London. Another Street.
 Enter PRINCE HENRY and POINS.

Prince Henry	Before God, I am exceeding weary.

Poins	Is't come to that? I had thought weariness durst not have 
	attached one of so high blood.

Prince Henry	Faith, it does me, though it discolours the complexion of 
	my greatness to acknowledge it. Doth it not show vilely in 
	me to desire small beer?

Poins	Why, a prince should not be so loosely studied as to 
	remember so weak a composition.

Prince Henry	Belike then my appetite was not princely got, for, by my 
	troth, I do now remember the poor creature small beer. But 
	indeed, these humble considerations make me out of love 
	with my greatness. What a disgrace is it to me to remember 
	thy name! Or to know thy face tomorrow! Or to take note 
	how many pair of silk stockings thou hast - viz. these, 
	and those that were thy peach-coloured ones! Or to bear 
	the inventory of thy shirts - as, one for superfluity, and 
	another for use! But that the tennis-court keeper knows 
	better than I, for it is a low ebb of linen with thee when 
	thou keepest not racket there; as thou hast not done a 
	great while, because the rest of thy low countries have 
	made a shift to eat up thy holland. And God knows whether 
	those that bawl out the ruins of thy linen shall inherit 
	His kingdom - but the midwives say the children are not in 
	the fault; whereupon the world increases, and kindreds are 
	mightily strengthened.

Poins	How ill it follows, after you have laboured so hard, you 
	should talk so idly! Tell me, how many good young princes 
	would do so, their fathers being so sick as yours at this 
	time is.

Prince Henry	Shall I tell thee one thing, Poins?

Poins	Yes, faith, and let it be an excellent good thing.

Prince Henry	It shall serve among wits of no higher breeding than 
	thine.

Poins	Go to, I stand the push of your one thing that you will 
	tell.

Prince Henry	Marry, I tell thee it is not meet that I should be sad now 
	my father is sick; albeit I could tell to thee - as to one 
	it pleases me, for fault of a better, to call my friend - 
	I could be sad, and sad indeed too.

Poins	Very hardly, upon such a subject.

Prince Henry	By this hand, thou thinkest me as far in the devil's book 
	as thou and Falstaff, for obduracy and persistency. Let 
	the end try the man. But I tell thee, my heart bleeds 
	inwardly that my father is so sick; and keeping such vile 
	company as thou art hath in reason taken from me all 
	ostentation of sorrow.

Poins	The reason?

Prince Henry	What wouldst thou think of me if I should weep?

Poins	I would think thee a most princely hypocrite.

Prince Henry	It would be every man's thought; and thou art a blessed 
	fellow to think as every man thinks - never a man's 
	thought in the world keeps the roadway better than thine. 
	Every man would think me an hypocrite indeed. And what 
	accites your most worshipful thought to think so?

Poins	Why, because you have been so lewd, and so much engraffed 
	to Falstaff.

Prince Henry	And to thee.

Poins	By this light, I am well spoke on; I can hear it with mine 
	own ears. The worst that they can say of me is that I am a 
	second brother and that I am a proper fellow of my hands, 
	and those two things I confess I cannot help. By the mass, 
	here comes Bardolph.

                       Enter BARDOLPH and the PAGE.

Prince Henry	And the boy that I gave Falstaff: a' had him from me 
	Christian, and look if the fat villain have not 
	transformed him ape.

Bardolph	God save your grace!

Prince Henry	And yours, most noble Bardolph!

Poins	[To BARDOLPH.] Come, you virtuous ass, you bashful fool, 
	must you be blushing? Wherefore blush you now? What a 
	maidenly man-at-arms are you become! Is't such a matter to 
	get a pottle-pot's maidenhead?

Page	A' calls me e'en now, my lord, through a red lattice, and 
	I could discern no part of his face from the window. At 
	last I spied his eyes, and methought he had made two holes 
	in the alewife's petticoat, and so peeped through.

Prince Henry	Has not the boy profited?

Bardolph	Away, you whoreson upright rabbit, away!

Page	Away, you rascally Althaea's dream, away!

Prince Henry	Instruct us, boy - what dream, boy?

