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Will. Articles are borrowed of the pronoun; and be thus declined, Singulariter, nominativo, hic, hæc, hoc.

Eva. Nominativo, hig, hag, hog;-pray you, mark: genitivo, hujus: Well, what is your accusative case? Will. Accusativo, hinc.

Eva. I pray you, have your remembrance, child; Accusativo, hing, hang, hog.

Quick. Hang hog is Latin for bacon, I warrant you. Eva. Leave your prabbles, 'oman. What is the focative case, William?

Will. O-vocativo, O.

Eva. Remember, William; focative is, caret.

Quick. And that's a good root.

Eva. 'Oman, forbear.

Mrs. Page. Peace. ·

Eva. What is your genitive case plural, William?
Will. Genitive case?

Eva. Ay.

Will. Genitive,-horum, harum, horum.

Quick. 'Vengeance of Jenny's case! fie on her!never name her, child, if she be a whore.

Evu. For shame, 'oman.

Quick. You do ill to teach the child such words: he teaches him to hick and to hack, which they 'll do fast enough of themselves; and to call horum;-fie upon you!

Eva. 'Oman, art thou lunatics? hast thou no understandings for thy cases, and the numbers of the genders? Thou art as foolish christian creatures as I would desires.

Mrs. Page. Pr'y thee, hold thy peace.

Eva. Shew me now, William, some declensions of your pronouns.

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horum, harum, horum.] Taylor, the water-poet, has borrowed this jest, such as it is, in his character of a strumpet: "And come to horum, harum, whorum, then

"She proves a great proficient among men."

Steevens.

6 to hick and to hack,] Sir William Blackstone thought, that this, in Dame Quickly's language, signifies "to stammer or hesitate, as boys do in saying their lessons;" but Mr. Steevens, with more probability, supposes that it signifies, in her dialect, të do mischief. Malone.

Will. Forsooth, I have forgot.

Eva. It is ki, ka, cod; if you forget your kies, your kas, and your cods, you must be preeches.

ways, and play, go.

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Go your

Mrs. Page. He is a better scholar, than I thought he

was.

Eva. He is a good sprag9 memory. Farewel, mistress Page.

Mrs. Page. Adieu, good sir Hugh. [Exit Sir HUGH] Get you home, boy.-Come, we stay too long.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II.

A Room in Ford's House.

Enter FALSTAFF and Mrs. FORD.

Fal. Mistress Ford, your sorrow hath eaten up my sufferance: I see, you are obsequious in your love,1 and I profess requital to a hair's breadth; not only, mistress Ford, in the simple office of love, but in all the accoutrement, complement, and ceremony of it. But. are you sure of your husband now?

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· your kies, your kæs, &c.] All this ribaldry is likewise found in Taylor the water-poet. See fol. edit. p. 106. Steevens. • you must be preeches.] Sir Hugh means to say-you must be breeched, i. e. flogged. To breech is to flog. So, in The Taming of the Shrew:

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"I am no breeching scholar in the schools."

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Again, in The Humorous Lieutenant, by Beaumont and Fletcher: Cry like a breech'd boy, not eat a bit." Steevens. sprag] I am told that this word is still used by the common people in the neighbourhood of Bath, where it signifies ready, alert, sprightly, and is pronounced as if it was writtensprack. Steevens.

A spackt lad or wench, says Ray, is apt to learn, ingenious.

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Reed.

- your sorrow hath eaten up my sufferance: I see, you are obsequious in your love,] So, in Hamlet:

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for some term

"To do obsequious sorrow."

The epithet obsequious refers, in both instances, to the serious. ness with which obsequies, or funeral ceremonies, are performed.

Steevens.

Mrs. Ford. He's a birding, sweet sir John.

Mrs. Page. [Within] What hoa, gossip Ford! what hoa!

Mrs. Ford. Step into the chamber, sir John.

Enter Mrs. PAGE.

[Exit FAL.

Mrs. Page. How now, sweetheart? who's at home besides yourself?

Mrs Ford. Why, none but mine own people.
Mrs. Page, Indeed?

Mrs. Ford. No, certainly;-Speak louder. [Aside. Mrs. Page Truly, I am so glad you have nobody here.

Mrs. Ford. Why?

Mrs. Page. Why, woman, your husband is in his old lunes again: he so takes on2 yonder with my husband; so rails against all married mankind; so curses all Eve's daughters, of what complexion soever; and so buffets himself on the forehead, crying, Peer-out, peerout! that any madness, I ever yet beheld, seemed but tameness, civility, and patience, to this distemper he is in now I am glad the fat knight is not here.

Mrs. Ford. Why, does he talk of him?

