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Enter Mrs. PAGE, L.

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.-Speak louder. [Aside. Mrs. Page. Truly, I am so glad you have nobody here

Mrs. Ford. Why?

Mrs. Puge. Why, woman, your husband is in his old lunes again: he so takes on yonder with my husband; so rails against all married mankind; 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. I am undone !-the knight is here.

Mrs. Page. Why, then thou art 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? Fal. [Without, at R. D.] No, I'll come no more i'the basket: May I not go out, ere he come?

Mrs. Page. (L. C.) Alas, three of Master Ford's brothers watch the door with pistols, that none should issue out; otherwise you might slip away ere he came

Enter FALSTAFF, R.D.

But what make you here?

Fal. (c.) What shall I do? I'll creep up into the chimney.

Mrs. Ford. (R. C.) There they always use to discharge their birding-pieces: creep into the kiln-hole.

Fal. 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.

Fal. I'll go out then.

Mrs. Ford. If you go out in your own semblance, you die, Sir John. Unless you go out disguis'd—Mrs. Page, 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 a hat, a muffler, and a kerchief, and so escape. Fal. Good hearts, devise something; any extremity rather than a mischief.

Mrs. Ford. My maid's aunt, the fat woman of Brentford, has a gown above.

Mrs. Page. On my word it will serve him: she's as big as he is and there's her thrum hat, and her muffler too: Run up, Sir John.

:

Mrs. Ford. Go, go, sweet Sir John: Mistress Page and I will look some linen for your head.

Mrs. Page. Quick, quick; we'll come dress you straight; put on the gown the while.

Fal. Oh! if all this should come to the ears of the court, they would melt my fat drop by drop, and liquor fishermen's boots with me. Follow-quick.

:

[Exit, R. D.

Mrs. Ford. I would my husband would meet him in this shape he cannot abide the old woman of Brentford; he swears she's a witch; forbade her my house, and hath threaten'd to beat her. But is my husband coming?

Mrs. Page. Ay, in good sadness is he; and talks of the basket too, howsoever he hath had intelligence.

Mrs. Ford. We'll try that; for I'll appoint my men to carry the basket again, to meet him at the door with it, as they did last time.

Mrs. Page. Nay, but he'll be here presently, let's go dress him like the witch of Brentford.

Mrs. Ford. I'll first direct my men what they shall do with the basket.

Mrs. Page. Hang him, dishonest varlet! we cannot misuse him enough.

Enter JOHN and ROBERT, R.

Mrs. Ford. Go, sirs, take this basket again on your shoulders; your master is hard at door: if he bid you set it down, obey him: quickly dispatch. Now then to see Falstaff dress'd.

Mrs. Page. Aye, well dress'd; both by ourselves and our husbands.

[Exeunt, R. [The Men take up the Basket, and are preparing to go off, L. S. E.

Enter CAIUS, Ford, Page, and EVANS, L.

Ford. Ay, but if it prove true, Master Page, have you any way then to unfool me again?-Set down the basket, villains :-Somebody call my wife.-[Exit MEN, R.] You, youth in a basket!-O, you panderly rascals! there's a knot, a gang, a pack, a conspiracy, against me: Now shall the devil be sham'd. -What! wife, I say! come, come forth: behold what honest clothes you send forth to bleaching.

Page. Why this passes! Master Ford, you are not to go loose any longer; you must be pinion'd.

Eva. Why this is lunaticks! This is mad as a mad dog!

Caius. Ma foi, Master Ford, dis is not vell; ma foi.

Enter Mrs. Ford, R.

Ford. So I say too, sir.-Why, wife, wife; come hither Mistress Ford; Mistress Ford, the honest woman, the modest wife, the virtuous creature, that hath the jealous fool to her husband!-I suspect without cause, mistress, do I?

Mrs. Ford. Heaven be my witness, you do, if you suspect me in any dishonesty.

Ford. Well said, brazen-face; hold it out.-Come forth, sirrah. [Pulls the Clothes out of the Basket.

Page. This passes!

Mrs. Ford. Are you not asham'd? Let the clothes alone.

