Act 2, Scene 4

London. The Boar's-head Tavern in Eastcheap.

[Enter two Drawers.]
First Drawer
944 What the devil hast thou brought there? apple-johns?
945 thou knowest Sir John cannot endure an apple-john.
Second Drawer
946 Mass, thou sayest true. The prince once set a dish of apple-johns
947 before him, and told him there were five more Sir Johns, and, putting
948 off his hat, said "I will now take my leave of these six dry, round,
949 old, withered knights." It angered him to the heart: but he hath
950 forgot that.
First Drawer
951 Why, then, cover, and set them down: and see if thou canst find out
952 Sneak's noise; Mistress Tearsheet would fain hear some music.
953 Dispatch: The room where they supped is too hot; they'll come in
954 straight.
Second Drawer
955 Sirrah, here will be the prince and Master Poins anon; and they
956 will put on two of our jerkins and aprons; and Sir John must
957 not know of it: Bardolph hath brought word.
First Drawer
958 By the mass, here will be old Utis: it will be an excellent
959 stratagem.
Second Drawer
960 I'll see if I can find out Sneak.
[Exit.]
[Enter Hostess and Doll Tearsheet.]
Mistress Quickly
961 I' faith, sweetheart, methinks now you are in an excellent good
962 temperality: your pulsidge beats as extraordinarily as heart would
963 desire; and your colour, I warrant you, is as red as any rose, in
964 good truth, la! But, i' faith, you have drunk too much canaries; and
965 that 's a marvellous searching wine, and it perfumes the blood ere one
966 can say "What's this?" How do you now?
Doll Tearsheet
967 Better than I was: hem!
Mistress Quickly
968 Why, that 's well said; a good heart's worth gold. Lo, here
969 comes Sir John.
[Enter Falstaff.]
[Singing]
Sir John Falstaff
970 "When Arthur first in court"—Empty the jordan.
[Exit First Drawer.]
Sir John Falstaff
971 —
[Singing]
Sir John Falstaff
972 "And was a worthy king."
973 How now, Mistress Doll!
Mistress Quickly
974 Sick of a calm; yea, good faith.
Sir John Falstaff
975 So is all her sect; an they be once in a calm, they are sick.
Doll Tearsheet
976 You muddy rascal, is that all the comfort you give me?
Sir John Falstaff
977 You make fat rascals, Mistress Doll.
Doll Tearsheet
978 I make them! gluttony and diseases make them; I make them not.
Sir John Falstaff
979 If the cook help to make the gluttony, you help to make the diseases,
980 Doll: we catch of you, Doll, we catch of you; grant that, my poor
981 virtue, grant that.
Doll Tearsheet
982 Yea, joy, our chains and our jewels.
Sir John Falstaff
983 "Your brooches, pearls, and ouches:" for to serve bravely is to come
984 halting off, you know: to come off the breach with his pike bent
985 bravely, and to surgery bravely; to venture upon the charged chambers
986 bravely,—
Doll Tearsheet
987 Hang yourself, you muddy conger, hang yourself!
Mistress Quickly
988 By my troth, this is the old fashion; you two never meet but you
989 fall to some discord: you are both, i' good truth, as rheumatic
990 as two dry toasts; you cannot one bear with another's confirmities.
991 What the good-year! one must bear, and that must be you: you are the
992 weaker vessel, as as they say, the emptier vessel.
Doll Tearsheet
993 Can a weak empty vessel bear such a huge full hogshead? there's a whole
994 merchant's venture of Bourdeaux stuff in him; you have not seen a hulk
995 better stuffed in the hold. Come, I'll be friends with thee, Jack:
996 thou art going to the wars; and whether I shall ever see thee again or
997 no, there is nobody cares.
[Re-enter First Drawer.]
First Drawer
998 Sir, Ancient Pistol's below, and would speak with you.
Doll Tearsheet
999 Hang him, swaggering rascal! let him not come hither: it is the
1000 foul-mouthed'st rogue in England.
Mistress Quickly
1001 If he swagger, let him not come here: no, by my faith; I must live
1002 among my neighbours; I'll no swaggerers: I am in good name and fame
1003 with the very best: shut the door; there comes no swaggerers here:
1004 I have not lived all this while, to have swaggering now: shut the
1005 door, I pray you.
