Act V

SCENE I. Gloucestershire. SHALLOW’S house.

Enter SHALLOW, FALSTAFF, BARDOLPH, and Page

SHALLOW

By cock and pie, sir, you shall not away to-night.
What, Davy, I say!

FALSTAFF

You must excuse me, Master Robert Shallow.

SHALLOW

I will not excuse you; you shall not be excused;
excuses shall not be admitted; there is no excuse
shall serve; you shall not be excused. Why, Davy!

Enter DAVY

DAVY

Here, sir.

SHALLOW

Davy, Davy, Davy, Davy, let me see, Davy; let me
see, Davy; let me see: yea, marry, William cook,
bid him come hither. Sir John, you shall not be excused.

DAVY

Marry, sir, thus; those precepts cannot be served:
and, again, sir, shall we sow the headland with wheat?

SHALLOW

With red wheat, Davy. But for William cook: are
there no young pigeons?

DAVY

Yes, sir. Here is now the smith’s note for shoeing
and plough-irons.

SHALLOW

Let it be cast and paid. Sir John, you shall not be excused.

DAVY

Now, sir, a new link to the bucket must need be
had: and, sir, do you mean to stop any of William’s
wages, about the sack he lost the other day at
Hinckley fair?

SHALLOW

A’ shall answer it. Some pigeons, Davy, a couple
of short-legged hens, a joint of mutton, and any
pretty little tiny kickshaws, tell William cook.

DAVY

Doth the man of war stay all night, sir?

SHALLOW

Yea, Davy. I will use him well: a friend i’ the
court is better than a penny in purse. Use his men
well, Davy; for they are arrant knaves, and will backbite.

DAVY

No worse than they are backbitten, sir; for they
have marvellous foul linen.

SHALLOW

Well conceited, Davy: about thy business, Davy.

DAVY

I beseech you, sir, to countenance William Visor of
Woncot against Clement Perkes of the hill.

SHALLOW

There is many complaints, Davy, against that Visor:
that Visor is an arrant knave, on my knowledge.

DAVY

I grant your worship that he is a knave, sir; but
yet, God forbid, sir, but a knave should have some
countenance at his friend’s request. An honest
man, sir, is able to speak for himself, when a knave
is not. I have served your worship truly, sir,
this eight years; and if I cannot once or twice in
a quarter bear out a knave against an honest man, I
have but a very little credit with your worship. The
knave is mine honest friend, sir; therefore, I
beseech your worship, let him be countenanced.

SHALLOW

Go to; I say he shall have no wrong. Look about, Davy.

Exit DAVY

Where are you, Sir John? Come, come, come, off
with your boots. Give me your hand, Master Bardolph.

BARDOLPH

I am glad to see your worship.

SHALLOW

I thank thee with all my heart, kind
Master Bardolph: and welcome, my tall fellow.

To the Page

Come, Sir John.

FALSTAFF

I’ll follow you, good Master Robert Shallow.

Exit SHALLOW

Bardolph, look to our horses.

Exeunt BARDOLPH and Page

If I were sawed into quantities, I should make four
dozen of such bearded hermits’ staves as Master
Shallow. It is a wonderful thing to see the
semblable coherence of his men’s spirits and his:
they, by observing of him, do bear themselves like
foolish justices; he, by conversing with them, is
turned into a justice-like serving-man: their
spirits are so married in conjunction with the
participation of society that they flock together in
consent, like so many wild-geese. If I had a suit
to Master Shallow, I would humour his men with the
imputation of being near their master: if to his
men, I would curry with Master Shallow that no man
could better command his servants. It is certain
that either wise bearing or ignorant carriage is
caught, as men take diseases, one of another:
therefore let men take heed of their company. I
will devise matter enough out of this Shallow to
keep Prince Harry in continual laughter the wearing
out of six fashions, which is four terms, or two
actions, and a’ shall laugh without intervallums. O,
it is much that a lie with a slight oath and a jest
with a sad brow will do with a fellow that never
had the ache in his shoulders! O, you shall see him
laugh till his face be like a wet cloak ill laid up!

