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The Merry Wives of Windsor: Act 4 Scene 2
Scene II A room in FORD'S house.
- [Enter FALSTAFF and MISTRESS FORD]
- FALSTAFF
- Mistress Ford, your sorrow hath eaten up my
- sufferance. I see you are obsequious in your love,
- and I profess requital to a hair's breadth; not
- only, Mistress Ford, in the simple
- office of love, but in all the accoutrement,
- complement and ceremony of it. But are you
- sure of your husband now?
- MISTRESS FORD
- He's a-birding, sweet Sir John.
- MISTRESS PAGE
- [Within] What, ho, gossip Ford! what, ho!
- MISTRESS FORD
- Step into the chamber, Sir John.
- [Exit FALSTAFF]
- [Enter MISTRESS PAGE]
- MISTRESS PAGE
- How now, sweetheart! who's at home besides yourself?
- MISTRESS FORD
- Why, none but mine own people.
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Indeed!
- MISTRESS FORD
- No, certainly.
- [Aside to her]
- Speak louder.
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Truly, I am so glad you have nobody here.
- MISTRESS FORD
- Why?
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Why, woman, your husband is in his old lunes again:
- he so takes on yonder with my husband; so rails
- against all married mankind; so curses all Eve's
- daughters, of what complexion soever; and so buffets
- himself on the forehead, crying, 'Peer out, peer
- out!' that any madness I ever yet beheld seemed but
- tameness, civility and patience, to this his
- distemper he is in now: I am glad the fat knight is not here.
- MISTRESS FORD
- Why, does he talk of him?
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Of none but him; and swears he was carried out, the
- last time he searched for him, in a basket; protests
- to my husband he is now here, and hath drawn him and
- the rest of their company from their sport, to make
- another experiment of his suspicion: but I am glad
- the knight is not here; now he shall see his own foolery.
- MISTRESS FORD
- How near is he, Mistress Page?
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Hard by; at street end; he will be here anon.
- MISTRESS FORD
- I am undone! The knight is here.
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Why then you are utterly shamed, and he's but a dead
- man. What a woman are you!--Away with him, away
- with him! better shame than murder.
- FORD
- Which way should be go? how should I bestow him?
- Shall I put him into the basket again?
- [Re-enter FALSTAFF]
- FALSTAFF
- No, I'll come no more i' the basket. May I not go
- out ere he come?
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Alas, three of Master Ford's brothers watch the door
- with pistols, that none shall issue out; otherwise
- you might slip away ere he came. But what make you here?
- FALSTAFF
- What shall I do? I'll creep up into the chimney.
- MISTRESS FORD
- There they always use to discharge their
- birding-pieces. Creep into the kiln-hole.
- FALSTAFF
- Where is it?
- MISTRESS FORD
- He will seek there, on my word. Neither press,
- coffer, chest, trunk, well, vault, but he hath an
- abstract for the remembrance of such places, and
- goes to them by his note: there is no hiding you in the house.
- FALSTAFF
- I'll go out then.
- MISTRESS PAGE
- If you go out in your own semblance, you die, Sir
- John. Unless you go out disguised--
- MISTRESS FORD
- How might we disguise him?
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Alas the day, I know not! There is no woman's gown
- big enough for him otherwise he might put on a hat,
- a muffler and a kerchief, and so escape.
- FALSTAFF
- Good hearts, devise something: any extremity rather
- than a mischief.
- MISTRESS FORD
- My maid's aunt, the fat woman of Brentford, has a
- gown above.
- MISTRESS PAGE
- On my word, it will serve him; she's as big as he
- is: and there's her thrummed hat and her muffler
- too. Run up, Sir John.
- MISTRESS FORD
- Go, go, sweet Sir John: Mistress Page and I will
- look some linen for your head.
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Quick, quick! we'll come dress you straight: put
- on the gown the while.
- [Exit FALSTAFF]
- MISTRESS FORD
- I would my husband would meet him in this shape: he
- cannot abide the old woman of Brentford; he swears
- she's a witch; forbade her my house and hath
- threatened to beat her.
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Heaven guide him to thy husband's cudgel, and the
- devil guide his cudgel afterwards!
- MISTRESS FORD
- But is my husband coming?
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Ah, in good sadness, is he; and talks of the basket
- too, howsoever he hath had intelligence.
- MISTRESS FORD
- We'll try that; for I'll appoint my men to carry the
- basket again, to meet him at the door with it, as
- they did last time.
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Nay, but he'll be here presently: let's go dress him
- like the witch of Brentford.
- MISTRESS FORD
- I'll first direct my men what they shall do with the
- basket. Go up; I'll bring linen for him straight.
- [Exit]
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Hang him, dishonest varlet! we cannot misuse him enough.
- We'll leave a proof, by that which we will do,
- Wives may be merry, and yet honest too:
- We do not act that often jest and laugh;
- 'Tis old, but true, Still swine eat all the draff.
- [Exit]
- [Re-enter MISTRESS FORD with two Servants]
- MISTRESS FORD
- Go, sirs, take the basket again on your shoulders:
- your master is hard at door; if he bid you set it
- down, obey him: quickly, dispatch.
- [Exit]
- FIRST SERVANT
- Come, come, take it up.
- SECOND SERVANT
- Pray heaven it be not full of knight again.
- FIRST SERVANT
- I hope not; I had as lief bear so much lead.
