your ostler?

FALSTAFF
041: Go, hang thyself in thine own heir-apparent
042: garters! If I be ta'en, I'll peach for this. An I
043: have not ballads made on you all and sung to filthy
044: tunes, let a cup of sack be my poison: when a jest
045: is so forward, and afoot too! I hate it.

Enter GADSHILL, BARDOLPH and PETO

GADSHILL
046: Stand.

FALSTAFF
047: So I do, against my will.

POINS
048: O, 'tis our setter: I know his voice. Bardolph,
049: what news?

BARDOLPH
050: Case ye, case ye; on with your vizards: there 's
051: money of the king's coming down the hill; 'tis going
052: to the king's exchequer.

FALSTAFF
053: You lie, ye rogue; 'tis going to the king's tavern.

GADSHILL
054: There's enough to make us all.

FALSTAFF
055: To be hanged.

PRINCE HENRY
056: Sirs, you four shall front them in the narrow lane;
057: Ned Poins and I will walk lower: if they 'scape
058: from your encounter, then they light on us.

PETO
059: How many be there of them?

GADSHILL
060: Some eight or ten.

FALSTAFF
061: 'Zounds, will they not rob us?

PRINCE HENRY
062: What, a coward, Sir John Paunch?

FALSTAFF
063: Indeed, I am not John of Gaunt, your grandfather;
064: but yet no coward, Hal.

PRINCE HENRY
065: Well, we leave that to the proof.

POINS
066: Sirrah Jack, thy horse stands behind the hedge:
067: when thou needest him, there thou shalt find him.
068: Farewell, and stand fast.

FALSTAFF
069: Now cannot I strike him, if I should be hanged.

PRINCE HENRY
070: Ned, where are our disguises?

POINS
071: Here, hard by: stand close.

Exeunt PRINCE HENRY and POINS

FALSTAFF
072: Now, my masters, happy man be his dole, say I:
073: every man to his business.

Enter the Travellers

First Traveller
074: Come, neighbour: the boy shall lead our horses down
075: the hill; we'll walk afoot awhile, and ease our legs.

Thieves
076: Stand!

Travellers
077: Jesus bless us!

FALSTAFF
078: Strike; down with them; cut the villains' throats:
079: ah! whoreson caterpillars! bacon-fed knaves! they
080: hate us youth: down with them: fleece them.

Travellers, First Traveller
081: O, we are undone, both we and ours for ever!

FALSTAFF
082: Hang ye, gorbellied knaves, are ye undone? No, ye
083: fat chuffs: I would your store were here! On,
084: bacons, on! What, ye knaves! young men must live.
085: You are Grand-jurors, are ye? we'll jure ye, 'faith.

Here they rob them and bind them. Exeunt

Re-enter PRINCE HENRY and POINS

PRINCE HENRY
086: The thieves have bound the true men. Now could thou
087: and I rob the thieves and go merrily to London, it
088: would be argument for a week, laughter for a month
089: and a good jest for ever.

POINS
090: Stand close; I hear them coming.

Enter the Thieves again

FALSTAFF
091: Come, my masters, let us share, and then to horse
092: before day. An the Prince and Poins be not two
093: arrant cowards, there's no equity stirring: there's
094: no more valour in that Poins than in a wild-duck.

PRINCE HENRY
095: Your money!

POINS
096: Villains!

As they are sharing, the Prince and Poins set upon them; they all run away; and Falstaff, after a blow or two, runs away too, leaving the booty behind them

PRINCE HENRY
097: Got with much ease. Now merrily to horse:
098: The thieves are all scatter'd and possess'd with fear
099: So strongly that they dare not meet each other;
100: Each takes his fellow for an officer.
101: Away, good Ned. Falstaff sweats to death,
102: And lards the lean earth as he walks along:
103: Were 't not for laughing, I should pity him.

POINS
104: How the rogue roar'd!

Exeunt

ACT II, SCENE III.

Warkworth castle

Enter HOTSPUR, solus, reading a letter

HOTSPUR
001: 'But for mine own part, my lord, I could be well
002: contented to be there, in respect of the love I bear
003: your house.' He could be contented: why is he not,
004: then? In respect of the love he bears our house:
005: he shows in this, he loves his own barn better than
006: he loves our house. Let me see some more. 'The
007: purpose you undertake is dangerous;'--why, that's
008: certain: 'tis dangerous to take a cold, to sleep, to
009: drink; but I tell you, my lord fool, out of this
010: nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety. 'The
011: purpose you undertake is dangerous; the friends you
012: have named uncertain; the time itself unsorted; and
013: your whole plot too light for the counterpoise of so
014: great an opposition.' Say you so, say you so? I say
015: unto you again, you are a shallow cowardly hind, and
016: you lie. What a lack-brain is this! By the Lord,
017: our plot is a good plot as ever was laid; our
018: friends true and constant: a good plot, good
019: friends, and full of expectation; an excellent plot,
020: very good friends. What a frosty-spirited rogue is
021: this! Why, my lord of York commends the plot and the
022: general course of action. 'Zounds, an I were now by
023: this rascal, I could brain him with his lady's fan.
024: Is there not my father, my uncle and myself? lord
025: Edmund Mortimer, My lord of York and Owen Glendower?
026: is there not besides the Douglas? have I not all
027: their letters to meet me in arms by the ninth of the
028: next month? and are they not some of them set
029: forward already? What a pagan rascal is this! an
030: infidel! Ha! you shall see now in very sincerity
031: of fear and cold heart, will he to the king and lay
032: open all our proceedings. O, I could divide myself
033: and go to buffets, for moving such a dish of
034: skim milk with so honourable an action! Hang him!
035: let him tell the king: we are prepared. I will set
036: forward to-night.
[Enter LADY PERCY]
037: How now, Kate! I must leave you within these two hours.

LADY PERCY
038: O, my good lord, why are you thus alone?
039: For what offence have I this fortnight been
040: A banish'd woman from my Harry's bed?
041: Tell me, sweet lord, what is't that takes from thee
042: Thy stomach, pleasure and thy golden sleep?
043: Why dost thou bend thine eyes upon the earth,
044: And start so often when thou sit'st alone?
045: Why hast thou lost the fresh blood in thy cheeks;
046: And given my treasures and my rights of thee
047: To thick-eyed musing and cursed melancholy?
048: In thy faint slumbers I by thee have watch'd,
049: And heard thee murmur tales of iron wars;
050: Speak terms of manage to thy bounding steed;
051: Cry 'Courage! to the field!' And thou hast talk'd
052: Of sallies and retires, of trenches, tents,
053: Of palisadoes, frontiers, parapets,
054: Of basilisks, of cannon, culverin,
055: Of prisoners' ransom and of soldiers slain,
056: And all the currents of a heady fight.
057: Thy spirit within thee hath been so at war
058: And thus hath so bestirr'd thee in thy sleep,
059: That beads of sweat have stood upon thy brow
060: Like bubbles in a late-disturbed stream;
061: And in thy face strange motions have appear'd,
062: Such as we see when men restrain their breath
063: On some great sudden hest. O, what portents are these?
064: Some heavy business hath my lord in hand,
065: And I must know it, else he loves me not.

HOTSPUR
066: What, ho!
[Enter Servant]
067: Is Gilliams with the packet gone?

Servant
068: He is, my lord, an hour ago.

HOTSPUR
069: Hath Butler brought those horses from the sheriff?

Servant
070: One horse, my lord, he brought even now.

HOTSPUR
071: What horse? a roan, a crop-ear, is it not?

Servant
072: It is, my lord.

HOTSPUR
073: That roan shall by my throne.
074: Well, I will back him straight: O esperance!
075: Bid Butler lead him forth into the park.

Exit Servant

LADY PERCY
076: But hear you, my lord.

HOTSPUR
077: What say'st thou, my lady?

LADY PERCY
078: What is it carries you away?

HOTSPUR
079: Why, my horse, my love, my horse.

LADY PERCY
080: Out, you mad-headed ape!
081: A weasel hath not such a deal of spleen
082: As you are toss'd with. In faith,
083: I'll know your business, Harry, that I will.
084: I fear my brother Mortimer doth stir
085: About his title, and hath sent for you
086: To line his enterprise: but if you go,--

HOTSPUR
087: So far afoot, I shall be weary, love.

LADY PERCY
088: Come, come, you paraquito, answer me
089: Directly unto this question that I ask:
090: In faith, I'll break thy little finger, Harry,
091: An if thou wilt not tell me all things true.

HOTSPUR
092: Away,
093: Away, you trifler! Love! I love thee not,
094: I care not for thee, Kate: this is no world
095: To play with mammets and to tilt with lips:
096: We must have bloody noses and crack'd crowns,
097: And pass them current too. God's me, my horse!
098: What say'st thou, Kate? what would'st thou
099: have with me?

LADY PERCY
100: Do you not love me? do you not, indeed?
101: Well, do not then; for since you love me not,
102: I will not love myself. Do you not love me?
103: Nay, tell me if you speak in jest or no.

HOTSPUR
104: Come, wilt thou see me ride?
105: And when I am on horseback, I will swear
106: I love thee infinitely. But hark you, Kate;
107: I must not have you henceforth question me
108: Whither I go, nor reason whereabout:
109: Whither I must, I must; and, to conclude,
110: This evening must I leave you, gentle Kate.
111: I know you wise, but yet no farther wise
112: Than Harry Percy's wife: constant you are,
113: But yet a woman: and for secrecy,
114: No lady closer; for I well believe
115: Thou wilt not utter what thou dost not know;
116: And so far will I trust thee, gentle Kate.

LADY PERCY
117: How! so far?

HOTSPUR
118: Not an inch further. But hark you, Kate:
119: Whither I go, thither shall you go too;
120: To-day will I set forth, to-morrow you.
121: Will this content you, Kate?

LADY PERCY
122: It must of force.

Exeunt

ACT II, SCENE IV.

The Boar's-Head Tavern, Eastcheap.

Enter PRINCE HENRY and POINS

PRINCE HENRY
001: Ned, prithee, come out of that fat room, and lend me
002: thy hand to laugh a little.

POINS
003: Where hast been, Hal?

PRINCE HENRY
004: With three or four loggerheads amongst three or four
005: score hogsheads. I have sounded the very
006: base-string of humility. Sirrah, I am sworn brother
007: to a leash of drawers; and can call them all by
008: their christen names, as Tom, Dick, and Francis.
009: They take it already upon their salvation, that
010: though I be but the prince of Wales, yet I am king
011: of courtesy; and tell me flatly I am no proud Jack,
012: like Falstaff, but a Corinthian, a lad of mettle, a
013: good boy, by the Lord, so they call me, and when I
014: am king of England, I shall command all the good
015: lads in Eastcheap. They call drinking deep, dyeing
016: scarlet; and when you breathe in your watering, they
017: cry 'hem!' and bid you play it off. To conclude, I
018: am so good a proficient in one quarter of an hour,
019: that I can drink with any tinker in his own language
020: during my life. I tell thee, Ned, thou hast lost
021: much honour, that thou wert not with me in this sweet
022: action. But, sweet Ned,--to sweeten which name of
023: Ned, I give thee this pennyworth of sugar, clapped
024: even now into my hand by an under-skinker, one that
025: never spake other English in his life than 'Eight
026: shillings and sixpence' and 'You are welcome,' with
027: this shrill addition, 'Anon, anon, sir! Score a pint
028: of bastard in the Half-Moon,' or so. But, Ned, to
029: drive away the time till Falstaff come, I prithee,
030: do thou stand in some by-room, while I question my
031: puny drawer to what end he gave me the sugar; and do
032: thou never leave calling 'Francis,' that his tale
033: to me may be nothing but 'Anon.' Step aside, and
034: I'll show thee a precedent.

POINS
035: Francis!

PRINCE HENRY
036: Thou art perfect.

POINS
037: Francis!

Exit POINS

Enter FRANCIS

FRANCIS
038: Anon, anon, sir. Look down into the Pomgarnet, Ralph.

PRINCE HENRY
039: Come hither, Francis.

FRANCIS
040: My lord?

PRINCE HENRY
041: How long hast thou to serve, Francis?

FRANCIS
042: Forsooth, five years, and as much as to--

POINS [Within]
043: Francis!

FRANCIS
044: Anon, anon, sir.

PRINCE HENRY
045: Five year! by'r lady, a long lease for the clinking
046: of pewter. But, Francis, darest thou be so valiant
047: as to play the coward with thy indenture and show it
048: a fair pair of heels and run from it?

FRANCIS
049: O Lord, sir, I'll be sworn upon all the books in
050: England, I could find in my heart.