SHALLOW

[Within] Sir John!

FALSTAFF

I come, Master Shallow; I come, Master Shallow.

Exit

SCENE II. Westminster. The palace.

Enter WARWICK and the Lord Chief-Justice, meeting

WARWICK

How now, my lord chief-justice! whither away?
Lord Chief-Justice How doth the king?

WARWICK

Exceeding well; his cares are now all ended.
Lord Chief-Justice I hope, not dead.

WARWICK

He’s walk’d the way of nature;
And to our purposes he lives no more.
Lord Chief-Justice I would his majesty had call’d me with him:
The service that I truly did his life
Hath left me open to all injuries.

WARWICK

Indeed I think the young king loves you not.
Lord Chief-Justice I know he doth not, and do arm myself
To welcome the condition of the time,
Which cannot look more hideously upon me
Than I have drawn it in my fantasy.

Enter LANCASTER, CLARENCE, GLOUCESTER, WESTMORELAND, and others

WARWICK

Here come the heavy issue of dead Harry:
O that the living Harry had the temper
Of him, the worst of these three gentlemen!
How many nobles then should hold their places
That must strike sail to spirits of vile sort!
Lord Chief-Justice O God, I fear all will be overturn’d!

LANCASTER

Good morrow, cousin Warwick, good morrow.

GLOUCESTER CLARENCE

Good morrow, cousin.

LANCASTER

We meet like men that had forgot to speak.

WARWICK

We do remember; but our argument
Is all too heavy to admit much talk.

LANCASTER

Well, peace be with him that hath made us heavy.
Lord Chief-Justice Peace be with us, lest we be heavier!

GLOUCESTER

O, good my lord, you have lost a friend indeed;
And I dare swear you borrow not that face
Of seeming sorrow, it is sure your own.

LANCASTER

Though no man be assured what grace to find,
You stand in coldest expectation:
I am the sorrier; would ’twere otherwise.

CLARENCE

Well, you must now speak Sir John Falstaff fair;
Which swims against your stream of quality.
Lord Chief-Justice Sweet princes, what I did, I did in honour,
Led by the impartial conduct of my soul:
And never shall you see that I will beg
A ragged and forestall’d remission.
If truth and upright innocency fail me,
I’ll to the king my master that is dead,
And tell him who hath sent me after him.

WARWICK

Here comes the prince.

Enter KING HENRY V, attended

Lord Chief-Justice Good morrow; and God save your majesty!

KING HENRY V

This new and gorgeous garment, majesty,
Sits not so easy on me as you think.
Brothers, you mix your sadness with some fear:
This is the English, not the Turkish court;
Not Amurath an Amurath succeeds,
But Harry Harry. Yet be sad, good brothers,
For, by my faith, it very well becomes you:
Sorrow so royally in you appears
That I will deeply put the fashion on
And wear it in my heart: why then, be sad;
But entertain no more of it, good brothers,
Than a joint burden laid upon us all.
For me, by heaven, I bid you be assured,
I’ll be your father and your brother too;
Let me but bear your love, I ‘ll bear your cares:
Yet weep that Harry’s dead; and so will I;
But Harry lives, that shall convert those tears
By number into hours of happiness.

Princes

We hope no other from your majesty.

KING HENRY V

You all look strangely on me: and you most;
You are, I think, assured I love you not.
Lord Chief-Justice I am assured, if I be measured rightly,
Your majesty hath no just cause to hate me.

