80

Your brother thus; so fought the noble Douglas;'
Stopping my greedy ear with their bold deeds:
But in the end, to stop mine ear indeed,
Thou hast a sigh to blow away this praise,
Ending with 'Brother, son, and all are dead.'
Mor. Douglas is living, and your brother, yet;
But, for my lord your son,-

North.
Why, he is dead.-
See, what a ready tongue suspicion hath! 84
He that but fears the thing he would not know
Hath by instinct knowledge from others' eyes
That what he fear'd is chanced. Yet speak,
Morton:

Remember'd knolling a departing friend. L. Bard. I cannot think, my lord, your son is dead. 104

Mor. I am sorry I should force you to believe That which I would to God I had not seen; But these mine eyes saw him in bloody state, Rendering faint quittance, wearied and outbreath'd, IOS

To Harry Monmouth; whose swift wrath beat down

The never-daunted Percy to the earth,
From whence with life he never more sprung up.
In few, his death,-whose spirit lent a fire 112
Even to the dullest peasant in his camp,-
Being bruited once, took fire and heat away
From the best-temper'd courage in his troops;
For from his metal was his party steel'd;

116

165

Mor. The lives of all your loving complices
Lean on your health; the which, if you give o'er
To stormy passion must perforce decay.
You cast the event of war, my noble lord,
And summ'd the account of chance, before you
said,

'Let us make head.' It was your presurmise 168
That in the dole of blows your son might drop:
You knew he walk'd o'er perils, on an edge,
More likely to fall in than to get o'er;
You were advis'd his flesh was capable 172
Of wounds and scars, and that his forward spirit
Would lift him where most trade of danger
rang'd:

Yet did you say, 'Go forth;' and none of this,
Though strongly apprehended, could restrain 176
The stiff-borne action: what hath then befallen,
Or what hath this bold enterprise brought forth,
More than that being which was like to be?

188

I hear for certain, and do speak the truth,
The gentle Archbishop of York is up,
With well-appointed powers: he is a man
Who with a double surety binds his followers.
My lord your son had only but the corpse', 192
But shadows and the shows of men to fight;
For that same word, rebellion, did divide
The action of their bodies from their souls;
And they did fight with queasiness, constrain'd,
As men drink potions, that their weapons only
Seem'd on our side: but, for their spirits and
souls,

This word, rebellion, it had froze them up,
As fish are in a pond. But now the bishop 200
Turns insurrection to religion:

Suppos'd sincere and holy in his thoughts,
He's follow'd both with body and with mind,
And doth enlarge his rising with the blood 204
Of fair King Richard, scrap'd from Pomfret
stones;

Enter SIR JOHN FALSTAFF, with his Page bearing his sword and buckler.

Fal. Sirrah, you giant, what says the doctor to my water?

Page. He said, sir, the water itself was a good healthy water; but, for the party that owed it, he might have more diseases than he knew.for. 5 Fal. Men of all sorts take a pride to gird at me: the brain of this foolish-compounded clay, man, is not able to invent anything that tends to laughter, more than I invent or is invented on me: I am not only witty in myself, but the cause that wit is in other men. I do here walk before thee like a sow that hath overwhelmed all her litter but one. If the prince put thee into my service for any other reason than to set me off, why then I have no judgment. Thou whoreson mandrake, thou art fitter to be worn in my cap than to wait at my heels. I was never manned with an agate till now; but I will set you neither in gold nor silver, but in vile apparel, and send you back again to your master, for a jewel; the juvenal, the prince your master, whose chin is not yet fledged. I will sooner have a beard grow in the palm of my hand than he shall get one on his cheek; and yet he will not stick to say, his face is a face-royal: God may finish it when he will, it is not a hair amiss yet: he may keep it still as a face-royal, for a barber shall never earn sixpence out of it; and yet he will be crowing as if he had writ man ever since his father was a bachelor. He may keep his own grace, but he is almost out of mine, I can assure him. What said Master Dombledon about the satin for my short cloak and my slops? 33

Page. He said, sir, you should procure him better assurance than Bardolph; he would not take his bond and yours: he liked not the security.

37

Fal. Let him be damned like the glutton! may his tongue be hotter! A whoreson Achitophel! a rascally yea-forsooth knave! to bear a gentleman in hand, and then stand upon security. The whoreson smooth-pates do now wear nothing but high shoes, and bunches of keys at their girdles; and if a man is thorough with them in honest taking up, then they must stand upon security. I had as lief they would put ratsbane in my mouth as offer to stop it with security. I looked a' should have sent me two and twenty

thou wert better be hanged. You hunt-counter: hence! avaunt!

Ser. Sir, my lord would speak with you. 104 Ch. Just. Sir John Falstaff, a word with you.

Fal. My good lord! God give your lordship good time of day. I am glad to see your lordship abroad; I heard say your lordship was sick: I hope your lordship goes abroad by advice. Your lordship, though not clean past your youth, hath yet some smack of age in you, some relish of the saltness of time; and I most humbly beseech your lordship to have a reverend care of your health.

115

Ch. Just. Sir John, I sent for you before your expedition to Shrewsbury.

Fal. An't please your lordship, I hear his majesty is returned with some discomfort from Wales.

120

You

Ch. Just. I talk not of his majesty. would not come when I sent for you. Fal. And I hear, moreover, his highness is fallen into this same whoreson apoplexy. Ch. Just. Well, heaven mend him! I pray you, let me speak with you.

124

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. 129 Ch. Just. What tell you me of it? be it as

it is.

this to the prince; this to the Earl of Westmoreland; and this to old Mistress Ursula, whom I have weekly sworn to marry since I perceived the first white hair on my chin. About it: you know where to find me. [Exit PAGE.] A pox of this gout! or, a gout of this pox! for the one or the other plays the rogue with my great toe. 'Tis no matter if I do halt; I have the wars for my colour, and my pension shall seem the more reasonable. A good wit will make use of anything; I will turn diseases to commodity. [Exit.

L. Bard. Yes, if this present quality of war,—
Indeed the instant action,—a cause on foot, 37
Lives so in hope, as in an early spring
We see the appearing buds; which, to prove fruit,
Hope gives not so much warrant as despair 40
That frosts will bite them. When we mean to
build,

We first survey the plot, then draw the model;
And when we see the figure of the house,
Then must we rate the cost of the erection; 44
Which if we find outweighs ability,
What do we then but draw anew the model
In fewer offices, or at last desist

49

To build at all? Much more, in this great work,—
Which is almost to pluck a kingdom down
And set another up,-should we survey
The plot of situation and the model,
Consent upon a sure foundation,
Question surveyors, know our own estate,
How able such a work to undergo,

52