Act III, Scene 3

A room in FORD’S house.

[Enter MISTRESS FORD and MISTRESS PAGE]

• Mistress Ford. What, John! What, Robert!

• Mistress Page. Quickly, quickly! is the buck-basket— 1405

• Mistress Ford. I warrant. What, Robin, I say!

[Enter Servants with a basket]

• Mistress Page. Come, come, come.

• Mistress Ford. Here, set it down.

• Mistress Page. Give your men the charge; we must be brief. 1410

• Mistress Ford. Marry, as I told you before, John and Robert, be
  ready here hard by in the brew-house: and when I
  suddenly call you, come forth, and without any pause
  or staggering take this basket on your shoulders:
  that done, trudge with it in all haste, and carry 1415
  it among the whitsters in Datchet-mead, and there
  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
  direction. Be gone, and come when you are called. 1420

[Exeunt Servants]

• Mistress Page. Here comes little Robin.

[Enter ROBIN]

• Mistress Ford. How now, my eyas-musket! what news with you?

• Robin. My master, Sir John, is come in at your back-door, 1425
  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
  being here and hath threatened to put me into
  everlasting liberty if I tell you of it; for he 1430
  swears he'll turn me away.

• Mistress Page. Thou'rt a good boy: this secrecy of thine shall be
  a tailor to thee and shall make thee a new doublet
  and hose. I'll go hide me.

• Mistress Ford. Do so. Go tell thy master I am alone. 1435
  [Exit ROBIN]
  Mistress Page, remember you your cue.

• Mistress Page. I warrant thee; if I do not act it, hiss me.

[Exit]

• Mistress Ford. Go to, then: we'll use this unwholesome humidity, 1440
  this gross watery pumpion; we'll teach him to know
  turtles from jays.

[Enter FALSTAFF]

• Falstaff. Have I caught thee, my heavenly jewel? Why, now let
  me die, for I have lived long enough: this is the 1445
  period of my ambition: O this blessed hour!

• Mistress Ford. O sweet Sir John!

• Falstaff. Mistress Ford, I cannot cog, I cannot prate,
  Mistress Ford. Now shall I sin in my wish: I would
  thy husband were dead: I'll speak it before the 1450
  best lord; I would make thee my lady.

• Mistress Ford. I your lady, Sir John! alas, I should be a pitiful lady!

• Falstaff. Let the court of France show me such another. I see
  how thine eye would emulate the diamond: thou hast
  the right arched beauty of the brow that becomes the 1455
  ship-tire, the tire-valiant, or any tire of
  Venetian admittance.

• Mistress Ford. A plain kerchief, Sir John: my brows become nothing
  else; nor that well neither.

• Falstaff. By the Lord, thou art a traitor to say so: thou 1460
  wouldst make an absolute courtier; and the firm
  fixture of thy foot would give an excellent motion
  to thy gait in a semi-circled farthingale. I see
  what thou wert, if Fortune thy foe were not, Nature
  thy friend. Come, thou canst not hide it. 1465

• Mistress Ford. Believe me, there is no such thing in me.

• Falstaff. What made me love thee? let that persuade thee
  there's something extraordinary in thee. Come, I
  cannot cog and say thou art this and that, like a
  many of these lisping hawthorn-buds, that come like 1470
  women in men's apparel, and smell like Bucklersbury
  in simple time; I cannot: but I love thee; none
  but thee; and thou deservest it.

• Mistress Ford. Do not betray me, sir. I fear you love Mistress Page.

• Falstaff. Thou mightst as well say I love to walk by the 1475
  Counter-gate, which is as hateful to me as the reek
  of a lime-kiln.

• Mistress Ford. Well, heaven knows how I love you; and you shall one
  day find it.

• Falstaff. Keep in that mind; I'll deserve it. 1480

• Mistress Ford. Nay, I must tell you, so you do; or else I could not
  be in that mind.

• Robin. [Within] Mistress Ford, Mistress Ford! here's
  Mistress Page at the door, sweating and blowing and
  looking wildly, and would needs speak with you presently. 1485

• Falstaff. She shall not see me: I will ensconce me behind the arras.

• Mistress Ford. Pray you, do so: she's a very tattling woman.
  [FALSTAFF hides himself]
  [Re-enter MISTRESS PAGE and ROBIN]
  What's the matter? how now! 1490

• Mistress Page. O Mistress Ford, what have you done? You're shamed,
  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
  to your husband, to give him such cause of suspicion! 1495

• Mistress Ford. What cause of suspicion?

• Mistress Page. What cause of suspicion! Out pon you! how am I
  mistook in you!

• Mistress Ford. Why, alas, what's the matter?

• Mistress Page. Your husband's coming hither, woman, with all the 1500
  officers in Windsor, to search for a gentleman that
  he says is here now in the house by your consent, to
  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 1505
  here! but 'tis most certain your husband's coming,
  with half Windsor at his heels, to search for such a
  one. I come before to tell you. If you know
  yourself clear, why, I am glad of it; but if you
  have a friend here convey, convey him out. Be not 1510
  amazed; call all your senses to you; defend your
  reputation, or bid farewell to your good life for ever.

• Mistress Ford. What shall I do? There is a gentleman my dear
  friend; and I fear not mine own shame so much as his
  peril: I had rather than a thousand pound he were 1515
  out of the house.

