William Shakespeare

“ FALSTAFF.
What, Hal! How now, mad wag? What a devil dost thou in Warwickshire? My good Lord of Westmoreland, I cry you mercy. I thought your honour had already been at Shrewsbury.
WESTMORELAND.
Faith, Sir John, ’tis more than time that I were there, and you too, but my powers are there already. The King, I can tell you, looks for us all. We must away all night.
FALSTAFF.
Tut, never fear me. I am as vigilant as a cat to steal cream.
PRINCE.
I think, to steal cream indeed, for thy theft hath already made thee butter. But tell me, Jack, whose fellows are these that come after? ”

“ FALSTAFF.
Why, Hal, thou knowest, as thou art but man, I dare, but as thou art prince, I fear thee as I fear the roaring of the lion’s whelp.
PRINCE.
And why not as the lion?
FALSTAFF.
The King himself is to be feared as the lion. Dost thou think I’ll fear thee as I fear thy father? Nay, an I do, I pray God my girdle break.
PRINCE.
O, if it should, how would thy guts fall about thy knees! But, sirrah, there’s no room for faith, truth, nor honesty in this bosom of thine; it is all filled up with midriff. Charge an honest woman with picking thy pocket! ”

“ FALSTAFF.
Yea, and so used it that were it not here apparent that thou art heir apparent—But I prithee sweet wag, shall there be gallows standing in England when thou art king? And resolution thus fubbed as it is with the rusty curb of old father Antic the law? Do not thou, when thou art king, hang a thief.
PRINCE.
No, thou shalt.
FALSTAFF.
Shall I? O rare! By the Lord, I’ll be a brave judge.
PRINCE.
Thou judgest false already, I mean thou shalt have the hanging of the thieves, and so become a rare hangman.
FALSTAFF.
Well, Hal, well ”

“ How long is’t ago, Jack, since thou sawest thine own knee?
FALSTAFF.
My own knee? When I was about thy years, Hal, I was not an eagle’s talon in the waist. I could have crept into any alderman’s thumb-ring: a plague of sighing and grief! It blows a man up like a bladder. There’s villanous news abroad: here was Sir John Bracy from your father; you must to the court in the morning. That same mad fellow of the north, Percy, and he of Wales that gave Amamon the bastinado, and made Lucifer cuckold, and swore the devil his true liegeman upon the cross of a Welsh hook—what a plague call you him? ”

“ O Jesu, my lord, my lord—
PRINCE.
Heigh, heigh, the devil rides upon a fiddlestick. What’s the matter?
HOSTESS.
The sheriff and all the watch are at the door. They are come to search the house. Shall I let them in?
FALSTAFF.
Dost thou hear, Hal? Never call a true piece of gold a counterfeit: thou art essentially made without seeming so.
PRINCE.
And thou a natural coward without instinct.
FALSTAFF.
I deny your major. If you will deny the sheriff, so; if not, let him enter. If I become not a cart as well as another man, a plague on my bringing up! ”

“ I fear thou art another counterfeit,
And yet, in faith, thou bearest thee like a king.
But mine I am sure thou art, whoe’er thou be,
And thus I win thee.
They fight; the King being in danger, enter Prince Henry.
PRINCE.
Hold up thy head, vile Scot, or thou art like
Never to hold it up again! The spirits
Of valiant Shirley, Stafford, Blunt are in my arms.
It is the Prince of Wales that threatens thee,
Who never promiseth but he means to pay.
[They fight. Douglas flies.]
Cheerly, my lord. How fares your Grace?
Sir Nicholas Gawsey hath for succour sent,
And so hath Clifton. ”

“ I prithee, call in Falstaff. I’ll play Percy, and that damned brawn shall play Dame Mortimer his wife. Rivo! says the drunkard. Call in Ribs, call in Tallow.
Enter Falstaff, Gadshill, Bardolph and Peto; followed by Francis with wine.
POINS.
Welcome, Jack. Where hast thou been?
FALSTAFF.
A plague of all cowards, I say, and a vengeance too! Marry, and amen! Give me a cup of sack, boy. Ere I lead this life long, I’ll sew nether-stocks, and mend them and foot them too. A plague of all cowards! Give me a cup of sack, rogue. Is there no virtue extant? ”