POINS [Within]
051: Francis!

FRANCIS
052: Anon, sir.

PRINCE HENRY
053: How old art thou, Francis?

FRANCIS
054: Let me see--about Michaelmas next I shall be--

POINS [Within]
055: Francis!

FRANCIS
056: Anon, sir. Pray stay a little, my lord.

PRINCE HENRY
057: Nay, but hark you, Francis: for the sugar thou
058: gavest me,'twas a pennyworth, wast't not?

FRANCIS
059: O Lord, I would it had been two!

PRINCE HENRY
060: I will give thee for it a thousand pound: ask me
061: when thou wilt, and thou shalt have it.

POINS [Within]
062: Francis!

FRANCIS
063: Anon, anon.

PRINCE HENRY
064: Anon, Francis? No, Francis; but to-morrow, Francis;
065: or, Francis, o' Thursday; or indeed, Francis, when
066: thou wilt. But, Francis!

FRANCIS
067: My lord?

PRINCE HENRY
068: Wilt thou rob this leathern jerkin, crystal-button,
069: not-pated, agate-ring, puke-stocking, caddis-garter,
070: smooth-tongue, Spanish-pouch,--

FRANCIS
071: O Lord, sir, who do you mean?

PRINCE HENRY
072: Why, then, your brown bastard is your only drink;
073: for look you, Francis, your white canvas doublet
074: will sully: in Barbary, sir, it cannot come to so much.

FRANCIS
075: What, sir?

POINS [Within]
076: Francis!

PRINCE HENRY
077: Away, you rogue! dost thou not hear them call?

Here they both call him; the drawer stands amazed, not knowing which way to go

Enter Vintner

Vintner
078: What, standest thou still, and hearest such a
079: calling? Look to the guests within.
[Exit Francis]
080: My lord, old Sir John, with half-a-dozen more, are
081: at the door: shall I let them in?

PRINCE HENRY
082: Let them alone awhile, and then open the door.
[Exit Vintner]
083: Poins!

Re-enter POINS

POINS
084: Anon, anon, sir.

PRINCE HENRY
085: Sirrah, Falstaff and the rest of the thieves are at
086: the door: shall we be merry?

POINS
087: As merry as crickets, my lad. But hark ye; what
088: cunning match have you made with this jest of the
089: drawer? come, what's the issue?

PRINCE HENRY
090: I am now of all humours that have showed themselves
091: humours since the old days of goodman Adam to the
092: pupil age of this present twelve o'clock at midnight.
[Re-enter FRANCIS]
093: What's o'clock, Francis?

FRANCIS
094: Anon, anon, sir.

Exit

PRINCE HENRY
095: That ever this fellow should have fewer words than a
096: parrot, and yet the son of a woman! His industry is
097: upstairs and downstairs; his eloquence the parcel of
098: a reckoning. I am not yet of Percy's mind, the
099: Hotspur of the north; he that kills me some six or
100: seven dozen of Scots at a breakfast, washes his
101: hands, and says to his wife 'Fie upon this quiet
102: life! I want work.' 'O my sweet Harry,' says she,
103: 'how many hast thou killed to-day?' 'Give my roan
104: horse a drench,' says he; and answers 'Some
105: fourteen,' an hour after; 'a trifle, a trifle.' I
106: prithee, call in Falstaff: I'll play Percy, and
107: that damned brawn shall play Dame Mortimer his
108: wife. 'Rivo!' says the drunkard. Call in ribs, call in tallow.

Enter FALSTAFF, GADSHILL, BARDOLPH, and PETO; FRANCIS following with wine

POINS
109: Welcome, Jack: where hast thou been?

FALSTAFF
110: A plague of all cowards, I say, and a vengeance too!
111: marry, and amen! Give me a cup of sack, boy. Ere I
112: lead this life long, I'll sew nether stocks and mend
113: them and foot them too. A plague of all cowards!
114: Give me a cup of sack, rogue. Is there no virtue extant?

He drinks

PRINCE HENRY
115: Didst thou never see Titan kiss a dish of butter?
116: pitiful-hearted Titan, that melted at the sweet tale
117: of the sun's! if thou didst, then behold that compound.

FALSTAFF
118: You rogue, here's lime in this sack too: there is
119: nothing but roguery to be found in villanous man:
120: yet a coward is worse than a cup of sack with lime
121: in it. A villanous coward! Go thy ways, old Jack;
122: die when thou wilt, if manhood, good manhood, be
123: not forgot upon the face of the earth, then am I a
124: shotten herring. There live not three good men
125: unhanged in England; and one of them is fat and
126: grows old: God help the while! a bad world, I say.
127: I would I were a weaver; I could sing psalms or any
128: thing. A plague of all cowards, I say still.

PRINCE HENRY
129: How now, wool-sack! what mutter you?

FALSTAFF
130: A king's son! If I do not beat thee out of thy
131: kingdom with a dagger of lath, and drive all thy
132: subjects afore thee like a flock of wild-geese,
133: I'll never wear hair on my face more. You Prince of Wales!

PRINCE HENRY
134: Why, you whoreson round man, what's the matter?

FALSTAFF
135: Are not you a coward? answer me to that: and Poins there?

POINS
136: 'Zounds, ye fat paunch, an ye call me coward, by the
137: Lord, I'll stab thee.

FALSTAFF
138: I call thee coward! I'll see thee damned ere I call
139: thee coward: but I would give a thousand pound I
140: could run as fast as thou canst. You are straight
141: enough in the shoulders, you care not who sees your
142: back: call you that backing of your friends? A
143: plague upon such backing! give me them that will
144: face me. Give me a cup of sack: I am a rogue, if I
145: drunk to-day.

PRINCE HENRY
146: O villain! thy lips are scarce wiped since thou
147: drunkest last.

FALSTAFF
148: All's one for that.
[He drinks]
149: A plague of all cowards, still say I.

PRINCE HENRY
150: What's the matter?

FALSTAFF
151: What's the matter! there be four of us here have
152: ta'en a thousand pound this day morning.

PRINCE HENRY
153: Where is it, Jack? where is it?

FALSTAFF
154: Where is it! taken from us it is: a hundred upon
155: poor four of us.

PRINCE HENRY
156: What, a hundred, man?

FALSTAFF
157: I am a rogue, if I were not at half-sword with a
158: dozen of them two hours together. I have 'scaped by
159: miracle. I am eight times thrust through the
160: doublet, four through the hose; my buckler cut
161: through and through; my sword hacked like a
162: hand-saw--ecce signum! I never dealt better since
163: I was a man: all would not do. A plague of all
164: cowards! Let them speak: if they speak more or
165: less than truth, they are villains and the sons of darkness.

PRINCE HENRY
166: Speak, sirs; how was it?

GADSHILL
167: We four set upon some dozen--

FALSTAFF
168: Sixteen at least, my lord.

GADSHILL
169: And bound them.

PETO
170: No, no, they were not bound.

FALSTAFF
171: You rogue, they were bound, every man of them; or I
172: am a Jew else, an Ebrew Jew.

GADSHILL
173: As we were sharing, some six or seven fresh men set upon us--

FALSTAFF
174: And unbound the rest, and then come in the other.

PRINCE HENRY
175: What, fought you with them all?

FALSTAFF
176: All! I know not what you call all; but if I fought
177: not with fifty of them, I am a bunch of radish: if
178: there were not two or three and fifty upon poor old
179: Jack, then am I no two-legged creature.

PRINCE HENRY
180: Pray God you have not murdered some of them.

FALSTAFF
181: Nay, that's past praying for: I have peppered two
182: of them; two I am sure I have paid, two rogues
183: in buckram suits. I tell thee what, Hal, if I tell
184: thee a lie, spit in my face, call me horse. Thou
185: knowest my old ward; here I lay and thus I bore my
186: point. Four rogues in buckram let drive at me--

PRINCE HENRY
187: What, four? thou saidst but two even now.

FALSTAFF
188: Four, Hal; I told thee four.

POINS
189: Ay, ay, he said four.

FALSTAFF
190: These four came all a-front, and mainly thrust at
191: me. I made me no more ado but took all their seven
192: points in my target, thus.

PRINCE HENRY
193: Seven? why, there were but four even now.

FALSTAFF
194: In buckram?

POINS
195: Ay, four, in buckram suits.

FALSTAFF
196: Seven, by these hilts, or I am a villain else.

PRINCE HENRY
197: Prithee, let him alone; we shall have more anon.

FALSTAFF
198: Dost thou hear me, Hal?

PRINCE HENRY
199: Ay, and mark thee too, Jack.

FALSTAFF
200: Do so, for it is worth the listening to. These nine
201: in buckram that I told thee of--

PRINCE HENRY
202: So, two more already.

FALSTAFF
203: Their points being broken,--

POINS
204: Down fell their hose.

FALSTAFF
205: Began to give me ground: but I followed me close,
206: came in foot and hand; and with a thought seven of
207: the eleven I paid.

PRINCE HENRY
208: O monstrous! eleven buckram men grown out of two!

FALSTAFF
209: But, as the devil would have it, three misbegotten
210: knaves in Kendal green came at my back and let drive
211: at me; for it was so dark, Hal, that thou couldst
212: not see thy hand.

PRINCE HENRY
213: These lies are like their father that begets them;
214: gross as a mountain, open, palpable. Why, thou
215: clay-brained guts, thou knotty-pated fool, thou
216: whoreson, obscene, grease tallow-catch,--

FALSTAFF
217: What, art thou mad? art thou mad? is not the truth
218: the truth?

PRINCE HENRY
219: Why, how couldst thou know these men in Kendal
220: green, when it was so dark thou couldst not see thy
221: hand? come, tell us your reason: what sayest thou to this?

POINS
222: Come, your reason, Jack, your reason.

FALSTAFF
223: What, upon compulsion? 'Zounds, an I were at the
224: strappado, or all the racks in the world, I would
225: not tell you on compulsion. Give you a reason on
226: compulsion! If reasons were as plentiful as
227: blackberries, I would give no man a reason upon
228: compulsion, I.

PRINCE HENRY
229: I'll be no longer guilty of this sin; this sanguine
230: coward, this bed-presser, this horseback-breaker,
231: this huge hill of flesh,--

FALSTAFF
232: 'Sblood, you starveling, you elf-skin, you dried
233: neat's tongue, you bull's pizzle, you stock-fish! O
234: for breath to utter what is like thee! you
235: tailor's-yard, you sheath, you bowcase; you vile
236: standing-tuck,--

PRINCE HENRY
237: Well, breathe awhile, and then to it again: and
238: when thou hast tired thyself in base comparisons,
239: hear me speak but this.

POINS
240: Mark, Jack.

PRINCE HENRY
241: We two saw you four set on four and bound them, and
242: were masters of their wealth. Mark now, how a plain
243: tale shall put you down. Then did we two set on you
244: four; and, with a word, out-faced you from your
245: prize, and have it; yea, and can show it you here in
246: the house: and, Falstaff, you carried your guts
247: away as nimbly, with as quick dexterity, and roared
248: for mercy and still run and roared, as ever I heard
249: bull-calf. What a slave art thou, to hack thy sword
250: as thou hast done, and then say it was in fight!
251: What trick, what device, what starting-hole, canst
252: thou now find out to hide thee from this open and
253: apparent shame?

POINS
254: Come, let's hear, Jack; what trick hast thou now?

FALSTAFF
255: By the Lord, I knew ye as well as he that made ye.
256: Why, hear you, my masters: was it for me to kill the
257: heir-apparent? should I turn upon the true prince?
258: why, thou knowest I am as valiant as Hercules: but
259: beware instinct; the lion will not touch the true
260: prince. Instinct is a great matter; I was now a
261: coward on instinct. I shall think the better of
262: myself and thee during my life; I for a valiant
263: lion, and thou for a true prince. But, by the Lord,
264: lads, I am glad you have the money. Hostess, clap
265: to the doors: watch to-night, pray to-morrow.
266: Gallants, lads, boys, hearts of gold, all the titles
267: of good fellowship come to you! What, shall we be
268: merry? shall we have a play extempore?

PRINCE HENRY
269: Content; and the argument shall be thy running away.

FALSTAFF
270: Ah, no more of that, Hal, an thou lovest me!

Enter Hostess

Hostess
271: O Jesu, my lord the prince!

PRINCE HENRY
272: How now, my lady the hostess! what sayest thou to
273: me?

Hostess
274: Marry, my lord, there is a nobleman of the court at
275: door would speak with you: he says he comes from
276: your father.