Sir John Falstaff
1006 Dost thou hear, hostess?
Mistress Quickly
1007 Pray ye, pacify yourself, Sir John: there comes no swaggerers here.
Sir John Falstaff
1008 Dost thou hear? it is mine ancient.
Mistress Quickly
1009 Tilly-fally, Sir John, ne'er tell me: your ancient swaggerer comes
1010 not in my doors. I was before Master Tisick, the debuty, t'other day;
1011 and, as he said to me, 'twas no longer ago than Wednesday last,
1012 "I' good faith, neighbour Quickly," says he; Master Dumbe, our
1013 minister, was by then; "neighbour Quickly," says he, "receive those
1014 that are civil; for" said he "you are in an ill name:" now a' said
1015 so, I can tell whereupon; "for," says he, "you are an honest woman,
1016 and well thought on; therefore take heed what guests you receive:
1017 receive," says he, "no swaggering companions." There comes none here:
1018 you would bless you to hear what he said: no, I'll no swaggerers.
Sir John Falstaff
1019 He's no swaggerer, hostess; a tame cheater, i' faith; you may stroke
1020 him as gently as a puppy greyhound: he'll not swagger with a Barbary
1021 hen, if her feathers turn back in any show of resistance. Call
1022 him up, drawer.
[Exit First Drawer.]
Mistress Quickly
1023 Cheater, call you him? I will bar no honest man my house, nor no
1024 cheater: but I do not love swaggering, by my troth; I am the worse,
1025 when one says swagger: feel, masters, how I shake; look you, I
1026 warrant you.
Doll Tearsheet
1027 So you do, hostess.
Mistress Quickly
1028 Do I? yea, in very truth, do I, an 'twere an aspen leaf: I
1029 cannot abide swaggerers.
[Enter Pistol, Bardolph, and Page.]
Pistol
1030 God save you, Sir John!
Sir John Falstaff
1031 Welcome, Ancient Pistol. Here, Pistol, I charge you with
1032 a cup of sack: do you discharge upon mine hostess.
Pistol
1033 I will discharge upon her, Sir John, with two bullets.
Sir John Falstaff
1034 She is pistol-proof, sir; you shall hardly offend her.
Mistress Quickly
1035 Come, I'll drink no proofs nor no bullets: I'll drink no
1036 more than will do me good, for no man's pleasure, I.
Pistol
1037 Then to you, Mistress Dorothy; I will charge you.
Doll Tearsheet
1038 Charge me! I scorn you, scurvy companion. What! you poor,
1039 base, rascally, cheating, lack-linen mate! Away, you mouldy
1040 rogue, away!
1041 I am meat for your master.
Pistol
1042 I know you, Mistress Dorothy.
Doll Tearsheet
1043 Away, you cut-purse rascal! you filthy bung, away! by this wine,
1044 I'll thrust my knife in your mouldy chaps, an you play the saucy
1045 cuttle with me. Away, you bottle-ale rascal! you basket-hilt stale
1046 juggler, you! Since when, I pray you, sir? God's light, with two
1047 points on your shoulder? much!
Pistol
1048 God let me not live, but I will murder your ruff for this.
Sir John Falstaff
1049 No more, Pistol; I would not have you go off here:
1050 discharge yourself of our company, Pistol.
Mistress Quickly
1051 No, good Captain Pistol; not here, sweet captain.
Doll Tearsheet
1052 Captain! thou abominable damned cheater, art thou not ashamed
1053 to be called captain? An captains were of my mind, they would
1054 truncheon you out, for taking their names upon you before you
1055 have earned them. You a captain! you slave, for what? for tearing
1056 a poor whore's ruff in a bawdy-house? He a captain! hang him,
1057 rogue! he lives upon mouldy stewed prunes and dried cakes. A
1058 captain! God's light, these villains will make the word as odious
1059 as the word "occupy;" which was an excellent good word before it
1060 was ill sorted: therefore captains had need look to't.
Bardolph
1061 Pray thee, go down, good ancient.
Sir John Falstaff
1062 Hark thee hither, Mistress Doll.
Pistol
1063 Not I: I tell thee what, Corporal Bardolph, I could tear
1064 her: I'll be revenged of her.
Page
1065 Pray thee go down.
Pistol
1066 I'll see her damned first; to Pluto's damned lake, by this
1067 hand, to the infernal deep, with Erebus and tortures vile also.
