Read The Merry Wives of Windsor Online
Authors: William Shakespeare
Exeunt
running scene 17 continues
Enter Falstaff [and] Mistress Quickly
FALSTAFF
Prithee, no more prattling. Go, I’ll
hold
1
. This is the
third time. I hope good luck lies in odd numbers. Away, go.
They say there is
divinity
3
in odd numbers, either in nativity,
chance, or death. Away.
MISTRESS QUICKLY
I’ll provide you a chain, and I’ll do what I can
to get you a pair of horns.
FALSTAFF
Away, I say. Time
wears
7
. Hold up your head, and
[
Exit Mistress Quickly
]
[
Enter Ford, disguised as Broom
]
How now, Master Broom? Master Broom, the matter will be
known tonight, or never. Be you in the park about midnight,
at Herne’s Oak, and you shall see wonders.
FORD
Went you not to her yesterday, sir, as you told me
you had appointed?
FALSTAFF
I went to her, Master Broom, as you see, like a poor
old man, but I came from her, Master Broom, like a poor old
woman. That same knave Ford, her husband, hath the finest
mad devil of jealousy in him, Master Broom, that ever
governed frenzy. I will tell you, he beat me grievously, in the
shape of a woman, for in the shape of man, Master Broom, I
fear not
Goliath with a weaver’s beam
20
, because I know also
life is a
shuttle
21
. I am in haste. Go along with me, I’ll tell you
all, Master Broom. Since I plucked geese, played truant and
whipped top
23
, I knew not what ’twas to be beaten till lately.
Follow me, I’ll tell you strange things of this knave Ford, on
whom tonight I will be revenged, and I will deliver his wife
into your hand. Follow. Strange things
in hand
26
, Master
Broom. Follow.
Exeunt
running scene 18
Enter Page, Shallow [and] Slender
PAGE
Come, come. We’ll
couch
1
i’th’castle-ditch till we
see the light of our fairies. Remember, son Slender, my
daughter—
SLENDER
Ay, forsooth, I have spoke with her and we have a
nay-word
5
how to know one another: I come to her in white,
and cry
‘mum’, she cries ‘budget’
6
, and by that we know one
another.
SHALLOW
That’s good too. But what needs either your ‘mum’
or her ‘budget’? The white will
decipher
9
her well enough. It
hath struck ten o’clock.
PAGE
The night is dark: light and spirits will
become
11
it
well. Heaven prosper our sport! No man means evil but the
devil, and we shall know him by his horns. Let’s away.
Follow me.
Exeunt
running scene 18 continues
Enter Mistress Page, Mistress Ford [and] Caius
MISTRESS PAGE
Master Doctor, my daughter is in green. When
you see your time, take her by the hand, away with her to the
deanery, and
dispatch
it quickly. Go before into the park. We
two must go together.
CAIUS
I know vat I have to do. Adieu.
MISTRESS PAGE
Fare you well, sir.
[
Exit Caius
]
My husband will not rejoice so much at the abuse of Falstaff
as he will
chafe
8
at the Doctor’s marrying my daughter. But
’tis no matter. Better a little chiding than a great deal of
heartbreak.
MISTRESS FORD
Where is Nan now, and her troop of fairies? And
the Welsh devil Hugh?
MISTRESS PAGE
They are all couched in a pit hard by Herne’s
Oak, with
obscured
14
lights, which, at the very instant of
Falstaff’s and our meeting, they will at once display to the
night.
MISTRESS FORD
That cannot
choose but amaze
17
him.
MISTRESS PAGE
If he be not amazed, he will be mocked. If he be
amazed, he will every way be mocked.
MISTRESS FORD
We’ll betray him finely.
MISTRESS PAGE
Against such lewdsters and their lechery.
Those that betray them do no treachery.
MISTRESS FORD
The hour draws on. To the Oak, to the Oak!
Exeunt
running scene 18 continues
Enter Evans [disguised, with others as] Fairies
EVANS
Trib
1
, trib, fairies. Come, and remember your parts.
Be pold, I pray you. Follow me into the pit, and when I give
the
watch-’ords
3
, do as I pid you. Come, come, trib, trib.
Exeunt
running scene 18 continues
Enter Falstaff [disguised as Herne
]
FALSTAFF
The Windsor bell hath struck twelve, the minute
draws on. Now, the hot-blooded gods assist me! Remember,
Jove, thou wast a bull for thy Europa
3
. Love set on thy horns.
O powerful Love, that in some respects makes a beast a man,
in some other a man a beast. You were also, Jupiter, a swan
for the love of
Leda
6
. O omnipotent Love, how near the god
drew to the complexion of a goose. A fault done first in the
form of a beast. O Jove, a beastly
fault
8
! And then another
fault in the semblance of a fowl. Think on’t, Jove, a foul fault!