• Mistress Page. For shame! never stand 'you had rather' and 'you
  had rather:' your husband's here at hand, bethink
  you of some conveyance: in the house you cannot
  hide him. O, how have you deceived me! Look, here 1520
  is a basket: if he be of any reasonable stature, he
  may creep in here; and throw foul linen upon him, as
  if it were going to bucking: or—it is whiting-time
  —send him by your two men to Datchet-mead.

• Mistress Ford. He's too big to go in there. What shall I do? 1525

• Falstaff. [Coming forward] Let me see't, let me see't, O, let
  me see't! I'll in, I'll in. Follow your friend's
  counsel. I'll in.

• Mistress Page. What, Sir John Falstaff! Are these your letters, knight?

• Falstaff. I love thee. Help me away. Let me creep in here. 1530
  I'll never—

[Gets into the basket; they cover him with foul linen]

• Mistress Page. Help to cover your master, boy. Call your men,
  Mistress Ford. You dissembling knight!

• Mistress Ford. What, John! Robert! John! 1535
  [Exit ROBIN]
  [Re-enter Servants]
  Go take up these clothes here quickly. Where's the
  cowl-staff? look, how you drumble! Carry them to
  the laundress in Datchet-meat; quickly, come. 1540

[Enter FORD, PAGE, DOCTOR CAIUS, and SIR HUGH EVANS]

• Ford. Pray you, come near: if I suspect without cause,
  why then make sport at me; then let me be your jest;
  I deserve it. How now! whither bear you this?

• Servant. To the laundress, forsooth. 1545

• Mistress Ford. Why, what have you to do whither they bear it? You
  were best meddle with buck-washing.

• Ford. Buck! I would I could wash myself of the buck!
  Buck, buck, buck! Ay, buck; I warrant you, buck;
  and of the season too, it shall appear. 1550
  [Exeunt Servants with the basket]
  Gentlemen, I have dreamed to-night; I'll tell you my
  dream. Here, here, here be my keys: ascend my
  chambers; search, seek, find out: I'll warrant
  we'll unkennel the fox. Let me stop this way first. 1555
  [Locking the door]
  So, now uncape.

• Page. Good Master Ford, be contented: you wrong yourself too much.

• Ford. True, Master Page. Up, gentlemen: you shall see
  sport anon: follow me, gentlemen. 1560

[Exit]

• Sir Hugh Evans. This is fery fantastical humours and jealousies.

• Doctor Caius. By gar, 'tis no the fashion of France; it is not
  jealous in France.

• Page. Nay, follow him, gentlemen; see the issue of his search. 1565

[Exeunt PAGE, DOCTOR CAIUS, and SIR HUGH EVANS]

• Mistress Page. Is there not a double excellency in this?

• Mistress Ford. I know not which pleases me better, that my husband
  is deceived, or Sir John.

• Mistress Page. What a taking was he in when your husband asked who 1570
  was in the basket!

• Mistress Ford. I am half afraid he will have need of washing; so
  throwing him into the water will do him a benefit.

• Mistress Page. Hang him, dishonest rascal! I would all of the same
  strain were in the same distress. 1575

• Mistress Ford. I think my husband hath some special suspicion of
  Falstaff's being here; for I never saw him so gross
  in his jealousy till now.

• Mistress Page. I will lay a plot to try that; and we will yet have
  more tricks with Falstaff: his dissolute disease will 1580
  scarce obey this medicine.

• Mistress Ford. Shall we send that foolish carrion, Mistress
  Quickly, to him, and excuse his throwing into the
  water; and give him another hope, to betray him to
  another punishment? 1585

• Mistress Page. We will do it: let him be sent for to-morrow,
  eight o'clock, to have amends.

[Re-enter FORD, PAGE, DOCTOR CAIUS, and SIR HUGH EVANS]

• Ford. I cannot find him: may be the knave bragged of that
  he could not compass. 1590

• 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! 1595

• 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
  chambers, and in the coffers, and in the presses,
  heaven forgive my sins at the day of judgment! 1600

• Doctor Caius. By gar, nor I too: there is no bodies.

• Page. Fie, fie, Master Ford! are you not ashamed? What
  spirit, what devil suggests this imagination? I
  would not ha' your distemper in this kind for the
  wealth of Windsor Castle. 1605

• Ford. 'Tis my fault, Master Page: I suffer for it.

• Sir Hugh Evans. You suffer for a pad conscience: your wife is as
  honest a 'omans as I will desires among five
  thousand, and five hundred too.

• Doctor Caius. By gar, I see 'tis an honest woman. 1610

• Ford. Well, I promised you a dinner. Come, come, walk in
  the Park: I pray you, pardon me; I will hereafter
  make known to you why I have done this. Come,
  wife; come, Mistress Page. I pray you, pardon me;
  pray heartily, pardon me. 1615

• Page. Let's go in, gentlemen; but, trust me, we'll mock
  him. I do invite you to-morrow morning to my house
  to breakfast: after, we'll a-birding together; I
  have a fine hawk for the bush. Shall it be so?

• Ford. Any thing. 1620

• 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
  knave, mine host. 1625

• Doctor Caius. Dat is good; by gar, with all my heart!

• Sir Hugh Evans. A lousy knave, to have his gibes and his mockeries!

[Exeunt]