1068 Hold hook and line, say I. Down, down, dogs! down, faitors!
1069 Have we not Hiren here?
Mistress Quickly
1070 Good Captain Peesel, be quiet; 'tis very late, i' faith: I
1071 beseek you now, aggravate your choler.
Pistol
1072 These be good humours, indeed! Shall packhorses
1073 And hollow pamper'd jades of Asia,
1074 Which cannot go but thirty mile a-day,
1075 Compare with Caesars, and with Cannibals,
1076 And Trojan Greeks? nay, rather damn them with
1077 King Cerberus; and let the welkin roar.
1078 Shall we fall foul for toys?
Mistress Quickly
1079 By my troth, captain, these are very bitter words.
Bardolph
1080 Be gone, good ancient: this will grow to a brawl anon.
Pistol
1081 Die men like dogs! give crowns like pins! Have we not Hiren
1082 here?
Mistress Quickly
1083 O' my word, captain, there 's none such here. What the
1084 good-year! do you think I would deny her? For God's sake, be
1085 quiet.
Pistol
1086 Then feed, and be fat, my fair Calipolis.
1087 Come, give 's some sack.
1088 "Si fortune me tormente, sperato me contento."
1089 Fear we broadsides? no, let the fiend give fire:
1090 Give me some sack: and, sweetheart, lie thou there.
[Laying down his sword.]
Pistol
1091 Come we to full points here, and are etceteras nothing?
Sir John Falstaff
1092 Pistol, I would be quiet.
Pistol
1093 Sweet knight, I kiss thy neif: what! we have seen the seven
1094 stars.
Doll Tearsheet
1095 For God's sake, thrust him down stairs: I cannot endure such a
1096 fustian rascal.
Pistol
1097 Thrust him down stairs! know we not Galloway nags?
Sir John Falstaff
1098 Quoit him down, Bardolph, like a shove-groat shilling:
1099 nay, an a' do nothing but speak nothing, a' shall be nothing
1100 here.
Bardolph
1101 Come, get you down stairs.
Pistol
1102 What! shall we have incision? shall we imbrue?
[Snatching up his sword.]
Pistol
1103 Then death rock me asleep, abridge my doleful days!
1104 Why, then, let grievous, ghastly, gaping wounds
1105 Untwine the Sisters Three! Come, Atropos, I say!
Mistress Quickly
1106 Here's goodly stuff toward!
Sir John Falstaff
1107 Give me my rapier, boy.
Doll Tearsheet
1108 I pray thee, Jack, I pray thee, do not draw.
Sir John Falstaff
1109 Get you down stairs.
[Drawing, and driving Pistol out.]
Mistress Quickly
1110 Here's a goodly tumult! I'll forswear keeping house, afore
1111 I'll be in these tirrits and frights. So; murder, I warrant now.
1112 Alas, alas! put up your naked weapons, put up your naked weapons.
[Exeunt Pistol and Bardolph.]
Doll Tearsheet
1113 I pray thee, Jack, be quiet; the rascal's gone. Ah, you whoreson
1114 little valiant villain, you!
Mistress Quickly
1115 Are you not hurt i' the groin? methought a' made a shrewd
1116 thrust at your belly.
[Re-enter Bardolph.]
Sir John Falstaff
1117 Have you turned him out o' doors?
Bardolph
1118 Yea, sir. The rascal's drunk: you have hurt him, sir, i'
1119 the shoulder.
Sir John Falstaff
1120 A rascal! to brave me!
Doll Tearsheet
1121 Ah, you sweet little rogue, you! Alas, poor ape, how thou
1122 sweatest! come, let me wipe thy face; come on, you whoreson chops:
1123 ah, rogue! i' faith, I love thee: thou art as valorous as Hector
1124 of Troy, worth five of Agamemnon, and ten times better than the Nine
1125 Worthies: ah, villain!
Sir John Falstaff
1126 A rascally slave! I will toss the rogue in a blanket.
Doll Tearsheet
1127 Do, an thou darest for thy heart: an thou dost, I'll canvass
1128 thee between a pair of sheets.
[Enter Music.]
Page
1129 The music is come, sir.
Sir John Falstaff
1130 Let them play. Play, sirs. Sit on my knee, Doll. A rascal
1131 bragging slave! The rogue fled from me like quicksilver.
Doll Tearsheet
1132 I' faith, and thou followedst him like a church. Thou whoreson
1133 little tidy Bartholomew boar-pig, when wilt thou leave fighting
1134 o' days and foining o' nights, and begin to patch up thine old body
1135 for heaven?