Mrs. Page. Of none but him; and swears, he was carried out, the last time he searched for him, in a basket: protests to my husband, he is now here; and hath drawn him and the rest of their company from their sport, to make another experiment of his suspicion: but I am glad the knight is not here; now he shall see his own foolery.

2 he so takes on ] To take on, which is now used for to grieve, seems to be used by our author for to rage. Perhaps it was applied to any passion. Johnson.

It is used by Nash in Pierce Penniless his Supplication to the Devil, 1592, in the same sense: "Some will take on like a madman, if they see a pig come to the table."

3 Peer-out!] That is, appear horns.

old lunes. Johnson.

Malone.

Shakspeare is at his

Shakspeare here refers to the practice of children, when they call on a snail to push forth his horns :

"Peer out, peer out, peer out of your hole,

"Or else I'll beat you black as a coal." Henley.

Mrs. Ford. How near is he, mistress Page

Mrs. Page. Hard by; at street end; he will be here

anon.

Mrs. Ford. I am undone !—the knight is here.

Mrs. Page. Why, then you are utterly shamed, and he's but a dead man. What a woman are you;Away with him, away with him; better shame than murder.

Mrs. Ford. Which way should he go? how should I bestow him? Shall I put him into the basket again? Re-enter FALSTAFF.

Fal. No, I'll come no more i' the basket: May I not go out, ere he come?

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Mrs. Page, Alas, three of master Ford's brothers watch the door with pistols, that none shall issue out; otherwise you might slip away ere he came. But what make you here?5

Fal. What shall I do?—I'll creep up into the chim

ney.

Mrs. Ford. There they always use to discharge their birding pieces: Creep into the kiln-hole.

Fal. Where is it?

Mrs. Ford. He will seek there, on my word. Neither press, coffer, chest, trunk, well, vault, but he hath an abstract for the remembrance of such places, and goes

·watch the door with pistols,] This is one of Shakspeare's anachronisms. Douce.

Thus, in Pericles, Prince of Tyre, Thaliard says:

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"Can get him once within my pistol's length," &c.

and Thaliard was one of the courtiers of Antiochus the third, who reigned 200 years before Christ; a period rather too early for the use of pistols. Steevens.

5 But what make you here?] i. e. what do you here? Malone. The same phrase occurs in the first scene of As you like it : "Now, sir! what make you here?" Steevens.

6 creep into the kiln-hole.] I suspect, these words belong to Mrs. Fage. See Mrs. Ford's next speech. That, however, may be a second thought; a correction of her former proposal: but the other supposition is more probable. Malone. 7 --- an abstract -] i. e. a list, an inventory. Rather, a short note or description. So, in Hamlet: "The abstract, and brief chronicle of the times." Malone.

Steevens.

to them by his note: there is no hiding you in the house.

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Mrs. Page. If you go out in your own semblance, you die, sir John. Unless you go out disguised,— Mrs. Ford. How might we disguise him?

Mrs. Page. Alas the day, I know not. There is no woman's gown big enough for him; otherwise, he might put on a hat, a muffler, and a kerchief, and so escape. Fal. Good hearts, devise something: any extremity, rather than a mischief.

Mrs. Ford. My maid's aunt, the fat woman of Brentford, has a gown above.

Mrs. Page. On my word, it will serve him; she's as big as he is: and there's her thrum'd hat, and her muffler too: Run up, sir John.

Mrs. Ford. Go, go, sweet sir John: mistress Page and I, will look some linen for your head.

Mrs. Page. Quick, quick: we 'll come dress you straight: put on the gown the while. [Exit FAL.

Mrs. Ford. I would, my husband would meet him in this shape: he cannot abide the old woman of Brentford; he swears, she 's a witch; forbade her my house, and hath threatened to beat her.

Mrs. Page. Heaven guide him to thy husband's cudgel; and the devil guide his cudgel afterwards!

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her thrum'd hat, and her muffler too:] The thrum is the end of a weaver's warp, and, we may suppose, was used for the purpose of making coarse hats. So, in A Midsummer Night's

Dream:

"O fates, come, come,

"Cut thread and thrum."

A muffler was some part of dress that covered the face. So,, in The Cobler's Prophecy, 1594:

"Now is she bare fac'd to be seen:-strait on her Muffler

goes."

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Again, in Laneham's account of Queen Elizabeth's entertainment at Kenelworth castle, 1575: " his mother lent him a nu mufflar for a napkin, that was tyed to hiz gyrdl for lozyng." Steevens. The muffler was a part of female attire, which only covered the lower half of the face. Douce.

A thrum'd hat was made of very coarse woollen cloth. See Minsheu's DICT. 1617, in v. Thrum'd is, form'd of thrums.

Malone.

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