PRINCE HENRY
277: Give him as much as will make him a royal man, and
278: send him back again to my mother.

FALSTAFF
279: What manner of man is he?

Hostess
280: An old man.

FALSTAFF
281: What doth gravity out of his bed at midnight? Shall
282: I give him his answer?

PRINCE HENRY
283: Prithee, do, Jack.

FALSTAFF
284: 'Faith, and I'll send him packing.

Exit FALSTAFF

PRINCE HENRY
285: Now, sirs: by'r lady, you fought fair; so did you,
286: Peto; so did you, Bardolph: you are lions too, you
287: ran away upon instinct, you will not touch the true
288: prince; no, fie!

BARDOLPH
289: 'Faith, I ran when I saw others run.

PRINCE HENRY
290: 'Faith, tell me now in earnest, how came Falstaff's
291: sword so hacked?

PETO
292: Why, he hacked it with his dagger, and said he would
293: swear truth out of England but he would make you
294: believe it was done in fight, and persuaded us to do the like.

BARDOLPH
295: Yea, and to tickle our noses with spear-grass to
296: make them bleed, and then to beslubber our garments
297: with it and swear it was the blood of true men. I
298: did that I did not this seven year before, I blushed
299: to hear his monstrous devices.

PRINCE HENRY
300: O villain, thou stolest a cup of sack eighteen years
301: ago, and wert taken with the manner, and ever since
302: thou hast blushed extempore. Thou hadst fire and
303: sword on thy side, and yet thou rannest away: what
304: instinct hadst thou for it?

BARDOLPH
305: My lord, do you see these meteors? do you behold
306: these exhalations?

PRINCE HENRY
307: I do.

BARDOLPH
308: What think you they portend?

PRINCE HENRY
309: Hot livers and cold purses.

BARDOLPH
310: Choler, my lord, if rightly taken.

PRINCE HENRY
311: No, if rightly taken, halter.
[Re-enter FALSTAFF]
312: Here comes lean Jack, here comes bare-bone.
313: How now, my sweet creature of bombast!
314: How long is't ago, Jack, since thou sawest thine own knee?

FALSTAFF
315: My own knee! when I was about thy years, Hal, I was
316: not an eagle's talon in the waist; I could have
317: crept into any alderman's thumb-ring: a plague of
318: sighing and grief! it blows a man up like a
319: bladder. There's villanous news abroad: here was
320: Sir John Bracy from your father; you must to the
321: court in the morning. That same mad fellow of the
322: north, Percy, and he of Wales, that gave Amamon the
323: bastinado and made Lucifer cuckold and swore the
324: devil his true liegeman upon the cross of a Welsh
325: hook--what a plague call you him?

POINS
326: O, Glendower.

FALSTAFF
327: Owen, Owen, the same; and his son-in-law Mortimer,
328: and old Northumberland, and that sprightly Scot of
329: Scots, Douglas, that runs o' horseback up a hill
330: perpendicular,--

PRINCE HENRY
331: He that rides at high speed and with his pistol
332: kills a sparrow flying.

FALSTAFF
333: You have hit it.

PRINCE HENRY
334: So did he never the sparrow.

FALSTAFF
335: Well, that rascal hath good mettle in him; he will not run.

PRINCE HENRY
336: Why, what a rascal art thou then, to praise him so
337: for running!

FALSTAFF
338: O' horseback, ye cuckoo; but afoot he will not budge a foot.

PRINCE HENRY
339: Yes, Jack, upon instinct.

FALSTAFF
340: I grant ye, upon instinct. Well, he is there too,
341: and one Mordake, and a thousand blue-caps more:
342: Worcester is stolen away to-night; thy father's
343: beard is turned white with the news: you may buy
344: land now as cheap as stinking mackerel.

PRINCE HENRY
345: Why, then, it is like, if there come a hot June and
346: this civil buffeting hold, we shall buy maidenheads
347: as they buy hob-nails, by the hundreds.

FALSTAFF
348: By the mass, lad, thou sayest true; it is like we
349: shall have good trading that way. But tell me, Hal,
350: art not thou horrible afeard? thou being
351: heir-apparent, could the world pick thee out three
352: such enemies again as that fiend Douglas, that
353: spirit Percy, and that devil Glendower? Art thou
354: not horribly afraid? doth not thy blood thrill at
355: it?

PRINCE HENRY
356: Not a whit, i' faith; I lack some of thy instinct.

FALSTAFF
357: Well, thou wert be horribly chid tomorrow when thou
358: comest to thy father: if thou love me, practise an answer.

PRINCE HENRY
359: Do thou stand for my father, and examine me upon the
360: particulars of my life.

FALSTAFF
361: Shall I? content: this chair shall be my state,
362: this dagger my sceptre, and this cushion my crown.

PRINCE HENRY
363: Thy state is taken for a joined-stool, thy golden
364: sceptre for a leaden dagger, and thy precious rich
365: crown for a pitiful bald crown!

FALSTAFF
366: Well, an the fire of grace be not quite out of thee,
367: now shalt thou be moved. Give me a cup of sack to
368: make my eyes look red, that it may be thought I have
369: wept; for I must speak in passion, and I will do it
370: in King Cambyses' vein.

PRINCE HENRY
371: Well, here is my leg.

FALSTAFF
372: And here is my speech. Stand aside, nobility.

Hostess
373: O Jesu, this is excellent sport, i' faith!

FALSTAFF
374: Weep not, sweet queen; for trickling tears are vain.

Hostess
375: O, the father, how he holds his countenance!

FALSTAFF
376: For God's sake, lords, convey my tristful queen;
377: For tears do stop the flood-gates of her eyes.

Hostess
378: O Jesu, he doth it as like one of these harlotry
379: players as ever I see!

FALSTAFF
380: Peace, good pint-pot; peace, good tickle-brain.
381: Harry, I do not only marvel where thou spendest thy
382: time, but also how thou art accompanied: for though
383: the camomile, the more it is trodden on the faster
384: it grows, yet youth, the more it is wasted the
385: sooner it wears. That thou art my son, I have
386: partly thy mother's word, partly my own opinion,
387: but chiefly a villanous trick of thine eye and a
388: foolish-hanging of thy nether lip, that doth warrant
389: me. If then thou be son to me, here lies the point;
390: why, being son to me, art thou so pointed at? Shall
391: the blessed sun of heaven prove a micher and eat
392: blackberries? a question not to be asked. Shall
393: the sun of England prove a thief and take purses? a
394: question to be asked. There is a thing, Harry,
395: which thou hast often heard of and it is known to
396: many in our land by the name of pitch: this pitch,
397: as ancient writers do report, doth defile; so doth
398: the company thou keepest: for, Harry, now I do not
399: speak to thee in drink but in tears, not in
400: pleasure but in passion, not in words only, but in
401: woes also: and yet there is a virtuous man whom I
402: have often noted in thy company, but I know not his name.

PRINCE HENRY
403: What manner of man, an it like your majesty?

FALSTAFF
404: A goodly portly man, i' faith, and a corpulent; of a
405: cheerful look, a pleasing eye and a most noble
406: carriage; and, as I think, his age some fifty, or,
407: by'r lady, inclining to three score; and now I
408: remember me, his name is Falstaff: if that man
409: should be lewdly given, he deceiveth me; for, Harry,
410: I see virtue in his looks. If then the tree may be
411: known by the fruit, as the fruit by the tree, then,
412: peremptorily I speak it, there is virtue in that
413: Falstaff: him keep with, the rest banish. And tell
414: me now, thou naughty varlet, tell me, where hast
415: thou been this month?

PRINCE HENRY
416: Dost thou speak like a king? Do thou stand for me,
417: and I'll play my father.

FALSTAFF
418: Depose me? if thou dost it half so gravely, so
419: majestically, both in word and matter, hang me up by
420: the heels for a rabbit-sucker or a poulter's hare.

PRINCE HENRY
421: Well, here I am set.

FALSTAFF
422: And here I stand: judge, my masters.

PRINCE HENRY
423: Now, Harry, whence come you?

FALSTAFF
424: My noble lord, from Eastcheap.

PRINCE HENRY
425: The complaints I hear of thee are grievous.

FALSTAFF
426: 'Sblood, my lord, they are false: nay, I'll tickle
427: ye for a young prince, i' faith.

PRINCE HENRY
428: Swearest thou, ungracious boy? henceforth ne'er look
429: on me. Thou art violently carried away from grace:
430: there is a devil haunts thee in the likeness of an
431: old fat man; a tun of man is thy companion. Why
432: dost thou converse with that trunk of humours, that
433: bolting-hutch of beastliness, that swollen parcel
434: of dropsies, that huge bombard of sack, that stuffed
435: cloak-bag of guts, that roasted Manningtree ox with
436: the pudding in his belly, that reverend vice, that
437: grey iniquity, that father ruffian, that vanity in
438: years? Wherein is he good, but to taste sack and
439: drink it? wherein neat and cleanly, but to carve a
440: capon and eat it? wherein cunning, but in craft?
441: wherein crafty, but in villany? wherein villanous,
442: but in all things? wherein worthy, but in nothing?

FALSTAFF
443: I would your grace would take me with you: whom
444: means your grace?

PRINCE HENRY
445: That villanous abominable misleader of youth,
446: Falstaff, that old white-bearded Satan.

FALSTAFF
447: My lord, the man I know.

PRINCE HENRY
448: I know thou dost.

FALSTAFF
449: But to say I know more harm in him than in myself,
450: were to say more than I know. That he is old, the
451: more the pity, his white hairs do witness it; but
452: that he is, saving your reverence, a whoremaster,
453: that I utterly deny. If sack and sugar be a fault,
454: God help the wicked! if to be old and merry be a
455: sin, then many an old host that I know is damned: if
456: to be fat be to be hated, then Pharaoh's lean kine
457: are to be loved. No, my good lord; banish Peto,
458: banish Bardolph, banish Poins: but for sweet Jack
459: Falstaff, kind Jack Falstaff, true Jack Falstaff,
460: valiant Jack Falstaff, and therefore more valiant,
461: being, as he is, old Jack Falstaff, banish not him
462: thy Harry's company, banish not him thy Harry's
463: company: banish plump Jack, and banish all the world.

PRINCE HENRY
464: I do, I will.

A knocking heard

Exeunt Hostess, FRANCIS, and BARDOLPH

Re-enter BARDOLPH, running

BARDOLPH
465: O, my lord, my lord! the sheriff with a most
466: monstrous watch is at the door.

FALSTAFF
467: Out, ye rogue! Play out the play: I have much to
468: say in the behalf of that Falstaff.

Re-enter the Hostess

Hostess
469: O Jesu, my lord, my lord!

PRINCE HENRY
470: Heigh, heigh! the devil rides upon a fiddlestick:
471: what's the matter?

Hostess
472: The sheriff and all the watch are at the door: they
473: are come to search the house. Shall I let them in?

FALSTAFF
474: Dost thou hear, Hal? never call a true piece of
475: gold a counterfeit: thou art essentially mad,
476: without seeming so.

PRINCE HENRY
477: And thou a natural coward, without instinct.

FALSTAFF
478: I deny your major: if you will deny the sheriff,
479: so; if not, let him enter: if I become not a cart
480: as well as another man, a plague on my bringing up!
481: I hope I shall as soon be strangled with a halter as another.

PRINCE HENRY
482: Go, hide thee behind the arras: the rest walk up
483: above. Now, my masters, for a true face and good
484: conscience.

FALSTAFF
485: Both which I have had: but their date is out, and
486: therefore I'll hide me.

PRINCE HENRY
487: Call in the sheriff.
[Exeunt all except PRINCE HENRY and PETO]
[Enter Sheriff and the Carrier]
488: Now, master sheriff, what is your will with me?

Sheriff
489: First, pardon me, my lord. A hue and cry
490: Hath follow'd certain men unto this house.

PRINCE HENRY
491: What men?

Sheriff
492: One of them is well known, my gracious lord,
493: A gross fat man.

Carrier
494: As fat as butter.

PRINCE HENRY
495: The man, I do assure you, is not here;
496: For I myself at this time have employ'd him.
497: And, sheriff, I will engage my word to thee
498: That I will, by to-morrow dinner-time,
499: Send him to answer thee, or any man,
500: For any thing he shall be charged withal:
501: And so let me entreat you leave the house.

Sheriff
502: I will, my lord. There are two gentlemen
503: Have in this robbery lost three hundred marks.

PRINCE HENRY
504: It may be so: if he have robb'd these men,
505: He shall be answerable; and so farewell.

Sheriff
506: Good night, my noble lord.

