Merry Wives of Windsor by William Shakespeare
Act 3 - Scene 3
A room in FORD’S house.
Mistress Ford : What, John! What, Robert!
Mistress Page : Quickly, quickly! is the buck-basket--
Mistress Ford : I warrant. What, Robin, I say!
Mistress Page : Come, come, come.
Mistress Ford : Here, set it down.
Mistress Page : Give your men the charge; we must be brief.
Mistress Ford : Marry, as I told you before, John and Robert, be
[p]ready here hard by
in the brew-house: and when I
[p]suddenly call you, come forth, and
without any pause
[p]or staggering take this basket on your
shoulders:
[p]that done, trudge with it in all haste, and carry
[p]it
among the whitsters in Datchet-mead, and there
[p]empty it in the
muddy ditch close by the Thames side.
Mistress Page : You will do it?
Mistress Ford : I ha' told them over and over; they lack no
[p]direction. Be gone, and
come when you are called.
Mistress Page : Here comes little Robin.
Mistress Ford : How now, my eyas-musket! what news with you?
Robin : My master, Sir John, is come in at your back-door,
[p]Mistress Ford,
and requests your company.
Mistress Page : You little Jack-a-Lent, have you been true to us?
Robin : Ay, I'll be sworn. My master knows not of your
[p]being here and hath
threatened to put me into
[p]everlasting liberty if I tell you of it;
for he
[p]swears he'll turn me away.
Mistress Page : Thou'rt a good boy: this secrecy of thine shall be
[p]a tailor to thee
and shall make thee a new doublet
[p]and hose. I'll go hide me.
Mistress Ford : Do so. Go tell thy master I am alone.
[p][Exit ROBIN]
[p]Mistress
Page, remember you your cue.
Mistress Page : I warrant thee; if I do not act it, hiss me.
Mistress Ford : Go to, then: we'll use this unwholesome humidity,
[p]this gross watery
pumpion; we'll teach him to know
[p]turtles from jays.
Mistress Ford : O sweet Sir John!
Mistress Ford : I your lady, Sir John! alas, I should be a pitiful lady!
Mistress Ford : A plain kerchief, Sir John: my brows become nothing
[p]else; nor that
well neither.
Mistress Ford : Believe me, there is no such thing in me.
Mistress Ford : Do not betray me, sir. I fear you love Mistress Page.
Mistress Ford : Well, heaven knows how I love you; and you shall one
[p]day find it.
Mistress Ford : Nay, I must tell you, so you do; or else I could not
[p]be in that
mind.
Robin : [Within] Mistress Ford, Mistress Ford! here's
[p]Mistress Page at the
door, sweating and blowing and
[p]looking wildly, and would needs
speak with you presently.
Mistress Ford : Pray you, do so: she's a very tattling woman.
[p][FALSTAFF hides
himself]
[p][Re-enter MISTRESS PAGE and ROBIN]
[p]What's the matter?
how now!
Mistress Page : O Mistress Ford, what have you done? You're shamed,
[p]you're
overthrown, you're undone for ever!
Mistress Ford : What's the matter, good Mistress Page?
Mistress Page : O well-a-day, Mistress Ford! having an honest man
[p]to your husband,
to give him such cause of suspicion!
Mistress Ford : What cause of suspicion?
Mistress Page : What cause of suspicion! Out pon you! how am I
[p]mistook in you!
Mistress Ford : Why, alas, what's the matter?
Mistress Page : Your husband's coming hither, woman, with all the
[p]officers in
Windsor, to search for a gentleman that
[p]he says is here now in the
house by your consent, to
[p]take an ill advantage of his assence: you
are undone.
Mistress Ford : 'Tis not so, I hope.
Mistress Page : Pray heaven it be not so, that you have such a man
[p]here! but 'tis
most certain your husband's coming,
[p]with half Windsor at his heels,
to search for such a
[p]one. I come before to tell you. If you
know
[p]yourself clear, why, I am glad of it; but if you
[p]have a
friend here convey, convey him out. Be not
[p]amazed; call all your
senses to you; defend your
[p]reputation, or bid farewell to your good
life for ever.
Mistress Ford : What shall I do? There is a gentleman my dear
[p]friend; and I fear
not mine own shame so much as his
[p]peril: I had rather than a
thousand pound he were
[p]out of the house.
Mistress Page : For shame! never stand 'you had rather' and 'you
[p]had rather:' your
husband's here at hand, bethink
[p]you of some conveyance: in the
house you cannot
[p]hide him. O, how have you deceived me! Look,
here
[p]is a basket: if he be of any reasonable stature, he
[p]may
creep in here; and throw foul linen upon him, as
[p]if it were going
to bucking: or--it is whiting-time
[p]--send him by your two men to
Datchet-mead.
Mistress Ford : He's too big to go in there. What shall I do?
Mistress Page : What, Sir John Falstaff! Are these your letters, knight?
