KING

  I suppose this news disrupts our plans to invade the Holy Land.

  WESTMORELAND

  This and other things, your Highness: even more unsettling and unwelcome news has arrived from the north. On Holy Cross Day, the heroic young Harry Percy—who we know as Hotspur—fought at Holmeden against Archibald, Earl of Douglas, that brave and battle-proven Scotsman. The two of them fought a long and bloody battle there, judging by the way the guns were firing. The messenger who brought the news left when the battle was at its height, so he couldn’t say for sure who had won.

  KING

  My loyal, hard-working friend Sir Walter Blunt has arrived here at court, fresh off his horse and covered with the mud of every town from Holmedon to here. He’s brought us very welcome news. The Earl of Douglas has been defeated. Blunt saw ten thousand Scotsmen and twenty-two knights piled up in their own blood on the fields of Holmedon. Hotspur took these men prisoner: Douglas’ son Mordake, the Earl of Fife; as well as the Earls of Athol, Murray, Angus, and Menteith. That’s a valuable group! A fantastic catch, isn’t it, kinsman?

  WESTMORELAND

  Truly, that’s a conquest to make even a prince brag.

  KING

  Yes, and that makes me sad. Seeing Lord Northumberland with such a blessed son makes me commit the sin of envy. When honor speaks, it speaks about Hotspur. In a grove of trees, Hotspur stands straightest. He is the favorite darling of Fortune. When I see how he is praised, I can only see my own son, Harry, and his reputation for wildness and dishonor. If only it could be proven that a fairy had come to their cradles at night and switched them! Then the Percy family would have my Harry, and we Plantagenets would have Hotspur! But stop thinking about Harry now. Westmoreland, what do you make of young Percy’s arrogance? He says he’ll keep all the prisoners he captured for himself, and will only send me Mordrake, Earl of Fife.

  WESTMORELAND

  His uncle Worcester put him up to that. It is just like Worcester to act against you in all ways. He’s the one making Hotspur behave like this, flaunting his youth in the face of your dignified age.

  KING

  I’ve sent for Hotspur to explain himself. We’ll have to postpone the plans for our crusade to Jerusalem. Go tell my advisers that our next meeting will be Wednesday at Windsor. Then hurry back here. There’s more to be said and done, but I’m too angry now to speak.

  WESTMORELAND

  I will, my lord.

  They exit.

  ACT 1 SCENE 2

  Original Text

  Enter HENRY, PRINCE of Wales, and Sir John FALSTAFF

  FALSTAFF

  Now, Hal, what time of day is it, lad?

  PRINCE HENRY

  Thou art so fat-witted, with drinking of old sack, and unbuttoning thee after supper, and sleeping upon benches after noon, that thou hast forgotten to demand that truly

  5

  which thou wouldst truly know. What a devil hast thou to do with the time of the day? Unless hours were cups of sack, and minutes capons, and clocks the tongues of bawds, and dials the signs of leaping-houses, and the blessed sun himself a fair hot wench in flame-colored taffeta, I see no

  10

  reason why thou shouldst be so superfluous to demand the time of the day.

  FALSTAFF

  Indeed, you come near me now, Hal, for we that take purses go by the moon and the seven stars, and not by Phoebus, he, that wand’ring knight so fair. And I prithee, sweet wag,

  15

  when thou art king, as God save thy Grace—Majesty, I should say, for grace thou wilt have none—

  PRINCE HENRY

  What, none?

  FALSTAFF

  No, by my troth, not so much as will serve to be prologue to an egg and butter.

  PRINCE HENRY

  20

  Well, how then? Come, roundly, roundly.

  FALSTAFF

  Marry, then, sweet wag, when thou art king, let not us that are squires of the night’s body be called thieves of the day’s beauty. Let us be Diana’s foresters, gentlemen of the shade, minions of the moon, and let men say we be men of good

  25

  government, being governed, as the sea is, by our noble and chaste mistress the moon, under whose countenance we steal.

  PRINCE HENRY

  Thou sayest well, and it holds well too, for the fortune of us that are the moon’s men doth ebb and flow like the sea,

  30

  being governed, as the sea is, by the moon. As for proof now: a purse of gold most resolutely snatched on Monday night and most dissolutely spent on Tuesday morning, got with swearing “Lay by” and spent with crying “Bring in”; now in as low an ebb as the foot of the ladder, and by and by

  35

  in as high a flow as the ridge of the gallows.

  FALSTAFF

  By the Lord, thou sayest true, lad. And is not my hostess of the tavern a most sweet wench?

  PRINCE HENRY

  As the honey of Hybla, my old lad of the castle. And is not a buff jerkin a most sweet robe of durance?

  FALSTAFF

  40

  How now, how now, mad wag? What, in thy quips and thy quiddities? What a plague have I to do with a buff jerkin?