KING HENRY V

No!
How might a prince of my great hopes forget
So great indignities you laid upon me?
What! rate, rebuke, and roughly send to prison
The immediate heir of England! Was this easy?
May this be wash’d in Lethe, and forgotten?
Lord Chief-Justice I then did use the person of your father;
The image of his power lay then in me:
And, in the administration of his law,
Whiles I was busy for the commonwealth,
Your highness pleased to forget my place,
The majesty and power of law and justice,
The image of the king whom I presented,
And struck me in my very seat of judgment;
Whereon, as an offender to your father,
I gave bold way to my authority
And did commit you. If the deed were ill,
Be you contented, wearing now the garland,
To have a son set your decrees at nought,
To pluck down justice from your awful bench,
To trip the course of law and blunt the sword
That guards the peace and safety of your person;
Nay, more, to spurn at your most royal image
And mock your workings in a second body.
Question your royal thoughts, make the case yours;
Be now the father and propose a son,
Hear your own dignity so much profaned,
See your most dreadful laws so loosely slighted,
Behold yourself so by a son disdain’d;
And then imagine me taking your part
And in your power soft silencing your son:
After this cold considerance, sentence me;
And, as you are a king, speak in your state
What I have done that misbecame my place,
My person, or my liege’s sovereignty.

KING HENRY V

You are right, justice, and you weigh this well;
Therefore still bear the balance and the sword:
And I do wish your honours may increase,
Till you do live to see a son of mine
Offend you and obey you, as I did.
So shall I live to speak my father’s words:
‘Happy am I, that have a man so bold,
That dares do justice on my proper son;
And not less happy, having such a son,
That would deliver up his greatness so
Into the hands of justice.’ You did commit me:
For which, I do commit into your hand
The unstained sword that you have used to bear;
With this remembrance, that you use the same
With the like bold, just and impartial spirit
As you have done ‘gainst me. There is my hand.
You shall be as a father to my youth:
My voice shall sound as you do prompt mine ear,
And I will stoop and humble my intents
To your well-practised wise directions.
And, princes all, believe me, I beseech you;
My father is gone wild into his grave,
For in his tomb lie my affections;
And with his spirit sadly I survive,
To mock the expectation of the world,
To frustrate prophecies and to raze out
Rotten opinion, who hath writ me down
After my seeming. The tide of blood in me
Hath proudly flow’d in vanity till now:
Now doth it turn and ebb back to the sea,
Where it shall mingle with the state of floods
And flow henceforth in formal majesty.
Now call we our high court of parliament:
And let us choose such limbs of noble counsel,
That the great body of our state may go
In equal rank with the best govern’d nation;
That war, or peace, or both at once, may be
As things acquainted and familiar to us;
In which you, father, shall have foremost hand.
Our coronation done, we will accite,
As I before remember’d, all our state:
And, God consigning to my good intents,
No prince nor peer shall have just cause to say,
God shorten Harry’s happy life one day!

Exeunt

SCENE III. Gloucestershire. SHALLOW’S orchard.

Enter FALSTAFF, SHALLOW, SILENCE, DAVY, BARDOLPH, and the Page

SHALLOW

Nay, you shall see my orchard, where, in an arbour,
we will eat a last year’s pippin of my own graffing,
with a dish of caraways, and so forth: come,
cousin Silence: and then to bed.

FALSTAFF

‘Fore God, you have here a goodly dwelling and a rich.

SHALLOW

Barren, barren, barren; beggars all, beggars all,
Sir John: marry, good air. Spread, Davy; spread,
Davy; well said, Davy.

FALSTAFF

This Davy serves you for good uses; he is your
serving-man and your husband.

SHALLOW

A good varlet, a good varlet, a very good varlet,
Sir John: by the mass, I have drunk too much sack
at supper: a good varlet. Now sit down, now sit
down: come, cousin.

SILENCE

Ah, sirrah! quoth-a, we shall
Do nothing but eat, and make good cheer,

Singing

And praise God for the merry year;
When flesh is cheap and females dear,
And lusty lads roam here and there
So merrily,
And ever among so merrily.

FALSTAFF

There’s a merry heart! Good Master Silence, I’ll
give you a health for that anon.

SHALLOW

Give Master Bardolph some wine, Davy.

DAVY

Sweet sir, sit; I’ll be with you anon. most sweet
sir, sit. Master page, good master page, sit.
Proface! What you want in meat, we’ll have in drink:
but you must bear; the heart’s all.

Exit

SHALLOW

Be merry, Master Bardolph; and, my little soldier
there, be merry.

SILENCE

Be merry, be merry, my wife has all;

Singing

For women are shrews, both short and tall:
‘Tis merry in hall when beards wag all,
And welcome merry Shrove-tide.
Be merry, be merry.

