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Prince. O villain! thou stolest a cup of sack eighteen years ago

and wert taken with the manner, and ever since thou hast blush'd

extempore. Thou hadst fire and sword on thy side, and yet thou

ran'st away. What instinct hadst thou for it?

Bard. My lord, do you see these meteors? Do you behold these exhalations?

Prince. I do.

Bard. What think you they portend?

Prince. Hot livers and cold purses.

Bard. Choler, my lord, if rightly taken.

Prince. No, if rightly taken, halter.

Enter Falstaff.

Here comes lean Jack; here comes bare-bone. How now, my sweet creature of bombast? How long is't ago, Jack, since thou sawest thine own knee? Fal. My own knee? When I was about thy years, Hal, I was not an eagle's talent in the waist; I could have crept into any alderman's thumb-ring. A plague of sighing and grief! It blows a man up like a bladder. There's villanous news abroad. Here was Sir John Bracy from your father. You must to the court in the morning. That same mad fellow of the North, Percy, and he of Wales that gave Amamon the bastinado, and made Lucifer cuckold, and swore the devil his true liegeman upon the cross of a Welsh hook- what a plague call you him? Poins. O, Glendower. Fal. Owen, Owen- the same; and his son-in-law Mortimer, and old Northumberland, and that sprightly Scot of Scots, Douglas, that runs a-horseback up a hill perpendicular- Prince. He that rides at high speed and with his pistol kills a sparrow flying. Fal. You have hit it. Prince. So did he never the sparrow. Fal. Well, that rascal hath good metal in him; he will not run. Prince. Why, what a rascal art thou then, to praise him so for running! Fal. A-horseback, ye cuckoo! but afoot he will not budge a foot. Prince. Yes, Jack, upon instinct. Fal. I grant ye, upon instinct. Well, he is there too, and one Mordake, and a thousand bluecaps more. Worcester is stol'n away to-night; thy father's beard is turn'd white with the news; you may buy land now as cheap as stinking mack'rel. Prince. Why then, it is like, if there come a hot June, and this civil buffeting hold, we shall buy maidenheads as they buy hobnails, by the hundreds. Fal. By the mass, lad, thou sayest true; it is like we shall have good trading that way. But tell me, Hal, art not thou horrible afeard? Thou being heir apparent, could the world pick thee out three such enemies again as that fiend Douglas, that spirit Percy, and that devil Glendower? Art thou not horribly afraid? Doth not thy blood thrill at it? Prince. Not a whit, i' faith. I lack some of thy instinct. Fal. Well, thou wilt be horribly chid to-morrow when thou comest to thy father. If thou love file, practise an answer. Prince. Do thou stand for my father and examine me upon the particulars of my life. Fal. Shall I? Content. This chair shall be my state, this dagger my sceptre, and this cushion my, crown. Prince. Thy state is taken for a join'd-stool, thy golden sceptre for a leaden dagger, and thy precious rich crown for a pitiful bald crown. Fal. Well, an the fire of grace be not quite out of thee, now shalt thou be moved. Give me a cup of sack to make my eyes look red, that it may be thought I have wept; for I must speak in passion, and I will do it in King Cambyses' vein. Prince. Well, here is my leg. Fal. And here is my speech. Stand aside, nobility. Host. O Jesu, this is excellent sport, i' faith! Fal. Weep not, sweet queen, for trickling tears are vain. Host. O, the Father, how he holds his countenance! Fal. For God's sake, lords, convey my tristful queen! For tears do stop the floodgates of her eyes. Host. O Jesu, he doth it as like one of these harlotry players as ever I see! Fal. Peace, good pintpot. Peace, good tickle-brain.- Harry, I do not only marvel where thou spendest thy time, but also how thou art accompanied. For though the camomile, the more it is trodden on, the faster it grows, yet youth, the more it is wasted, the sooner it wears. That thou art my son I have partly thy mother's word, partly my own opinion, but chiefly a villanous trick of thine eye and a