The Complete Works of William Shakespeare - Israel Gollancz William Shakespeare [747]
EVANS.
Ay.
WILLIAM.
Genitive: horum, harum, horum.
QUICKLY.
Vengeance of Jenny's case; fie on her! Never
name her, child, if she be a whore.
EVANS.
For shame, oman.
QUICKLY.
YOU do ill to teach the child such words. He
teaches him to hick and to hack, which they'll do fast
enough of themselves; and to call 'horum'; fie upon you!
EVANS.
Oman, art thou lunatics? Hast thou no understandings
for thy cases, and the numbers of the genders? Thou
art as foolish Christian creatures as I would desires.
MRS.
PAGE. Prithee hold thy peace.
EVANS.
Show me now, William, some declensions of your pronouns.
WILLIAM.
Forsooth, I have forgot.
EVANS.
It is qui, quae, quod; if you forget your qui's, your
quae's, and your quod's, you must be preeches. Go your
ways and play; go.
MRS.
PAGE. He is a better scholar than I thought he was.
EVANS.
He is a good sprag memory. Farewell, Mistress Page.
MRS.
PAGE. Adieu, good Sir Hugh. Exit SIR HUGH
Get you home, boy. Come, we stay too long. Exeunt
SCENE 2.
FORD'S house
Enter FALSTAFF and MISTRESS FORD
FALSTAFF.
Mistress Ford, your sorrow hath eaten up my
sufferance. I see you are obsequious in your love, and I
profess requital to a hair's breadth; not only, Mistress Ford, in
the simple office of love, but in all the accoutrement,
complement, and ceremony of it. But are you sure of your husband now?
MRS.
FORD. He's a-birding, sweet Sir John.
MRS.
PAGE. [Within] What hoa, gossip Ford, what hoa!
MRS.
FORD. Step into th' chamber, Sir John. Exit FALSTAFF
Enter MISTRESS PAGE
MRS.
PAGE. How now, sweetheart, who's at home besides yourself?
MRS.
FORD. Why, none but mine own people.
MRS.
PAGE. Indeed?
MRS.
FORD. No, certainly. [Aside to her] Speak louder.
MRS.
PAGE. Truly, I am so glad you have nobody here.
MRS.
FORD. Why?
MRS.
PAGE. Why, woman, your husband is in his old lunes
again. He so takes on yonder with my husband; so rails
against all married mankind; so curses an Eve's daughters,
of what complexion soever; and so buffets himself on the
forehead, crying 'Peer-out, peer-out!' that any madness I
ever yet beheld seem'd but tameness, civility, and patience,
to this his distemper he is in now. I am glad the fat knight is not here.
MRS.
FORD. Why, does he talk of him?
MRS.
PAGE. Of none but him; and swears he was carried out,
the last time he search'd for him, in a basket; protests to
my husband he is now here; and hath drawn him and the
rest of their company from their sport, to make another
experiment of his suspicion. But I am glad the knight is not
here; now he shall see his own foolery.
MRS.
FORD. How near is he, Mistress Page?
MRS.
PAGE. Hard by, at street end; he will be here anon.
MRS.
FORD. I am undone: the knight is here.
MRS.
PAGE. Why, then, you are utterly sham'd, and he's but
a dead man. What a woman are you! Away with him,
away with him; better shame than murder.
MRS.
FORD. Which way should he go? How should I bestow
him? Shall I put him into the basket again?
Re-enter FALSTAFF
FALSTAFF.
No, I'll come no more i' th' basket. May I not go out ere he come?
MRS.
PAGE. Alas, three of Master Ford's brothers watch the
door with pistols, that none shall issue out; otherwise you
might slip away ere he came. But what make you here?
FALSTAFF.
What shall I do? I'll creep up into the chimney.
MRS.
FORD. There they always use to discharge their
birding-pieces.
MRS.
PAGE. Creep into the kiln-hole.
FALSTAFF.
Where is it?
MRS.
FORD. He will seek there, on my word. Neither press,
coffer, chest, trunk, well, vault, but he hath an abstract for
the remembrance of such places, and goes to them by his
note. There is no hiding you in the house.
FALSTAFF.
I'll go out then.
MRS.
PAGE. If you go out in your own semblance, you die,
Sir John. Unless you go out disguis'd.
MRS.
FORD. How might we disguise him?
MRS.
PAGE. Alas the day, I know not! There is no woman's
gown big enough for him; otherwise he might put on