And vaulted with such ease into his seat, And witch the world with noble horsemanship. Hot. No more, no more; worse than the sun in March, This praise doth nourish agues. Let them come; And to the fire-ey'd maid of smoky war, Ver. my horse, There is more news: I learn'd in Worcester, as I rode along, Hot. Forty let it be; day. My father and Glendower being both away, 19 The quartos of 1598 and 1599 read taste. [Exeunt. SCENE II. A Publick Road near Coventry. Enter FALSTAFF and BARDOLPH. Fal. Bardolph, get thee before to Coventry; fill me a bottle of sack; our soldiers shall march through; we'll to Sutton-Colfield to-night. Bard. Will you give me money, captain? Fal. Lay out, lay out. Bard. This bottle makes an angel. Fal. An if it do, take it for thy labour; and if it make twenty, take them all, I'll answer the coinage. .my lieutenant Peto meet me at the town's end. Bard. I will, captain: farewell. Bid [Exit. Fal. If I be not ashamed of my soldiers, I am a souced gurnet1. I have misused the king's press damnably. I have got, in exchange of a hundred and fifty soldiers, three hundred and odd pounds. I press me none but good householders, yeomen's sons inquire me out contracted bachelors, such as had been asked twice on the bans; such a commodity of warm slaves, as had as lief hear the devil as a drum; such as fear the report of a caliver2, worse than a struck fowl, or a hurt wild-duck. I pressed me none but such toasts and butter3, with hearts in their bellies no bigger than pins' heads, and they have bought out their services; and now my whole charge consists of ancients, corporals, lieutenants, gentlemen of companies, slaves as ragged as Lazarus in the painted cloth, where the glutton's dogs 1 The gurnet, or gurnard, was a fish of the piper kind. It was probably deemed a vulgar dish when soused or pickled, hence soused gurnet was a common term of reproach. 2 A gun. 3 Londoners, and all within the sound of Bow bell, are in reproach called cockneys, and eaters of buttered toasts.'-Moryson's Itin. 1617. So in Beaumont and Fletcher's Wit without Money: They love young toasts and butter, Bow bell suckers.' licked his sores and such as, indeed, were never soldiers; but discarded unjust serving-men, younger sons to younger brothers, revolted tapsters, and ostlers trade-fallen; the cankers of a calm world, and a long peace; ten times more dishonourable ragged than an old faced ancient: and such have I, to fill up the rooms of them that have bought out their services, that you would think, that I had a hundred and fifty tattered prodigals, lately come from swine keeping, from eating draff and husks. A mad fellow met me on the way, and told me, I had unloaded all the gibbets, and pressed the dead bodies. No eye hath seen such scare-crows. I'll not march through Coventry with them, that's flat: -Nay, and the villains march wide betwixt the legs, as if they had gives on; for indeed, I had the most of them out of prison. There's but a shirt and a half in all my company: and the half-shirt is two napkins, tacked together, and thrown over the shoulders like a herald's coat without sleeves; and the shirt, to say the truth, stolen from my host at Saint Albans, or the red-nose inn-keeper of Daintry. But that's all one; they'll find linen enough on every hedge. Enter PRINCE HENRY and WESTMORELAND. P. Hen. How now, blown Jack? how now, quilt? Fal. What, Hal? How now, mad wag? what a devil dost thou in Warwickshire?-My good lord 4 An old faced ancient' is an old patched standard. To face a garment was to line or trim it. Thus in the present play : To face the garment of rebellion With some fine colour.' : In the Puritan, a Comedy, 1607, we have full of holes like a shot ancient.' Dishonourable for dishonourably, is in Shakspeare's manner, who often uses adjectives adverbially. of Westmoreland, I cry you mercy; I thought, your honour had already been at Shrewsbury. West. 'Faith, Sir John, 'tis more than time that I were there, and you too; but my powers are there already: The king, I can tell you, looks for us all : we must away all night. Fal. Tut, never fear me; I am as vigilant as a cat to steal cream. P. Hen. I think, to steal cream indeed; for thy theft hath already made thee butter. But tell me, Jack; Whose fellows are these that come after? Fal. Mine, Hal, mine. P. Hen. I did never see such pitiful rascals. Fal. Tut, tut; good enough to toss; food for powder, food for powder; they'll fill a pit, as well as better: tush, man, mortal men, mortal men. West. Ay, but, Sir John, methinks they are exceeding poor and bare; too beggarly. Fal. 'Faith, for their poverty,-I know not where they had that: and for their bareness,—I am sure, they never learned that of me. P. Hen. No, I'll be sworn; unless you call three fingers on the ribs, bare. But, sirrah, make haste; Percy is already in the field. Fal. What, is the king encamped? West. He is, Sir John; I fear, we shall stay too long. To the latter end of a fray, and the beginning of a feast, [Exeunt. SCENE III. The Rebel Camp near Shrewsbury. Enter HOTSPUR, WORCESTER, DOUGLAS, and VERNON. Hot. We'll fight with him to-night. Wor. It may not be. Doug. You give him then advantage. Ver. Not a whit. Hot. Why say you so? looks he not for supply? Ver. So do we. Hot. His is certain, ours is doubtful. Wor. Good cousin, be advis'd; stir not to-night. Doug. You do not counsel well; You speak it out of fear, and cold heart. Ver. Do me no slander, Douglas: by my life I wonder much, being men of such great leading, That you foresee not what impediments In general, journey-bated, and brought low; Wor. The number of the king exceedeth ours: For God's sake, cousin, stay till all come in. [The trumpet sounds a parley. 1 The old copies read that this day lives;' but the words, as Mason observes, weaken the sense and destroy the measure. 2 Leading is experience in the conduct of armies. The old copies have such leading as you are;' but the superfluous words serve only to destroy the metre. |