P. HEN. He is walk'd up to the top of the hill; I'll go feek him. [Pretends to feek POINS. FAL. I am accurft to rob in that thief's company: the rafcal hath removed my horfe, and tied him I know not where. If I travel but four foot by the fquire further afoot, I fhall break my wind. Well, I doubt not but to die a fair death for all this, if I 'fcape hanging for killing that rogue. I have forfworn his company hourly any time this two and twenty years, and yet I am bewitch'd with the rogue's company. If the rafcal have not given me medicines to make me love him,' I'll be hang'd; it could not be elfe; I have drunk medicines.Poins!-Hal!-a plague upon you both!-Bardolph!-Peto!-I'll ftarve, ere I'll rob a foot further. An 'twere not as good a deed as drink, to 8 6 four foot by the fquire-] The thought is humourous, and alludes to his bulk: infinuating, that his legs being four foot afunder, when he advanced four foot, this put together made four feet fquare. WARBURTON. I am in doubt whether there is fo much humour here as is fufpected: Four foot by the fquire is probably no more than four foot by a rule. JOHNSON. Dr. Johnfon is certainly right. Bishop Corbet fays in one of his poems: "Some twelve foot by the fquare." FARMER. All the old copies read by the Squire, which points out the etymology-efquierre, Fr. The fame phrafe occurs in The Winter's Tale: " not the worst of the three, but jumps twelve foot and a half by the fquire." STEEVENS. 7 -medicines to make me love him,] Alluding to the vulgar notion of love-powder. JOHNSON. So, in Othello: fhe is corrupted By fpells and medicines bought of mountebanks." STEEVENS. - rob a foot further.] This is only a flight error, which turn true man, and to leave these rogues, I am the veriest varlet that ever chew'd with a tooth. Eight yards of uneven ground, is threefcore and ten miles afoot with me; and the ftony-hearted villains know it well enough: A plague upon't, when thieves cannot be true to one another! [They whistle.] Whew! -A plague upon you all! Give me my horse, you rogues; give me my horse, and be hang'd. P. HEN. Peace, ye fat-guts! lie down; lay thine ear close to the ground, and lift if thou canst hear the tread of travellers. FAL. Have you any levers to lift me up again, being down? 'Sblood, I'll not bear mine own flesh fo far afoot again, for all the coin in thy father's exchequer. What a plague mean ye, to colt me thus? P. HEN. Thou lieft, thou art not colted, thou art uncolted. FAL. I pr'ythee, good prince Hal, help me to my horse; good king's fon. P. HEN. Out, you rogue! fhall I be your oftler? FAL. Go, hang thy felf in thy own heir-apparent yet has run through all the copies. We fhould read-rub a foot. So we now fay-rub on. JOHNSON. Why may it not mean-I will not go a foot further to rob? STEEVENS. 9to colt-] Is to fool, to trick; but the prince taking it in another fenfe, oppofes it by uncolt, that is, unhorse. JOHNSON. you In the first of these fenfes it is used by Nafhe, in Have with to Saffron Walden, &c. 1596: "His mafter fretting and chaffing to be thus colted of both of them," &c. Again, in Beaumont and Fletcher's Loyal Subject: "What, are we bobb'd thus ftill? colted and carted?" From Decker's Bell-man's Night-Walkes, &c. 1616, it appears that the technical term for any inn-keeper or hackneyman who had been cheated of horfes, was a colt. STEEVENS. garters! If I be ta'en, I'll peach for this. An I have not ballads made on you all, and fung to filthy tunes, let a cup of fack be my poison: When a jeft is fo forward, and afoot too,-I hate it. GADS. Stand. Enter GADSHILL. FAL. So I do, against my will. POINS. O, 'tis our fetter: I know his voice. Enter BARDOLPH. BARD. What news?+ GADS. Cafe ye, cafe ye; on with your visors; there's money of the king's coming down the hill; 'tis going to the king's exchequer. FAL. You lie, you rogue; 'tis going to the king's tavern. - 2 heir-apparent garters!]" He may hang himself in his own garters" is a proverb in Ray's Collection. STEEVENS. 