PRINCE HENRY
507: I think it is good morrow, is it not?

Sheriff
508: Indeed, my lord, I think it be two o'clock.

Exeunt Sheriff and Carrier

PRINCE HENRY
509: This oily rascal is known as well as Paul's. Go,
510: call him forth.

PETO
511: Falstaff!--Fast asleep behind the arras, and
512: snorting like a horse.

PRINCE HENRY
513: Hark, how hard he fetches breath. Search his pockets.
[He searcheth his pockets, and findeth certain papers]
514: What hast thou found?

PETO
515: Nothing but papers, my lord.

PRINCE HENRY
516: Let's see what they be: read them.

PETO [Reads]
517: Item, A capon,. . 2s. 2d.
518: Item, Sauce,. . . 4d.
519: Item, Sack, two gallons, 5s. 8d.
520: Item, Anchovies and sack after supper, 2s. 6d.
521: Item, Bread, ob.

PRINCE HENRY
522: O monstrous! but one half-penny-worth of bread to
523: this intolerable deal of sack! What there is else,
524: keep close; we'll read it at more advantage: there
525: let him sleep till day. I'll to the court in the
526: morning. We must all to the wars, and thy place
527: shall be honourable. I'll procure this fat rogue a
528: charge of foot; and I know his death will be a
529: march of twelve-score. The money shall be paid
530: back again with advantage. Be with me betimes in
531: the morning; and so, good morrow, Peto.

PETO
532: Good morrow, good my lord.

Exeunt

ACT III, SCENE I.

Bangor. The Archdeacon's house.

Enter HOTSPUR, WORCESTER, MORTIMER, and GLENDOWER

MORTIMER
001: These promises are fair, the parties sure,
002: And our induction full of prosperous hope.

HOTSPUR
003: Lord Mortimer, and cousin Glendower,
004: Will you sit down?
005: And uncle Worcester: a plague upon it!
006: I have forgot the map.

GLENDOWER
007: No, here it is.
008: Sit, cousin Percy; sit, good cousin Hotspur,
009: For by that name as oft as Lancaster
010: Doth speak of you, his cheek looks pale and with
011: A rising sigh he wisheth you in heaven.

HOTSPUR
012: And you in hell, as oft as he hears Owen Glendower spoke of.

GLENDOWER
013: I cannot blame him: at my nativity
014: The front of heaven was full of fiery shapes,
015: Of burning cressets; and at my birth
016: The frame and huge foundation of the earth
017: Shaked like a coward.

HOTSPUR
018: Why, so it would have done at the same season, if
019: your mother's cat had but kittened, though yourself
020: had never been born.

GLENDOWER
021: I say the earth did shake when I was born.

HOTSPUR
022: And I say the earth was not of my mind,
023: If you suppose as fearing you it shook.

GLENDOWER
024: The heavens were all on fire, the earth did tremble.

HOTSPUR
025: O, then the earth shook to see the heavens on fire,
026: And not in fear of your nativity.
027: Diseased nature oftentimes breaks forth
028: In strange eruptions; oft the teeming earth
029: Is with a kind of colic pinch'd and vex'd
030: By the imprisoning of unruly wind
031: Within her womb; which, for enlargement striving,
032: Shakes the old beldam earth and topples down
033: Steeples and moss-grown towers. At your birth
034: Our grandam earth, having this distemperature,
035: In passion shook.

GLENDOWER
036: Cousin, of many men
037: I do not bear these crossings. Give me leave
038: To tell you once again that at my birth
039: The front of heaven was full of fiery shapes,
040: The goats ran from the mountains, and the herds
041: Were strangely clamorous to the frighted fields.
042: These signs have mark'd me extraordinary;
043: And all the courses of my life do show
044: I am not in the roll of common men.
045: Where is he living, clipp'd in with the sea
046: That chides the banks of England, Scotland, Wales,
047: Which calls me pupil, or hath read to me?
048: And bring him out that is but woman's son
049: Can trace me in the tedious ways of art
050: And hold me pace in deep experiments.

HOTSPUR
051: I think there's no man speaks better Welsh.
052: I'll to dinner.

MORTIMER
053: Peace, cousin Percy; you will make him mad.

GLENDOWER
054: I can call spirits from the vasty deep.

HOTSPUR
055: Why, so can I, or so can any man;
056: But will they come when you do call for them?

GLENDOWER
057: Why, I can teach you, cousin, to command
058: The devil.

HOTSPUR
059: And I can teach thee, coz, to shame the devil
060: By telling truth: tell truth and shame the devil.
061: If thou have power to raise him, bring him hither,
062: And I'll be sworn I have power to shame him hence.
063: O, while you live, tell truth and shame the devil!

MORTIMER
064: Come, come, no more of this unprofitable chat.

GLENDOWER
065: Three times hath Henry Bolingbroke made head
066: Against my power; thrice from the banks of Wye
067: And sandy-bottom'd Severn have I sent him
068: Bootless home and weather-beaten back.

HOTSPUR
069: Home without boots, and in foul weather too!
070: How 'scapes he agues, in the devil's name?

GLENDOWER
071: Come, here's the map: shall we divide our right
072: According to our threefold order ta'en?

MORTIMER
073: The archdeacon hath divided it
074: Into three limits very equally:
075: England, from Trent and Severn hitherto,
076: By south and east is to my part assign'd:
077: All westward, Wales beyond the Severn shore,
078: And all the fertile land within that bound,
079: To Owen Glendower: and, dear coz, to you
080: The remnant northward, lying off from Trent.
081: And our indentures tripartite are drawn;
082: Which being sealed interchangeably,
083: A business that this night may execute,
084: To-morrow, cousin Percy, you and I
085: And my good Lord of Worcester will set forth
086: To meet your father and the Scottish power,
087: As is appointed us, at Shrewsbury.
088: My father Glendower is not ready yet,
089: Not shall we need his help these fourteen days.
090: Within that space you may have drawn together
091: Your tenants, friends and neighbouring gentlemen.

GLENDOWER
092: A shorter time shall send me to you, lords:
093: And in my conduct shall your ladies come;
094: From whom you now must steal and take no leave,
095: For there will be a world of water shed
096: Upon the parting of your wives and you.

HOTSPUR
097: Methinks my moiety, north from Burton here,
098: In quantity equals not one of yours:
099: See how this river comes me cranking in,
100: And cuts me from the best of all my land
101: A huge half-moon, a monstrous cantle out.
102: I'll have the current in this place damm'd up;
103: And here the smug and silver Trent shall run
104: In a new channel, fair and evenly;
105: It shall not wind with such a deep indent,
106: To rob me of so rich a bottom here.

GLENDOWER
107: Not wind? it shall, it must; you see it doth.

MORTIMER
108: Yea, but
109: Mark how he bears his course, and runs me up
110: With like advantage on the other side;
111: Gelding the opposed continent as much
112: As on the other side it takes from you.

EARL OF WORCESTER
113: Yea, but a little charge will trench him here
114: And on this north side win this cape of land;
115: And then he runs straight and even.

HOTSPUR
116: I'll have it so: a little charge will do it.

GLENDOWER
117: I'll not have it alter'd.

HOTSPUR
118: Will not you?

GLENDOWER
119: No, nor you shall not.

HOTSPUR
120: Who shall say me nay?

GLENDOWER
121: Why, that will I.

HOTSPUR
122: Let me not understand you, then; speak it in Welsh.

GLENDOWER
123: I can speak English, lord, as well as you;
124: For I was train'd up in the English court;
125: Where, being but young, I framed to the harp
126: Many an English ditty lovely well
127: And gave the tongue a helpful ornament,
128: A virtue that was never seen in you.

HOTSPUR
129: Marry,
130: And I am glad of it with all my heart:
131: I had rather be a kitten and cry mew
132: Than one of these same metre ballad-mongers;
133: I had rather hear a brazen canstick turn'd,
134: Or a dry wheel grate on the axle-tree;
135: And that would set my teeth nothing on edge,
136: Nothing so much as mincing poetry:
137: 'Tis like the forced gait of a shuffling nag.

GLENDOWER
138: Come, you shall have Trent turn'd.

HOTSPUR
139: I do not care: I'll give thrice so much land
140: To any well-deserving friend;
141: But in the way of bargain, mark ye me,
142: I'll cavil on the ninth part of a hair.
143: Are the indentures drawn? shall we be gone?

GLENDOWER
144: The moon shines fair; you may away by night:
145: I'll haste the writer and withal
146: Break with your wives of your departure hence:
147: I am afraid my daughter will run mad,
148: So much she doteth on her Mortimer.

Exit GLENDOWER

MORTIMER
149: Fie, cousin Percy! how you cross my father!

HOTSPUR
150: I cannot choose: sometime he angers me
151: With telling me of the mouldwarp and the ant,
152: Of the dreamer Merlin and his prophecies,
153: And of a dragon and a finless fish,
154: A clip-wing'd griffin and a moulten raven,
155: A couching lion and a ramping cat,
156: And such a deal of skimble-skamble stuff
157: As puts me from my faith. I tell you what;
158: He held me last night at least nine hours
159: In reckoning up the several devils' names
160: That were his lackeys: I cried 'hum,' and 'well, go to,'
161: But mark'd him not a word. O, he is as tedious
162: As a tired horse, a railing wife;
163: Worse than a smoky house: I had rather live
164: With cheese and garlic in a windmill, far,
165: Than feed on cates and have him talk to me
166: In any summer-house in Christendom.

MORTIMER
167: In faith, he is a worthy gentleman,
168: Exceedingly well read, and profited
169: In strange concealments, valiant as a lion
170: And as wondrous affable and as bountiful
171: As mines of India. Shall I tell you, cousin?
172: He holds your temper in a high respect
173: And curbs himself even of his natural scope
174: When you come 'cross his humour; faith, he does:
175: I warrant you, that man is not alive
176: Might so have tempted him as you have done,
177: Without the taste of danger and reproof:
178: But do not use it oft, let me entreat you.

EARL OF WORCESTER
179: In faith, my lord, you are too wilful-blame;
180: And since your coming hither have done enough
181: To put him quite beside his patience.
182: You must needs learn, lord, to amend this fault:
183: Though sometimes it show greatness, courage, blood,--
184: And that's the dearest grace it renders you,--
185: Yet oftentimes it doth present harsh rage,
186: Defect of manners, want of government,
187: Pride, haughtiness, opinion and disdain:
188: The least of which haunting a nobleman
189: Loseth men's hearts and leaves behind a stain
190: Upon the beauty of all parts besides,
191: Beguiling them of commendation.

HOTSPUR
192: Well, I am school'd: good manners be your speed!
193: Here come our wives, and let us take our leave.

Re-enter GLENDOWER with the ladies

MORTIMER
194: This is the deadly spite that angers me;
195: My wife can speak no English, I no Welsh.

GLENDOWER
196: My daughter weeps: she will not part with you;
197: She'll be a soldier too, she'll to the wars.

MORTIMER
198: Good father, tell her that she and my aunt Percy
199: Shall follow in your conduct speedily.

Glendower speaks to her in Welsh, and she answers him in the same

GLENDOWER
200: She is desperate here; a peevish self-wind harlotry,
201: one that no persuasion can do good upon.

The lady speaks in Welsh

MORTIMER
202: I understand thy looks: that pretty Welsh
203: Which thou pour'st down from these swelling heavens
204: I am too perfect in; and, but for shame,
205: In such a parley should I answer thee.
[The lady speaks again in Welsh]
206: I understand thy kisses and thou mine,
207: And that's a feeling disputation:
208: But I will never be a truant, love,
209: Till I have learned thy language; for thy tongue
210: Makes Welsh as sweet as ditties highly penn'd,
211: Sung by a fair queen in a summer's bower,
212: With ravishing division, to her lute.

GLENDOWER
213: Nay, if you melt, then will she run mad.

The lady speaks again in Welsh

MORTIMER
214: O, I am ignorance itself in this!

GLENDOWER
215: She bids you on the wanton rushes lay you down
216: And rest your gentle head upon her lap,
217: And she will sing the song that pleaseth you
218: And on your eyelids crown the god of sleep.
219: Charming your blood with pleasing heaviness,
220: Making such difference 'twixt wake and sleep
221: As is the difference betwixt day and night
222: The hour before the heavenly-harness'd team
223: Begins his golden progress in the east.

MORTIMER
224: With all my heart I'll sit and hear her sing:
225: By that time will our book, I think, be drawn

GLENDOWER
226: Do so;
227: And those musicians that shall play to you
228: Hang in the air a thousand leagues from hence,
229: And straight they shall be here: sit, and attend.

