The Merry Wives of Windsor

of the pronoun, and be thus declined: Singulariter, nominativo; hic, haec, hoc. Sir Hugh Evans Nominativo, hig, hag, hog; pray you, mark: genitivo, hujus. Well, what is your accusative case? William Accusativo, hinc. Sir Hugh Evans I pray you, have your remembrance, child. Accusativo, hung, hang, hog. Mistress Quickly “Hang-hog” is Latin for bacon, I warrant you. Sir Hugh Evans Leave your prabbles, ’oman. What is the focative case, William? William Scratches his head. O vocativo, O. Sir Hugh Evans Remember, William: focative is caret. Mistress Quickly And that’s a good root. Sir Hugh Evans ’Oman, forbear. Mistress Page Peace. Sir Hugh Evans What is your genitive case plural, William? William Genitive case? Sir Hugh Evans Ay. William Genitive: horum, harum, horum. Mistress Quickly Vengeance of Jenny’s case; fie on her! Never name her, child, if she be a whore. Sir Hugh Evans For shame, ’oman. Mistress Quickly 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! Sir Hugh Evans ’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. Mistress Page To Mistress Quickly. Prithee, hold thy peace. Sir Hugh Evans Show me now, William, some declensions of your pronouns. William Forsooth, I have forgot. Sir Hugh Evans It is qui, quae, quod; if you forget your “quis,” your “quaes,” and your “quods,” you must be preeches. Go your ways and play; go. Mistress Page He is a better scholar than I thought he was. Sir Hugh Evans He is a good sprag memory. Farewell, Mistress Page. Mistress Page Adieu, good Sir Hugh. Exit Sir Hugh Evans. Get you home, boy. Come, we stay too long. Exeunt.

Scene II

A room in Ford’s house; the buck-basket in a corner.

	Enter Falstaff and Mistress Ford.
Falstaff	Mistress Ford, your sorrow hath eaten up my sufferance. I see you are obsequious in your love, 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?
Mistress Ford	He’s a-birding, sweet Sir John.
Mistress Page	Within. What ho! gossip Ford, what ho!
Mistress Ford	Opening a door. Step into the chamber, Sir John.
	Exit Falstaff, leaving the door ajar.
	Enter Mistress Page.
Mistress Page	How now, sweetheart! who’s at home besides yourself?
Mistress Ford	Why, none but mine own people.
Mistress Page	Indeed!
Mistress Ford	No, certainly.⁠—Aside to her. Speak louder.
Mistress Page	Truly, I am so glad you have nobody here.
Mistress Ford	Why?
Mistress Page	Why, woman, your husband is in his old lunes again. He so takes on 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, peer out!” that any madness I ever yet beheld seemed but tameness, civility, and patience, to this his distemper he is in now. I am glad the fat knight is not here.
Mistress Ford	Why, does he talk of him?
Mistress 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.
Mistress Ford	How near is he, Mistress Page?
Mistress Page	Hard by, at street end; he will be here anon.
Mistress Ford	I am undone! the knight is here.
Mistress 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.
	Falstaff peers forth from the chamber.
Mistress Ford	Which way should he go? How should I bestow him? Shall I put him into the basket again?
	Re-enter Falstaff.
Falstaff	No, I’ll come no more i’ the basket. May I not go out ere he come?
Mistress 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?
Falstaff	What shall I do? I’ll creep up into the chimney.
Mistress Ford	There they always use to discharge their birding-pieces.
Mistress Page	Creep into the kiln-hole.
Falstaff	Where is it?
Mistress 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 to them by his note: there is no hiding you in the house.
Falstaff	At bay. I’ll go out then.
Mistress Page	If you go out in your own semblance, you die, Sir John. Unless you go out disguised⁠—
Mistress Ford	How might we disguise him?
Mistress 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.
Falstaff	Good hearts, devise something: any extremity rather than a mischief.
Mistress Ford	My maid’s aunt, the fat woman of Brainford, has a gown above.
Mistress Page	On my word, it will serve him; she’s as big as he is; and there’s her thrummed hat, and her muffler too. Run up, Sir John.
Mistress Ford	Go, go, sweet Sir John. Mistress Page and I will look some linen for your head.
Mistress Page	Quick, quick! we’ll come dress you straight; put on the gown the while.
	Exit Falstaff.
Mistress Ford	I would my husband would meet him in this shape; he cannot abide the old woman of Brainford; he swears she’s a witch, forbade her my house, and hath threatened to beat her.
Mistress Page	Heaven guide him to thy husband’s cudgel; and the devil guide his cudgel afterwards!
Mistress Ford	But is my husband coming?
Mistress