3 An I have not ballads made on you all, and fung to filthytunes, let a cup of fack be my poison:] So, in The Rape of Lucrece: "Shall have thy trefpafs cited up in rhymes, "And fung by children in fucceeding times." Again, in Antony and Cleopatra: faucy lictors "Will catch at us like ftrumpets, and fcald rhimers 4 Bard. What news?] In all the copies that I have feen, Poins is made to fpeak upon the entrance of Gadshill thus: O, 'tis our fetter; I know his voice.-Bardolph, what news? This is abfurd; he knows Gadshill to be the fetter, and afks Bardolph what news. To countenance this impropriety, the latter editions have made Gadshill and Bardolph enter together, but the old copies bring in Gadshill alone, and we find that Falstaff, who knew their stations, calls to Bardolph among others for his horse, but not to Gadshill, who was pofted at a distance. We should therefore read: Poins. O, 'tis our fetter, &c. Bard. What news? Gads. Cafe ye, &c. JOHNSON. GADS. There's enough to make us all. P. HEN. Sirs, you four fhall front them in the narrow lane; Ned Poins, and I will walk lower: if they 'scape from your encounter, then they light on us. PETO. How many be there of them? FAL. Zounds! will they not rob us? P. HEN. What, a coward, fir John Paunch? FAL. Indeed, I am not John of Gaunt, your grandfather; but yet no coward, Hal. P. HEN. Well, we leave that to the proof. POINS. Sirrah Jack, thy horfe ftands behind the hedge; when thou need'ft him, there thou fhalt find him. Farewell, and ftand fast. FAL. Now cannot I ftrike him, if I fhould be hang'd. P. HEN. Ned, where are our disguises? POINS. Here, hard by; ftand close. [Exeunt P. HENRY and POINS. FAL. Now, my mafters, happy man be his dole, say I; every man to his bufinefs. 5 dole,] The portion of alms diftributed at Lambeth palace gate is at this day called the dole. In Jonfon's Alchemist, Subtle charges Face with perverting his mafter's charitable intentions, by felling the dole beer to aqua-vite men. SIR J. HAWKINS. So, in The Coftly Whore, 1633: Again: 66 we came thinking "We should have fome dole at the bishop's funeral." "Go to the back gate, and you fhall have dole.” STEEVENS. Enter Travellers. I TRAV. Come, neighbour; the boy fhall lead our horfes down the hill: we'll walk afoot a while, and ease our legs. THIEVES. Stand. TRAV. Jefu blefs us! FAL. Strike; down with them; cut the villains' throats: Ah! whorfon caterpillars! bacon-fed knaves! they hate us youth: down with them; fleece them. I TRAV. O, we are undone, both we and ours, for ever. FAL. Hang ye, gorbellied" knaves; Are ye undone? No, ye fat chuffs; I would, your ftore were 6 gorbellied-] i. e. fat and corpulent. See the Gloffary to Kennet's Parochial Antiquities. This word is likewise used by Sir Thomas North in his Translation of Plutarch. Nafhe, in his Have with you to Saffron-Walden, 1596, fays:— "O'tis an unconfcionable gorbellied volume, bigger bulk'd than a Dutch hoy, and far more boisterous and cumbersome than a payre of Swiffers omnipotent galeaze breeches." Again, in The Weakest goes to the Wall, 1600: "What are these thick-skinn'd, heavypurs'd, gorbellied churles mad?" STEEVENS. 7 -ye fat chuffs;] This term of contempt is always applied to rich and avaricious people. So, in The Mufes' Looking Glass, 1638: the chuff's crowns, Imprifon'd in his rufty cheft," &c. The derivation of the word is faid to be uncertain. Perhaps it is a corruption of chough, a thievifh bird that collects his prey on the fea-fhore. So, in Chaucer's Affemble of Foules: "The thief the chough, and eke the chatt'ring pie." Sir W. D'Avenant, in his Just Italian, 1630, has the fame term: "They're rich choughs, they've ftore "Of villages and plough'd earth." |