Ch. Juft. What to York? call him back again. Fal. Boy, tell him I am deaf. Page. You muft fpeak louder, my mafter, is deaf. Ch. Juft. I am fure, he is, to the hearing of any thing good. Go pluck him by the elbow. I must fpeak with him. Serv. Sir John Fal. What! a young knave and beg! are there not wars? is there not employment? doth not the King lack Subjects? do not the Rebels need foldiers? though it be a fhame to be on any fide but one, it is worse fhame to beg, than to be on the worst side, were it worse than the name of Rebellion can tell how to make it. Serv. You mistake me, Sir. Fal. Why, Sir, did I fay you were an honeft man? fetting my knight-hood and my foldiership afide, I had lied in my throat, if I had faid fo. Serv. I pray you, Sir, then fet your knight-hood and your foldiership afide, and give me leave to tell you, you lie in your throat, if you fay I am any other than an honest man. Fal. I give thee leave to tell me fo? I lay afide That, which grows to me? if thou gett'ft any leave of me, hang me; if thou tak'ft leave, thou wert better be hang'd: you hunt-counter, hence; avaunt. Serv. Sir, my lord would fpeak with you. Ch. Juft. Sir John Falstaff, a word with you. Fal. My good lord! God give your lordship good time of day. I am glad to fee your lordship abroad; I heard fay, your lordship was fick. I hope, your lordfhip goes abroad by advice. Your lordship, though not clean past your youth, hath yet some smack age in you: fome relish of the faltnefs of time; and I moft humbly befeech your lordship, to have a reverend care of your health. of Ch. Just. Ch. Juft. Sir John, I fent for you before your expedition to Shrewsbury, Fal. If it please your lordship, I hear, his Majefty is return'd with fome difcomfort from Wales. Ch. Juft. I talk not of his Majesty: you would not come when I fent for you; Fal. And I hear moreover, his Highness is fallen into this fame whorefon apoplexy. Ch. Just. Well, heav'n mend him! I pray, let me fpeak with you. Fal. This apoplexy is, as I take it, a kind of lethargy, an't please your lordship, a kind of sleeping in the blood, a whoreson tingling. Ch. Juft. What tell you me of it? be it, as it is. Fal. It hath its original from much grief; from Atudy and perturbation of the brain. I have read the caufe of it in Galen. It is a kind of deafness. for Ch. Juft. I think, you are fallen into that disease: you hear not what I fay to you. Fal. Very well, my lord, very well: rather, an't please you, it is the disease of not lift'ning, the malady of not marking, that I am troubled withal. Ch. Juft. To punish you by the heels, would amend the attention of your ears; and I care not if I do become your physician. Fal. I am as poor as Job, my lord, but not fo patient: your lordship may minifter the potion of imprisonment to me, in respect of poverty; but how I fhould be your Patient to follow your prescriptions, the wife may make fome dram of a fcruple, or, indeed, a fcruple itself. Ch. Juft. I fent for you, when there were matters against you for your life, to come fpeak with me. Fal. As I was then advis'd by my Counfel learned in the laws of this land-fervice, I did not come. Ch. Juft. Well, the truth is, Sir John, you live in great infamy. Fal. Fal. He that buckles him in my belt, cannot live in lefs. Ch. Juft. Your means are very flender, and your wafte is great. Fal. I would it were otherwise: I would, my means were greater, and my waste flenderer. Ch. Juft. You have mif-led the youthful Prince. Fal. The Prince hath mif-led me. young I am the fellow with the great belly, and he my dog. Ch. Juft. Well, I'm loth to gall a new-heal'd wound; your day's fervice at Shrewsbury hath a little gilded over your night's exploit on Gads-hill. You may thank the unquiet time, for your quite o'er-pofting that action. Fal. My lord Ch. Juft. But fince all is well, keep it fo: wake not a fleeping Wolf. Fal. To wake a Wolf, is as bad as to fmell a Fox. Ch. Juft. What? you are as a candle, the better part burnt out. Fal. A waffel candle, my lord; all tallow: but if I did fay of wax, my growth would approve the