mind as well as another does :-Out upon't! what have

I forgot?

ACT II.

[Exit.

SCENE I. Before Page's House.

Enter Miftrefs PAGE, with a letter.

MRS. PAGE. What! have I 'fcaped love-letters in the holy-day time of my beauty, and am I now a fubject for them? Let me fee: [reads.

Afk me no reason why I love you; for though love ufe reafon for his precifian, he admits him not for his counsellor: You are not young, no more am I; go to then, there's sympathy: you are merry, fo am I; Ha! ha! then there's more fympathy: you love fack, and fo do I; Would you defire better fympathy? Let it fuffice thee, miftrefs Page, (at the leaft, if the love of a foldier can fuffice,) that I love thee. I will not say, pity me, 'tis not a foldier-like phrafe; but I fay, love me. By

What a Herod of Jewry is this?O wicked, wicked world!-one that is well nigh worn to pieces with age, to show himself a young gallant! What an unweigh'd behaviour hath this Flemish drunkard pick'd (with the devil's name) out of my conversation, that he dares in this manner affay me? Why, he hath not been thrice in my company!-What should I fay to him ?—I was then frugal of my mirth :-heaven forgive me!_Why, I'll exhibit a bill in the parliament for the putting down

of men. How shall I be revenged on him? for revenged I will be, as fure as his guts are made of puddings.

Enter Miftrefs FORD.

MRS. FORD. Mistress Page! truft me, I was going to your house.

MRS. PAGE. And, trust me, I was coming to you. You look very ill.

MRS. FORD. Nay, I'll ne'er believe that ; I have to show to the contrary.

MRS. PAGE. 'Faith, but you do, in my mind.

MRS. FORD. Well, I do then; yet, I fay, I could fhow you to the contrary: O, mistress Page, give me fome counsel !

MRS. PAGE. What's the matter, woman?

MRS. FORD. O woman, if it were not for one trifling respect, I could come to fuch honour!

MRS. PAGE. Hang the trifle, woman; take the honour: What is it?difpenfe with trifles ;-what is it?

MRS. FORD. If I would but go to hell for an eternal moment, or so, I could be knighted.

MRS. PAGE. What?-thou lieft!-Sir Alice Ford! __These knights will hack; and fo thou fhouldst not alter the article of thy gentry.

MRS. FORD. We burn day-light :-here, read, read perceive how I might be knighted. I fhall think the worse of fat men, as long as I have an eye to make difference of men's liking; And yet he would not fwear; prais'd women's modesty and gave fuch orderly and well-behaved reproof to all uncomelinefs, that I would have fworn his difpofition would have gone to the truth of his words: but they do no more adhere, and keep place together, than the hundredth pfalm to the tune of Green fleeves. What tempeft, I trow, threw this whale,

with fo many tuns of oil in his belly, afhore at Windfor? How fhall I be revenged on him? I think, the best way were to entertain him with hope, till the wicked fire of luft have melted him in his own greafe.-Did you ever hear the like?

MRS. PAGE. Letter for letter; but that the name of Page and Ford differs!-To thy great comfort in this mystery of ill opinions, here's the twin-brother of thy letter: but let thine inherit firft; for, I proteft, mine never fhall. I warrant, he hath a thousand of thefe letters, writ with blank fpace for different names, (fure more,) and thefe are of the fecond edition: He will print them out of doubt; for he cares not what he puts into the prefs, when he would put us two. I had rather be a giantefs, and lie under mount Pelion. Well, I will find you twenty lafcivious turtles, ere one chaste

man.

MRS. FORD. Why, this is the very fame; the very hand, the very words: What doth he think of us?

MRS. PAGE. Nay, I know not: It makes me almost ready to wrangle with mine own honefty. I'll entertain myself like one that I am not acquainted withal; for, fure, unless he knew fome ftrain in me, that I know not myself, he would never have boarded me in this fury.

MRS. FORD. Boarding, call you it? I'll be fure to keep him above deck.

MRS. PAGE. So will I; if he come under my hatches, I'll never to fea again. Let's be revenged on him: let's appoint him a meeting; give him a fhow of comfort in his fuit; and lead him on with a fine-baited delay, till he hath pawn'd his horfes to mine Hoft of the Garter.

MRS. FORD. Nay, I will confent to act any villainy against him, that may not fully the charinefs of our ho

nesty. O, that my husband faw this letter! it would give eternal food to his jealousy.

MRS. PAGE. Why, look, where he comes; and my good man too: he's as far from jealousy, as I am from giving him cause; and that, I hope, is an unmeasurable distance.

MRS. FORD. You are the happier woman.

MRS. PAGE. Let's confult together against this greasy knight: Come hither.

[they retire. Enter FORD, PISTOL, PAGE, and Nrм.

FORD. Well, I hope, it be not fo.

PIST. Hope is a curtail dog in fome affairs:

Sir John affects thy wife.

FORD. Why, fir, my wife is not young.

PIST. He wooes both high and low, both rich and poor, Both young and old, one with another, Ford;

He loves thy gally-mawfry; Ford, perpend.

FORD. Love my wife?

PIST. With liver burning hot: Prevent, or go thou, Like Sir Acteon he, with Ring-wood at thy heels :— O, odious is the name!

FORD. What name, fir?

PIST. The horn, I fay: Farewel.

Take heed; have open eye; for thieves do foot by night: Take heed, ere fummer comes, or cuckoo-birds do fing.Away, fir corporal Nym.

Believe it, Page; he speaks fense.

[Exit PISTOL.

FORD. I will be patient; I will find out this.

Nrм. And this is true; [to Page.] I like not the humour of lying. He hath wrong'd me in some humours: I should have borne the humour'd letter to her; but I have a fword, and it fhall bite upon my neceffity. He loves your wife; there's the fhort and the long. My

name is corporal Nym; I fpeak, and I avouch. 'Tis true-my name is Nym, and Falstaff loves your wife. -Adieu! I love not the humour of bread and cheese ; and there's the humour of it. Adieu.

[Exit Nrм.

PAGE. The bumour of it, quoth 'a! here's a fellow frights humour out of his wits.

FORD. I will feek out Falstaff.

PAGE. I never heard fuch a drawling, affecting rogue. FORD. If I do find it, well.

PAGE. I will not believe fuch a Cataian, though the priest o' the town commended him for a true man. FORD. 'Twas a good fenfible fellow: Well.

PAGE. How now, Meg?

MRS. PAGE. Whither go you, George?-Hark you. MRS. FORD. How now, fweet Frank? why art thou melancholy?

FORD. I melancholy! I am not melancholy.you home, go.

Get

MRS. FORD. 'Faith, thou haft fome crotchets in thy head now.-Will you go, mistress Page?

MRS. PAGE. Have with you.-You'll come to dinner, George? Look, who comes yonder: fhe fhall be our meffenger to this paltry knight. [Afide to Mrs. FORD. Enter Mistress QUICKLY.

MRS. FORD. Truft me, I thought on her: fhe'll fit it. MRS. PAGE. You are come to see my daughter Anne? QUICK. Ay, forfooth; And, I pray, how does good mistress Anne?

MRS. PAGE. Go in with us, and fee; we have an hour's talk with you.

[Exeunt Mrs. PAGE, Mrs. FORD, and Mrs. QUICKLY. PAGE. How now, mafter Ford?

FORD. You heard what this knave told me; did

you not?