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Enter Ford, Shallow, Page, Caius and Evans.

Ford. Ay, but if it prove true, master Page, have you any way then to unfool me again? fit down the basket, villain; fomebody call my wife: youth in a basket! oh, you panderly rascals! there's a knot, a gang, a pack, a confpiracy, against me: now shall the devil be fham'd. What! wife, I fay; come, come forth, behold what honest cloaths

to bleaching.

you fend forth Page. Why, this paffes, mafter Ford, not to go loose any longer, you must be pinnion'd. Eva. Why, this is lunaticks; this is mad as a mad

dog.

Enter Mrs. Ford.

you are

Shal. Indeed, master Ford, this is not well, indeed. Ford. So fay I too, Sir. Come hither, mistress Ford; mistress Ford, the honeft woman, the modeft wife, the virtuous creature, that hath the jealous fool to her husband! I fufpect without caufe, mistress, do I?

Mrs. Ford. Heav'n be my witnefs, you do, if you fufpect me in any dishonesty.

Fard. Well faid, brazen-face; hold it out: come forth, Sirrah. [Pulls the cloaths out of the basket.

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1 Why, this paffes, Mr. Ford.] No phrafe occurs more frequently in Shakespear than thisit paft,- and-it paffes. It is ufed on all occafions treated in the familiar way, and always conveys the idea of excefs: So that it paffes fignifies it furpaffes all meafure, imagination, or expreffion. And this is the fenfe of the phrafe wherever it is ufed. Englishmen hate long speeches, which hath made our tongue abound with half fentences, and, what is more, with half words. IT TAKES is another phrafe of the fame kind, which modern ufe has rendered very intelligible, yet in it felf it is as ambiguous as it paffes. The whole sentence being it takes or captivates the judgment, the fancy, the In.. tereit, the paffions, &c.

Y 3

Page.

Page. This paffes.

Mrs. Ford. Are you not asham'd? let the cloaths

alone.

Ford. I fhall find you anon.

Eva. 'Tis unreafonable; will you take up your wife's cloaths? come away.

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Ford. Empty the basket, I fay.
Mrs. Ford. Why, man, why

Ford. Mafter Page, as I am a man, there was one convey'd out of my houfe yesterday in this basket; why may not he be there again? in my house I am fure he is; my intelligence is true, my jealoufie is reafonable; pluck me out all the linnen.

Mrs. Ford. If you find a man there, he fhall die a flea's death.

Page. Here's no man.

Shal. By my fidelity, this is not well, mafter Ford; this wrongs you.

Eva. Mafter Ford, you must pray, and not follow the imaginations of your own heart; this is jealoufies, Ford. Well, he's not here I feek for.

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Page. No, nor no where elfe but in your brain.

Ford. Help to fearch my house this one time; if I find not what I feek, fhew no colour for my extremity; let me for ever be your table fport; let them fay of me, as jealous as Ford, that fearcheth a hollow wall-nut for his wife's leman.

Satisfie me once more,

once more fearch with me.
Mrs. Ford. What hoa, mistress Page! come you,
and the old woman down; my husband will come into
the chamber.

Ford. Old woman! what old woman's that?
Mrs. Ford. Why, it is my maid's aunt of Brain-

ford.

Ford. A witch, a quean, an old cozening quean; have I not forbid her my houfe? fhe comes of errands, does she? we are simple men, we do not know what's

brought

brought to pass under the profeffion of fortune-telling. She works by charms, by fpells, by th' figure; and fuch dawbry as this is beyond our element; we know nothing. Come down, you witch; you hag you, come down, I fay.

Mrs. Ford. Nay, good sweet husband; good gentlemen, let him not ftrike the old woman.

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Enter Falstaff in womens cloaths, and Mrs. Page.

Mrs. Page. Come,

mother Prat, come give me

your hand.

