Slen. I may quarter, coz?

Shal. You may, by marrying.

Evans. It is marring indeed, if he quarter it.

Shal. Not a whit.

Evans. Yes, py'r Lady; if he has a quarter of your coat, there is but three skirts for yourself, in my simple conjectures: but that is all one. If Sir John Falstaff have committed disparagements unto you, I am of the Church, and will be glad to do my benevolence to make atonements and compremises between you.

Shal. The Council shall hear it; it is a riot.

Evans. It is not meet the Council hear a riot; there is no fear of Got in a riot: the Council, look you, shall desire to hear the fear of Got, and not to hear a riot; take your vizaments in that.

Shal. Ha! o' my life, if I were young again, the sword should end it.

Evans. It is petter that friends is the sword, and end it : and there is also another device in my prain, which peradventure prings goot discretions with it: there is Anne Page, which is daughter to Master George Page, which is pretty virginity.

Slen. Mistress Anne Page! She has brown hair, and speaks small 10 like a woman.

taking luce for louse, the "familiar beast to man." Then Shallow mistakes Sir Hugh's "familiar beast" for the fresh fish, and proceeds to correct him by saying, "The luce or louse that you speak of is the fresh fish, and so does not become an old coat well, such as mine is; for the salt fish is an old coat." 8 To quarter is, in heraldic language, to have armorial bearings as an appendage to hereditary arms; as a man, by marrying, may add his wife's titles, if she have any, to his own. Sir Hugh, who must still be talking, mistakes the quartering of Heraldry for the cutting of a thing into four parts. 9 The Star-Chamber, as mentioned in note 2.

10 To speak small is much the same as old Lear means, when he says over his dead Cordelia, "Her voice was ever soft, gentle, and low,—an excellent thing in woman."

Evans. It is that fery person for all the 'orld, as just as you will desire; and seven hundred pounds of moneys, and gold, and silver, is her grandsire upon his death's-bed (Got deliver to a joyful resurrections!) give, when she is able to overtake seventeen years old: it were a goot motion if we leave our pribbles and prabbles, and desire a marriage between Master Abraham and Mistress Anne Page.

Shal. Did her grandsire leave her seven hundred pound? Evans. Ay, and her father is make her a petter penny. Shal. I know the young gentlewoman; she has good gifts.

Evans. Seven hundred pounds and possibilities is goot gifts.

Shal. Well, let us see honest Master Page. Is Falstaff there?

Evans. Shall I tell you a lie? I do despise a liar as I do despise one that is false, or as I despise one that is not true. The knight, Sir John, is there; and, I beseech you, be ruled by your well-willers. I will peat the door for Master Page.— [Knocks.] What, ho! Got pless your house here!

Page. [Appearing above.] Who's there?

Evans. Here is Got's plessing, and your friend, and Justice Shallow; and here young Master Slender, that peradventures shall tell you another tale, if matters grow to your likings.

Enter PAGE.

Page. I am glad to see your Worships well. I thank you for my venison, Master Shallow.

Shal. Master Page, I am glad to see you: much good do it your good heart! I wish'd your venison better; it was ill kill'd. How doth good Mistress Page?-and I thank you always with my heart, la; with my heart.

Fage. Sir, I thank you.

Shal. Sir, I thank you; by yea and no, I do.

Page. I am glad to see you, good Master Slender. Slen. How does your fallow greyhound, sir? I heard say he was outrun on Cotsol'.11

Page. It could not be judged, sir.

Slen. You'll not confess, you'll not confess.

Shal. That he will not.

'tis a good dog.

Page. A cur, sir.

'Tis your fault, 12 'tis your fault :

Shal. Sir, he's a good dog, and a fair dog: can there be more said? he is good and fair. Is Sir John Falstaff here?

Page. Sir, he is within; and I would I could do a good office between you.

Evans. It is spoke as a Christians ought to speak.

Shal. He hath wrong'd me, Master Page.

Page. Sir, he doth in some sort confess it.

Shal. If it be confessed, it is not redressed: is not that so, Master Page? He hath wrong'd me; indeed he hath; at a word, he hath; believe me; Robert Shallow, esquire, saith he is wrong'd.

Page. Here comes Sir John.

