SIL. Thereafter as they be: a score of good ewes

may be worth ten pounds.

SHAL. And is old Double dead!

Enter BARDOLPH, and one with him.

SIL. Here come two of sir John Falstaff's men, as I think.

BARD. Good morrow, honest gentlemen*: I beseech you, which is justice Shallow?

SHAL. I am Robert Shallow, sir; a poor esquire of this county, and one of the king's justices of the peace: What is your good pleasure with me?

BARD. My captain, sir, commends him to you: my captain, sir John Falstaff: a tall gentleman, by heaven, and a most gallant leader.

SHAL. He greets me well, sir; I knew him a good backsword man: How doth the good knight? may I ask, how my lady his wife doth?

BARD. Sir, pardon; a soldier is better accommodated, than with a wife.

SHAL. It is well said, in faith, sir; and it is well said indeed too. Better accommodated!—it is good; yea, indeed, it is: good phrases are surely, and ever were, very commendable. Accommodated!-it comes from accommodo: very good; a good phrase ".

3

* Folio gives Good morrow, honest gentlemen, to Shallow.

--

3 very good; a good phrase, &c.] Accommodate was a modish term of that time, as Ben Jonson informs us: "You are not to cast or wring for the perfumed terms of the time, as accommodation, complement, spirit, &c. but use them properly in their places as others." Discoveries. Hence Bardolph calls it a word of exceeding good command. His definiton of it is admirable, and highly satirical: nothing being more common than for inaccurate speakers or writers, when they should define, to put their hearers off with a synonymous term; or, for want of that, even with the same term differently accommodated: as in the instance before us. WARBURTON.

The same word occurs in Ben Jonson's Every Man in his Humour :

BARD. Pardon me, sir; I have heard the word. Phrase, call you it? By this good day, I know not the phrase but I will maintain the word with my sword, to be a soldier-like word, and a word of exceeding good command. Accommodated; That is, when a man is, as they say, accommodated: or, when a man is,-being,-whereby, he may be thought to be accommodated; which is an excellent thing.

Enter FALSTAFF.

SHAL. It is very just :-Look, here comes good sir John.-Give me your good hand, give me your worship's good hand: By my troth, you look well, and bear your years very well: welcome, good sir John.

FAL. I am glad to see you well, good master Robert Shallow :-Master Sure-card, as I think1. SHAL. No, sir John; it is my cousin Silence, in commission with me.

FAL. Good master Silence, it well befits you should be of the peace.

SIL. Your good worship is welcome.

FAL. Fye! this is hot weather.-Gentlemen, have you provided me here half a dozen sufficient men ?

4

SHAL. Marry, have we, sir. Will you sit ?
FAL. Let me see them, I beseech you.

SHAL. Where's the roll? where's the roll?

"Hostess, accommodate us with another bedstaff:
"The woman does not understand the words of action."
STEEVENS.

Master SURE-CARD, as I think.] It is observable, that many of Shakspeare's names are invented, and characteristical. Master Forth-right, the tilter; Master Shoe-tie, the traveller; Master Smooth, the silkman; Mrs. Over-done, the bawd; Kate Keep-down, Jane Night-work, &c. Sure-card was used as a term for a boon companion, so lately as the latter end of the last century, by one of the translators of Suetonius. MALONE.

where's the roll ?-Let me see, let me see.

So, so,

so, so: Yea, marry, sir:-Ralph Mouldy:-let them appear as I call; let them do so, let them do so. Let me see; Where is Mouldy?

MOUL. Here, an't please you.

SHAL. What think you, sir John? a good limbed fellow: young, strong, and of good friends. FAL. Is thy name Mouldy?

MOUL. Yea, an't please you.

FAL. 'Tis the more time thou wert used..

SHAL. Ha, ha, ha! most excellent, i' faith! things, that are mouldy, lack use: Very singular good!-In faith, well said, sir John; very well said. Fal. Prick him. To SHALLOW.

MOUL. I was pricked well enough before, an you could have let me alone: my old dame will be undone now, for one to do her husbandry, and her drudgery: you need not to have pricked me; there are other men fitter to go out than I.

