right fencing grace, my lord; tap for tap, and so part fair. Ch. Just. Now the Lord lighten thee! thou art a great fool. [Exeunt. Prince. Before God, I am exceeding weary. Poins. Is 't come to that? I had thought weariness durst not have attached one of so high blood. Prince. Faith, it does me; though it discolours the complexion of my greatness to acknowledge it. Doth it not show vilely in me to desire small beer? not Poins. Why, a prince should not be so loosely studied as to remember so weak a composition. Prince. Belike then my appetite was princely got; for, by my troth, I do now remember the poor creature, small beer. But, indeed, these humble considerations make me out of love IC with my greatness. What a disgrace is it to me to remember thy name! or to know thy face tomorrow! or to take note how many pair of silk stockings thou hast, viz. these, and those that were thy peach-coloured ones! or to bear the inventory of thy shirts, as, one for superfluity, and 20 another for use ! But that the tennis-court-keeper knows better than I; for it is a low ebb of linen with thee when thou keepest not racket there; as tat. 206. tap for tap, tit for 3. attached, arrested, taken possession of. 5. discolours the complexion of my greatness, puts me to an unprincely blush. 10. studied, inclined. . thou hast not done a great while, because the rest of thy low countries have made a shift to eat up thy holland: and God knows, whether those that bawl out the ruins of thy linen shall inherit his kingdom: but the midwives say the children are not in the fault; whereupon the world increases, and kindreds are mightily strengthened. 30 Poins. How ill it follows, after you have laboured so hard, you should talk so idly! Tell me, how many good young princes would do so, their fathers being so sick as yours at this time is? Prince. Shall I tell thee one thing, Poins? Poins. Yes, faith; and let it be an excellent good thing. Prince. It shall serve among wits of no higher breeding than thine. Poins. Go to; I stand the push of your one thing that you will tell. Prince. Marry, I tell thee, it is not meet that I should be sad, now my father is sick albeit I could tell to thee, as to one it pleases me, for fault of a better, to call my friend, I could be sad, and sad indeed too. Poins. Very hardly upon such a subject. 40 Prince. By this hand, thou thinkest me as far in the devil's book as thou and Falstaff for obduracy and persistency: let the end try the 50 man. But I tell thee, my heart bleeds inwardly that my father is so sick and keeping such vile company as thou art hath in reason taken from me all ostentation of sorrow. Poins. The reason? 26-30. and God . . . strengthened; omitted in Ff. 27. out, out of; the allusion is to Poins' illegitimate children, who 'bawl' in swaddling-clothes made out of his old shirts. tion. Prince. What wouldst thou think of me, if I should weep? Poins, I would think thee a most princely hypocrite. Prince. It would be every man's thought; and 69 thou art a blessed fellow to think as every man thinks: never a man's thought in the world keeps the road-way better than thine: every man would think me an hypocrite indeed. And what accites your most worshipful thought to think so? Poins. Why, because you have been so lewd and so much engraffed to Falstaff. Prince. And to thee. Poins. By this light, I am well spoke on; I can hear it with mine own ears: the worst that they 70 can say of me is that I am a second brother and that I am a proper fellow of my hands; and those two things, I confess, I cannot help. By the mass, here comes Bardolph. Enter BARDOLPH and Page. Prince. And the boy that I gave Falstaff; a' had him from me Christian; and look, if the fat villain have not transformed him ape. Bard. God save your grace! Prince, And yours, most noble Bardolph! Bard. Come, you virtuous ass, you bashful 80 fool, must you be blushing? wherefore blush you now? What a maidenly man-at-arms are you become ! Is 't such a matter to get a pottle-pot's maidenhead? Page. A' calls me e'en now, my lord, through a red lattice, and I could discern no part of his face from the window: at last I spied his eyes, and methought he had made two holes in the ale-wife's new petticoat and so peeped through. Prince. Has not the boy profited? Bard. Away, you whoreson upright rabbit, away! Page. Away, you rascally Althaa's dream, away! Prince. Instruct us, boy; what dream, boy? Page. Marry, my lord, Althea dreamed she was delivered of a fire-brand; and therefore I call him her dream. Prince. A crown's worth of good interpretation: there 'tis, boy. Poins. O, that this good blossom could be kept from cankers! Well, there is sixpence to preserve thee. Bard. An you do not make him hanged among you, the gallows shall have wrong. Prince. And how doth thy master, Bardolph ? Bard. Well, my lord. He heard of your grace's coming to town: there's a letter for you. Poins. Delivered with good respect. how doth the martlemas, your master? Bard. In bodily health, sir. And Poins. Marry, the immortal part needs a phy 85. through a red lattice, i.e. out of a low tavern; these houses being distinguished by their red lattices. A quibble on Bardolph's red face. 96. The page confuses Althæa, who snatched the firebrand from the hearth, with Hecuba, who dreamed-before the birth of Paris-that she would be delivered of a firebrand. [The story is correctly referred to in 2 Hen. VI. i. 1. 234, Tr. and Cres. ii. 2. 110. L.] 110. martlemas, Martinmas ; hence of a person in the November of life, like 'All-hallown summer,' I Henry IV. i. 2. 178. sician; but that moves not him: though that be sick, it dies not. Prince. I do allow this wen to be as familiar with me as my dog; and he holds his place; for look you how he writes. Poins. [Reads] 'John Falstaff, knight,'-every man must know that, as oft as he has occasion to name himself: even like those that are kin to the 120 king; for they never prick their finger but they say, 'There's some of the king's blood spilt.' 'How comes that?' says he, that takes upon him not to conceive. The answer is as ready as a borrower's cap, 'I am the king's poor cousin, sir.' Prince. Nay, they will be kin to us, or they will fetch it from Japhet. But to the letter: Poins. [Reads] 'Sir John Falstaff, knight, to the son of the king, nearest his father, Harry 130 Prince of Wales, greeting.' Why, this is a certificate. Prince. Peace! Poins. [Reads] 'I will imitate the honourable Romans in brevity:' he sure means brevity in breath, short-winded. 'I commend me to thee, I commend thee, and I leave thee. Be not too 'Thine, by yea and no, which is as much 125. borrower's cap; Theobald's excellent emendation for Q Ff 'borrowed cap.' |