- [Enter FORD, PAGE, SHALLOW, DOCTOR CAIUS, and
- SIR HUGH EVANS]
- FORD
- Ay, but if it prove true, Master Page, have you any
- way then to unfool me again? Set down the basket,
- villain! Somebody call my wife. Youth in a basket!
- O you panderly rascals! there's a knot, a ging, a
- pack, a conspiracy against me: now shall the devil
- be shamed. What, wife, I say! Come, come forth!
- Behold what honest clothes you send forth to bleaching!
- PAGE
- Why, this passes, Master Ford; you are not to go
- loose any longer; you must be pinioned.
- SIR HUGH EVANS
- Why, this is lunatics! this is mad as a mad dog!
- SHALLOW
- Indeed, Master Ford, this is not well, indeed.
- FORD
- So say I too, sir.
- [Re-enter MISTRESS FORD]
- Come hither, Mistress Ford; Mistress Ford the honest
- woman, the modest wife, the virtuous creature, that
- hath the jealous fool to her husband! I suspect
- without cause, mistress, do I?
- MISTRESS FORD
- Heaven be my witness you do, if you suspect me in
- any dishonesty.
- FORD
- Well said, brazen-face! hold it out. Come forth, sirrah!
- [Pulling clothes out of the basket]
- PAGE
- This passes!
- MISTRESS FORD
- Are you not ashamed? let the clothes alone.
- FORD
- I shall find you anon.
- SIR HUGH EVANS
- 'Tis unreasonable! Will you take up your wife's
- clothes? Come away.
- FORD
- Empty the basket, I say!
- MISTRESS FORD
- Why, man, why?
- FORD
- Master Page, as I am a man, there was one conveyed
- out of my house yesterday in this basket: why may
- not he be there again? In my house I am sure he is:
- my intelligence is true; my jealousy is reasonable.
- Pluck me out all the linen.
- MISTRESS FORD
- If you find a man there, he shall die a flea's death.
- PAGE
- Here's no man.
- SHALLOW
- By my fidelity, this is not well, Master Ford; this
- wrongs you.
- SIR HUGH EVANS
- Master Ford, you must pray, and not follow the
- imaginations of your own heart: this is jealousies.
- FORD
- Well, he's not here I seek for.
- PAGE
- No, nor nowhere else but in your brain.
- FORD
- Help to search my house this one time. If I find
- not what I seek, show no colour for my extremity; let
- me for ever be your table-sport; let them say of
- me, 'As jealous as Ford, Chat searched a hollow
- walnut for his wife's leman.' Satisfy me once more;
- once more search with me.
- MISTRESS FORD
- What, ho, Mistress Page! come you and the old woman
- down; my husband will come into the chamber.
- FORD
- Old woman! what old woman's that?
- MISTRESS FORD
- Nay, it is my maid's aunt of Brentford.
- FORD
- A witch, a quean, an old cozening quean! Have I not
- forbid her my house? She comes of errands, does
- she? We are simple men; we do not know what's
- brought to pass under the profession of
- fortune-telling. She works by charms, by spells,
- by the figure, and such daubery as this is, beyond
- our element we know nothing. Come down, you witch,
- you hag, you; come down, I say!
- MISTRESS FORD
- Nay, good, sweet husband! Good gentlemen, let him
- not strike the old woman.
- [Re-enter FALSTAFF in woman's clothes, and
- MISTRESS PAGE]
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Come, Mother Prat; come, give me your hand.
- FORD
- I'll prat her.
- [Beating him]
- Out of my door, you witch, you hag, you baggage, you
- polecat, you runyon! out, out! I'll conjure you,
- I'll fortune-tell you.
- [Exit FALSTAFF]
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Are you not ashamed? I think you have killed the
- poor woman.
- MISTRESS FORD
- Nay, he will do it. 'Tis a goodly credit for you.
- FORD
- Hang her, witch!
- SIR HUGH EVANS
- By the yea and no, I think the 'oman is a witch
- indeed: I like not when a 'oman has a great peard;
- I spy a great peard under his muffler.
- FORD
- Will you follow, gentlemen? I beseech you, follow;
- see but the issue of my jealousy: if I cry out thus
- upon no trail, never trust me when I open again.
- PAGE
- Let's obey his humour a little further: come,
- gentlemen.
- [Exeunt FORD, PAGE, SHALLOW, DOCTOR CAIUS, and
- SIR HUGH EVANS]
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Trust me, he beat him most pitifully.
- MISTRESS FORD
- Nay, by the mass, that he did not; he beat him most
- unpitifully, methought.
- MISTRESS PAGE
- I'll have the cudgel hallowed and hung o'er the
- altar; it hath done meritorious service.
- MISTRESS FORD
- What think you? may we, with the warrant of
- womanhood and the witness of a good conscience,
- pursue him with any further revenge?
- MISTRESS PAGE
- The spirit of wantonness is, sure, scared out of
- him: if the devil have him not in fee-simple, with
- fine and recovery, he will never, I think, in the
- way of waste, attempt us again.
- MISTRESS FORD
- Shall we tell our husbands how we have served him?
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Yes, by all means; if it be but to scrape the
- figures out of your husband's brains. If they can
- find in their hearts the poor unvirtuous fat knight
- shall be any further afflicted, we two will still be
- the ministers.
- MISTRESS FORD
- I'll warrant they'll have him publicly shamed: and
- methinks there would be no period to the jest,
- should he not be publicly shamed.
- MISTRESS PAGE
- Come, to the forge with it then; shape it: I would
- not have things cool.
- [Exeunt]
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