MISTRESS FORD

Mistress Page, trust me, I was going to your house. Nay, I'll never beleeee that; I have to show to the contrary. Well: I do then: yet I say, I could show you to the contrary: Oh Mistress Page, give me some counsel. Why this is the very same: the very hand: the very words: what does he think of us? You are the happier woman. How now (sweet Frank ) why art thou me lancholy? Faith, thou hast some crochets in thy head, Now: will you go, Mistress Page ? Trust me, I thought on her: shee'll fit it. I warrant. What Robin I say. Well, heaven knows how I love you, And you shall one day find it. Shall we send that foolishion Carrion, Missed. Quickly to him, and excuse his throwing into the water, and give him another hope, to betray him to another punishment? You use me well, M. Ford ? Do you? He's a birding (sweet Sir John. ) Step into the chamber, Sir John. No certainly: Speak louder. Oh woman: if it were not for one trifling re specked, I could come to such honour. If I would but go to hell, for and eternal moment, or so: I could be knighted. We burn daylight: here, read, read: perceive how I might be knighted, I shall think the worse of fat men, as long as I have and eye to make diffe rence of men's liking: and yet he would not swear: praise women's modesty: and gave such orderly and wel-behaued reproof to all uncomeliness, that I would have sworn his disposition would have gone to the truth of his words: but they do no more adhere and keep place together, then the hundred Psalms to the tune of Green-sleeues: What tempest (I troa) threw this Whale, (with so many Tons of oil in his belly) a'shoare at Windsor? How shall I be revenged on him? I think the best way were, to entertain him with hope, till the wicked fire of lust have melted him in his own greace: Did you e ver hear the Like? Boarding, call you it? I'll be sure to keep him above deck. Nay, I will consent to act any villainy against him, that may not sully the chariness of our honesty: o that my husband saw this Letter: it would give eternal food to his jealousy. Do so: go tell thy Master, I am alone: Mi stris Page, remember you your Queen. What John, what Robert. Here, set it down. How now my Eyas-Musket, what news with you? Go-too then: we'll use this unwholesome humidity, this grosse-watry Pompion; we'll teach him to know Turtles from Jays. Oh sweet Sir John. I your Lady Sir John ? Alas, I should be a pitiful Lady. A plain Kerchief, Sir John : My brows become nothing else, nor that well neither. Believe me, ther's no such thing in me. Nay, I must tell you, so you do; Or else I could not be in that mind. I know not which pleases me better, That my husband is deceived, or Sir John. I am half afraid he will have need of washing: so throwing him into the water, will do him a benefit. I think my husband hath some special suspicion of Falstaffs being here: for I never saw him so gross in his jealousy till now. Why? Why, do's he talk of him? How near is he Mistress Page? I am undone, the Knight is here. Which way should he go? How should I bestow him? Shall I put him into the basket again? There they always use to discharge their Birding-pieces: creep into the Kill-hole. If you go out in your own semblance, you die Sir John, unless you go out disguised. How might we disguise him? My Maids Aunt the fat woman of Brain ford, has a gown above. Go, go, sweet Sir John: Mistriis Page and I will look some linen for your head. I would my husband would meet him in this shape: he cannot abide the old woman of Brain ford; he swears she's a witch, forbade her my house, and hath threatened to beat her. But is my husband coming? 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. I'll first direct direct my men, what they shall do with the basket: Go up, I'll bring linen for him straight. Go Sirs, take the basket again on your shoulders: your Master is hard at door: if he bid you set it down, obey him: quickly, dispatch. Heaven be my witness you do, if you suspect me in any dishonesty. Are you not ashamed, let the clothes alone. If you find a man there, he shall die a Fleas death. Nay, good sweet husband, good Gentle men, let him strike the old woman. Nay he will do it, it's a goodly credit for you. Nay by the Mass that he did not: he beat him most unpitifully, me thought. What think you? May we with the war rant of woman hood, and the witness of a good consci ence, pursue him with any further revenge? Shall we tell our husbands how we have served him? I'll warrant, they'll have him publicly shamed, and me thinks there would be no perjod to the jest, should he not be publicly shamed. Marry this is our devise, That Falstaff at that Oak shall meet with us. Where is Nan now? and her troop of Fai rises? and the Welch-deuill Herne? That cannot choose but amaze him. Wee'll betray him finely. The hour drawes-on: to the Oak, to the Oak. Marry as I told you before ( John & Robert ) be ready here hard-by in the Brewhouse, & when I so Daintily call you, come forth, and (without any pause, or staggering) take this basket on your shoulders: y to done, trudge with it in all hast, and carry it among the Whit sters in Dotchet Mead, and there empty it in the muddy ditch, close by the Thames side. I would told them over and over, they lack no direction Be gone, and come when you are called. Do not betray me sir, I fear you love M. Page. Pray you do so, she's a very tattling woman. Whats the matter? How now? What's the matter, good mistress Page? What cause of suspicion? Why (alas) what's the matter? It's not so, I hope. What shall I do? There is a Gentleman my deer friend: and I fear not mine own shame so much, as his peril. I had rather then a thousand pound he were out of the house. He's too big to go in there: what shall I do? What John, Robert, John ; Go, take up these clothes here, quickly: Where's the Cowlstaff? Look how you drumble? Carry them to the Laundress in That chet mead: quickly, come. Why, what have you to do whither they bear it? You were best meddle with buck-washing. Heaven make you better then your thoughts Why man, why? What hoa (Mistress Page, ) come you and the old woman down: my husband will come into the Chamber. Why it is my maids Aunt of Brainford. Devise but how you'll use him when ̄ he comes, And let us two devise to bring him thither. Sir John ? Art thou there (my Dear?) My male-Deere? Mistress Page is come with me (sweet heart.) Heaven forgive our sins. Sir John, we have had ill luck: we could never meet: I will never take you for my Love again, but I will always count you my Dear. He will seek there on my word: Neither Press, Coffer, Chest, Trunk, Well, Vault, but he hath and abstract for the remembrance of such places, and goes to them by his Note: There is no hiding you in the house. Why none but mine own people.