[Enter, behind, Prince Henry and Poins, disguised as drawers.]
Sir John Falstaff
1136 Peace, good Doll! do not speak like a death's-head; do
1137 not bid me remember mine end.
Doll Tearsheet
1138 Sirrah, what humour 's the prince of?
Sir John Falstaff
1139 A good shallow young fellow: 'a would have made a good
1140 pantler; a' would ha' chipped bread well.
Doll Tearsheet
1141 They say Poins has a good wit.
Sir John Falstaff
1142 He a good wit! hang him, baboon! his wit's as thick as
1143 Tewksbury mustard; there 's no more conceit in him than is in a
1144 mallet.
Doll Tearsheet
1145 Why does the prince love him so, then?
Sir John Falstaff
1146 Because their legs are both of a bigness, and a' plays at quoits
1147 well, and eats conger and fennel, and drinks off candles' ends for
1148 flap-dragons, and rides the wild-mare with the boys, and jumps upon
1149 joined-stools, and swears with a good grace, and wears his boots very
1150 smooth, like unto the sign of the leg, and breeds no bate with telling
1151 of discreet stories; and such other gambol faculties a' has, that show
1152 a weak mind and an able body, for the which the prince admits him: for
1153 the prince himself is such another; the weight of a hair will turn the
1154 scales between their avoirdupois.
Prince Hal
1155 Would not this nave of a wheel have his ears cut off?
Poins
1156 Let 's beat him before his whore.
Prince Hal
1157 Look, whether the withered elder hath not his poll clawed
1158 like a parrot.
Poins
1159 Is it not strange that desire should so many years outlive
1160 performance?
Sir John Falstaff
1161 Kiss me, Doll.
Prince Hal
1162 Saturn and Venus this year in conjunction! what says the
1163 almanac to that?
Poins
1164 And, look, whether the fiery Trigon, his man, be not lisping
1165 to his master's old tables, his note-book, his counsel-keeper.
Sir John Falstaff
1166 Thou dost give me flattering busses.
Doll Tearsheet
1167 By my troth, I kiss thee with a most constant heart.
Sir John Falstaff
1168 I am old, I am old.
Doll Tearsheet
1169 I love thee better than I love e'er a scurvy young boy of
1170 them all.
Sir John Falstaff
1171 What stuff wilt have a kirtle of? I shall receive money o'
1172 Thursday: shalt have a cap to-morrow. A merry song, come: it
1173 grows late; we'll to bed. Thou'lt forget me when I am gone.
Doll Tearsheet
1174 By my troth, thou'lt set me a-weeping, an thou sayest so:
1175 prove that ever I dress myself handsome till thy return: well,
1176 hearken at the end.
Sir John Falstaff
1177 Some sack, Francis.
Sir John Falstaff
1178 PRINCE & POINS.
1179 Anon, anon, sir.
[Coming forward.]
Sir John Falstaff
1180 Ha! a bastard son of the king's? And art thou not Poins
1181 his brother?
Prince Hal
1182 Why, thou globe of sinful continents, what a life dost thou lead!
Sir John Falstaff
1183 A better than thou: I am a gentleman; thou art a drawer.
Prince Hal
1184 Very true, sir; and I come to draw you out by the ears.
Mistress Quickly
1185 O, the Lord preserve thy grace! by my troth, welcome to
1186 London. Now, the Lord bless that sweet face of thine! O Jesu,
1187 are you come from Wales?
Sir John Falstaff
1188 Thou whoreson mad compound of majesty, by this light
1189 flesh and corrupt blood, thou art welcome.
Doll Tearsheet
1190 How, you fat fool! I scorn you.
Poins
1191 My lord, he will drive you out of your revenge and turn all
1192 to a merriment, if you take not the heat.
Prince Hal
1193 You whoreson candle-mine, you, how vilely did you speak of
1194 me even now before this honest, virtuous, civil gentlewoman!
Mistress Quickly
1195 God's blessing of your good heart! and so she is, by my troth.
Sir John Falstaff
1196 Didst thou hear me?
Prince Hal
1197 Yea, and you knew me, as you did when you ran away by
1198 Gad's-hill: you knew I was at your back, and spoke it on purpose
1199 to try my patience.
Sir John Falstaff
1200 No, no, no; not so; I did not think thou wast within hearing.
Prince Hal
1201 I shall drive you then to confess the wilful abuse; and then I
1202 know how to handle you.