Page	Marry, my lord, Althaea dreamt she was delivered of a 
	firebrand; and therefore I call him her dream.

Prince Henry	A crown's-worth of good interpretation! There 'tis, boy.
													[Giving money.

Poins	O, that this blossom could be kept from cankers! Well, 
	there is sixpence to preserve thee.

Bardolph	And you do not make him be hanged among you, the gallows 
	shall have wrong.

Prince Henry	And how doth thy master, Bardolph?

Bardolph	Well, my lord. He heard of your grace's coming to town: 
	there's a letter for you.

Poins	Delivered with good respect. And how doth the martlemas 
	your master?

Bardolph	In bodily health, sir.

Poins	Marry, the immortal part needs a physician, but that moves 
	not him; though that be sick, it dies not.

Prince Henry	I do allow this wen to be as familiar with me as my dog; 
	and he holds his place, for look you how he writes.
													[Gives POINS the letter.

Poins	[Reads.]	"John Falstaff, knight" - every man must know 
	that as oft as he has occasion to name himself; even like 
	those that are kin to the king, for they never prick their 
	finger but they say "There's some of the king's blood 
	spilt". "How comes that?" says he that takes upon him not 
	to conceive. The answer is as ready as a borrower's cap: 
	"I am the king's poor cousin, sir".

Prince Henry	Nay, they will be kin to us, or they will fetch it from 
	Japhet. But the letter.
													[Takes the letter.
	[Reads.]	"Sir John Falstaff, knight, to the son of the 
	king nearest his father, Harry Prince of Wales, greeting."

Poins	Why, this is a certificate.

Prince Henry	Peace!
	[Reads.]	"I will imitate the honourable Romans in 
	brevity."

Poins	He sure means brevity in breath, short-winded.

Prince Henry	[Reads.]	"I commend me to thee, I commend thee, and I 
	leave thee. Be not too familiar with Poins, for he misuses 
	thy favours so much that he swears thou art to marry his 
	sister Nell. Repent at idle times as thou mayst, and so 
	farewell.
	Thine by yea and no - which is as much as to say as thou 
	usest him - Jack Falstaff with my familiars, John with my 
	brothers and sisters, and Sir John with all Europe."

Poins	My lord, I'll steep this letter in sack and make him eat 
	it.

Prince Henry	That's to make him eat twenty of his words. But do you use 
	me thus, Ned? Must I marry your sister?

Poins	God send the wench no worse fortune! But I never said so.

Prince Henry	Well, thus we play the fools with the time, and the 
	spirits of the wise sit in the clouds and mock us. Is your 
	master here in London?

Bardolph	Yea, my lord.

Prince Henry	Where sups he? Doth the old boar feed in the old frank?

Bardolph	At the old place, my lord, in Eastcheap.

Prince Henry	What company?

Page	Ephesians, my lord, of the old church.

Prince Henry	Sup any women with him?

Page	None, my lord, but old Mistress Quickly and Mistress Doll 
	Tearsheet.

Prince Henry	What pagan may that be?

Page	A proper gentlewoman, sir, and a kinswoman of my master's.

Prince Henry	Even such kin as the parish heifers are to the town bull. 
	Shall we steal upon them, Ned, at supper?

Poins	I am your shadow, my lord; I'll follow you.

Prince Henry	Sirrah, you boy, and Bardolph, no word to your master that 
	I am yet come to town.
													[Giving them money.
	There's for your silence.

Bardolph	I have no tongue, sir.

Page	And for mine, sir, I will govern it.

Prince Henry	Fare you well; go.
												[Exeunt BARDOLPH and PAGE.
	This Doll Tearsheet should be some road.

Poins	I warrant you, as common as the way between Saint Albans 
	and London.

Prince Henry	How might we see Falstaff bestow himself tonight in his 
	true colours, and not ourselves be seen?

Poins	Put on two leathern jerkins and aprons, and wait upon him 
	at his table as drawers.

Prince Henry	From a god to a bull? - a heavy descension. It was Jove's 
	case. From a prince to a prentice? - a low transformation,
	that shall be mine; for in everything the purpose must 
	weigh with the folly. Follow me, Ned.
													[Exeunt.
