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[Footnote I.4: _----wrest_,] i.e., distort.]
[Footnote I.5: _----or bow your reading_,] i.e., bend your interpretation.]
[Footnote I.6: _Or nicely charge your understanding soul_] Take heed, lest by nice and subtle sophistry you burthen your knowing soul, or _knowingly burthen your soul_, with the guilt of advancing a false t.i.tle, or of maintaining, by specious fallacies, a claim which, if shown in its native and true colours, would appear to be false. --JOHNSON.]
[Footnote I.7: _----miscreate_,] Ill-begotten, illegitimate, spurious.]
[Footnote I.8: _----in approbation_] i.e., in proving and supporting that t.i.tle which shall be now set up.]
[Footnote I.9: _----imp.a.w.n our person_,] To engage and to p.a.w.n were in our author's time synonymous.]
[Footnote I.10: _----gloze_] Expound, explain.]
[Footnote I.11: _----+imbare+ their crooked t.i.tles_] i.e., to lay open, to display to view.]
[Footnote I.12: In allusion to the battle of Crecy, fought 25th August, 1346.]
[Footnote I.13: _So hath your highness;_] i.e., your highness hath indeed what they think and know you have.]
[Footnote I.14: _They of those +marches+,_] The _marches_ are the borders, the confines. Hence the _Lords Marchers_, i.e., the lords presidents of the _marches_, &c.]
[Footnote I.15: _----in few._] i.e., in short, brief.]
[Footnote I.16: _----a nimble +galliard+ won;_] A _galliard_ was an ancient dance. The word is now obsolete.]
SCENE II.--EASTCHEAP, LONDON.
_Enter BARDOLPH,(I) NYM, PISTOL, MRS. QUICKLY, and BOY, L.2 E._
_Quick._ (L.C.) Pr'ythee, honey-sweet husband, let me bring thee to Staines.[17]
_Pist._ (C.) No; for my manly heart doth yearn.-- Bardolph, be blithe;--Nym, rouse thy vaunting veins; Boy, bristle thy courage up; for Falstaff he is dead, And we must yearn therefore.
_Bard._ (R.) 'Would I were with him, wheresome'er he is!
_Quick._ (C.) Sure, he's in Arthur's bosom,[18] if ever man went to Arthur's bosom. 'A made a finer end,[19] and went away, an it had been any christom child;[20] 'a parted even just between twelve and one, e'en at turning o' the tide:[21] for after I saw him fumble with the sheets,[22] and play with flowers, and smile upon his fingers' ends, I knew there was but one way; for his nose was as sharp as a pen, and a'
babbled of green fields. How now, Sir John! quoth I: what, man! be of good cheer. So a' cried out--Heaven, Heaven, Heaven! three or four times. Now I, to comfort him, bid him 'a should not think of Heaven; I hoped, there was no need to trouble himself with any such thoughts yet. So 'a bade me lay more clothes on his feet: I put my hand into the bed and felt them, and they were as cold as any stone.
_Nym._ (R.C.) They say he cried out of sack.
_Quick._ Ay, that 'a did.
_Bard._ And of women.
_Quick._ Nay, that 'a did not.
_Boy._ (L.) Yes, that 'a did, and said they were devils incarnate.
_Quick._ (_crosses L.C._) 'A could never abide carnation;[23] 'twas a colour he never liked.
_Boy._ Do you not remember, 'a saw a flea stick upon Bardolph's nose, and 'a said it was a black soul burning in h.e.l.l-fire?
_Bard._ Well, the fuel is gone that maintained that fire: that's all the riches I got in his service.
_Nym._ Shall we shog off?[24] the king will be gone from Southampton.
_Pist._ Come, let's away.--My love, give me thy lips.
Look to my chattels and my moveables: Let senses rule;[25] the word is, _Pitch and pay_;[26]
Trust none; For oaths are straws, men's faiths are wafer-cakes, And hold-fast is the only dog,[27] my duck: Therefore, _caveto_ be thy counsellor.[28]
Go, clear thy crystals.[29]--Yoke-fellows in arms,
[_Crosses L.H._
Let us to France; like horse-leeches, my boys, To suck, to suck, the very blood to suck!
[_Crosses R.H._
_Boy._ And that is but unwholesome food, they say.
_Pitt._ Touch her soft mouth, and march.
_Bard._ Farewell, hostess.
[_Kissing her._
_Nym._ I cannot kiss, that is the humour of it; but adieu.
_Pist._ Let housewifery appear: keep close, I thee command.
_Quick._ Farewell; adieu.
[_Exeunt BARDOLPH, PISTOL, NYM, R.H., and DAME QUICKLY, L.H._
_Boy._ As young as I am, I have observed these three swashers. I am boy to them all three: but all they three, though they would serve me, could not be a man to me; for, indeed, three such anticks do not amount to a man. For Bardolph,--he is white-livered and red-faced; by the means whereof 'a faces it out, but fights not. For Pistol,--he hath a killing tongue and a quiet sword; by the means whereof 'a breaks words, and keeps whole weapons. For Nym,--he hath heard that men of few words are the best men; and therefore he scorns to say his prayers, lest 'a should be thought a coward: but his few bad words are match'd with as few good deeds; for 'a never broke any man's head but his own, and that was against a post when he was drunk. They will steal any thing, and call it--purchase. They would have me as familiar with men's pockets as their gloves or their handkerchiefs: which makes much against my manhood, if I should take from another's pocket to put into mine; for it is plain pocketing up of wrongs. I must leave them, and seek some better service: their villainy goes against my weak stomach, and therefore I must cast it up.
[_Distant March heard. Exit BOY, R.H._
END OF FIRST ACT.
[Footnote I.17: _----let me bring thee to Staines._] i.e., let me attend, or accompany thee.]
[Footnote I.18: _----Arthur's bosom,_] Dame Quickly, in her usual blundering way, mistakes Arthur for Abraham.]
[Footnote I.19: _'A made a finer end,_] To make a fine end is not an uncommon expression for making a good end. The Hostess means that Falstaff died with becoming resignation and patient submission to the will of Heaven.]