Sir John Falstaff
1203 No abuse, Hal, o' mine honour; no abuse.
Prince Hal
1204 Not to dispraise me, and call me pantler and bread-chipper and I
1205 know not what!
Sir John Falstaff
1206 No abuse, Hal.
Poins
1207 No abuse!
Sir John Falstaff
1208 No abuse, Ned, i' the world; honest Ned, none. I dispraised him before
1209 the wicked, that the wicked might not fall in love with him; in which
1210 doing, I have done the part of a careful friend and a true subject,
1211 and thy father is to give me thanks for it. No abuse, Hal: none,
1212 Ned, none: no, faith, boys, none.
Prince Hal
1213 See now, whether pure fear and entire cowardice doth not make thee
1214 wrong this virtuous gentlewoman to close with us. Is she of the wicked?
1215 is thine hostess here of the wicked? or is thy boy of the wicked?
1216 or honest Bardolph, whose zeal burns in his nose, of the wicked?
Poins
1217 Answer, thou dead elm, answer.
Sir John Falstaff
1218 The fiend hath pricked down Bardolph irrecoverable; and his
1219 face is Lucifer's privy-kitchen, where he doth nothing but roast
1220 malt-worms.
1221 For the boy, there is a good angel about him; but the devil
1222 outbids him too.
Prince Hal
1223 For the women?
Sir John Falstaff
1224 For one of them, she is in hell already, and burns poor souls.
1225 For the other, I owe her money; and whether she be damned for
1226 that, I know not.
Mistress Quickly
1227 No, I warrant you.
Sir John Falstaff
1228 No, I think thou art not; I think thou art quit for that. Marry, there
1229 is another indictment upon thee, for suffering flesh to be eaten in
1230 thy house, contrary to the law; for the which I think thou wilt howl.
Mistress Quickly
1231 All victuallers do so: what 's a joint of mutton or two in a
1232 whole Lent?
Prince Hal
1233 You, gentlewoman,—
Doll Tearsheet
1234 What says your grace?
Sir John Falstaff
1235 His grace says that which his flesh rebels against.
[Knocking within.]
Mistress Quickly
1236 Who knocks so loud at door? Look to the door there, Francis.
[Enter Peto.]
Prince Hal
1237 Peto, how now! what news?
Peto
1238 The king your father is at Westminster;
1239 And there are twenty weak and wearied posts
1240 Come from the north: and, as I came along,
1241 I met and overtook a dozen captains,
1242 Bare-headed, sweating, knocking at the taverns,
1243 And asking every one for Sir John Falstaff.
Prince Hal
1244 By heaven, Poins, I feel me much to blame,
1245 So idly to profane the precious time,
1246 When tempest of commotion, like the south
1247 Borne with black vapour, doth begin to melt
1248 And drop upon our bare unarmed heads.
1249 Give me my sword and cloak. Falstaff, good night.
[Exeunt Prince, Poins, Peto, and Bardolph.]
Sir John Falstaff
1250 Now comes in the sweetest morsel of the night, and we must
1251 hence, and leave it unpicked.
[Knocking within.]
Sir John Falstaff
1252 More knocking at the door!
[Re-enter Bardolph.]
Sir John Falstaff
1253 How now! what's the matter?
Bardolph
1254 You must away to court, sir, presently;
1255 A dozen captains stay at door for you.
[To the Page]
Sir John Falstaff
1256 .
1257 Pay the musicians, sirrah. Farewell, hostess; farewell, Doll.
1258 You see, my good wenches, how men of merit are sought after:
1259 the undeserver may sleep, when the man of action is called on.
1260 Farewell, good wenches: if I be not sent away post, I will see
1261 you again ere I go.
Doll Tearsheet
1262 I cannot speak; if my heart be not ready to burst,—well, sweet
1263 Jack, have a care of thyself.
Sir John Falstaff
1264 Farewell, farewell.
[Exeunt Falstaff and Bardolph.]
Mistress Quickly
1265 Well, fare thee well: I have known thee these twenty-nine years,
1266 come peascod-time; but an honester and truer-hearted man,—
1267 well, fare thee well.
[Within.]
Bardolph
1268 Mistress Tearsheet!
Mistress Quickly
1269 What's the matter?
[Within.]