truth. Ch. Juft. There is not a white hair on your face, but should have his effect of gravity. Fal. His effect of gravy, gravy, gravy. Ch. Juft. You follow the young Prince up and down, like his ill angel. Fal. Not fo, my lord, your angel is light; but I hope, he that looks upon me, will take me without weighing; and yet, in some respects, I grant, I cannot go -I cannot tell; Virtue is of fo little regard in thefe cofter-mongers' days, that true valour is turned bear-herd. Pregnancy is made a tapfter, and hath his quick wit wafted in giving reckonings; all the other gifts appertinent to man, as the malice of this age fhapes them, are not worth a goose-berry. You,. You, that are old, confider not the capacities of us that are young; you measure the heat of our Livers, with the bitterness of your Gall; and we that are in the vaward of our youth, I must confess, are wags too. Ch. Juft. Do you fet down your name in the fcrowl of youth, that are written down old, with all the characters of age? have you not a moift eye? a dry hand? a yellow cheek? a white beard? a decreasing leg? an increafing belly? is not your voice broken? your wind fhort? your chin double? chin double? your wit single? and every part about you blafted with antiquity? and will you yet call yourfelf young? fie, fie, fie, Sir John. Fal. My lord, I was born about three of the clock in the afternoon, with a white head, and fomething a round belly. For my voice, I have loft it with hallowing and finging of Anthems. To approve my youth further, I will not. The truth is, I am only old in judgment and understanding, and he, that will caper with me for a thousand marks, let him lend me the money, and have at him. For the box o' th' ear that the Prince gave you, he gave it like a rude Prince, and you took it like a fenfible lord. checkt him for it; and the young Lion repents: marry, not in ashes and fack-cloth, but in new filk and old fack. I have Ch. Juft. Well, heav'n fend the Prince a better Companion! Fal. Heav'n fend the companion a better Prince! I cannot rid my hands of him. Ch. Juft. Well, the King hath fever'd you and Prince Harry. I hear, you are going with lord John of Lancafter, against the Archbishop and the Earl of Nor Fal. Yes, I thank your pretty fweet wit for it; but look you, pray, all you that kifs my lady Peace at home, that our armies join not in a hot day: for, by the the Lord, I take but two fhirts out with me, and I mean not to fweat extraordinarily: if it be a hot day, if I brandish any thing but a bottle, would I might never spit white again. There is not a dangerous action can peep out his head, but I am thruft upon it. Well, I cannot laft ever.▬▬▬▬▬▬▬ -but it was always yet the trick of our English Nation, if they have a good thing, to make it too common. If ye will needs fay, I am an old man, you should give me Reft: I would to God, my name were not fo terrible to the enemy as it is! I were better to be eaten to death with a ruft, than to be fcour'd to nothing with perpetual motion. Ch. Juft. Well, be honeft, be honeft, and heav'n blefs your expedition! Fal. Will your lordship lend me a thousand pound, to furnish me forth? Ch. Juft. Not a penny, not a penny; you are too impatient to bear croffes. Fare you well. Commend me to my coufin Westmorland. [Exit. Fal. If I do, fillip me with a three-man beetleA man can no more feparate age and covetousness, than he can part young limbs and letchery: but the gout galls the one, and the pox pinches the other, and fo both the degrees prevent my curfes. Boy,Page. Sir? Fal. What money is in my purse? Page. Seven groats and two pence. Fal. I can get no remedy against this confumption of the purse. Borrowing only lingers and lingers it out, but the disease is incurable. Go bear this letter to my lord of Lancaster, this to the Prince, this to the Earl of Westmorland, and this to old Mrs. Urfula, whom I have weekly fworn to marry fince I perceived the firft white hair on my chin. About it; you know where to find me. A pox of this gout! or, a gout of this pox for the one, or t'other, plays the rogue with |