Out of my door, you witch! you baggage, you poulcat, you

Ford. I'll Prat her. [Beats him.] you hag, runnion! out, out, out; I'll conjure you, I'll fortune

tell you.

[Exit Fal. Mrs. Page. Are you not afham'd? I think, you have kill'd the poor woman.

Mrs. Ford. Nay, he will do it; 'tis a goodly credit for you.

Ford. Hang her, witch.

Eva. By yea and no, I think, the 'oman is a witch indeed: I like not when a 'oman has a great peard; I spy a great peard under her muffler.

Ford. Will you follow, gentlemen? I beseech you, follow; fee but the iffue of my jealoufie; if I cry out thus upon no trail, never truft me when I open again. Page. Let's obey his humour a little further: come, gentlemen.

[Exeunt. Mrs. Page. Truft me, he beat him most pitifully. Mrs. Ford. Nay, by th' mass, that he did not; he beat him moft unpitifully, methought.

Mrs. Page. I'll have the cudgel hallow'd and hung o'er the altar; it hath done meritorious fervice.

Mrs. Ford. What think you? may we, with the warrant of woman-hood, and the witnefs of a good conscience, pursue him with any further revenge? Mrs. Page.

Y 4

Mrs. Page. The spirit of wantonnefs is, sure, scar'd out of him; if the devil have him not in fee-fimple, with fine and recovery, he will never, I think, in the way of wafte, attempt us again.

Mrs. Ford. Shall we tell our husbands how we have ferved him?

Mrs. Page. Yes, by all means; if it be but to scrape the figures out of your husband's brain. If they can find in their hearts the poor unvirtuous fat knight fhall be any further afflicted, we two will ftill be the ministers.

Mrs. Ford. I'll warrant, they'll have him publickly fham'd; and, methinks, there would be no period to the jeft, fhould he not be publickly fham'd.

Mrs. Page. Come to the forge with it, then shape it: I would not have things cool.

Bard.

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SIR,

VI.

[Exeunt.

the German defires to have three of your horfes; the Duke himself will be to-morrow

at court, and they are going to meet him,

Hoft. What Duke should that be, comes fo fecretly? I hear not of him in the court: let me speak with the gentlemen; they speak English?

Bard. Sir, I'll call them to you.

Hoft. They fhall have my horfes, but I'll make them pay, I'll fawce them. They have had my house a week at command; I have turn'd away my other guests; 2 they must compt off; I'll fawce them, [Exeunt.

come.

2 they muft COME off;] This can never be our Poet's or his Hoft's meaning. To come off being in other terms to go feotfree. We must read, comPT off, i. e. clear their reckoning. SCENE

S C E N E VII.

Changes to Ford's Houfe.

Enter Page, Ford, Mrs. Page, Mrs. Ford, and Evans,

Eva. 'T's

Tever I did look upon.
IS one of the best discretions of 'oman, as

Page. And did he send you both these letters at an inftant?

Mrs. Page. Within a quarter of an hour.

Ford. Pardon me, wife. Henceforth do what thou wilt;

I rather will fufpect the fun with cold,

Than thee with wantonnefs; thy honour stands,
In him that was of late an heretick,

As firm as faith.

Page. 'Tis well, 'tis well; no more.

Be not as extream in fubmiffion, as in offence;
But let our plot go forward: let our wives
Yet once again, to make us publick sport,
Appoint a meeting with this old fat fellow,
Where we may take him, and difgrace him for it.
Ford. There is no better way than that they spoke of.
Page. How? to fend him word they'll meet him
in the park at midnight? fie, fie, he'll never come.

Eva. You fay, he hath been thrown into the river; and has been grievously peaten, as an old 'oman; methinks, there fhould be terrors in him, that he should not come; methinks, his flesh is punish'd, he fhall have no defires.

Page. So think I too.

Mrs. Ford. Devife but how you'll use him, when he comes;

And let us two devise to bring him thither.

Mrs. Page. There is an old tale goes, that Herne

the hunter,

Sometime

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