When gods have hot
backs
10
, what shall poor men do? For me,
I am here a Windsor stag, and the fattest, I think, i’th’forest.
Send me a cool
rut-time
, Jove, or who can blame me to
piss
12
my tallow? Who comes here? My
doe
13
?
[
Enter Mistress Ford and Mistress Page
]
MISTRESS FORD
Sir John? Art thou there, my
deer
14
? My male deer?
FALSTAFF
My doe with the black
scut
! Let the sky rain
potatoes
15
,
let it thunder to the tune of Greensleeves, hail
kissing-comfits
16
and snow
eryngoes
. Let there come a tempest of
provocation
17
,
I will shelter me here.
Embraces her
MISTRESS FORD
Mistress Page is come with me,
sweetheart
19
.
FALSTAFF
Divide me like a bribed buck
20
, each a haunch: I will
keep my sides to myself, my shoulders for the
fellow of this
21
walk, and my horns I bequeath your husbands. Am I a
woodman
23
, ha? Speak I like Herne the hunter? Why, now is
Cupid a child of conscience: he makes restitution
24
. As I am a
true spirit, welcome.
Horns within
MISTRESS PAGE
Alas, what noise?
MISTRESS FORD
Heaven forgive our sins.
FALSTAFF
What should this be?
MISTRESS FORD
and
MISTRESS PAGE
Away, away!
They run off
FALSTAFF
I think the devil will not have me damned, lest the
oil
31
that’s in me should set hell on fire. He would never else
cross
me thus.
Enter [Evans, disguised as before; Pistol, as
Hobgoblin
32
; Mistress
Quickly, Anne and others, as] Fairies [with tapers
]
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Fairies black, grey, green and white,
You moonshine revellers and
shades
34
of night,
You
orphan
heirs of fixèd destiny
35
,
Attend your office and your quality
36
.
Crier
Hobgoblin, make the fairy
oyez
37
.
PISTOL
Elves,
list
your names. Silence, you airy
toys
38
.
Cricket, to Windsor chimneys shalt thou leap.
Where fires thou find’st
unraked
40
and hearths unswept,
There pinch the maids as blue as
bilberry
41
,
Our radiant queen hates sluts and sluttery.
FALSTAFF
They are fairies, he that speaks to them shall die.
Aside
Lies down upon his face
EVANS
Where’s Bede? Go you, and where you find a maid
That ere she sleep has thrice her prayers said,
Raise up the organs of her fantasy
47
:
Sleep she
as sound as
careless
48
infancy.
But those
as
49
sleep and think not on their sins,
Pinch them, arms, legs, backs, shoulders, sides and shins.
MISTRESS QUICKLY
About
51
, about.
Search Windsor Castle, elves, within and out.
Strew good luck,
oafs
53
, on every sacred room,
That it may stand till the
perpetual doom
54
,
In state
as wholesome as in state ’tis fit
55
,
Worthy
56
the owner and the owner it.
The
several chairs of order
57
look you scour
With juice of
balm
58
and every precious flower.
Each fair
instalment
,
coat
, and sev’ral
crest
59
,
With loyal
blazon
60
evermore be blest.
And nightly meadow-fairies, look you sing,
Like to the Garter’s
compass
62
, in a ring.
Th’expressure
63
that it bears, green let it be,
More fertile-fresh than all the field to see.
And
Honi soit qui mal y pense
65
write
In em’rald tufts, flowers purple, blue and white,
Like sapphire, pearl and rich embroidery,
Buckled
68
below fair knighthood’s bending knee.
Fairies use flowers for their
charactery
69
.
Away, disperse. But till ’tis one o’clock,
Our
dance of custom
71
round about the oak
Of Herne the hunter, let us not forget.
EVANS
Pray you, lock hand in hand, yourselves in order set.
And twenty glow-worms shall our lanterns be,
To guide our
measure
75
round about the tree.
But stay, I smell a
man of middle-earth
76
.
FALSTAFF
Heavens defend me from that Welsh fairy,
Aside
lest he transform me to a piece of
cheese
78
!
PISTOL
Vile worm, thou wast
o’erlooked
79
even in
To Falstaff
thy birth.
MISTRESS QUICKLY
With
trial-fire
touch me
81
his finger-end.
If he be chaste, the flame will back descend
And
turn
him to no pain. But if he
start
83
,
It is the flesh of a corrupted heart.
PISTOL
A trial, come.
EVANS
Come, will this
wood
86
take
fire?
They burn him with their tapers