HOTSPUR
230: Come, Kate, thou art perfect in lying down: come,
231: quick, quick, that I may lay my head in thy lap.

LADY PERCY
232: Go, ye giddy goose.

The music plays

HOTSPUR
233: Now I perceive the devil understands Welsh;
234: And 'tis no marvel he is so humorous.
235: By'r lady, he is a good musician.

LADY PERCY
236: Then should you be nothing but musical for you are
237: altogether governed by humours. Lie still, ye thief,
238: and hear the lady sing in Welsh.

HOTSPUR
239: I had rather hear Lady, my brach, howl in Irish.

LADY PERCY
240: Wouldst thou have thy head broken?

HOTSPUR
241: No.

LADY PERCY
242: Then be still.

HOTSPUR
243: Neither;'tis a woman's fault.

LADY PERCY
244: Now God help thee!

HOTSPUR
245: To the Welsh lady's bed.

LADY PERCY
246: What's that?

HOTSPUR
247: Peace! she sings.

Here the lady sings a Welsh song

HOTSPUR
248: Come, Kate, I'll have your song too.

LADY PERCY
249: Not mine, in good sooth.

HOTSPUR
250: Not yours, in good sooth! Heart! you swear like a
251: comfit-maker's wife. 'Not you, in good sooth,' and
252: 'as true as I live,' and 'as God shall mend me,' and
253: 'as sure as day,'
254: And givest such sarcenet surety for thy oaths,
255: As if thou never walk'st further than Finsbury.
256: Swear me, Kate, like a lady as thou art,
257: A good mouth-filling oath, and leave 'in sooth,'
258: And such protest of pepper-gingerbread,
259: To velvet-guards and Sunday-citizens.
260: Come, sing.

LADY PERCY
261: I will not sing.

HOTSPUR
262: 'Tis the next way to turn tailor, or be red-breast
263: teacher. An the indentures be drawn, I'll away
264: within these two hours; and so, come in when ye will.

Exit

GLENDOWER
265: Come, come, Lord Mortimer; you are as slow
266: As hot Lord Percy is on fire to go.
267: By this our book is drawn; we'll but seal,
268: And then to horse immediately.

MORTIMER
269: With all my heart.

Exeunt

ACT III, SCENE II.

London. The palace.

Enter KING HENRY IV, PRINCE HENRY, and others

KING HENRY IV
001: Lords, give us leave; the Prince of Wales and I
002: Must have some private conference; but be near at hand,
003: For we shall presently have need of you.
[Exeunt Lords]
004: I know not whether God will have it so,
005: For some displeasing service I have done,
006: That, in his secret doom, out of my blood
007: He'll breed revengement and a scourge for me;
008: But thou dost in thy passages of life
009: Make me believe that thou art only mark'd
010: For the hot vengeance and the rod of heaven
011: To punish my mistreadings. Tell me else,
012: Could such inordinate and low desires,
013: Such poor, such bare, such lewd, such mean attempts,
014: Such barren pleasures, rude society,
015: As thou art match'd withal and grafted to,
016: Accompany the greatness of thy blood
017: And hold their level with thy princely heart?

PRINCE HENRY
018: So please your majesty, I would I could
019: Quit all offences with as clear excuse
020: As well as I am doubtless I can purge
021: Myself of many I am charged withal:
022: Yet such extenuation let me beg,
023: As, in reproof of many tales devised,
024: which oft the ear of greatness needs must hear,
025: By smiling pick-thanks and base news-mongers,
026: I may, for some things true, wherein my youth
027: Hath faulty wander'd and irregular,
028: Find pardon on my true submission.

KING HENRY IV
029: God pardon thee! yet let me wonder, Harry,
030: At thy affections, which do hold a wing
031: Quite from the flight of all thy ancestors.
032: Thy place in council thou hast rudely lost.
033: Which by thy younger brother is supplied,
034: And art almost an alien to the hearts
035: Of all the court and princes of my blood:
036: The hope and expectation of thy time
037: Is ruin'd, and the soul of every man
038: Prophetically doth forethink thy fall.
039: Had I so lavish of my presence been,
040: So common-hackney'd in the eyes of men,
041: So stale and cheap to vulgar company,
042: Opinion, that did help me to the crown,
043: Had still kept loyal to possession
044: And left me in reputeless banishment,
045: A fellow of no mark nor likelihood.
046: By being seldom seen, I could not stir
047: But like a comet I was wonder'd at;
048: That men would tell their children 'This is he;'
049: Others would say 'Where, which is Bolingbroke?'
050: And then I stole all courtesy from heaven,
051: And dress'd myself in such humility
052: That I did pluck allegiance from men's hearts,
053: Loud shouts and salutations from their mouths,
054: Even in the presence of the crowned king.
055: Thus did I keep my person fresh and new;
056: My presence, like a robe pontifical,
057: Ne'er seen but wonder'd at: and so my state,
058: Seldom but sumptuous, showed like a feast
059: And won by rareness such solemnity.
060: The skipping king, he ambled up and down
061: With shallow jesters and rash bavin wits,
062: Soon kindled and soon burnt; carded his state,
063: Mingled his royalty with capering fools,
064: Had his great name profaned with their scorns
065: And gave his countenance, against his name,
066: To laugh at gibing boys and stand the push
067: Of every beardless vain comparative,
068: Grew a companion to the common streets,
069: Enfeoff'd himself to popularity;
070: That, being daily swallow'd by men's eyes,
071: They surfeited with honey and began
072: To loathe the taste of sweetness, whereof a little
073: More than a little is by much too much.
074: So when he had occasion to be seen,
075: He was but as the cuckoo is in June,
076: Heard, not regarded; seen, but with such eyes
077: As, sick and blunted with community,
078: Afford no extraordinary gaze,
079: Such as is bent on sun-like majesty
080: When it shines seldom in admiring eyes;
081: But rather drowzed and hung their eyelids down,
082: Slept in his face and render'd such aspect
083: As cloudy men use to their adversaries,
084: Being with his presence glutted, gorged and full.
085: And in that very line, Harry, standest thou;
086: For thou has lost thy princely privilege
087: With vile participation: not an eye
088: But is a-weary of thy common sight,
089: Save mine, which hath desired to see thee more;
090: Which now doth that I would not have it do,
091: Make blind itself with foolish tenderness.

PRINCE HENRY
092: I shall hereafter, my thrice gracious lord,
093: Be more myself.

KING HENRY IV
094: For all the world
095: As thou art to this hour was Richard then
096: When I from France set foot at Ravenspurgh,
097: And even as I was then is Percy now.
098: Now, by my sceptre and my soul to boot,
099: He hath more worthy interest to the state
100: Than thou the shadow of succession;
101: For of no right, nor colour like to right,
102: He doth fill fields with harness in the realm,
103: Turns head against the lion's armed jaws,
104: And, being no more in debt to years than thou,
105: Leads ancient lords and reverend bishops on
106: To bloody battles and to bruising arms.
107: What never-dying honour hath he got
108: Against renowned Douglas! whose high deeds,
109: Whose hot incursions and great name in arms
110: Holds from all soldiers chief majority
111: And military title capital
112: Through all the kingdoms that acknowledge Christ:
113: Thrice hath this Hotspur, Mars in swathling clothes,
114: This infant warrior, in his enterprises
115: Discomfited great Douglas, ta'en him once,
116: Enlarged him and made a friend of him,
117: To fill the mouth of deep defiance up
118: And shake the peace and safety of our throne.
119: And what say you to this? Percy, Northumberland,
120: The Archbishop's grace of York, Douglas, Mortimer,
121: Capitulate against us and are up.
122: But wherefore do I tell these news to thee?
123: Why, Harry, do I tell thee of my foes,
124: Which art my near'st and dearest enemy?
125: Thou that art like enough, through vassal fear,
126: Base inclination and the start of spleen
127: To fight against me under Percy's pay,
128: To dog his heels and curtsy at his frowns,
129: To show how much thou art degenerate.

PRINCE HENRY
130: Do not think so; you shall not find it so:
131: And God forgive them that so much have sway'd
132: Your majesty's good thoughts away from me!
133: I will redeem all this on Percy's head
134: And in the closing of some glorious day
135: Be bold to tell you that I am your son;
136: When I will wear a garment all of blood
137: And stain my favours in a bloody mask,
138: Which, wash'd away, shall scour my shame with it:
139: And that shall be the day, whene'er it lights,
140: That this same child of honour and renown,
141: This gallant Hotspur, this all-praised knight,
142: And your unthought-of Harry chance to meet.
143: For every honour sitting on his helm,
144: Would they were multitudes, and on my head
145: My shames redoubled! for the time will come,
146: That I shall make this northern youth exchange
147: His glorious deeds for my indignities.
148: Percy is but my factor, good my lord,
149: To engross up glorious deeds on my behalf;
150: And I will call him to so strict account,
151: That he shall render every glory up,
152: Yea, even the slightest worship of his time,
153: Or I will tear the reckoning from his heart.
154: This, in the name of God, I promise here:
155: The which if He be pleased I shall perform,
156: I do beseech your majesty may salve
157: The long-grown wounds of my intemperance:
158: If not, the end of life cancels all bands;
159: And I will die a hundred thousand deaths
160: Ere break the smallest parcel of this vow.

KING HENRY IV
161: A hundred thousand rebels die in this:
162: Thou shalt have charge and sovereign trust herein.
[Enter BLUNT]
163: How now, good Blunt? thy looks are full of speed.

SIR WALTER BLUNT
164: So hath the business that I come to speak of.
165: Lord Mortimer of Scotland hath sent word
166: That Douglas and the English rebels met
167: The eleventh of this month at Shrewsbury
168: A mighty and a fearful head they are,
169: If promises be kept on every hand,
170: As ever offer'd foul play in the state.

KING HENRY IV
171: The Earl of Westmoreland set forth to-day;
172: With him my son, Lord John of Lancaster;
173: For this advertisement is five days old:
174: On Wednesday next, Harry, you shall set forward;
175: On Thursday we ourselves will march: our meeting
176: Is Bridgenorth: and, Harry, you shall march
177: Through Gloucestershire; by which account,
178: Our business valued, some twelve days hence
179: Our general forces at Bridgenorth shall meet.
180: Our hands are full of business: let's away;
181: Advantage feeds him fat, while men delay.

Exeunt

ACT III, Scene III

Eastcheap. The Boar's-Head Tavern.

Enter FALSTAFF and BARDOLPH

FALSTAFF
001: Bardolph, am I not fallen away vilely since this last
002: action? do I not bate? do I not dwindle? Why my
003: skin hangs about me like an like an old lady's loose
004: gown; I am withered like an old apple-john. Well,
005: I'll repent, and that suddenly, while I am in some
006: liking; I shall be out of heart shortly, and then I
007: shall have no strength to repent. An I have not
008: forgotten what the inside of a church is made of, I
009: am a peppercorn, a brewer's horse: the inside of a
010: church! Company, villanous company, hath been the
011: spoil of me.

BARDOLPH
012: Sir John, you are so fretful, you cannot live long.

FALSTAFF
013: Why, there is it: come sing me a bawdy song; make
014: me merry. I was as virtuously given as a gentleman
015: need to be; virtuous enough; swore little; diced not
016: above seven times a week; went to a bawdy-house once
017: in a quarter--of an hour; paid money that I
018: borrowed, three of four times; lived well and in
019: good compass: and now I live out of all order, out
020: of all compass.

BARDOLPH
021: Why, you are so fat, Sir John, that you must needs
022: be out of all compass, out of all reasonable
023: compass, Sir John.

FALSTAFF
024: Do thou amend thy face, and I'll amend my life:
025: thou art our admiral, thou bearest the lantern in
026: the poop, but 'tis in the nose of thee; thou art the
027: Knight of the Burning Lamp.

BARDOLPH
028: Why, Sir John, my face does you no harm.

FALSTAFF
029: No, I'll be sworn; I make as good use of it as many
030: a man doth of a Death's-head or a memento mori: I
031: never see thy face but I think upon hell-fire and
032: Dives that lived in purple; for there he is in his
033: robes, burning, burning. If thou wert any way
034: given to virtue, I would swear by thy face; my oath
035: should be 'By this fire, that's God's angel:' but
036: thou art altogether given over; and wert indeed, but
037: for the light in thy face, the son of utter
038: darkness. When thou rannest up Gadshill in the
039: night to catch my horse, if I did not think thou
040: hadst been an ignis fatuus or a ball of wildfire,
041: there's no purchase in money. O, thou art a
042: perpetual triumph, an everlasting bonfire-light!
043: Thou hast saved me a thousand marks in links and
044: torches, walking with thee in the night betwixt
045: tavern and tavern: but the sack that thou hast
046: drunk me would have bought me lights as good cheap
047: at the dearest chandler's in Europe. I have
048: maintained that salamander of yours with fire any
049: time this two and thirty years; God reward me for
050: it!