FALSTAFF

I did not think Master Silence had been a man of
this mettle.

SILENCE

Who, I? I have been merry twice and once ere now.

Re-enter DAVY

DAVY

There’s a dish of leather-coats for you.

To BARDOLPH

SHALLOW

Davy!

DAVY

Your worship! I’ll be with you straight.

To BARDOLPH

A cup of wine, sir?

SILENCE

A cup of wine that’s brisk and fine,

Singing

And drink unto the leman mine;
And a merry heart lives long-a.

FALSTAFF

Well said, Master Silence.

SILENCE

An we shall be merry, now comes in the sweet o’ the night.

FALSTAFF

Health and long life to you, Master Silence.

SILENCE

Fill the cup, and let it come;

Singing

I’ll pledge you a mile to the bottom.

SHALLOW

Honest Bardolph, welcome: if thou wantest any
thing, and wilt not call, beshrew thy heart.
Welcome, my little tiny thief.

To the Page

And welcome indeed too. I’ll drink to Master
Bardolph, and to all the cavaleros about London.

DAVY

I hove to see London once ere I die.

BARDOLPH

An I might see you there, Davy,—

SHALLOW

By the mass, you’ll crack a quart together, ha!
Will you not, Master Bardolph?

BARDOLPH

Yea, sir, in a pottle-pot.

SHALLOW

By God’s liggens, I thank thee: the knave will
stick by thee, I can assure thee that. A’ will not
out; he is true bred.

BARDOLPH

And I’ll stick by him, sir.

SHALLOW

Why, there spoke a king. Lack nothing: be merry.

Knocking within

Look who’s at door there, ho! who knocks?

Exit DAVY

FALSTAFF

Why, now you have done me right.

To SILENCE, seeing him take off a bumper

SILENCE

[Singing]
Do me right,
And dub me knight: Samingo.
Is’t not so?

FALSTAFF

‘Tis so.

SILENCE

Is’t so? Why then, say an old man can do somewhat.

Re-enter DAVY

DAVY

An’t please your worship, there’s one Pistol come
from the court with news.

FALSTAFF

From the court! let him come in.

Enter PISTOL

How now, Pistol!

PISTOL

Sir John, God save you!

FALSTAFF

What wind blew you hither, Pistol?

PISTOL

Not the ill wind which blows no man to good. Sweet
knight, thou art now one of the greatest men in this realm.

SILENCE

By’r lady, I think a’ be, but goodman Puff of Barson.

PISTOL

Puff!
Puff in thy teeth, most recreant coward base!
Sir John, I am thy Pistol and thy friend,
And helter-skelter have I rode to thee,
And tidings do I bring and lucky joys
And golden times and happy news of price.

FALSTAFF

I pray thee now, deliver them like a man of this world.

PISTOL

A foutre for the world and worldlings base!
I speak of Africa and golden joys.

FALSTAFF

O base Assyrian knight, what is thy news?
Let King Cophetua know the truth thereof.

SILENCE

And Robin Hood, Scarlet, and John.

Singing

PISTOL

Shall dunghill curs confront the Helicons?
And shall good news be baffled?
Then, Pistol, lay thy head in Furies’ lap.

SILENCE

Honest gentleman, I know not your breeding.

PISTOL

Why then, lament therefore.

SHALLOW

Give me pardon, sir: if, sir, you come with news
from the court, I take it there’s but two ways,
either to utter them, or to conceal them. I am,
sir, under the king, in some authority.

PISTOL

Under which king, Besonian? speak, or die.

SHALLOW

Under King Harry.

PISTOL

Harry the Fourth? or Fifth?

SHALLOW

Harry the Fourth.

PISTOL

A foutre for thine office!
Sir John, thy tender lambkin now is king;
Harry the Fifth’s the man. I speak the truth:
When Pistol lies, do this; and fig me, like
The bragging Spaniard.

FALSTAFF

What, is the old king dead?

PISTOL

As nail in door: the things I speak are just.

