Quick. Who’s there, I trow? Come near the house, I pray you.
[Enter] Fenton.
Fent. How now, good woman, how dost thou?
Quick. The better that it pleases your good worship to ask.
Fent. What news? How does pretty Mistress Anne?
Quick. In truth, sir, and she is pretty, and honest, and gentle, and one that is your friend; I can tell you that by the way, I praise heaven for it.
Fent. Shall I do any good, think’st thou? shall I not lose my suit?
Quick. Troth, sir, all is in His hands above. But notwithstanding, Master Fenton, I’ll be sworn on a book she loves you. Have not your worship a wart above your eye?
Fent. Yes, marry, have I, what of that?
Quick. Well, thereby hangs a tale. Good faith, it is such another Nan; but (I detest) an honest maid as ever broke bread. We had an hour’s talk of that wart. I shall never laugh but in that maid’s company! But, indeed, she is given too much to allicholy and musing; but for you—well—go to.
Fent. Well; I shall see her to-day. Hold, there’s money for thee. Let me have thy voice in my behalf. If thou seest her before me, commend me.
Quick. Will I? I’ faith, that we will; and I will tell your worship more of the wart the next time we have confidence, and of other wooers.
Fent. Well, farewell, I am in great haste now.
Quick. Farewell to your worship. [Exit Fenton.] Truly, an honest gentleman; but Anne loves him not; for I know Anne’s mind as well as another does. Out upon’t! what have I forgot?
Exit.
¶
ACT II
Scene I
Enter Mistress Page [reading of a letter].
Mrs. Page. What, have [I] scap’d love-letters in the holiday-time of my beauty, and am I now a subject for them? Let me see.
[Reads.]
“Ask me no reason why I love you, for though Love use Reason for his precisian, he admits him not for his counsellor. You are not young, no more am I; go to then, there’s sympathy. You are merry, so am I; ha, ha! then there’s more sympathy. You love sack, and so do I; would you desire better sympathy? Let it suffice thee, Mistress Page—at the least if the love of a soldier can suffice—that I love thee. I will not say, pity me—’tis not a soldier- like phrase—but I say, love me. By me,
Thine own true knight,
By day or night,
Or any kind of light,
With all his might
For thee to fight,
John Falstaff.”
What a Herod of Jewry is this! O wicked, wicked world! One that is well-nigh worn to pieces with age to show himself a young gallant! What an unweigh’d behavior hath this Flemish drunkard pick’d (with the devil’s name!) out of my conversation, that he dares in this manner assay me? Why, he hath not been thrice in my company! What should I say to him? I was then frugal of my mirth. Heaven forgive me! Why, I’ll exhibit a bill in the parliament for the putting down of men. How shall I be reveng’d on him? for reveng’d I will be! as sure as his guts are made of puddings.
[Enter] Mistress Ford.
Mrs. Ford. Mistress Page, trust me, I was going to your house.
Mrs. Page. And trust me, I was coming to you. You look very ill.
Mrs. Ford. Nay, I’ll ne’er believe that; I have to show to the contrary.
Mrs. Page. Faith, but you do, in my mind.
Mrs. Ford. Well—I do then; yet I say I could show you to the contrary. O Mistress Page, give me some counsel!
Mrs. Page. What’s the matter, woman?
Mrs. Ford. O woman—if it were not for one trifling respect, I could come to such honor!
Mrs. Page. Hang the trifle, woman, take the honor. What is it? Dispense with trifles. What is it?
Mrs. Ford. If I would but go to hell for an eternal moment or so, I could be knighted.
Mrs. Page. What? thou liest! Sir Alice Ford! These knights will hack, and so thou shouldst not alter the article of thy gentry.
Mrs. Ford. We burn daylight. Here, read, read; perceive how I might be knighted. I shall think the worse of fat men, as long as I have an eye to make difference of men’s liking: and yet he would not swear; [prais’d] women’s modesty; and gave such orderly and well-behav’d reproof to all uncomeliness, that I would have sworn his disposition would have gone to the truth of his words; but they do no more adhere and keep place together than the hundred Psalms to the tune of ‘Green-sleeves.’ What tempest, I trow, threw this whale (with so many tuns of oil in his belly) ashore at Windsor? How shall I be reveng’d on him? I think the best way were to entertain him with hope, till the wicked fire of lust have melted him in his own grease. Did you ever hear the like?
Mrs. Page. Letter for letter; but that the name of Page and Ford differs! To thy great comfort in this mystery of ill opinions, here’s the twin-brother of thy letter; but let thine inherit first, for I protest mine never shall. I warrant he hath a thousand of these letters, writ with blank space for different names (sure, more!); and these are of the second edition. He will print them, out of doubt; for he cares not what he puts into the press, when he would put us two. I had rather be a giantess, and lie under Mount Pelion. Well—I will find you twenty lascivious turtles ere one chaste man.
Mrs. Ford. Why, this is the very same: the very hand; the very words. What doth he think of us?
Mrs. Page. Nay, I know not; it makes me almost ready to wrangle with mine own honesty. I’ll entertain myself like one that I am not acquainted withal; for sure unless he know some strain in me that I know not myself, he would never have boarded me in this fury.
Mrs. Ford. ‘Boarding,’ call you it? I’ll be sure to keep him above deck.
Mrs. Page. So will I; if he come under my hatches, I’ll never to sea again. Let’s be reveng’d on him: let’s appoint him a meeting, give him a show of comfort in his suit, and lead him on with a fine-baited delay, till he hath pawn’d his horses to mine host of the Garter.
Mrs. Ford. Nay, I will consent to act any villainy against him, that may not sully the chariness of our honesty. O that my husband saw this letter! it would give eternal food to his jealousy.
Mrs. Page. Why, look where he comes; and my good man too. He’s as far from jealousy as I am from giving him cause, and that (I hope) is an unmeasurable distance.
Mrs. Ford. You are the happier woman.
Mrs. Page. Let’s consult together against this greasy knight. Come hither.
[They retire.]
[Enter] Ford [with] Pistol; Page [with] Nym.
Ford. Well, I hope it be not so.
Pist. Hope is a curtal dog in some affairs. Sir John affects