BARDOLPH
051: 'Sblood, I would my face were in your belly!

FALSTAFF
052: God-a-mercy! so should I be sure to be heart-burned.
[Enter Hostess]
053: How now, Dame Partlet the hen! have you inquired
054: yet who picked my pocket?

Hostess
055: Why, Sir John, what do you think, Sir John? do you
056: think I keep thieves in my house? I have searched,
057: I have inquired, so has my husband, man by man, boy
058: by boy, servant by servant: the tithe of a hair
059: was never lost in my house before.

FALSTAFF
060: Ye lie, hostess: Bardolph was shaved and lost many
061: a hair; and I'll be sworn my pocket was picked. Go
062: to, you are a woman, go.

Hostess
063: Who, I? no; I defy thee: God's light, I was never
064: called so in mine own house before.

FALSTAFF
065: Go to, I know you well enough.

Hostess
066: No, Sir John; You do not know me, Sir John. I know
067: you, Sir John: you owe me money, Sir John; and now
068: you pick a quarrel to beguile me of it: I bought
069: you a dozen of shirts to your back.

FALSTAFF
070: Dowlas, filthy dowlas: I have given them away to
071: bakers' wives, and they have made bolters of them.

Hostess
072: Now, as I am a true woman, holland of eight
073: shillings an ell. You owe money here besides, Sir
074: John, for your diet and by-drinkings, and money lent
075: you, four and twenty pound.

FALSTAFF
076: He had his part of it; let him pay.

Hostess
077: He? alas, he is poor; he hath nothing.

FALSTAFF
078: How! poor? look upon his face; what call you rich?
079: let them coin his nose, let them coin his cheeks:
080: Ill not pay a denier. What, will you make a younker
081: of me? shall I not take mine case in mine inn but I
082: shall have my pocket picked? I have lost a
083: seal-ring of my grandfather's worth forty mark.

Hostess
084: O Jesu, I have heard the prince tell him, I know not
085: how oft, that ring was copper!

FALSTAFF
086: How! the prince is a Jack, a sneak-cup: 'sblood, an
087: he were here, I would cudgel him like a dog, if he
088: would say so.
[Enter PRINCE HENRY and PETO, marching, and FALSTAFF meets them playing on his truncheon like a fife]
089: How now, lad! is the wind in that door, i' faith?
090: must we all march?

BARDOLPH
091: Yea, two and two, Newgate fashion.

Hostess
092: My lord, I pray you, hear me.

PRINCE HENRY
093: What sayest thou, Mistress Quickly? How doth thy
094: husband? I love him well; he is an honest man.

Hostess
095: Good my lord, hear me.

FALSTAFF
096: Prithee, let her alone, and list to me.

PRINCE HENRY
097: What sayest thou, Jack?

FALSTAFF
098: The other night I fell asleep here behind the arras
099: and had my pocket picked: this house is turned
100: bawdy-house; they pick pockets.

PRINCE HENRY
101: What didst thou lose, Jack?

FALSTAFF
102: Wilt thou believe me, Hal? three or four bonds of
103: forty pound apiece, and a seal-ring of my
104: grandfather's.

PRINCE HENRY
105: A trifle, some eight-penny matter.

Hostess
106: So I told him, my lord; and I said I heard your
107: grace say so: and, my lord, he speaks most vilely
108: of you, like a foul-mouthed man as he is; and said
109: he would cudgel you.

PRINCE HENRY
110: What! he did not?

Hostess
111: There's neither faith, truth, nor womanhood in me else.

FALSTAFF
112: There's no more faith in thee than in a stewed
113: prune; nor no more truth in thee than in a drawn
114: fox; and for womanhood, Maid Marian may be the
115: deputy's wife of the ward to thee. Go, you thing,
116: go

Hostess
117: Say, what thing? what thing?

FALSTAFF
118: What thing! why, a thing to thank God on.

Hostess
119: I am no thing to thank God on, I would thou
120: shouldst know it; I am an honest man's wife: and,
121: setting thy knighthood aside, thou art a knave to
122: call me so.

FALSTAFF
123: Setting thy womanhood aside, thou art a beast to say
124: otherwise.

Hostess
125: Say, what beast, thou knave, thou?

FALSTAFF
126: What beast! why, an otter.

PRINCE HENRY
127: An otter, Sir John! Why an otter?

FALSTAFF
128: Why, she's neither fish nor flesh; a man knows not
129: where to have her.

Hostess
130: Thou art an unjust man in saying so: thou or any
131: man knows where to have me, thou knave, thou!

PRINCE HENRY
132: Thou sayest true, hostess; and he slanders thee most grossly.

Hostess
133: So he doth you, my lord; and said this other day you
134: ought him a thousand pound.

PRINCE HENRY
135: Sirrah, do I owe you a thousand pound?

FALSTAFF
136: A thousand pound, Ha! a million: thy love is worth
137: a million: thou owest me thy love.

Hostess
138: Nay, my lord, he called you Jack, and said he would
139: cudgel you.

FALSTAFF
140: Did I, Bardolph?

BARDOLPH
141: Indeed, Sir John, you said so.

FALSTAFF
142: Yea, if he said my ring was copper.

PRINCE HENRY
143: I say 'tis copper: darest thou be as good as thy word now?

FALSTAFF
144: Why, Hal, thou knowest, as thou art but man, I dare:
145: but as thou art prince, I fear thee as I fear the
146: roaring of a lion's whelp.

PRINCE HENRY
147: And why not as the lion?

FALSTAFF
148: The king is to be feared as the lion: dost thou
149: think I'll fear thee as I fear thy father? nay, an
150: I do, I pray God my girdle break.

PRINCE HENRY
151: O, if it should, how would thy guts fall about thy
152: knees! But, sirrah, there's no room for faith,
153: truth, nor honesty in this bosom of thine; it is all
154: filled up with guts and midriff. Charge an honest
155: woman with picking thy pocket! why, thou whoreson,
156: impudent, embossed rascal, if there were anything in
157: thy pocket but tavern-reckonings, memorandums of
158: bawdy-houses, and one poor penny-worth of
159: sugar-candy to make thee long-winded, if thy pocket
160: were enriched with any other injuries but these, I
161: am a villain: and yet you will stand to if; you will
162: not pocket up wrong: art thou not ashamed?

FALSTAFF
163: Dost thou hear, Hal? thou knowest in the state of
164: innocency Adam fell; and what should poor Jack
165: Falstaff do in the days of villany? Thou seest I
166: have more flesh than another man, and therefore more
167: frailty. You confess then, you picked my pocket?

PRINCE HENRY
168: It appears so by the story.

FALSTAFF
169: Hostess, I forgive thee: go, make ready breakfast;
170: love thy husband, look to thy servants, cherish thy
171: guests: thou shalt find me tractable to any honest
172: reason: thou seest I am pacified still. Nay,
173: prithee, be gone.
[Exit Hostess]
174: Now Hal, to the news at court: for the robbery,
175: lad, how is that answered?

PRINCE HENRY
176: O, my sweet beef, I must still be good angel to
177: thee: the money is paid back again.

FALSTAFF
178: O, I do not like that paying back; 'tis a double labour.

PRINCE HENRY
179: I am good friends with my father and may do any thing.

FALSTAFF
180: Rob me the exchequer the first thing thou doest, and
181: do it with unwashed hands too.

BARDOLPH
182: Do, my lord.

PRINCE HENRY
183: I have procured thee, Jack, a charge of foot.

FALSTAFF
184: I would it had been of horse. Where shall I find
185: one that can steal well? O for a fine thief, of the
186: age of two and twenty or thereabouts! I am
187: heinously unprovided. Well, God be thanked for
188: these rebels, they offend none but the virtuous: I
189: laud them, I praise them.

PRINCE HENRY
190: Bardolph!

BARDOLPH
191: My lord?

PRINCE HENRY
192: Go bear this letter to Lord John of Lancaster, to my
193: brother John; this to my Lord of Westmoreland.
[Exit Bardolph]
194: Go, Peto, to horse, to horse; for thou and I have
195: thirty miles to ride yet ere dinner time.
[Exit Peto]
196: Jack, meet me to-morrow in the temple hall at two
197: o'clock in the afternoon.
198: There shalt thou know thy charge; and there receive
199: Money and order for their furniture.
200: The land is burning; Percy stands on high;
201: And either we or they must lower lie.

Exit PRINCE HENRY

FALSTAFF
202: Rare words! brave world! Hostess, my breakfast, come!
203: O, I could wish this tavern were my drum!

Exit

ACT IV, SCENE I.

The rebel camp near Shrewsbury.

Enter HOTSPUR, WORCESTER, and DOUGLAS

HOTSPUR
001: Well said, my noble Scot: if speaking truth
002: In this fine age were not thought flattery,
003: Such attribution should the Douglas have,
004: As not a soldier of this season's stamp
005: Should go so general current through the world.
006: By God, I cannot flatter; I do defy
007: The tongues of soothers; but a braver place
008: In my heart's love hath no man than yourself:
009: Nay, task me to my word; approve me, lord.

EARL OF DOUGLAS
010: Thou art the king of honour:
011: No man so potent breathes upon the ground
012: But I will beard him.

HOTSPUR
013: Do so, and 'tis well.
[Enter a Messenger with letters]
014: What letters hast thou there?--I can but thank you.

Messenger
015: These letters come from your father.

HOTSPUR
016: Letters from him! why comes he not himself?

Messenger
017: He cannot come, my lord; he is grievous sick.

HOTSPUR
018: 'Zounds! how has he the leisure to be sick
019: In such a rustling time? Who leads his power?
020: Under whose government come they along?

Messenger
021: His letters bear his mind, not I, my lord.

EARL OF WORCESTER
022: I prithee, tell me, doth he keep his bed?

Messenger
023: He did, my lord, four days ere I set forth;
024: And at the time of my departure thence
025: He was much fear'd by his physicians.

EARL OF WORCESTER
026: I would the state of time had first been whole
027: Ere he by sickness had been visited:
028: His health was never better worth than now.

HOTSPUR
029: Sick now! droop now! this sickness doth infect
030: The very life-blood of our enterprise;
031: 'Tis catching hither, even to our camp.
032: He writes me here, that inward sickness--
033: And that his friends by deputation could not
034: So soon be drawn, nor did he think it meet
035: To lay so dangerous and dear a trust
036: On any soul removed but on his own.
037: Yet doth he give us bold advertisement,
038: That with our small conjunction we should on,
039: To see how fortune is disposed to us;
040: For, as he writes, there is no quailing now.
041: Because the king is certainly possess'd
042: Of all our purposes. What say you to it?

EARL OF WORCESTER
043: Your father's sickness is a maim to us.

HOTSPUR
044: A perilous gash, a very limb lopp'd off:
045: And yet, in faith, it is not; his present want
046: Seems more than we shall find it: were it good
047: To set the exact wealth of all our states
048: All at one cast? to set so rich a main
049: On the nice hazard of one doubtful hour?
050: It were not good; for therein should we read
051: The very bottom and the soul of hope,
052: The very list, the very utmost bound
053: Of all our fortunes.

EARL OF DOUGLAS
054: 'Faith, and so we should;
055: Where now remains a sweet reversion:
056: We may boldly spend upon the hope of what
057: Is to come in:
058: A comfort of retirement lives in this.

HOTSPUR
059: A rendezvous, a home to fly unto.
060: If that the devil and mischance look big
061: Upon the maidenhead of our affairs.

EARL OF WORCESTER
062: But yet I would your father had been here.
063: The quality and hair of our attempt
064: Brooks no division: it will be thought
065: By some, that know not why he is away,
066: That wisdom, loyalty and mere dislike
067: Of our proceedings kept the earl from hence:
068: And think how such an apprehension
069: May turn the tide of fearful faction
070: And breed a kind of question in our cause;
071: For well you know we of the offering side
072: Must keep aloof from strict arbitrement,
073: And stop all sight-holes, every loop from whence
074: The eye of reason may pry in upon us:
075: This absence of your father's draws a curtain,
076: That shows the ignorant a kind of fear
077: Before not dreamt of.

