SCENE III. Another Part of the Forest. Alarums: Excursions. Enter FALSTAFF and Fal. What's your name, sir? of what condition are you; and of what place, I pray? Cole. I am a knight, sir; and my name isColevile of the dale. Fal. Well then, Colevile is your name; a knight is your degree; and your place, the dale: Colevile shall still be your name; a traitor your degree; and the dungeon your place, a place deep enough; so shall you still be Colevile of the dale. Cole. Are not you sir John Falstaff? Fal. As good a man as he, sir, whoe'er I am. Do ye yield, sir? or shall I sweat for you? If I do sweat, they are drops of thy lovers, and they weep for thy death: therefore rouse up fear and trembling, and do observance to my mercy. Cole. I think, you are sir John Falstaff; and, in that thought, yield me. Fal. I have a whole school of tongues in this belly of mine; and not a tongue of them all speaks any other word but my name. An I had but a belly of any indifferency, I were simply the most active fellow in Europe: My womb, my womb, my womb undoes me.-Here comes our general. Enter Prince JOHN of LANCASTER, WESTMORELAND, and Others. 9 6 P. John. The heat is past, follow no further now; The heat is past,] That is, the violence of resentment, the eagerness of revenge. Call in the powers, good cousin Westmoreland.- Now, Falstaff, where have you been all this while? Fal. I would be sorry, my lord, but it should be thus; I never knew yet, but rebuke and check was the reward of valour. Do you think me a swallow, an arrow, or a bullet? have I, in my poor and old motion, the expedition of thought? I have speeded hither with the very extremest inch of possibility; I have foundered nine-score and odd posts: and here, travel-tainted as I am, have, in my pure and immaculate valour, taken sir John Colevile of the dale, a most furious knight, and valorous enemy: But what of that? he saw me, and yielded; that I may justly say with the hook-nosed fellow of Rome, -I came, saw, and overcame. P. John. It was more of his courtesy than your deserving. Fal. I know not; here he is, and here I yield him: and I beseech your grace, let it be booked with the rest of this day's deeds; or, by the lord, I will have it in a particular ballad else, with mine own picture on the top of it, Colevile kissing my foot: To the which course if I be enforced, if you do not all show like gilt two-pences to me; and I, in the clear sky of fame, o'ershine you as much as the full moon doth the cinders of the element," which show like pins' heads to her; believe not the word of the noble: Therefore let me have right, and let desert mount. 7 P. John. Thine's too heavy to mount. Fal. Let it shine then. cinders of the element,] A ludicrous term for the stars. P. John. Thine's too thick to shine. Fal. Let it do something, my good lord, that may do me good, and call it what you will. P. John. Is thy name Colevile? Cole. It is, my lord. P. John. A famous rebel art thou, Colevile. Fal. And a famous true subject took him. Cole. I am, my lord, but as my betters are, That led me hither: had they been rul'd by me, You should have won them dearer than you have. Fal. I know not how they sold themselves: but thou, like a kind fellow, gavest thyself away; and I thank thee for thee. Re-enter WESTMORELAND. P. John. Now, have you left pursuit? Blunt, lead him hence; and see you guard him sure. Fal. My lord, I beseech you, give me leave to go through Glostershire: and, when you come to court, stand my good lord, pray, in your good report. 8 P. John. Fare you well, Falstaff: I, in my condition,9 stand my good lord,] i. e. stand my good friend. 9-I, in my condition,] Condition is, perhaps, the same with temper of mind: or it may mean, I, in my condition, i. e. in my place as commanding officer, who ought to represent things merely as they are, shall speak of you better than you deserve. Shall better speak of you than you deserve. deserve. [Exit. Fal. I would, you had but the wit; 'twere better than your dukedom.'-Good faith, this same young sober-blooded boy doth not love me; nor a man cannot make him laugh;2-but that's no marvel, he drinks no wine. There's never any of these demure boys come to any proof:3 for thin drink doth so over-cool their blood, and making many fish-meals, that they fall into a kind of male greensickness; and then, when they marry, they get wenches: they are generally fools and cowards;which some of us should be too, but for inflaınmation. A good sherris-sack hath a two-fold operation in it. It ascends me into the brain; dries me there all the foolish, and dull, and crudy vapours which environ it: makes it apprehensive, quick, forgetive, full of nimble, fiery, and delectable shapes; which delivered o'er to the voice, (the tongue,) which is the birth, becomes excellent wit. The second property of your excellent sherris is,-— the warming of the blood; which, before cold and settled, left the liver white and pale, which is the badge of pusillanimity and cowardice: but the sherris warms it, and makes it course from the inwards to the parts extreme. It illumineth the face; which, as a beacon, gives warning to all the rest of this little kingdom, man, to arm: and then the vital 2 your dukedom.] He had no dukedom. this same young sober-blooded boy doth not love me; nor a man cannot make him laugh;] Falstaff here speaks like a veteran in life. The young prince did not love him, and he despaired to gain his affection, for he could not make him laugh. Men only become friends by community of pleasures. He who cannot be softened into gaiety, cannot easily be melted into kindness. 3 to any proof:] i. e. any confirmed state of manhood. The allusion is to armour hardened till it abides a certain trial. -apprehensive,] i. e. quick to understand. -forgetive,] Forgetive from forge; inventive, imaginative. commoners, and inland petty spirits, muster me all to their captain, the heart; who, great, and puffed up with this retinue, doth any deed of courage; and this valour comes of sherris: So that skill in the weapon is nothing, without sack; for that sets it a-work and learning, a mere hoard of gold kept by a devil; till sack commences it, and sets it in act and use. Hereof comes it, that prince Harry is valiant: for the cold blood he did naturally inherit of his father, he hath, like lean, steril, and bare land, manured, husbanded, and tilled, with excellent endeavour of drinking good, and good store of fertile sherris; that he is become very hot, and valiant. If I had a thousand sons, the first human principle I would teach them, should be,→ to forswear thin potations, and addict themselves to sack. Enter BARDOLPH. How now, Bardolph ? Bard. The army is discharged all, and gone. Fal. Let them go. I'll through Glostershire; and there will I visit master Robert Shallow, esquire: I have him already tempering between my finger and my thumb, and shortly will I seal with him. Come away. [Exeunt, kept by a devil;] It was anciently supposed that all the mines of gold, &c. were guarded by evil spirits. 7 till sack commences it,] i. e. till sack gives it a beginning, brings it into action: or perhaps, Shakspeare alludes to the Cambridge Commencement; and in what follows to the Oxford Act: for by those different names our two universities have long distinguished the season, at which each of them gives to her respective students a complete authority to use those hoards of learning which have entitled them to their several degrees in arts, law, physick, and divinity. -I have him already tempering, &c.] A very pleasant allusion to the old use of sealing with soft wax. |