“ I have forsworn his company hourly any time this two-and-twenty years, and yet I am bewitched with the rogue’s company. If the rascal have not given me medicines to make me love him, I’ll be hanged. It could not be else: I have drunk medicines. Poins! Hal! A plague upon you both! Bardolph! Peto! I’ll starve ere I’ll rob a foot further. An ’twere not as good a deed as drink, to turn true man, and to leave these rogues, I am the veriest varlet that ever chewed with a tooth. Eight yards of uneven ground is threescore and ten miles afoot with me, and the stony-hearted villains know it well enough. ”

“ FALSTAFF.
You rogue, here’s lime in this sack too: there is nothing but roguery to be found in villainous man, yet a coward is worse than a cup of sack with lime in it. A villanous coward! Go thy ways, old Jack. Die when thou wilt, if manhood, good manhood, be not forgot upon the face of the Earth, then am I a shotten herring. There lives not three good men unhanged in England, and one of them is fat, and grows old, God help the while, a bad world, I say. I would I were a weaver; I could sing psalms or anything. A plague of all cowards, I say still. ”

“ BARDOLPH.
’Sblood, I would my face were in your belly!
FALSTAFF.
God-a-mercy! so should I be sure to be heartburnt.
Enter the Hostess.
How now, Dame Partlet the hen, have you enquired yet who picked my pocket?
HOSTESS.
Why, Sir John, what do you think, Sir John, do you think I keep thieves in my house? I have searched, I have enquired, so has my husband, man by man, boy by boy, servant by servant. The tithe of a hair was never lost in my house before.
FALSTAFF.
Ye lie, hostess. Bardolph was shaved and lost many a hair, and I’ll be sworn my pocket was picked. ”

“ Enter Hotspur, Worcester and Douglas.
HOTSPUR.
Well said, my noble Scot. If speaking truth
In this fine age were not thought flattery,
Such attribution should the Douglas have
As not a soldier of this season’s stamp
Should go so general current through the world.
By God, I cannot flatter, I do defy
The tongues of soothers, but a braver place
In my heart’s love hath no man than yourself.
Nay, task me to my word; approve me, lord.
DOUGLAS.
Thou art the king of honour.
No man so potent breathes upon the ground
But I will beard him.
HOTSPUR.
Do so, and ’tis well. ”

“ The lion will not touch the true prince. Instinct is a great matter. I was now a coward on instinct. I shall think the better of myself, and thee, during my life—I for a valiant lion, and thou for a true prince. But, by the Lord, lads, I am glad you have the money.—Hostess, clap to the doors. Watch tonight, pray tomorrow. Gallants, lads, boys, hearts of gold, all the titles of good fellowship come to you! What, shall we be merry? Shall we have a play extempore?
PRINCE.
Content; and the argument shall be thy running away.
FALSTAFF.
Ah, no more of that, Hal, an thou lovest me! ”

“ I think there is no man speaks better Welsh.
I’ll to dinner.
MORTIMER.
Peace, cousin Percy, you will make him mad.
GLENDOWER.
I can call spirits from the vasty deep.
HOTSPUR.
Why, so can I, or so can any man,
But will they come when you do call for them?
GLENDOWER.
Why, I can teach you, cousin, to command the devil.
HOTSPUR.
And I can teach thee, coz, to shame the devil
By telling truth; tell truth, and shame the devil.
If thou have power to raise him, bring him hither,
And I’ll be sworn I have power to shame him hence.
O, while you live, tell truth, and shame the devil! ”

“ FALSTAFF.
O, thou hast damnable iteration, and art indeed able to corrupt a saint. Thou hast done much harm upon me, Hal, God forgive thee for it. Before I knew thee, Hal, I knew nothing, and now am I, if a man should speak truly, little better than one of the wicked. I must give over this life, and I will give it over. By the Lord, an I do not, I am a villain. I’ll be damned for never a king’s son in Christendom. ”

“ WORCESTER.
Hear you, cousin, a word.
HOTSPUR.
All studies here I solemnly defy,
Save how to gall and pinch this Bolingbroke:
And that same sword-and-buckler Prince of Wales,
But that I think his father loves him not,
And would be glad he met with some mischance—
I would have him poison’d with a pot of ale.
WORCESTER.
Farewell, kinsman. I will talk to you
When you are better temper’d to attend.
NORTHUMBERLAND.
Why, what a wasp-stung and impatient fool
Art thou to break into this woman’s mood,
Tying thine ear to no tongue but thine own! ”

