Page 2559 - Shakespeare - Vol. 2

MISTRESS FORD

Mistress Page is come with me, sweet-heart.

FALSTAFF
Divide me like a bribed buck, each a haunch; I will keep my sides to myself,
my shoulders for the fellow of this walk − and my horns I bequeath your
husbands. Am I a woodman, ha? Speak I like Herne the hunter? [25] Why,

now is Cupid a child of conscience: he makes restitution. As I am a true spirit,
welcome!
Noise of horns within.

MISTRESS PAGE
Alas, what noise?

MISTRESS FORD
Heaven forgive our sins!

FALSTAFF
What should this be? [30]

MISTRESS FORD and MISTRESS PAGE

Away, away!
They run off.

FALSTAFF
I think the devil will not have me damned, lest the oil that’s in me should set
hell on fire; he would never else cross me thus.

Enter Evans [disguised as before; Pistol as Hobgoblin]; Mistress Quickly as

the Fairy Queen; [Anne Page and] children as Fairies [with tapers].

QUICKLY

Fairies, black, gray, green, and white, [35]
You moonshine revellers, and shades of night,
You orphan heirs of fixed destiny,

Attend your office and your quality.
Crier Hobgoblin, make the fairy oyes.