Ford. I shall find you anon.

Eva. "Tis unreasonable! Will you take up your wife's clothes? Come away.

Ford. Master Page, as I am a man, there was one conveyed out of my house yesterday in this basket:Why may not he be there again? In my house I am sure he is, my intelligence is true: my jealousy is reasonable. Pluck me out all the linen.

Mrs. Ford. If you find a man there he shall die a flea's death.

Ford. Well, he's not here I seek for.

Page. No, nor no where else but in your brain.

Ford. Help to search my house this one time; if I find not what I seek, show no colour for my extremity, let me for ever be your table sport; let them say of me, "As jealous as Ford, that search'd a hollow walnut for his wife's leman." Satisfy me once more, once more search with me.

Mrs. Ford. What hoa, Mistress Page! come you, and the old woman, down; my husband will come into the chamber.

Ford. Old woman! what old woman's that?

Mrs. Ford. Why, it is my maid's aunt, of Brentford. Ford. A witch, a quean, an old cozening quean !— Have I not forbid her my house? She comes of errands, does she? We are simple men; we do not know what's brought to pass under the profession of fortune-telling. -Come down, you witch; you hag, you; come down, I

say.

Mrs. Ford. Nay, good sweet husband:-good gentlemen, let him not strike the old woman.

Enter FALSTAFF, R.D. in Woman's Clothes, led by Mrs. PAGE, L.

Mrs. Page. Come, Mother Prat, come, give me your hand.

Ford. I'll prat her:-Out of my door, you witch! [Beats him across to L.] you hag, you baggage, you polecat, you ronyon! out! out! I'll conjure you, I'll fortune-tell you. [Exit FAL. L.

Mrs. Page. Are you not asham'd? I think you have kill'd the poor woman.

Mrs. Ford. Nay, he will do it: "Tis a goodly credit for you.

Ford. Hang her, witch!

Eva. By yea and no, I think the 'oman is a witch indeed: I like not when a 'omans has a great peard; spy a great peard under her muffler.

Ford. Will you follow, gentlemen? I beseech you follow; see but the issue of my jealousy; if I cry out thus upon no trail, never trust me when I open again. [Exit, R. Page. Let's obey his humour a little further, Come, gentlemen.

[Exeunt all but Mrs. FORD and Mrs. PAGE, R. Mrs. Page. Trust me, he beat him most pitifully. Mrs. Ford. Nay, most unpitifully, methought.

Mrs. Page. I'll have the cudgel hallow'd and hung o'er the altar.

Mrs. Ford. What think you? may we, with the warrant of womanhood, and the witness of a good conscience, pursue him with any further revenge?

Mrs. Page. The spirit of wantonness is sure scared out of him.

Mrs. Ford. Shall we tell our husbands how we have serv'd him?

Mrs. Page. Yea, by all means; if it be but to scrape the figures out of your husband's brains. If they can find in their hearts, the poor, unvirtuous, fat knight shall be any further afflicted, we two will still be the ministers.

Mrs. Ford. I'll warrant-what trick, what prank, shall we play next?

Mrs. Page. Listen: I have another crotchet. You've heard of Herne, the hunter's tree-your husband has― farewell-more anon. [Exit, L.

Mrs. F. My husband has! what does she mean? am I jealous in my turn? I might be if his love of hunting would make me so.

SONNET.-Mrs. FORD.

Even as the sun with purple-coloured face,
Had ta'en his last leave of the weeping morn,
Rose cheek'd Adonis hied him to the chace,
Hunting he lov'd, but love he laugh'd to scorn,
Whilst Venus' anthem still concludes in woe,
And still the choir of echoes answer so.

[Exit, L.

SCENE III.-Ford's House, and View of Windsor Castle in distance.

Enter FORD, MRS. FORD, PAGE, MRS. PAGE, ANNE PAGE, EVANS, and CAIUS, from the steps of FORD'S House.

Eva. "Tis one of the best discretions of a 'omans as ever I did look upon.

Page. And did he send you both these letters at an instant?

Mrs. Page. Within a quarter of an hour.

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