Bardolph
1270 Bid Mistress Tearsheet come to my master.
Mistress Quickly
1271 O, run, Doll, run; run, good Doll: come.
[She comes blubbered.]
Mistress Quickly
1272 Yea, will you come, Doll?
[Exeunt.]

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Word definitions on hover

Notes

TLN 946cultural context
“a dish of apple-johns before him, and told him there were five more Sir Johns”
An apple-john was a dried, wrinkled variety of apple that was traditionally kept for two years before eating, so it shrivelled into a round, withered shape. Hal uses a dish of them to mock Falstaff as an over-ripe, wizened old man — the five extra apples making six 'Sir Johns' in total, each as dry and shrunk as the real knight. The joke lands harder in Part 2 because Falstaff's age is a growing preoccupation of the whole play.
TLN 951archaic vocab
“find out Sneak's noise”
'Noise' here means a small band of musicians — a common Elizabethan usage. 'Sneak's noise' is the ensemble led by a musician named Sneak, apparently a well-known London street or tavern band. Doll wants live music to accompany the evening.
TLN 958archaic vocab
“here will be old Utis: it will be an excellent stratagem”
'Old Utis' means a great uproar or merry ruckus. 'Utis' (also 'Utas') was the eighth day after a religious feast — the extended celebration when people relaxed and made merry. By extension it came to mean any festive tumult. The drawer is looking forward to the chaos when Hal and Poins reveal themselves to Falstaff.
TLN 961archaic vocab
“excellent good temperality: your pulsidge beats as extraordinarily as heart would desire”
Mistress Quickly garbles her medical vocabulary: 'temperality' is her mishearing of 'temperature' (bodily constitution), and 'pulsidge' is her mangling of 'pulse.' The comic effect is that she tries to speak like a physician checking Doll's health after her drinking bout but cannot manage the words. Shakespeare uses Quickly's malapropisms throughout both Henry IV plays to comic and affectionate effect.
TLN 964archaic vocab
“you have drunk too much canaries; and that 's a marvellous searching wine”
'Canaries' (or 'canary') was a sweet fortified wine imported from the Canary Islands, prized for its heady strength. 'Searching' means penetrating — the wine was said to work through the whole body quickly, like a searcher probing every part. Doll has had too much of it and is unsteady.
TLN 989archaic vocab
“as rheumatic as two dry toasts; you cannot one bear with another's confirmities”
Mistress Quickly produces two more mangled words: she says 'rheumatic' when she means a humour-word for bad-tempered (editors gloss it as 'choleric' — quarrelsome, prone to dispute), and 'confirmities' when she means 'infirmities' — ailments, weaknesses. The malapropism is characteristic: she blends the word she intends with one she half-knows, producing unintentional comedy. A 'dry toast' was a popular image of irritability and sourness.
TLN 991biblical allusion
“that must be you: you are the weaker vessel, as as they say, the emptier vessel”
The phrase 'weaker vessel' is a direct quotation from the New Testament: 'giving honour unto the woman, as unto the weaker vessel' (1 Peter 3:7). Elizabethans heard it as a standard description of women as physically and constitutionally less robust than men. Quickly quotes it to urge Doll to put up with Falstaff. Then she tangles it with a different proverb — 'the emptier vessel makes the more noise' — producing an absurd double image: Doll is both weaker and emptier.
TLN 1009archaic vocab
“Tilly-fally, Sir John, ne'er tell me: your ancient swaggerer comes not in my doors”
'Tilly-fally' (sometimes 'tilly-vally') is an Elizabethan exclamation of contemptuous dismissal, equivalent to 'nonsense!' or 'rubbish!'; it appears in Twelfth Night as well. 'Ancient' here does not mean 'old' but is the rank: an ensign or standard-bearer (from the French 'enseigne'), the lowest officer grade. Pistol's title is 'Ancient Pistol.' Quickly is dismissing Falstaff's claim that Pistol is his officer and therefore must be admitted.
TLN 1019archaic vocab
“a tame cheater, i' faith; you may stroke him as gently as a puppy greyhound: he'll not swagger with a Barbary hen”
A 'cheater' was originally an officer of the Exchequer (the royal treasury) who handled forfeited property — a term that slipped into slang for any swindler. Falstaff reassures Quickly by calling Pistol a harmless fraud. A 'Barbary hen' was a guinea fowl, imported from the Barbary Coast of North Africa, known for its loud raucous noise and spiky feathers when alarmed — a comic image for the indignant Doll. Falstaff is saying Pistol would not even bully a noisy, puffed-up guinea hen.
