The Illustrated Works of Shakespeare/Illustrated Works of Shakespeare, The (1990)(Animated Pixels)[!][CDTV-PC].iso/shakes/text/09/04_03

Text File | 1991-04-10 | 7KB | 170 lines

Another Part of the Forest.
 Alarum. Excursions.
 Enter FALSTAFF and COLEVILLE, meeting.

Falstaff    What's your name, sir? Of what condition are you, and of
    what place?

Coleville    I am a knight, sir, and my name is Coleville of the Dale.

Falstaff    Well then, Coleville is your name, a knight is your
    degree, and your place the Dale. Coleville shall be still
    your name, a traitor your degree, and the dungeon your
    place - a place deep enough; so shall you be still
    Coleville of the Dale.

Coleville    Are not you Sir John Falstaff?

Falstaff    As good a man as he, sir, whoe'er I am. Do ye yield, sir,
    or shall I sweat for you? If I do sweat, they are the
    drops of thy lovers, and they weep for thy death;
    therefore rouse up fear and trembling, and do observance
    to my mercy.

Coleville    I think you are Sir John Falstaff, and in that thought
    yield me.
                                                    [Kneels.

Falstaff    I have a whole school of tongues in this belly of mine,
    and not a tongue of them all speaks any other word but my
    name. And I had but a belly of any indifferency, I were
    simply the most active fellow in Europe - my womb, my
    womb, my womb undoes me. Here comes our general.

                             Retreat sounded.
     Enter Prince John of LANCASTER, WESTMORELAND, BLUNT, and OTHERS.

Lancaster    The heat is past; follow no further now.
    Call in the powers, good cousin Westmoreland.
                                                    [Exit WESTMORELAND.

    Now, Falstaff, where have you been all this while?
    When everything is ended, then you come.
    These tardy tricks of yours will, on my life,
    One time or other break some gallows' back.

Falstaff    I would be sorry, my lord, but it should be thus. I never
    knew yet but rebuke and check was the reward of valour. Do
    you think me a swallow, an arrow, or a bullet? Have I in
    my poor and old motion the expedition of thought? I have
    speeded hither with the very extremest inch of
    possibility; I have foundered ninescore and odd posts; and
    here, travel-tainted as I am, have in my pure and
    immaculate valour taken Sir John Coleville of the Dale, a
    most furious knight and valorous enemy. But what of that?
    He saw me, and yielded, that I may justly say, with the
    hook-nosed fellow of Rome, "I came, saw, and overcame".

Lancaster    It was more of his courtesy than your deserving.

Falstaff    I know not. Here he is, and here I yield him; and I
    beseech your grace, let it be booked with the rest of this
    day's deeds; or, by the Lord, I will have it in a
    particular ballad else, with mine own picture on the top
    on't, Coleville kissing my foot; to the which course if I
    be enforced, if you do not all show like gilt twopences to
    me, and I in the clear sky of fame o'ershine you as much
    as the full moon doth the cinders of the element, which
    show like pins' heads to her, believe not the word of the
    noble. Therefore let me have right, and let desert mount.

Lancaster    Thine's too heavy to mount.

Falstaff    Let it shine, then.

Lancaster    Thine's too thick to shine.

Falstaff    Let it do something, my good lord, that may do me good,
    and call it what you will.

Lancaster    Is thy name Coleville?

Coleville                                It is, my lord.

Lancaster    A famous rebel art thou, Coleville.

Falstaff    And a famous true subject took him.

Coleville    I am, my lord, but as my betters are
    That led me hither. Had they been ruled by me,
    You should have won them dearer than you have.

Falstaff    I know not how they sold themselves; but thou, like a kind
    fellow, gav'st thyself away gratis, and I thank thee for
    thee.

                          Re-enter WESTMORELAND.

Lancaster    Now, have you left pursuit?

Westmoreland    Retreat is made and execution stayed.

Lancaster    Send Coleville with his confederates
    To York, to present execution.
    Blunt, lead him hence, and see you guard him sure.
                                            [Exit BLUNT with COLEVILLE.

    And now dispatch we toward the court, my lords:
    I hear the king my father is sore sick.
    Our news shall go before us to his majesty,
    Which, cousin, you shall bear to comfort him,
    And we with sober speed will follow you.

Falstaff    My lord, I beseech you give me leave to go
    Through Gloucestershire; and when you come to court,
    Stand my good lord, pray, in your good report.

Lancaster    Fare you well, Falstaff. I, in my condition,
    Shall better speak of you than you deserve.
                                                    [Exeunt all but FALSTAFF.

Falstaff    I would you had the wit: 'twere better than your dukedom.
    Good faith, this same young sober-blooded boy doth not
    love me, nor a man cannot make him laugh; but that's no
    marvel, he drinks no wine. There's never none of these
    demure boys come to any proof; for thin drink doth so
    over-cool their blood, and making many fish meals, that
    they fall into a kind of male green-sickness; and then,
    when they marry, they get wenches. They are generally
    fools and cowards, which some of us should be too but for
    inflammation. A good sherris-sack hath a twofold operation
    in it. It ascends me into the brain, dries me there all
    the foolish and dull and crudy vapours which environ it,
    makes it apprehensive, quick, forgetive, full of nimble,
    fiery, and delectable shapes, which, delivered o'er to the
    voice, the tongue, which is the birth, becomes excellent
    wit. The second property of your excellent sherris is the
    warming of the blood, which before, cold and settled, left
    the liver white and pale, which is the badge of
    pusillanimity and cowardice; but the sherris warms it, and
    makes it course from the inwards to the parts' extremes.
    It illumineth the face, which, as a beacon, gives warning
    to all the rest of this little kingdom, man, to arm; and
    then the vital commoners and inland petty spirits muster
    me all to their captain, the heart, who, great and puffed
    up with this retinue, doth any deed of courage: and this
    valour comes of sherris. So that skill in the weapon is
    nothing without sack, for that sets it a-work; and
    learning a mere hoard of gold kept by a devil, till sack
    commences it and sets it in act and use. Hereof comes it
    that Prince Harry is valiant; for the cold blood he did
    naturally inherit of his father he hath, like lean,
    sterile, and bare land, manured, husbanded, and tilled,
    with excellent endeavour of drinking good and good store
    of fertile sherris, that he is become very hot and
    valiant. If I had a thousand sons, the first human
    principle I would teach them should be to forswear thin
    potations, and to addict themselves to sack.

                             Enter BARDOLPH.

    How now, Bardolph?

Bardolph    The army is dischargd all and gone.

Falstaff    Let them go. I'll through Gloucestershire, and there will
    I visit Master Robert Shallow, Esquire. I have him already
    tempering between my finger and my thumb, and shortly will
    I seal with him. Come away.
                                                    [Exeunt.