HOTSPUR
078: You strain too far.
079: I rather of his absence make this use:
080: It lends a lustre and more great opinion,
081: A larger dare to our great enterprise,
082: Than if the earl were here; for men must think,
083: If we without his help can make a head
084: To push against a kingdom, with his help
085: We shall o'erturn it topsy-turvy down.
086: Yet all goes well, yet all our joints are whole.

EARL OF DOUGLAS
087: As heart can think: there is not such a word
088: Spoke of in Scotland as this term of fear.

Enter SIR RICHARD VERNON

HOTSPUR
089: My cousin Vernon, welcome, by my soul.

VERNON
090: Pray God my news be worth a welcome, lord.
091: The Earl of Westmoreland, seven thousand strong,
092: Is marching hitherwards; with him Prince John.

HOTSPUR
093: No harm: what more?

VERNON
094: And further, I have learn'd,
095: The king himself in person is set forth,
096: Or hitherwards intended speedily,
097: With strong and mighty preparation.

HOTSPUR
098: He shall be welcome too. Where is his son,
099: The nimble-footed madcap Prince of Wales,
100: And his comrades, that daff'd the world aside,
101: And bid it pass?

VERNON
102: All furnish'd, all in arms;
103: All plumed like estridges that with the wind
104: Baited like eagles having lately bathed;
105: Glittering in golden coats, like images;
106: As full of spirit as the month of May,
107: And gorgeous as the sun at midsummer;
108: Wanton as youthful goats, wild as young bulls.
109: I saw young Harry, with his beaver on,
110: His cuisses on his thighs, gallantly arm'd
111: Rise from the ground like feather'd Mercury,
112: And vaulted with such ease into his seat,
113: As if an angel dropp'd down from the clouds,
114: To turn and wind a fiery Pegasus
115: And witch the world with noble horsemanship.

HOTSPUR
116: No more, no more: worse than the sun in March,
117: This praise doth nourish agues. Let them come:
118: They come like sacrifices in their trim,
119: And to the fire-eyed maid of smoky war
120: All hot and bleeding will we offer them:
121: The mailed Mars shall on his altar sit
122: Up to the ears in blood. I am on fire
123: To hear this rich reprisal is so nigh
124: And yet not ours. Come, let me taste my horse,
125: Who is to bear me like a thunderbolt
126: Against the bosom of the Prince of Wales:
127: Harry to Harry shall, hot horse to horse,
128: Meet and ne'er part till one drop down a corse.
129: O that Glendower were come!

VERNON
130: There is more news:
131: I learn'd in Worcester, as I rode along,
132: He cannot draw his power this fourteen days.

EARL OF DOUGLAS
133: That's the worst tidings that I hear of yet.

WORCESTER
134: Ay, by my faith, that bears a frosty sound.

HOTSPUR
135: What may the king's whole battle reach unto?

VERNON
136: To thirty thousand.

HOTSPUR
137: Forty let it be:
138: My father and Glendower being both away,
139: The powers of us may serve so great a day
140: Come, let us take a muster speedily:
141: Doomsday is near; die all, die merrily.

EARL OF DOUGLAS
142: Talk not of dying: I am out of fear
143: Of death or death's hand for this one-half year.

Exeunt

ACT IV, SCENE II.

A public road near Coventry.

Enter FALSTAFF and BARDOLPH

FALSTAFF
001: Bardolph, get thee before to Coventry; fill me a
002: bottle of sack: our soldiers shall march through;
003: we'll to Sutton Co'fil' tonight.

BARDOLPH
004: Will you give me money, captain?

FALSTAFF
005: Lay out, lay out.

BARDOLPH
006: This bottle makes an angel.

FALSTAFF
007: An if it do, take it for thy labour; and if it make
008: twenty, take them all; I'll answer the coinage. Bid
009: my lieutenant Peto meet me at town's end.

BARDOLPH
010: I will, captain: farewell.

Exit

FALSTAFF
011: If I be not ashamed of my soldiers, I am a soused
012: gurnet. I have misused the king's press damnably.
013: I have got, in exchange of a hundred and fifty
014: soldiers, three hundred and odd pounds. I press me
015: none but good house-holders, yeoman's sons; inquire
016: me out contracted bachelors, such as had been asked
017: twice on the banns; such a commodity of warm slaves,
018: as had as lieve hear the devil as a drum; such as
019: fear the report of a caliver worse than a struck
020: fowl or a hurt wild-duck. I pressed me none but such
021: toasts-and-butter, with hearts in their bellies no
022: bigger than pins' heads, and they have bought out
023: their services; and now my whole charge consists of
024: ancients, corporals, lieutenants, gentlemen of
025: companies, slaves as ragged as Lazarus in the
026: painted cloth, where the glutton's dogs licked his
027: sores; and such as indeed were never soldiers, but
028: discarded unjust serving-men, younger sons to
029: younger brothers, revolted tapsters and ostlers
030: trade-fallen, the cankers of a calm world and a
031: long peace, ten times more dishonourable ragged than
032: an old faced ancient: and such have I, to fill up
033: the rooms of them that have bought out their
034: services, that you would think that I had a hundred
035: and fifty tattered prodigals lately come from
036: swine-keeping, from eating draff and husks. A mad
037: fellow met me on the way and told me I had unloaded
038: all the gibbets and pressed the dead bodies. No eye
039: hath seen such scarecrows. I'll not march through
040: Coventry with them, that's flat: nay, and the
041: villains march wide betwixt the legs, as if they had
042: gyves on; for indeed I had the most of them out of
043: prison. There's but a shirt and a half in all my
044: company; and the half shirt is two napkins tacked
045: together and thrown over the shoulders like an
046: herald's coat without sleeves; and the shirt, to say
047: the truth, stolen from my host at Saint Alban's, or
048: the red-nose innkeeper of Daventry. But that's all
049: one; they'll find linen enough on every hedge.

Enter the PRINCE and WESTMORELAND

PRINCE HENRY
050: How now, blown Jack! how now, quilt!

FALSTAFF
051: What, Hal! how now, mad wag! what a devil dost thou
052: in Warwickshire? My good Lord of Westmoreland, I
053: cry you mercy: I thought your honour had already been
054: at Shrewsbury.

WESTMORELAND
055: Faith, Sir John,'tis more than time that I were
056: there, and you too; but my powers are there already.
057: The king, I can tell you, looks for us all: we must
058: away all night.

FALSTAFF
059: Tut, never fear me: I am as vigilant as a cat to
060: steal cream.

PRINCE HENRY
061: I think, to steal cream indeed, for thy theft hath
062: already made thee butter. But tell me, Jack, whose
063: fellows are these that come after?

FALSTAFF
064: Mine, Hal, mine.

PRINCE HENRY
065: I did never see such pitiful rascals.

FALSTAFF
066: Tut, tut; good enough to toss; food for powder, food
067: for powder; they'll fill a pit as well as better:
068: tush, man, mortal men, mortal men.

WESTMORELAND
069: Ay, but, Sir John, methinks they are exceeding poor
070: and bare, too beggarly.

FALSTAFF
071: 'Faith, for their poverty, I know not where they had
072: that; and for their bareness, I am sure they never
073: learned that of me.

PRINCE HENRY
074: No I'll be sworn; unless you call three fingers on
075: the ribs bare. But, sirrah, make haste: Percy is
076: already in the field.

FALSTAFF
077: What, is the king encamped?

WESTMORELAND
078: He is, Sir John: I fear we shall stay too long.

FALSTAFF
079: Well,
080: To the latter end of a fray and the beginning of a feast
081: Fits a dull fighter and a keen guest.

Exeunt

ACT IV, SCENE III.

The rebel camp near Shrewsbury.

Enter HOTSPUR, WORCESTER, DOUGLAS, and VERNON

HOTSPUR
001: We'll fight with him to-night.

EARL OF WORCESTER
002: It may not be.

EARL OF DOUGLAS
003: You give him then the advantage.

VERNON
004: Not a whit.

HOTSPUR
005: Why say you so? looks he not for supply?

VERNON
006: So do we.

HOTSPUR
007: His is certain, ours is doubtful.

EARL OF WORCESTER
008: Good cousin, be advised; stir not tonight.

VERNON
009: Do not, my lord.

EARL OF DOUGLAS
010: You do not counsel well:
011: You speak it out of fear and cold heart.

VERNON
012: Do me no slander, Douglas: by my life,
013: And I dare well maintain it with my life,
014: If well-respected honour bid me on,
015: I hold as little counsel with weak fear
016: As you, my lord, or any Scot that this day lives:
017: Let it be seen to-morrow in the battle
018: Which of us fears.

EARL OF DOUGLAS
019: Yea, or to-night.

VERNON
020: Content.

HOTSPUR
021: To-night, say I.

VERNON
022: Come, come it nay not be. I wonder much,
023: Being men of such great leading as you are,
024: That you foresee not what impediments
025: Drag back our expedition: certain horse
026: Of my cousin Vernon's are not yet come up:
027: Your uncle Worcester's horse came but today;
028: And now their pride and mettle is asleep,
029: Their courage with hard labour tame and dull,
030: That not a horse is half the half of himself.

HOTSPUR
031: So are the horses of the enemy
032: In general, journey-bated and brought low:
033: The better part of ours are full of rest.

EARL OF WORCESTER
034: The number of the king exceedeth ours:
035: For God's sake. cousin, stay till all come in.

The trumpet sounds a parley

Enter SIR WALTER BLUNT

SIR WALTER BLUNT
036: I come with gracious offers from the king,
037: if you vouchsafe me hearing and respect.

HOTSPUR
038: Welcome, Sir Walter Blunt; and would to God
039: You were of our determination!
040: Some of us love you well; and even those some
041: Envy your great deservings and good name,
042: Because you are not of our quality,
043: But stand against us like an enemy.

SIR WALTER BLUNT
044: And God defend but still I should stand so,
045: So long as out of limit and true rule
046: You stand against anointed majesty.
047: But to my charge. The king hath sent to know
048: The nature of your griefs, and whereupon
049: You conjure from the breast of civil peace
050: Such bold hostility, teaching his duteous land
051: Audacious cruelty. If that the king
052: Have any way your good deserts forgot,
053: Which he confesseth to be manifold,
054: He bids you name your griefs; and with all speed
055: You shall have your desires with interest
056: And pardon absolute for yourself and these
057: Herein misled by your suggestion.

HOTSPUR
058: The king is kind; and well we know the king
059: Knows at what time to promise, when to pay.
060: My father and my uncle and myself
061: Did give him that same royalty he wears;
062: And when he was not six and twenty strong,
063: Sick in the world's regard, wretched and low,
064: A poor unminded outlaw sneaking home,
065: My father gave him welcome to the shore;
066: And when he heard him swear and vow to God
067: He came but to be Duke of Lancaster,
068: To sue his livery and beg his peace,
069: With tears of innocency and terms of zeal,
070: My father, in kind heart and pity moved,
071: Swore him assistance and perform'd it too.
072: Now when the lords and barons of the realm
073: Perceived Northumberland did lean to him,
074: The more and less came in with cap and knee;
075: Met him in boroughs, cities, villages,
076: Attended him on bridges, stood in lanes,
077: Laid gifts before him, proffer'd him their oaths,
078: Gave him their heirs, as pages follow'd him
079: Even at the heels in golden multitudes.
080: He presently, as greatness knows itself,
081: Steps me a little higher than his vow
082: Made to my father, while his blood was poor,
083: Upon the naked shore at Ravenspurgh;
084: And now, forsooth, takes on him to reform
085: Some certain edicts and some strait decrees
086: That lie too heavy on the commonwealth,
087: Cries out upon abuses, seems to weep
088: Over his country's wrongs; and by this face,
089: This seeming brow of justice, did he win
090: The hearts of all that he did angle for;
091: Proceeded further; cut me off the heads
092: Of all the favourites that the absent king
093: In deputation left behind him here,
094: When he was personal in the Irish war.

SIR WALTER BLUNT
095: Tut, I came not to hear this.

HOTSPUR
096: Then to the point.
097: In short time after, he deposed the king;
098: Soon after that, deprived him of his life;
099: And in the neck of that, task'd the whole state:
100: To make that worse, suffer'd his kinsman March,
101: Who is, if every owner were well placed,
102: Indeed his king, to be engaged in Wales,
103: There without ransom to lie forfeited;
104: Disgraced me in my happy victories,
105: Sought to entrap me by intelligence;
106: Rated mine uncle from the council-board;
107: In rage dismiss'd my father from the court;
108: Broke oath on oath, committed wrong on wrong,
109: And in conclusion drove us to seek out
110: This head of safety; and withal to pry
111: Into his title, the which we find
112: Too indirect for long continuance.