TLN 1066classical allusion
“to Pluto's damned lake, by this hand, to the infernal deep, with Erebus and tortures vile also”
Pistol's ranting threat piles up names of the classical underworld. Pluto (Greek Hades) was the god and ruler of the underworld; his 'lake' refers to the infernal rivers — usually Styx — that the dead must cross. Erebus was the primordial darkness through which souls passed on their way to Hades, born from Chaos at the beginning of creation. Pistol does not use these references with any precision; he simply stacks up the scariest classical words he half-remembers from stage plays, producing bombast rather than meaning.
classical Erebus
TLN 1073historical topical
“hollow pamper'd jades of Asia, Which cannot go but thirty mile a-day, Compare with Caesars, and with Cannibals, And Trojan Greeks? nay, rather damn them with King Cerberus”
Pistol's tirade is a garbled parody of Christopher Marlowe's Tamburlaine the Great, Part 2 (1588): Tamburlaine's famous line 'Holla, ye pampered jades of Asia! / What! can ye draw but twenty miles a-day?' was well known to Elizabethan playgoers. 'Jades' are worn-out horses. Pistol inflates the speech further, replacing 'twenty' with 'thirty,' scrambling 'Caesars and Cannibals' (apparently for 'Hannibal'), and inventing 'King Cerberus' — Cerberus is the three-headed dog guarding the underworld, not a king. The comedy is that Pistol misremembers and mangles the very plays he tries to quote.
TLN 1088historical topical
“Si fortune me tormente, sperato me contento”
Pistol quotes a snatch of mangled Spanish or Italian: roughly 'If fortune torments me, hope contents me.' The line appears to derive from a song or motto circulating in Elizabethan England; a version appeared in a manuscript commonplace book of the period. Pistol's habit of quoting in foreign languages — equally garbled — is part of his character as a posturing fake who confuses language with learning.
TLN 1103classical allusion
“Then death rock me asleep, abridge my doleful days! Why, then, let grievous, ghastly, gaping wounds Untwine the Sisters Three! Come, Atropos, I say!”
The 'Sisters Three' are the Fates of classical mythology — three goddesses who controlled human life: Clotho spun the thread of life, Lachesis measured it, and Atropos cut it. Atropos (Greek: 'she who cannot be turned') was therefore the one who ended each life. Pistol, facing Bardolph's attempt to eject him, strikes a theatrical pose of melodramatic suicide-wish, demanding that Atropos herself come cut his life-thread. The lines are almost certainly a parody of a lost stage play.
TLN 1123classical allusion
“thou art as valorous as Hector of Troy, worth five of Agamemnon, and ten times better than the Nine Worthies”
Doll lavishes inflated classical praise on Falstaff for expelling Pistol. Hector of Troy was the greatest warrior of the Trojan side in the Iliad — the standard for military valor. Agamemnon was the king who led the Greek forces. The 'Nine Worthies' were a medieval list of the greatest warriors of all time: three pagans (Hector, Alexander, Julius Caesar), three Jews (Joshua, David, Judas Maccabaeus), and three Christians (Arthur, Charlemagne, Godfrey of Bouillon).
TLN 1132cultural context
“thou whoreson little tidy Bartholomew boar-pig, when wilt thou leave fighting o' days and foining o' nights”
A 'Bartholomew boar-pig' was a roasted suckling pig sold at Bartholomew Fair — the great annual London fair held at Smithfield around 24 August (St Bartholomew's Day) — a comic image of plump, greasy excess. 'Tidy' means plump or fat. 'Foining' means thrusting — originally a fencing term for a sword-thrust, here used with an obvious sexual double meaning. Doll tells Falstaff it is time he stopped brawling by day and whoring by night, and patched up his old body for death.
TLN 1136cultural context
“do not speak like a death's-head; do not bid me remember mine end”
A 'death's-head' was a skull — often a real or carved skull kept on a desk or worn as a ring to remind the owner of mortality, a practice called a memento mori (Latin: 'remember you must die'). Falstaff is telling Doll to stop talking like a grim reminder of death. The irony is acute: the whole scene is shadowed by Falstaff's age and his coming summons to the wars, and the ring itself was a common Elizabethan fashion item, visible to the audience.