Mistress Page : Help to cover your master, boy. Call your men,
[p]Mistress Ford. You
dissembling knight!
Mistress Ford : What, John! Robert! John!
[p][Exit ROBIN]
[p][Re-enter Servants]
[p]Go
take up these clothes here quickly. Where's the
[p]cowl-staff? look,
how you drumble! Carry them to
[p]the laundress in Datchet-meat;
quickly, come.
Ford : Pray you, come near: if I suspect without cause,
[p]why then make
sport at me; then let me be your jest;
[p]I deserve it. How now!
whither bear you this?
Servant : To the laundress, forsooth.
Mistress Ford : Why, what have you to do whither they bear it? You
[p]were best meddle
with buck-washing.
Ford : Buck! I would I could wash myself of the buck!
[p]Buck, buck, buck!
Ay, buck; I warrant you, buck;
[p]and of the season too, it shall
appear.
[p][Exeunt Servants with the basket]
[p]Gentlemen, I have
dreamed to-night; I'll tell you my
[p]dream. Here, here, here be my
keys: ascend my
[p]chambers; search, seek, find out: I'll
warrant
[p]we'll unkennel the fox. Let me stop this way
first.
[p][Locking the door]
[p]So, now uncape.
Page : Good Master Ford, be contented: you wrong yourself too much.
Ford : True, Master Page. Up, gentlemen: you shall see
[p]sport anon: follow
me, gentlemen.
Sir Hugh Evans : This is fery fantastical humours and jealousies.
Doctor Caius : By gar, 'tis no the fashion of France; it is not
[p]jealous in
France.
Page : Nay, follow him, gentlemen; see the issue of his search.
Mistress Page : Is there not a double excellency in this?
Mistress Ford : I know not which pleases me better, that my husband
[p]is deceived, or
Sir John.
Mistress Page : What a taking was he in when your husband asked who
[p]was in the
basket!
Mistress Ford : I am half afraid he will have need of washing; so
[p]throwing him into
the water will do him a benefit.
Mistress Page : Hang him, dishonest rascal! I would all of the same
[p]strain were in
the same distress.
Mistress Ford : I think my husband hath some special suspicion of
[p]Falstaff's being
here; for I never saw him so gross
[p]in his jealousy till now.
Mistress Page : I will lay a plot to try that; and we will yet have
[p]more tricks
with Falstaff: his dissolute disease will
[p]scarce obey this
medicine.
Mistress Ford : Shall we send that foolish carrion, Mistress
[p]Quickly, to him, and
excuse his throwing into the
[p]water; and give him another hope, to
betray him to
[p]another punishment?
Mistress Page : We will do it: let him be sent for to-morrow,
[p]eight o'clock, to
have amends.
Ford : I cannot find him: may be the knave bragged of that
[p]he could not
compass.
Mistress Page : [Aside to MISTRESS FORD] Heard you that?
Mistress Ford : You use me well, Master Ford, do you?
Ford : Ay, I do so.
Mistress Ford : Heaven make you better than your thoughts!
Ford : Amen!
Mistress Page : You do yourself mighty wrong, Master Ford.
Ford : Ay, ay; I must bear it.
Sir Hugh Evans : If there be any pody in the house, and in the
[p]chambers, and in the
coffers, and in the presses,
[p]heaven forgive my sins at the day of
judgment!
Doctor Caius : By gar, nor I too: there is no bodies.
Page : Fie, fie, Master Ford! are you not ashamed? What
[p]spirit, what devil
suggests this imagination? I
[p]would not ha' your distemper in this
kind for the
[p]wealth of Windsor Castle.
Ford : 'Tis my fault, Master Page: I suffer for it.
Sir Hugh Evans : You suffer for a pad conscience: your wife is as
[p]honest a 'omans as
I will desires among five
[p]thousand, and five hundred too.
Doctor Caius : By gar, I see 'tis an honest woman.
Ford : Well, I promised you a dinner. Come, come, walk in
[p]the Park: I pray
you, pardon me; I will hereafter
[p]make known to you why I have done
this. Come,
[p]wife; come, Mistress Page. I pray you, pardon
me;
[p]pray heartily, pardon me.
Page : Let's go in, gentlemen; but, trust me, we'll mock
[p]him. I do invite
you to-morrow morning to my house
[p]to breakfast: after, we'll
a-birding together; I
[p]have a fine hawk for the bush. Shall it be
so?
Ford : Any thing.
Sir Hugh Evans : If there is one, I shall make two in the company.
Doctor Caius : If dere be one or two, I shall make-a the turd.
Ford : Pray you, go, Master Page.
Sir Hugh Evans : I pray you now, remembrance tomorrow on the lousy
[p]knave, mine
host.
Doctor Caius : Dat is good; by gar, with all my heart!
Sir Hugh Evans : A lousy knave, to have his gibes and his mockeries!
Previous: Act 3 - Scene 2
Next: Act 3 - Scene 4
