Like saphire, pearl, and rich embroidery, Away; disperse: But, till 'tis one o'clock, 150 Eva. Pray you, lock hand in hand; yourselves in order set: And twenty glow-worms shall our lanterns be, Fal. Heavens defend me from that Welch fairy! Lest he transform me to a piece of cheese! Eva. Vile worm, thou wast o'er-look'd even in thy birth. Quic. With trial-fire touch me his finger-end : If he be chaste, the flame will back descend, And turn him to no pain; but if he start, It is the flesh of a corrupted heart. Eva. A trial, come. 160 [They burn him with their Tapers and pinch him. Come, will this wood take fire? Fal. Oh, oh, oh! Quic. Corrupt, corrupt, and tainted in desire! About him, fairies; sing a scornful rhime : And, as you trip, still pinch him to your time. Eva. It is right; indeed, he is full of lecheries and iniquity. 470 The The SON G. Fie on sinful phantasy! Fie on lust and luxury! Lust is but a bloody fire, Kindled with unchaste desire, Fed in heart; whose flames aspire, As thoughts do blow them, higher and higher. Pinch him for his villainy; Pinch him, and burn him, and turn him about, 'Till candles, and star-light, and moon-shine be out. 180 During this Song, they pinch him. Dr. CAIUS comes one way, and steals away a Fairy in green; SLENDER another way, and he takes away a Fairy in white; and FENTON comes, and steals away Mrs. ANNE PAGE. A Noise of Hunting is made within. All the Fairies run away. FALSTAFF pulls off his Buck's Head, and rises. Enter PAGE, FORD, &c. They lay hold on him. Page. Nay, do not fly: I think, we have watch'd you now; Will none but Herne the hunter, serve your turn? Mrs. Page. I pray you, come; hold up the jest no higher : Now, good sir John, how like you Windsor wives? See you these, husband? do not these fair yokes Become the forest better than the town? Ford. Now, sir, who's a cuckold now ?-Master Brook, Falstaff's a knave, a cuckoldly knave; here are his horns, master Brook: And, master Brook, he hath enjoyed nothing of Ford's but his buck-basket, his cudgel, and twenty pounds of money; which must be paid to master Brook; his horses are arrested for it, master Brook. 193 Mrs. Ford. Sir John, we have had ill luck; we could never meet. I will never take you for my love again, but I will always count you my deer. Fal. I do begin to perceive that I am made an ass. Ford. Ay, and an ox too; both the proofs are extant. 200 Fal. And these are not fairies? I was three or four times in the thought they were not fairies: and yet the guiltiness of my mind, the sudden surprise of my powers, drove the grossness of the foppery into a receiv'd belief, in despight of the teeth of all rhime and reason, that they were fairies. See now, how wit may be made a Jack-a-lent, when 'tis upon ill em. ployment! Eva. Sir John Falstaff, serve Got, and leave your desires, and fairies will not pinse you. Ford. Well said, fairy Hugh. 210 Eva. And leave your jealousies also, I pray you. Ford. I will never mistrust my wife again, till thou art able to woo her in good English. Fal. Have I laid my brain in the sun, and dried it, that it wants matter to prevent so gross o'er-reaching as this? Am I ridden with a Welch goat too? shall I have a coxcomb of frize? 'tis time I were chok'd with a piece of toasted cheese. 219 Eva. Seese is not good to give putter; your pelly is all putter. Fal. Fal. Seese and putter! have I liv'd to stand in the taunt of one that makes fritters of English? this is enough to be the decay of lust and late-walking, through the realm. Mrs. Page. Why, sir John, do you think, though we would have thrust virtue out of our hearts by the head and shoulders, and have given ourselves without scruple to hell, that ever the devil could have made you our delight? Ford. What, a hodge-pudding? a bag of flax? 230 Page. Old, cold, wither'd, and of intolerable entrails? Ford. And one that is as slanderous as Satan? Ford. And as wicked as his wife? Eva. And given to fornications, and to taverns, and sacks, and wines, and metheglins, and to drinkings, and swearings, and starings, pribbles and prabbles? Fal. Well, I am your theme; you have the start of me; I am dejected; I am not able to answer the Welch flannel; ignorance itself is a plummet o'er me: use me as you will. 244 Ford. Marry, sir, we'll bring you to Windsor, to one master Brook, that you cozen'd of money, to whom you should have been a pandar: over and above that you have suffer'd, I think, to repay that money will be a biting affliction. Mrs. Ford. Nay, husband, let that go to make amends: Forgive that sum, and so we'll all be friends. 251 Ford. Ford. Well, here's my hand; all's forgiven at last. Page. Yet be cheerful, knight: thou shalt eat a posset to-night at my house; where I will desire thee to laugh at my wife, that now laughs at thee: Tell her, master Slender hath married her daughter. Mrs. Page. Doctors doubt that; if Anne Page be my daughter, she is, by this, doctor Caius' wife. [Aside. Enter SLENDER. Slen. Whoo, ho! ho! father Page! Page. Son! how now? how now, son? have you dispatch'd? 261 Slen. Dispatch'd !-I'll make the best in Gloucestershire know on't; would I were hang'd, la, else. Page. Of what, son? Slen. I came yonder at Eton to marry mistress Anne Page, and she's a great lubberly boy: If it had not been i' the church, I would have swing'd him, or he should have swing'd me. If I did not think it had been Anne Page, would I might never stir, and 'tis a post-master's boy. 270 Page. Upon my life then you took the wrong. Slen. What need you tell me that? I think so, when I took a boy for a girl: If I had been married to him, for all he was in woman's apparel, I would not have had him. Page. Why, this is your own folly; Did not I tell you, how you should know my daughter by her garments ? Slen. I went to her in white, and cry'd, mum, and she |