TLN 1142cultural context
“his wit's as thick as Tewksbury mustard; there 's no more conceit in him than is in a mallet”
Tewkesbury (in Gloucestershire) was famous in Elizabethan England for a particularly thick, coarse-ground mustard — the opposite of anything refined or sharp. To say Poins's wit is 'as thick as Tewksbury mustard' is to call him blunt, dense, and coarse. 'Conceit' here means wit or lively imagination; a mallet is a heavy wooden hammer. Falstaff strings together two images of brute dullness to dismiss Poins's intelligence.
TLN 1147cultural context
“eats conger and fennel, and drinks off candles' ends for flap-dragons, and rides the wild-mare with the boys”
Falstaff lists the crude tavern pastimes that supposedly unite Poins and the prince. Conger (large sea-eel) and fennel were commonly served together; eating this combination was considered coarse and lower-class. 'Flap-dragons' (snap-dragon) was a drinking game in which players tried to snatch burning candle-ends or raisins out of a dish of burning brandy and swallow them alight. 'Riding the wild mare' was a rough-and-tumble see-saw game played by boys. Together these pursuits paint Prince Hal as a man who wastes himself in childish, low company.
TLN 1162cultural context
“Saturn and Venus this year in conjunction! what says the almanac to that?”
Elizabethans took astrology seriously and consulted almanacs — annual publications that predicted events from planetary positions. A 'conjunction' is when two planets appear in the same region of the sky simultaneously. Saturn was the planet of age, gloom, and cold; Venus was the planet of love and desire. Hal mockingly 'reads' Falstaff and Doll's embrace as a rare astronomical event: an aged, melancholy man (Saturn) in conjunction with the goddess of love (Venus) — that is, Falstaff and Doll.
TLN 1182wordplay
“thou globe of sinful continents, what a life dost thou lead”
Hal's insult fuses two meanings of 'continent': first, 'land masses' (Falstaff's enormous belly as a world-sized globe of sinful territories); second, 'that which contains or holds' (Falstaff's body contains his sins). The joke is both a fat-body insult and a meditation on Falstaff as a whole world of vice.
TLN 1218wordplay
“his face is Lucifer's privy-kitchen, where he doth nothing but roast malt-worms”
Falstaff riffs on Bardolph's famously red, blotchy nose and face — a running joke through both Henry IV plays — by calling it 'Lucifer's privy-kitchen' (the devil's private kitchen) where 'malt-worms' are roasted. 'Malt-worms' was slang for heavy drinkers — people who worm their way through malt liquor. A 'privy' kitchen was a private or inner kitchen (from Latin privatus), as opposed to the great kitchen that served the household. The joke is that Bardolph's face is so fiery-red it looks like a hellish stove perpetually roasting drunkards.
TLN 1229historical topical
“another indictment upon thee, for suffering flesh to be eaten in thy house, contrary to the law; for the which I think thou wilt howl”
Elizabethan law required abstinence from meat on Fridays and during Lent — not primarily for religious reasons by this period, but to support the fishing industry and navy. Selling or serving meat in Lent was a fineable offence. Falstaff jokes that the Hostess faces two charges: first, owing him money he has never repaid, and now, illegally serving meat during Lent. Quickly defends herself with the exasperated practicality of a real innkeeper: 'what's a joint of mutton or two in a whole Lent?'
TLN 1244rhetorical device
“I feel me much to blame, So idly to profane the precious time, When tempest of commotion, like the south Borne with black vapour, doth begin to melt And drop upon our bare unarmed heads”
The arrival of Peto with news of the northern rebellion snaps Hal out of the tavern and into a register of genuine verse and feeling. The 'tempest of commotion' is an extended metaphor comparing the rebellion sweeping down from the north to a violent southern storm — the south wind ('the south') was associated in Elizabethan weather-lore with warm, damp, plague-bearing air and sudden violent rain. The image of black vapour melting into rain on their 'bare unarmed heads' captures both the military threat and the prince's sense of shameful unreadiness.
TLN 1265archaic vocab
“I have known thee these twenty-nine years, come peascod-time”
'Peascod-time' is the season when peas are in the pod — late June to July, a simple country way of marking the calendar. Mistress Quickly's farewell to Falstaff is one of the most touching moments in the scene: she has known him for nearly three decades (which is impossible to reconcile with the play's timeline, but the number carries emotional rather than literal weight) and despite everything — the debts, the broken promises — her affection for him is genuine.