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well bestowed. Exit

SCENE 2.

A room in the Garter Inn

Enter FALSTAFF and PISTOL

FALSTAFF.

I will not lend thee a penny.

PISTOL.

I will retort the sum in equipage.

FALSTAFF.

Not a penny.

PISTOL.

Why, then the world's mine oyster. Which I with sword will open.

FALSTAFF.

Not a penny. I have been content, sir, you should

lay my countenance to pawn. I have grated upon my good

friends for three reprieves for you and your coach-fellow,

Nym; or else you had look'd through the grate, like a

geminy of baboons. I am damn'd in hell for swearing to

gentlemen my friends you were good soldiers and tall fellows;

and when Mistress Bridget lost the handle of her fan,

I took 't upon mine honour thou hadst it not.

PISTOL.

Didst not thou share? Hadst thou not fifteen pence?

FALSTAFF.

Reason, you rogue, reason. Think'st thou I'll

endanger my soul gratis? At a word, hang no more about me,

I am no gibbet for you. Go-a short knife and a throng!-

to your manor of Pickt-hatch; go. You'll not bear a letter

for me, you rogue! You stand upon your honour! Why,

thou unconfinable baseness, it is as much as I can do to

keep the terms of my honour precise. I, I, I myself

sometimes, leaving the fear of God on the left hand, and hiding

mine honour in my necessity, am fain to shuffle, to hedge,

and to lurch; and yet you, rogue, will ensconce your rags,

your cat-a-mountain looks, your red-lattice phrases, and

your bold-beating oaths, under the shelter of your honour!

You will not do it, you!

PISTOL.

I do relent; what would thou more of man?

Enter ROBIN

ROBIN.

Sir, here's a woman would speak with you.

FALSTAFF.

Let her approach.

Enter MISTRESS QUICKLY

QUICKLY.

Give your worship good morrow.

FALSTAFF.

Good morrow, good wife.

QUICKLY.

Not so, an't please your worship.

FALSTAFF.

Good maid, then.

QUICKLY.

I'll be sworn;

As my mother was, the first hour I was born.

FALSTAFF.

I do believe the swearer. What with me?

QUICKLY.

Shall I vouchsafe your worship a word or two?

FALSTAFF.

Two thousand, fair woman; and I'll vouchsafe thee the hearing.

QUICKLY.

There is one Mistress Ford, sir-I pray, come a little

nearer this ways. I myself dwell with Master Doctor Caius.

FALSTAFF.

Well, on: Mistress Ford, you say-

QUICKLY.

Your worship says very true. I pray your worship

come a little nearer this ways.

FALSTAFF.

I warrant thee nobody hears-mine own people,

mine own people.

QUICKLY.

Are they so? God bless them, and make them his servants!

FALSTAFF.

Well; Mistress Ford, what of her?

QUICKLY.

Why, sir, she's a good creature. Lord, Lord, your

worship's a wanton! Well, heaven forgive you, and all of

us, I pray.

FALSTAFF.

Mistress Ford; come, Mistress Ford-

QUICKLY.

Marry, this is the short and the long of it: you

have brought her into such a canaries as 'tis wonderful.

The best courtier of them all, when the court lay at Windsor,

could never have brought her to such a canary. Yet

there has been knights, and lords, and gentlemen, with

their coaches; I warrant you, coach after coach, letter after

letter, gift after gift; smelling so sweetly, all musk, and so

rushling, I warrant you, in silk and gold; and in such alligant

terms; and in such wine and sugar of the best and the

fairest, that would have won any woman's heart; and I

warrant you, they could never get an eye-wink of her.

I had myself twenty angels given me this morning; but I

defy all angels, in any such sort, as they say, but in the

way of honesty; and, I warrant you, they could never get

her so much as sip on a cup with the proudest of them all;

and yet there has been earls, nay, which is more,

pensioners; but, I warrant you, all is one with her.

FALSTAFF.

But what says she to me? Be brief, my good she-

Mercury.

QUICKLY.

Marry, she hath receiv'd your letter; for the

which she thanks you a thousand times; and she gives you

to notify that her husband will be absence from his house

between ten and