“ But as the devil would have it, three misbegotten knaves in Kendal green came at my back and let drive at me, for it was so dark, Hal, that thou couldst not see thy hand.
PRINCE.
These lies are like the father that begets them, gross as a mountain, open, palpable. Why, thou clay-brained guts, thou knotty-pated fool, thou whoreson, obscene greasy tallow-catch—
FALSTAFF.
What, art thou mad? Art thou mad? Is not the truth the truth? ”

“ Why, Percy I kill’d myself, and saw thee dead.
FALSTAFF.
Didst thou? Lord, Lord, how this world is given to lying! I grant you I was down and out of breath, and so was he, but we rose both at an instant, and fought a long hour by Shrewsbury clock. If I may be believed, so; if not, let them that should reward valour bear the sin upon their own heads. I’ll take it upon my death, I gave him this wound in the thigh. If the man were alive, and would deny it, zounds, I would make him eat a piece of my sword. ”

“ Now, Harry, whence come you?
FALSTAFF.
My noble lord, from Eastcheap.
PRINCE.
The complaints I hear of thee are grievous.
FALSTAFF.
’Sblood, my lord, they are false.—Nay, I’ll tickle ye for a young prince, i’faith.
PRINCE.
Swearest thou, ungracious boy? Henceforth ne’er look on me. Thou art violently carried away from grace. There is a devil haunts thee in the likeness of an old fat man. A tun of man is thy companion. ”

“ If sack and sugar be a fault, God help the wicked! If to be old and merry be a sin, then many an old host that I know is damned. If to be fat be to be hated, then Pharaoh’s lean kine are to be loved. No, my good lord, banish Peto, banish Bardolph, banish Poins, but for sweet Jack Falstaff, kind Jack Falstaff, true Jack Falstaff, valiant Jack Falstaff, and therefore more valiant, being as he is old Jack Falstaff, banish not him thy Harry’s company, banish not him thy Harry’s company. ”

“ FALSTAFF.
I am a rogue if I were not at half-sword with a dozen of them two hours together. I have ’scaped by miracle. I am eight times thrust through the doublet, four through the hose, my buckler cut through and through, my sword hacked like a handsaw. Ecce signum! I never dealt better since I was a man: all would not do. A plague of all cowards! Let them speak. If they speak more or less than truth, they are villains, and the sons of darkness. ”

“ Why, thou whoreson, impudent, embossed rascal, if there were anything in thy pocket but tavern reckonings, memorandums of bawdy houses, and one poor pennyworth of sugar-candy to make thee long-winded, if thy pocket were enriched with any other injuries but these, I am a villain. And yet you will stand to it, you will not pocket up wrong. Art thou not ashamed!
FALSTAFF.
Dost thou hear, Hal? Thou knowest in the state of innocency Adam fell, and what should poor Jack Falstaff do in the days of villainy? Thou seest I have more flesh than another man and therefore more frailty. ”

“ FALSTAFF.
By the mass, lad, thou sayest true. It is like we shall have good trading that way. But tell me, Hal, art not thou horrible afeard? Thou being heir-apparent, could the world pick thee out three such enemies again as that fiend Douglas, that spirit Percy, and that devil Glendower? Art thou not horribly afraid? ”

“ A plague upon it when thieves cannot be true one to another! [They whistle.] Whew! A plague upon you all! Give me my horse, you rogues, give me my horse and be hanged!
PRINCE.
[Coming forward.] Peace, you fat guts, lie down, lay thine ear close to the ground, and list if thou canst hear the tread of travellers.
FALSTAFF.
Have you any levers to lift me up again, being down? ’Sblood, I’ll not bear my own flesh so far afoot again for all the coin in thy father’s exchequer. ”

“ FALSTAFF.
So I do, against my will.
POINS.
O, ’tis our setter. I know his voice.
Comes forward with Bardolph and Peto.
BARDOLPH.
What news?
GADSHILL.
Case ye, case ye, on with your visards. There’s money of the King’s coming down the hill, ’tis going to the King’s exchequer.
FALSTAFF.
You lie, ye rogue, ’tis going to the King’s tavern.
GADSHILL.
There’s enough to make us all.
FALSTAFF.
To be hanged.
PRINCE.
Sirs, you four shall front them in the narrow lane. Ned Poins and I will walk lower; if they ’scape from your encounter, then they light on us. ”

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