FALSTAFF

Away, Bardolph! saddle my horse. Master Robert
Shallow, choose what office thou wilt in the land,
’tis thine. Pistol, I will double-charge thee with dignities.

BARDOLPH

O joyful day!
I would not take a knighthood for my fortune.

PISTOL

What! I do bring good news.

FALSTAFF

Carry Master Silence to bed. Master Shallow, my
Lord Shallow,—be what thou wilt; I am fortune’s
steward—get on thy boots: we’ll ride all night.
O sweet Pistol! Away, Bardolph!

Exit BARDOLPH

Come, Pistol, utter more to me; and withal devise
something to do thyself good. Boot, boot, Master
Shallow: I know the young king is sick for me. Let
us take any man’s horses; the laws of England are at
my commandment. Blessed are they that have been my
friends; and woe to my lord chief-justice!

PISTOL

Let vultures vile seize on his lungs also!
‘Where is the life that late I led?’ say they:
Why, here it is; welcome these pleasant days!

Exeunt

SCENE IV. London. A street.

Enter Beadles, dragging in HOSTESS QUICKLY and DOLL TEARSHEET

MISTRESS QUICKLY

No, thou arrant knave; I would to God that I might
die, that I might have thee hanged: thou hast
drawn my shoulder out of joint.

First Beadle

The constables have delivered her over to me; and
she shall have whipping-cheer enough, I warrant
her: there hath been a man or two lately killed about her.

DOLL TEARSHEET

Nut-hook, nut-hook, you lie. Come on; I ‘ll tell
thee what, thou damned tripe-visaged rascal, an
the child I now go with do miscarry, thou wert
better thou hadst struck thy mother, thou
paper-faced villain.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

O the Lord, that Sir John were come! he would make
this a bloody day to somebody. But I pray God the
fruit of her womb miscarry!

First Beadle

If it do, you shall have a dozen of cushions again;
you have but eleven now. Come, I charge you both go
with me; for the man is dead that you and Pistol
beat amongst you.

DOLL TEARSHEET

I’ll tell you what, you thin man in a censer, I
will have you as soundly swinged for this,—you
blue-bottle rogue, you filthy famished correctioner,
if you be not swinged, I’ll forswear half-kirtles.

First Beadle

Come, come, you she knight-errant, come.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

O God, that right should thus overcome might!
Well, of sufferance comes ease.

DOLL TEARSHEET

Come, you rogue, come; bring me to a justice.

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Ay, come, you starved blood-hound.

DOLL TEARSHEET

Goodman death, goodman bones!

MISTRESS QUICKLY

Thou atomy, thou!

DOLL TEARSHEET

Come, you thin thing; come you rascal.

First Beadle

Very well.

Exeunt

SCENE V. A public place near Westminster Abbey.

Enter two Grooms, strewing rushes

First Groom

More rushes, more rushes.

Second Groom

The trumpets have sounded twice.

First Groom

‘Twill be two o’clock ere they come from the
coronation: dispatch, dispatch.

Exeunt

Enter FALSTAFF, SHALLOW, PISTOL, BARDOLPH, and Page

FALSTAFF

Stand here by me, Master Robert Shallow; I will
make the king do you grace: I will leer upon him as
a’ comes by; and do but mark the countenance that he
will give me.

PISTOL

God bless thy lungs, good knight.

FALSTAFF

Come here, Pistol; stand behind me. O, if I had had
time to have made new liveries, I would have
bestowed the thousand pound I borrowed of you. But
’tis no matter; this poor show doth better: this
doth infer the zeal I had to see him.

SHALLOW

It doth so.

FALSTAFF

It shows my earnestness of affection,—

SHALLOW

It doth so.

FALSTAFF

My devotion,—

SHALLOW

It doth, it doth, it doth.

FALSTAFF

As it were, to ride day and night; and not to
deliberate, not to remember, not to have patience
to shift me,—

SHALLOW

It is best, certain.

FALSTAFF

But to stand stained with travel, and sweating with
desire to see him; thinking of nothing else,
putting all affairs else in oblivion, as if there
were nothing else to be done but to see him.