FAL. Go to; peace, Mouldy, you shall go. Mouldy, it is time you were spent.

MOUL. Spent!

SHAL. Peace, fellow, peace; stand aside: Know you where you are ?-For the other, sir John:let me see;-Simon Shadow!

FAL. Ay marry, let me have him to sit under: he's like to be a cold soldier.

SHAL. Where's Shadow.

SHAD. Here, sir.

FAL. Shadow, whose son art thou?

SHAD. My mother's son, sir.

FAL. Thy mother's son! like enough; and thy father's shadow: so the son of the female is the shadow of the male: It is often so, indeed; but not much of the father's substance.

SHAL. Do you like him, sir John?

FAL. Shadow will serve for summer, prick him;

-for we have a number of shadows to fill up the

muster-book 5.

SHAL. Thomas Wart!

FAL. Where's he?

WART. Here, sir.

FAL. Is thy name Wart?

WART. Yea, sir.

FAL. Thou art a very ragged wart.

SHAL. Shall I prick him, sir John?

FAL. It were superfluous; for his apparel is built upon his back, and the whole frame stands upon pins: prick him no more.

SHAL. Ha, ha, ha!-you can do it, sir; you can do it: I commend you well.-Francis Feeble! FEE. Here, sir.

FAL. What trade art thou, Feeble ?

FEE. A woman's tailor, sir.

SHAL. Shall I prick him, sir?

FAL. You may: but if he had been a man's tailor, he would have pricked you.-Wilt thou make as many holes in an enemy's battle, as thou hast done in a woman's petticoat?

FEE. I will do my good will, sir; you can have

no more.

FAL. Well said, good woman's tailor! well said, courageous Feeble! Thou will be as valiant as the wrathful dove, or most magnanimous mouse.-Prick the woman's tailor well, master Shallow; deep, master Shallow.

5

-

we have a number of shadows to fill up the muster-book.] That is, we have in the muster-book many names for which we receive pay, though we have not the men. JOHNSON.

So, in Barnabie Riche's Souldiers Wishe to Britons Welfare, or Captaine Skill and Captaine Pill, 1604, p. 19: "One speciall meane that a shifting captaine hath to deceive his prince, is in his number, to take pay for a whole company, when he hath not halfe." STEEVENS.

FEE. I would, Wart might have gone, sir.

FAL. I would, thou wert a man's tailor; that thou might'st mend him, and make him fit to go. I cannot put him to a private soldier, that is the leader of so many thousands: Let that suffice, most forcible Feeble.

FEE. It shall suffice, sir.

FAL. I am bound to thee, reverend Feeble.Who is next?

SHAL. Peter Bull-calf of the green!

FAL. Yea, marry, let us see Bull-calf.

BULL. Here, sir.

FAL. 'Fore God, a likely fellow!-Come, prick me Bull-calf till he roar again.

BULL. O lord! good my lord captain,

FAL. What, dost thou roar before thou art pricked?

BULL. O lord, sir! I am a diseased man.

FAL. What disease hast thou ?

BULL. A whoreson cold, sir; a cough, sir; which I caught with ringing in the king's affairs upon his coronation day, sir.

FAL. Come, thou shalt go to the wars in a gown; we will have away thy cold; and I will take such order o, that thy friends shall ring for thee.—Is here all?

SHAL. Here is two more called than your number; you must have but four here, sir;-and so, pray you, go in with me to dinner.

I

6 -take such order,] i. e. take such measures. So, in Othello:

"Honest lago hath ta'en order fort." STEEVENS. 7 Here is two more called than your number;] Five only have been called, and the number required is four. Some name seems to have been omitted by the transcriber. The restoration of this

sixth man would solve the difficulty that occurs below; for when Mouldy and Bull-calf are set aside, Falstaff, as Dr. Farmer has observed, gets but three recruits. Perhaps our author himself is answerable for this slight inaccuracy. MALONE. BOSWELL.

Mr. Capell omits the word two.