The Highway, near Gad's Hill.
 Enter PRINCE, POINS, and PETO.

Poins	Come, shelter, shelter! I have removed Falstaff's horse, 
	and he frets like a gummed velvet.

Prince Henry	Stand close!
												[They stand aside.
                             Enter FALSTAFF.

Falstaff	Poins! Poins, and be hanged! Poins!

Prince Henry	[Advancing.] Peace, ye fat-kidneyed rascal! What a 
	brawling dost thou keep!

Falstaff	Where's Poins, Hal?

Prince Henry	He is walked up to the top of the hill; I'll go seek him.
												[Stands aside.

Falstaff	I am accursed to rob in that thief's company; the rascal 
	hath removed my horse and tied him I know not where. If I 
	travel but four foot by the square further afoot I shall 
	break my wind. Well, I doubt not but to die a fair death 
	for all this if I scape hanging for killing that rogue. I 
	have forsworn his company hourly any time this two-and-
	twenty years, and yet I am bewitched with the rogue's 
	company. If the rascal have not given me medicines to make 
	me love him, I'll be hanged: it could not be else - I have 
	drunk medicines. Poins! Hal! A plague upon you both! 
	Bardolph! Peto! I'll starve ere I'll rob a foot further. 
	And 'twere not as good a deed as drink to turn true man 
	and to leave these rogues, I am the veriest varlet that 
	ever chewed with a tooth. Eight yards of uneven ground is 
	threescore and ten miles afoot with me, and the stony-
	hearted villains know it well enough. A plague upon it 
	when thieves cannot be true one to another!
												[They whistle.
	Whew! A plague upon you all! Give me my horse, you rogues. 
	Give me my horse and be hanged!

Prince Henry	[Advancing.] Peace, ye fat guts! Lie down, lay thine ear 
	close to the ground and list if thou canst hear the tread 
	of travellers.

Falstaff	Have you any levers to lift me up again, being down? 
	'Sblood, I'll not bear my own flesh so far afoot again for 
	all the coin in thy father's exchequer. What a plague mean 
	ye to colt me thus?

Prince Henry	Thou liest, thou art not colted, thou art uncolted.

Falstaff	I prithee, good Prince Hal, help me to my horse, good 
	king's son.

Prince Henry	Out, ye rogue! Shall I be your ostler?

Falstaff	Hang thyself in thine own heir-apparent garters! If I be 
	ta'en, I'll peach for this. And I have not ballads made on 
	you all, and sung to filthy tunes, let a cup of sack be my 
	poison. When a jest is so forward, and afoot too, I hate 
	it.

                       Enter GADSHILL and BARDOLPH.

Gadshill	Stand!

Falstaff	So I do, against my will.

Poins	O, 'tis our setter, I know his voice.
	[Advancing with PETO.] Bardolph, what news?

Bardolph	Case ye, case ye, on with your vizards! There's money of 
	the king's coming down the hill; 'tis going to the king's 
	exchequer.

Falstaff	You lie, ye rogue, 'tis going to the king's tavern.

Gadshill	There's enough to make us all.

Falstaff	To be hanged.

Prince Henry	Sirs, you four shall front them in the narrow lane; Ned 
	Poins and I will walk lower. If they scape from your 
	encounter, then they light on us.

Peto	How many be there of them?

Gadshill	Some eight or ten.

Falstaff	Zounds, will they not rob us?

Prince Henry	What, a coward, Sir John Paunch?

Falstaff	Indeed I am not John of Gaunt, your grandfather; but yet 
	no coward, Hal.

Prince Henry	Well, we leave that to the proof.

Poins	Sirrah Jack, thy horse stands behind the hedge; when thou 
	need'st him there thou shalt find him. Farewell, and stand 
	fast.

Falstaff	Now cannot I strike him if I should be hanged.

Prince Henry	[Aside to POINS.] Ned, where are our disguises?

Poins	[Aside to PRINCE.] Here, hard by. Stand close.
												[Exeunt PRINCE and POINS.

Falstaff	Now, my masters, happy man be his dole, say I. Every man 
	to his business.

                          Enter the TRAVELLERS.

1st Traveller	Come, neighbour, the boy shall lead our horses down the 
	hill; we'll walk afoot awhile and ease our legs.

Thieves	Stand!

2nd Traveller	Jesus bless us!

Falstaff	Strike! Down with them! Cut the villains' throats! Ah, 
	whoreson caterpillars, bacon-fed knaves! They hate us 
	youth. Down with them! Fleece them!

1st Traveller	O, we are undone, both we and ours for ever!

Falstaff	Hang ye, gorbellied knaves, are ye undone? No, ye fat 
	chuffs; I would your store were here! On, bacons, on! 
	What, ye knaves! - Young men must live. You are grand-
	jurors, are ye? We'll jure ye, faith.
									[Here they rob them and bind them.
												[Exeunt.
                  Re-enter PRINCE and POINS, disguised.

Prince Henry	The thieves have bound the true men; now could thou and I 
	rob the thieves and go merrily to London - it would be 
	argument for a week, laughter for a month, and a good jest 
	for ever.

Poins	Stand close, I hear them coming.
												[They stand aside.

          Enter the Thieves again (FALSTAFF, BARDOLPH and PETO).

Falstaff	Come, my masters, let us share, and then to horse before 
	day. And the Prince and Poins be not two arrant cowards 
	there's no equity stirring. There's no more valour in that 
	Poins than in a wild duck.
									  [As they are sharing, the PRINCE
												and POINS set upon them.
Prince Henry	Your money!

Poins	Villains!
		  [They all run away, and FALSTAFF, after a blow or two,
					 runs away too, leaving the booty behind them.

Prince Henry	Got with much ease. Now merrily to horse.
	The thieves are all scattered, and possessed with fear
	So strongly that they dare not meet each other:
	Each takes his fellow for an officer.
	Away, good Ned. Falstaff sweats to death,
	And lards the lean earth as he walks along.
	Were't not for laughing, I should pity him.

Poins	How the fat rogue roared!
												[Exeunt.
