In disadvantage, to abide a field

Where nothing but the sound of Hotspur’s name

Did seem defensible; so you left him.

Never, O never do his ghost the wrong

To hold your honour more precise and nice

With others than with him. Let them alone.

The Marshal and the Archbishop are strong.

Had my sweet Harry had but half their numbers,

Today might I, hanging on Hotspur’s neck,

Have talked of Monmouth’s grave.

NORTHUMBERLAND Beshrew your heart,

Fair daughter, you do draw my spirits from me

With new lamenting ancient oversights.

But I must go and meet with danger there,

Or it will seek me in another place,

And find me worse provided.

LADY NORTHUMBERLAND O fly to Scotland,

Till that the nobles and the armed commons

Have of their puissance made a little taste.

LADY PERCY

If they get ground and vantage of the King,

Then join you with them like a rib of steel,

To make strength stronger; but, for all our loves,

First let them try themselves. So did your son.

He was so suffered. So came I a widow,

And never shall have length of life enough

To rain upon remembrance with mine eyes,

That it may grow and sprout as high as heaven

For recordation to my noble husband.

NORTHUMBERLAND

Come, come, go in with me. ’Tis with my mind

As with the tide swelled up unto his height,

That makes a still stand, running neither way.

Fain would I go to meet the Archbishop,

But many thousand reasons hold me back.

I will resolve for Scotland. There am I

Till time and vantage crave my company. Exeunt

2.4 ⌈A table and chairs set forth.⌉ Enter a Drawer ⌈With wind⌉ and another Drawer ⌈With a dish of apple-johns⌉

⌈FIRST DRAWER⌉ What the devil hast thou brought there—apple-johns? Thou knowest Sir John cannot endure an apple-john.

⌈SECOND DRAWER⌉ Mass, thou sayst true. The Prince once set a dish of apple-johns before him; and told him, there were five more Sir Johns; and, putting off his hat, said ‘I will now take my leave of these six dry, round, old, withered knights.’ It angered him to the heart. But he hath forgot that.

⌈FIRST DRAWER⌉ Why then, cover, and set them down; and see if thou canst find out Sneak’s noise. Mistress Tearsheet would fain hear some music.

⌈Exit the Second Drawer⌉

⌈The First Drawer covers the table.⌉

⌈Enter the Second Drawer⌉

⌈SECOND DRAWER⌉ Sirrah, here will be the Prince and Master Poins anon, and they will put on two of our jerkins and aprons, and Sir John must not know of it. Bardolph hath brought word.

⌈FIRST DRAWER⌉ By the mass, here will be old utis! It will be an excellent stratagem.

⌈SECOND DRAWER⌉ I’ll see if I can find out Sneak. Exeunt Enter Mistress Quickly and Doll Tearsheet, drunk

MISTRESS QUICKLY I‘faith, sweetheart, methinks now you are in an excellent good temperality. Your pulsidge beats as extraordinarily as heart would desire, and your colour, I warrant you, is as red as any rose, in good truth, la; but i’faith, you have drunk too much canaries, and that’s a marvellous searching wine, and it perfumes the blood ere we can say ‘What’s this?’ How do you now?

DOLL TEARSHEET Better than I was.—Hem!

MISTRESS QUICKLY Why, that’s well said! A good heart’s worth gold.

Enter Sir John Falstaff

Lo, here comes Sir John.

SIR JOHN (sings) ‘When Arthur first in court’—⌈Calls⌉ Empty the jordan!—(Sings) ‘And was a worthy king’—How now, Mistress Doll?

MISTRESS QUICKLY Sick of a qualm, yea, good faith.

SIR JOHN So is all her sect; an they be once in a calm, they are sick.

DOLL TEARSHEET A pox damn you, you muddy rascal! Is that all the comfort you give me?

SIR JOHN You make fat rascals, Mistress Doll.

DOLL TEARSHEET I make them? Gluttony and diseases make them; I make them not.

SIR JOHN If the cook help to make the gluttony, you help to make the diseases, Doll. We catch of you, Doll, we catch of you; grant that, my poor virtue, grant that.

DOLL TEARSHEET Yea, Jesu, our chains and our jewels.

SIR JOHN ’Your brooches, pearls, and ouches’—for to serve bravely is to come halting off, you know; to come off the breach with his pike bent bravely, and to surgery bravely; to venture upon the charged chambers bravely.

MISTRESS QUICKLY By my troth, this is the old fashion. You two never meet but you fall to some discord. You are both, i’ good truth, as rheumatic as two dry toasts; you cannot one bear with another’s confirmities. What the goodyear, one must bear, (to Doll) and that must be you. You are the weaker vessel, as they say, the emptier vessel.

DOLL TEARSHEET Can a weak empty vessel bear such a huge full hogshead? There’s a whole merchant’s venture of Bordeaux stuff in him; you have not seen a hulk better stuffed in the hold.—Come, I’ll be friends with thee, Jack. Thou art going to the wars, and whether I shall ever see thee again or no there is nobody cares.

Enter a Drawer

DRAWER Sir, Ensign Pistol’s below, and would speak with you.

DOLL TEARSHEET Hang him, swaggering rascal, let him not come hither. It is the foul-mouthedest rogue in England.

MISTRESS QUICKLY If he swagger, let him not come here. No, by my faith! I must live among my neighbours; I’ll no swaggerers. I am in good name and fame with the very best. Shut the door; there comes no swaggerers here. I have not lived all this while to have swaggering now. Shut the door, I pray you.

SIR JOHN Dost thou hear, hostess?

MISTRESS QUICKLY Pray ye pacify yourself, Sir John. There comes no swaggerers here.

SIR JOHN Dost thou hear? It is mine ensign.

MISTRESS QUICKLY Tilly-fally, Sir John, ne‘er tell me. Your ensign-swaggerer comes not in my doors. I was before Master Tisick the debuty t’other day, and, as he said to me—’twas no longer ago than Wed‘sday last, i’ good faith—‘Neighbour Quickly,’ says he—Master Dumb our minister was by then—‘Neighbour Quickly,’ says he, ‘receive those that are civil, for,’ said he, ‘you are in an ill name.’ Now a said so, I can tell whereupon. ‘For,’ says he, ‘you are an honest woman, and well thought on; therefore take heed what guests you receive. Receive,‘ says he, ‘no swaggering companions.’ There comes none here. You would bless you to hear what he said. No, I’ll no swaggerers.

SIR JOHN He’s no swaggerer, hostess—a tame cheater, i’faith. You may stroke him as gently as a puppy greyhound. He’ll not swagger with a Barbary hen, if her feathers turn back in any show of resistance.—Call him up, drawer. ⌈Exit Drawer⌉

MISTRESS QUICKLY Cheater call you him? I will bar no honest man my house, nor no cheater, but I do not love swaggering, by my troth, I am the worse when one says ‘swagger’. Feel, masters, how I shake, look you, I warrant you.