SIR WALTER BLUNT
113: Shall I return this answer to the king?

HOTSPUR
114: Not so, Sir Walter: we'll withdraw awhile.
115: Go to the king; and let there be impawn'd
116: Some surety for a safe return again,
117: And in the morning early shall my uncle
118: Bring him our purposes: and so farewell.

SIR WALTER BLUNT
119: I would you would accept of grace and love.

HOTSPUR
120: And may be so we shall.

SIR WALTER BLUNT
121: Pray God you do.

Exeunt

ACT IV, SCENE IV.

York. The ARCHBISHOP'S palace.

Enter the ARCHBISHOP OF YORK and SIR MICHAEL

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK
001: Hie, good Sir Michael; bear this sealed brief
002: With winged haste to the lord marshal;
003: This to my cousin Scroop, and all the rest
004: To whom they are directed. If you knew
005: How much they do to import, you would make haste.

SIR MICHAEL
006: My good lord,
007: I guess their tenor.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK
008: Like enough you do.
009: To-morrow, good Sir Michael, is a day
010: Wherein the fortune of ten thousand men
011: Must bide the touch; for, sir, at Shrewsbury,
012: As I am truly given to understand,
013: The king with mighty and quick-raised power
014: Meets with Lord Harry: and, I fear, Sir Michael,
015: What with the sickness of Northumberland,
016: Whose power was in the first proportion,
017: And what with Owen Glendower's absence thence,
018: Who with them was a rated sinew too
019: And comes not in, o'er-ruled by prophecies,
020: I fear the power of Percy is too weak
021: To wage an instant trial with the king.

SIR MICHAEL
022: Why, my good lord, you need not fear;
023: There is Douglas and Lord Mortimer.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK
024: No, Mortimer is not there.

SIR MICHAEL
025: But there is Mordake, Vernon, Lord Harry Percy,
026: And there is my Lord of Worcester and a head
027: Of gallant warriors, noble gentlemen.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK
028: And so there is: but yet the king hath drawn
029: The special head of all the land together:
030: The Prince of Wales, Lord John of Lancaster,
031: The noble Westmoreland and warlike Blunt;
032: And moe corrivals and dear men
033: Of estimation and command in arms.

SIR MICHAEL
034: Doubt not, my lord, they shall be well opposed.

ARCHBISHOP OF YORK
035: I hope no less, yet needful 'tis to fear;
036: And, to prevent the worst, Sir Michael, speed:
037: For if Lord Percy thrive not, ere the king
038: Dismiss his power, he means to visit us,
039: For he hath heard of our confederacy,
040: And 'tis but wisdom to make strong against him:
041: Therefore make haste. I must go write again
042: To other friends; and so farewell, Sir Michael.

Exeunt

ACT V, SCENE I.

KING HENRY IV's camp near Shrewsbury.

Enter KING HENRY, PRINCE HENRY, Lord John of LANCASTER, EARL OF WESTMORELAND, SIR WALTER BLUNT, and FALSTAFF

KING HENRY IV
001: How bloodily the sun begins to peer
002: Above yon busky hill! the day looks pale
003: At his distemperature.

PRINCE HENRY
004: The southern wind
005: Doth play the trumpet to his purposes,
006: And by his hollow whistling in the leaves
007: Foretells a tempest and a blustering day.

KING HENRY IV
008: Then with the losers let it sympathize,
009: For nothing can seem foul to those that win.
[The trumpet sounds]
[Enter WORCESTER and VERNON]
010: How now, my Lord of Worcester! 'tis not well
011: That you and I should meet upon such terms
012: As now we meet. You have deceived our trust,
013: And made us doff our easy robes of peace,
014: To crush our old limbs in ungentle steel:
015: This is not well, my lord, this is not well.
016: What say you to it? will you again unknit
017: This curlish knot of all-abhorred war?
018: And move in that obedient orb again
019: Where you did give a fair and natural light,
020: And be no more an exhaled meteor,
021: A prodigy of fear and a portent
022: Of broached mischief to the unborn times?

EARL OF WORCESTER
023: Hear me, my liege:
024: For mine own part, I could be well content
025: To entertain the lag-end of my life
026: With quiet hours; for I do protest,
027: I have not sought the day of this dislike.

KING HENRY IV
028: You have not sought it! how comes it, then?

FALSTAFF
029: Rebellion lay in his way, and he found it.

PRINCE HENRY
030: Peace, chewet, peace!

EARL OF WORCESTER
031: It pleased your majesty to turn your looks
032: Of favour from myself and all our house;
033: And yet I must remember you, my lord,
034: We were the first and dearest of your friends.
035: For you my staff of office did I break
036: In Richard's time; and posted day and night
037: to meet you on the way, and kiss your hand,
038: When yet you were in place and in account
039: Nothing so strong and fortunate as I.
040: It was myself, my brother and his son,
041: That brought you home and boldly did outdare
042: The dangers of the time. You swore to us,
043: And you did swear that oath at Doncaster,
044: That you did nothing purpose 'gainst the state;
045: Nor claim no further than your new-fall'n right,
046: The seat of Gaunt, dukedom of Lancaster:
047: To this we swore our aid. But in short space
048: It rain'd down fortune showering on your head;
049: And such a flood of greatness fell on you,
050: What with our help, what with the absent king,
051: What with the injuries of a wanton time,
052: The seeming sufferances that you had borne,
053: And the contrarious winds that held the king
054: So long in his unlucky Irish wars
055: That all in England did repute him dead:
056: And from this swarm of fair advantages
057: You took occasion to be quickly woo'd
058: To gripe the general sway into your hand;
059: Forget your oath to us at Doncaster;
060: And being fed by us you used us so
061: As that ungentle hull, the cuckoo's bird,
062: Useth the sparrow; did oppress our nest;
063: Grew by our feeding to so great a bulk
064: That even our love durst not come near your sight
065: For fear of swallowing; but with nimble wing
066: We were enforced, for safety sake, to fly
067: Out of sight and raise this present head;
068: Whereby we stand opposed by such means
069: As you yourself have forged against yourself
070: By unkind usage, dangerous countenance,
071: And violation of all faith and troth
072: Sworn to us in your younger enterprise.

KING HENRY IV
073: These things indeed you have articulate,
074: Proclaim'd at market-crosses, read in churches,
075: To face the garment of rebellion
076: With some fine colour that may please the eye
077: Of fickle changelings and poor discontents,
078: Which gape and rub the elbow at the news
079: Of hurlyburly innovation:
080: And never yet did insurrection want
081: Such water-colours to impaint his cause;
082: Nor moody beggars, starving for a time
083: Of pellmell havoc and confusion.

PRINCE HENRY
084: In both your armies there is many a soul
085: Shall pay full dearly for this encounter,
086: If once they join in trial. Tell your nephew,
087: The Prince of Wales doth join with all the world
088: In praise of Henry Percy: by my hopes,
089: This present enterprise set off his head,
090: I do not think a braver gentleman,
091: More active-valiant or more valiant-young,
092: More daring or more bold, is now alive
093: To grace this latter age with noble deeds.
094: For my part, I may speak it to my shame,
095: I have a truant been to chivalry;
096: And so I hear he doth account me too;
097: Yet this before my father's majesty--
098: I am content that he shall take the odds
099: Of his great name and estimation,
100: And will, to save the blood on either side,
101: Try fortune with him in a single fight.

KING HENRY IV
102: And, Prince of Wales, so dare we venture thee,
103: Albeit considerations infinite
104: Do make against it. No, good Worcester, no,
105: We love our people well; even those we love
106: That are misled upon your cousin's part;
107: And, will they take the offer of our grace,
108: Both he and they and you, every man
109: Shall be my friend again and I'll be his:
110: So tell your cousin, and bring me word
111: What he will do: but if he will not yield,
112: Rebuke and dread correction wait on us
113: And they shall do their office. So, be gone;
114: We will not now be troubled with reply:
115: We offer fair; take it advisedly.

Exeunt WORCESTER and VERNON

PRINCE HENRY
116: It will not be accepted, on my life:
117: The Douglas and the Hotspur both together
118: Are confident against the world in arms.

KING HENRY IV
119: Hence, therefore, every leader to his charge;
120: For, on their answer, will we set on them:
121: And God befriend us, as our cause is just!

Exeunt all but PRINCE HENRY and FALSTAFF

FALSTAFF
122: Hal, if thou see me down in the battle and bestride
123: me, so; 'tis a point of friendship.

PRINCE HENRY
124: Nothing but a colossus can do thee that friendship.
125: Say thy prayers, and farewell.

FALSTAFF
126: I would 'twere bed-time, Hal, and all well.

PRINCE HENRY
127: Why, thou owest God a death.

Exit PRINCE HENRY

FALSTAFF
128: 'Tis not due yet; I would be loath to pay him before
129: his day. What need I be so forward with him that
130: calls not on me? Well, 'tis no matter; honour pricks
131: me on. Yea, but how if honour prick me off when I
132: come on? how then? Can honour set to a leg? no: or
133: an arm? no: or take away the grief of a wound? no.
134: Honour hath no skill in surgery, then? no. What is
135: honour? a word. What is in that word honour? what
136: is that honour? air. A trim reckoning! Who hath it?
137: he that died o' Wednesday. Doth he feel it? no.
138: Doth he hear it? no. 'Tis insensible, then. Yea,
139: to the dead. But will it not live with the living?
140: no. Why? detraction will not suffer it. Therefore
141: I'll none of it. Honour is a mere scutcheon: and so
142: ends my catechism.

Exit

ACT V, SCENE II.

The rebel camp.

Enter WORCESTER and VERNON

EARL OF WORCESTER
001: O, no, my nephew must not know, Sir Richard,
002: The liberal and kind offer of the king.

VERNON
003: 'Twere best he did.

EARL OF WORCESTER
004: Then are we all undone.
005: It is not possible, it cannot be,
006: The king should keep his word in loving us;
007: He will suspect us still and find a time
008: To punish this offence in other faults:
009: Suspicion all our lives shall be stuck full of eyes;
010: For treason is but trusted like the fox,
011: Who, ne'er so tame, so cherish'd and lock'd up,
012: Will have a wild trick of his ancestors.
013: Look how we can, or sad or merrily,
014: Interpretation will misquote our looks,
015: And we shall feed like oxen at a stall,
016: The better cherish'd, still the nearer death.
017: My nephew's trespass may be well forgot;
018: it hath the excuse of youth and heat of blood,
019: And an adopted name of privilege,
020: A hair-brain'd Hotspur, govern'd by a spleen:
021: All his offences live upon my head
022: And on his father's; we did train him on,
023: And, his corruption being ta'en from us,
024: We, as the spring of all, shall pay for all.
025: Therefore, good cousin, let not Harry know,
026: In any case, the offer of the king.

VERNON
027: Deliver what you will; I'll say 'tis so.
028: Here comes your cousin.

Enter HOTSPUR and DOUGLAS

HOTSPUR
029: My uncle is return'd:
030: Deliver up my Lord of Westmoreland.
031: Uncle, what news?

EARL OF WORCESTER
032: The king will bid you battle presently.

EARL OF DOUGLAS
033: Defy him by the Lord of Westmoreland.

HOTSPUR
034: Lord Douglas, go you and tell him so.

EARL OF DOUGLAS
035: Marry, and shall, and very willingly.

Exit

EARL OF WORCESTER
036: There is no seeming mercy in the king.

HOTSPUR
037: Did you beg any? God forbid!

EARL OF WORCESTER
038: I told him gently of our grievances,
039: Of his oath-breaking; which he mended thus,
040: By now forswearing that he is forsworn:
041: He calls us rebels, traitors; and will scourge
042: With haughty arms this hateful name in us.

Re-enter the EARL OF DOUGLAS

EARL OF DOUGLAS
043: Arm, gentlemen; to arms! for I have thrown
044: A brave defiance in King Henry's teeth,
045: And Westmoreland, that was engaged, did bear it;
046: Which cannot choose but bring him quickly on.

EARL OF WORCESTER
047: The Prince of Wales stepp'd forth before the king,
048: And, nephew, challenged you to single fight.

HOTSPUR
049: O, would the quarrel lay upon our heads,
050: And that no man might draw short breath today
051: But I and Harry Monmouth! Tell me, tell me,
052: How show'd his tasking? seem'd it in contempt?

VERNON
053: No, by my soul; I never in my life
054: Did hear a challenge urged more modestly,
055: Unless a brother should a brother dare
056: To gentle exercise and proof of arms.
057: He gave you all the duties of a man;
058: Trimm'd up your praises with a princely tongu