PISTOL

‘Tis ‘semper idem,’ for ‘obsque hoc nihil est:’
’tis all in every part.

SHALLOW

‘Tis so, indeed.

PISTOL

My knight, I will inflame thy noble liver,
And make thee rage.
Thy Doll, and Helen of thy noble thoughts,
Is in base durance and contagious prison;
Haled thither
By most mechanical and dirty hand:
Rouse up revenge from ebon den with fell
Alecto’s snake,
For Doll is in. Pistol speaks nought but truth.

FALSTAFF

I will deliver her.

Shouts within, and the trumpets sound

PISTOL

There roar’d the sea, and trumpet-clangor sounds.

Enter KING HENRY V and his train, the Lord Chief- Justice among them

FALSTAFF

God save thy grace, King Hal! my royal Hal!

PISTOL

The heavens thee guard and keep, most royal imp of fame!

FALSTAFF

God save thee, my sweet boy!

KING HENRY IV

My lord chief-justice, speak to that vain man.
Lord Chief-Justice Have you your wits? know you what ’tis to speak?

FALSTAFF

My king! my Jove! I speak to thee, my heart!

KING HENRY IV

I know thee not, old man: fall to thy prayers;
How ill white hairs become a fool and jester!
I have long dream’d of such a kind of man,
So surfeit-swell’d, so old and so profane;
But, being awaked, I do despise my dream.
Make less thy body hence, and more thy grace;
Leave gormandizing; know the grave doth gape
For thee thrice wider than for other men.
Reply not to me with a fool-born jest:
Presume not that I am the thing I was;
For God doth know, so shall the world perceive,
That I have turn’d away my former self;
So will I those that kept me company.
When thou dost hear I am as I have been,
Approach me, and thou shalt be as thou wast,
The tutor and the feeder of my riots:
Till then, I banish thee, on pain of death,
As I have done the rest of my misleaders,
Not to come near our person by ten mile.
For competence of life I will allow you,
That lack of means enforce you not to evil:
And, as we hear you do reform yourselves,
We will, according to your strengths and qualities,
Give you advancement. Be it your charge, my lord,
To see perform’d the tenor of our word. Set on.

Exeunt KING HENRY V, & c

FALSTAFF

Master Shallow, I owe you a thousand pound.

SHALLOW

Yea, marry, Sir John; which I beseech you to let me
have home with me.

FALSTAFF

That can hardly be, Master Shallow. Do not you
grieve at this; I shall be sent for in private to
him: look you, he must seem thus to the world:
fear not your advancements; I will be the man yet
that shall make you great.

SHALLOW

I cannot well perceive how, unless you should give
me your doublet and stuff me out with straw. I
beseech you, good Sir John, let me have five hundred
of my thousand.

FALSTAFF

Sir, I will be as good as my word: this that you
heard was but a colour.

SHALLOW

A colour that I fear you will die in, Sir John.

FALSTAFF

Fear no colours: go with me to dinner: come,
Lieutenant Pistol; come, Bardolph: I shall be sent
for soon at night.

Re-enter Prince John of LANCASTER, the Lord Chief-Justice; Officers with them

Lord Chief-Justice Go, carry Sir John Falstaff to the Fleet:
Take all his company along with him.

FALSTAFF

My lord, my lord,—
Lord Chief-Justice I cannot now speak: I will hear you soon.
Take them away.

PISTOL

Si fortune me tormenta, spero contenta.

Exeunt all but PRINCE JOHN and the Lord Chief-Justice

LANCASTER

I like this fair proceeding of the king’s:
He hath intent his wonted followers
Shall all be very well provided for;
But all are banish’d till their conversations
Appear more wise and modest to the world.
Lord Chief-Justice And so they are.

LANCASTER

The king hath call’d his parliament, my lord.
Lord Chief-Justice He hath.

LANCASTER

I will lay odds that, ere this year expire,
We bear our civil swords and native fire
As far as France: I beard a bird so sing,
Whose music, to my thinking, pleased the king.
Come, will you hence?

Exeunt