Enter Sir JOHN FALSTAFF, BARDOLPH, NYM, and PISTOL.

Fal. Now, Master Shallow! you'll complain of me to the King?

Shal. Knight, you have beaten my men, kill'd my deer, and broke open my lodge.

Fal. But not kiss'd your keeper's daughter?

11 The Cotswold hills in Gloucestershire were once famous for rural sports. Shallow in 2 Henry IV. speaks of "Will Squele, a Cotsol' man," as if it were something of a distinction to be born there.

12 Fault was sometimes used for misfortune.-Shallow here very politely tries to arrest the unpleasant course of speech Slender persists in taking.

Shal. Tut, a pin! this shall be answer'd.

Fal. I will answer it straight; I have done all this. That is now answer'd.

Shal. The Council shall know this.

Fal. 'Twere better for you if it were known in counsel: 13 you'll be laugh'd at.

Evans. Pauca verba, Sir John, goot worts.

Fal. Good worts !14 good cabbage. Slender, I broke your head what matter have you against me?

Slen. Marry, sir, I have matter in my head against you : and against your cony-catching 15 rascals, Bardolph, Nym, and Pistol; they carried me to the tavern and made me drunk, and afterward pick'd my pocket.

Bard. You Banbury cheese ! 16

Slen. Ay, it is no matter.

Pist. How now, Mephostophilus ! 17

Slen. Ay, it is no matter.

Nym. Slice, I say! pauca, pauca; 18 slice! that's my humour.

Slen. Where's Simple, my man? can you tell, cousin? Evans. Peace, I pray you. Now let us understand.

18 In counsel here means, apparently, in secret; Falstaff playing upon the word. The Poet uses counsel for secret repeatedly.

14 Worts, a general name for all kinds of pot-herbs, was sometimes used, as here, in a narrower sense, for coleworts or cabbages.

15 Cony-catcher was a common name for cheats and sharpers in the Poet's time. See vol. ii., page 203, note 8.

16 Said in allusion to Slender's thinness. So in Jack Drum's Entertainment, 1601: "Put off your clothes, and you are like a Banbury cheese, nothing but paring."

17 Mephistophilus was the name of a familiar spirit in the old story of Dr. Faustus.

18 Nym's pauca means the same as Sir Hugh's pauca verba, used a little before,― few words.- Slice! appears to be Nym's word for fight! as using swords is apt to do slicing work. Schmidt, however, in his Shakespeare Lexicon, takes it in a more literal sense, and as referring to Slender's thinness; like Bardolph's "Banbury cheese."

There is three umpires in this matter, as I understand; that is, Master Page, fidelicet Master Page; and there is myself, fidelicet myself; and the three party is, lastly and finally, mine Host of the Garter.

Page. We three, to hear it and end it between them.

Evans. Fery goot: I will make a prief of it in my notebook; and we will afterwards 'ork upon the cause with as great discreetly as we can.

Fal. Pistol,

Pist. He hears with ears.

Evans. The Tevil and his tam! what phrase is this, He hears with ear? why, it is affectations.

Fal. Pistol, did you pick Master Slender's purse?

Slen. Ay, by these gloves, did he, or I would I might never come in mine own great chamber again else, of seven groats in mill-sixpences, and two Edward shovel-boards, 19 that cost me two shilling and two pence a-piece of Yead Miller, by these gloves.

Fal. Is this true, Pistol?

Evans. No; it is false, if it is a pick-purse.

Pist. Ha, thou mountain-foreigner!-Sir John and mas

ter mine,

I combat challenge of this latten bilbo.20

Word of denial in thy labras here;

Word of denial: froth and scum, thou liest !

19 Milled, or stamped, sixpences were used as counters; said to have been first coined in 1561.- Edward shovel-boards were the broad shillings of Edward IV., used for playing the game of shuffle-board: the shilling being placed on the edge of the table, and driven at the mark by a stroke of the hand.

20 Another fling at Slender's slenderness. Bilbo is from Bilboa, in Spain, famous for the manufacture of swords.-Latten was a mixed metal resembling tin.- The two words together mean a sword without edge and temper. - Labras, in the next line, is Spanish for lips. The phrase is a Pistolism for "the lie in thy teeth."