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youth further, I will not: the truth is, I am only old in judgment and understanding; and he that will caper with me for a thousand marks, let him lend me the money, and have at him.-For the box o' the ear that the prince gave you,-he gave it like a rude prince, and you took it like a sensible lord. I have checked him for it, and the young lion repents; marry, not in ashes and sackcloth, but in new silk, and old sack.

Ch. Just. Well, Heaven send the prince a better companion!

Fal. Heaven send the companion a better prince! I cannot rid my hands of him.

Ch. Just. Well, the king hath severed you and Prince Harry: I hear, you are going with Lord John of Lancaster, against the Archbishop, and the Earl of Northumberland.

Fal. Yea;-I thank your pretty sweet wit for it ;but look you pray, all you that kiss my lady peace at home, that our armies join not in a hot day; for, by the lord, I take but two shirts out with me, and I mean not to sweat extraordinarily if it be a hot day, an I brandish any thing but a bottle, I would I might never spit white again. There is not a dan

gerous action can peep out his head, but I am thrust upon it: Well, I cannot last ever: But it was always yet the trick of our English nation, if they have a good thing, to make it too common. If you will needs say, I am an old man, you should give me rest. I would to Heaven, my name were not so terrible to the enemy as it is. I were better to be eaten to death with a rust, than to be scoured to death with perpetual motion.

Ch. Just. Well, be honest, be honest; and Heaven bless your expedition

Fal. Will your lordship lend me a thousand pound,

to furnish me forth?

Ch. Just. Not a penny, not a penny; you are too

impatient to hear crosses. Fare you me to my cousin Westmoreland.

well Commend

[Exeunt the CHIEF JUSTICE and APPARITORS. Fal. If I do, fillip me with a three-man beetle.—A man can no more separate age and covetousness, than he can part young limbs and lechery.-Boy!Page. Sir?

Fal. What money is in my purse?

Page. Seven groats and two pence.

Fal. I can get no remedy against this consumption of the purse: borrowing only lingers and lingers it out, but the disease is incurable.-Go, bear this letter to my Lord of Lancaster; this to the Prince; this to the Earl of Westmoreland; and this to old Mistress Ursula,--whom I have weekly sworn to marry, since J perceived the first white hair on my chin :-About it; you know where to find me. [Exit PAGE.] A plague of this gout! it plays the rogue with my great toe. It is no matter, if I do halt; I have the wars for my colour, and my pension shall seem the more reasonable: A good wit will make use of any thing; I will turn diseases to commodity. [Exit.

SCENE II.

The ARCHBISHOP OF YORK's Palace, in Yorkshire.

The ARCHBISHOP OF YORK, LORD HASTINGS, TнOMAS MOWBRAY (Earl Marshal), and two other GENTLEMEN discovered, seated.

They rise.

Archb. Thus have

you

heard our cause, and known

our means;

And, my most noble friends, I pray you all,
Speak plainly your opinions of our hopes.

Hast. Our present musters grow upon the file
To five and twenty thousand men of choice;
And our supplies live largely in the hope
Of great Northumberland, whose bosom burns
With an incensed fire of injuries.

Mow. The question then, Lord Hastings, standeth thus ;

Whether our present five and twenty thousand
May hold up head without Northumberland.
Hast. With him, we may.

Mow. Ay, marry, there's the point :-
But if, without him, we be thought too feeble?—
My judgment is, we should not step too far,
Till we had his assistance by the hand;
For, in a theme so bloody-fac'd as this,
Conjecture, expectation, and surmise,
Of aids uncertain, should not be admitted.

Archb. "Tis very true, Lord Marshal; for, indeed,

It was young Hotspur's case at Shrewsbury.

Mow. It was, my lord; who lin'd himself with hope,

Eating the air on promise of supply,

Flattering himself in project of a power,

Much smaller than the smallest of his thoughts;

And so, with great imagination,

Proper to madmen, led his powers to death,
And, winking, leap'd into destruction.

Hast. But, by your leave, it never yet did hurt,
To lay down likelihoods, and forms of hope.
Mow. Yes, in this present quality of war,
Indeed of instant action: A cause on foot
Lives so in hope, as in an early spring

We see the appearing buds; which, to prove fruit,
Hope gives not so much warrant, as despair,
That frosts will bite them.

C

Hast. I think, we are a body strong enough, Even as we are, to equal with the king.

Archb. What is the king but five and twenty thousand?

Hast. To us, no more; nay, not so much, my lord;

For his divisions, as the times do brawl,

Are in three heads: one power against the French, And one against Glendower; perforce, a third Must take up us.

Archb. Who, is it like, should lead his forces hither?

Hast. Prince John of Lancaster, and Westmoreland:

Against the Welsh, himself, and Harry Mon

mouth :

But who is substituted 'gainst the French,
I have no certain notice.

Archb. Let us on;

And publish the occasion of our arms.

The commonwealth is sick of their own choice,
Their over-greedy love hath surfeited:

A habitation giddy and unsure

Hath he, that buildeth on the vulgar heart.
O, thou fond many, with what loud applause
Didst thou beat Heaven with blessing Bolingbroke,
Before he was what thou wouldst have him be,-
And, being now trimm'd in thine own desires,
Thou, beastly feeder, art so full of him,

That thou provok'st thyself to cast him up!
What trust is in these times?

They that, when Richard liv'd, would have him die,

Are now become enamour'd on his grave:

Thou, that threw'st dust upon his goodly head, When, through proud London, he came sighing on, After the admired heels of Bolingbroke,

Cry'st now, "O earth, give us that king again,
And take thou this!"O thoughts of men accurs'd!
Past, and to come, seem best; things present, worst.

SCENE 1II.

A Street in London.

Enter HOSTESS, FANG, and SNARE.

Host. Master Fang, have you entered the action? Fang. It is entered.-Snare, we must arrest Sir John Falstaff.

Snare. It may chance cost some of us our lives, for he will stab.

Fang. An I but fist him once;-an a' come but within my vice ;

Host. I am undone by his going? I warrant you, he's an infinite thing upon my score:-Good Master Fang, hold him sure:good Master Snare, let him not 'scape. He comes continually to Pye Corner, (saving your manhoods), to buy a saddle; and he's indited to dinner, to the Lubbar's Head, in Lumbart Street, to Master Smooth's, the silkman: I pray ye, since my exion is entered, and my case so openly known to the world, let him be brought in to his answer. A hundred mark is a long loan for a poor lone woman to bear; and I have borne, and borne, and borne; and have been fubbed off, and fubbed off, from this day to that day, that it is a shame to be thought on. There is no honesty in such dealing; unless a woman should be made an ass, and a beast, to bear every knave's wrong.-Yonder he comes; and that arrant malmsey-nose knave, Bardolph, with him.

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