  PRINCE HENRY

  Why, what a pox have I to do with my hostess of the tavern?

  FALSTAFF

  Well, thou hast called her to a reckoning many a time and oft.

  PRINCE HENRY

  45

  Did I ever call for thee to pay thy part?

  FALSTAFF

  No, I’ll give thee thy due. Thou hast paid all there.

  PRINCE HENRY

  Yea, and elsewhere, so far as my coin would stretch, and where it would not, I have used my credit.

  FALSTAFF

  Yea, and so used it that were it not here apparent that thou

  50

  art heir apparent—But I prithee, sweet wag, shall there be gallows standing in England when thou art king? And resolution thus fubbed as it is with the rusty curb of old father Antic the law? Do not thou, when thou art king, hang a thief.

  PRINCE HENRY

  55

  No, thou shalt.

  FALSTAFF

  Shall I? O rare! By the Lord, I’ll be a brave judge.

  PRINCE HENRY

  Thou judgest false already: I mean thou shalt have the hanging of the thieves, and so become a rare hangman.

  FALSTAFF

  Well, Hal, well, and in some sort it jumps with my humor

  60

  as well as waiting in the court, I can tell you.

  PRINCE HENRY

  For obtaining of suits?

  FALSTAFF

  Yea, for obtaining of suits, whereof the hangman hath no lean wardrobe. ’Sblood, I am as melancholy as a gib cat or a lugged bear.

  PRINCE HENRY

  65

  Or an old lion, or a lover’s lute.

  FALSTAFF

  Yea, or the drone of a Lincolnshire bagpipe.

  PRINCE HENRY

  What sayest thou to a hare, or the melancholy of Moorditch?

  FALSTAFF

  Thou hast the most unsavory similes, and art indeed the

  70

  most comparative, rascaliest, sweet young Prince. But, Hal, I prithee trouble me no more with vanity. I would to God thou and I knew where a commodity of good names were to be bought. An old lord of the council rated me the other day in the street about you, sir, but I marked him not,

  75

  and yet he talked very wisely, but I regarded him not, and yet he talked wisely, and in the street, too.

  PRINCE HENRY

  Thou didst well, for wisdom cries out in the streets and no man regards it.

  FALSTAFF

  O, thou hast damnable iteration, and art indeed able to

  80

  corrupt a saint. Thou hast done much harm upon me, Hal, God forgive thee for it. Before I knew thee, Hal, I knew nothing, and now am I, if a man should speak truly, little better than one of the wicked. I must give over this life, and I will give it over. By the Lord, an I do not, I am a villain. I’ll

  85

  be damned for never a king’s son in Christendom.

  PRINCE HENRY

  Where shall we take a purse tomorrow, Jack?

  FALSTAFF

  Zounds, where thou wilt, lad. I’ll make one. An I do not, call me villain and baffle me.

  PRINCE HENRY

  I see a good amendment of life in thee, from praying to

  90

  purse-taking.

  FALSTAFF

  Why, Hal, ’tis my vocation, Hal. ’Tis no sin for a man to labor in his vocation.

  Enter POINS

  Poins!—Now shall we know if Gadshill have set a match. O, if men were to be saved by merit, what hole in hell were

  95

  hot enough for him? This is the most omnipotent villain that ever cried “Stand!” to a true man.

  PRINCE HENRY

  Good morrow, Ned.

  POINS

  Good morrow, sweet Hal.—What says Monsieur Remorse? What says Sir John Sack-and-Sugar? Jack, how

  100

  agrees the devil and thee about thy soul that thou soldest him on Good Friday last for a cup of Madeira and a cold capon’s leg?

  PRINCE HENRY

  Sir John stands to his word. The devil shall have his bargain, for he was never yet a breaker of proverbs. He will give the

  105

  devil his due.

  POINS

  (to FALSTAFF) Then art thou damned for keeping thy word with the devil.

  PRINCE HENRY

  Else he had been damned for cozening the devil.

  POINS

  But, my lads, my lads, tomorrow morning, by four o’clock,

  110

  early at Gad’s Hill, there are pilgrims going to Canterbury with rich offerings, and traders riding to London with fat purses. I have vizards for you all. You have horses for yourselves. Gadshill lies tonight in Rochester. I have bespoke supper tomorrow night in Eastcheap. We may do

  115

  it as secure as sleep. If you will go, I will stuff your purses full of crowns. If you will not, tarry at home and be hanged.

  FALSTAFF

  Hear ye, Yedward, if I tarry at home and go not, I’ll hang you for going.

  POINS

  You will, chops?

  FALSTAFF

  120

  Hal, wilt thou make one?

  PRINCE HENRY

  Who, I rob? I a thief? not I, by my faith.

  FALSTAFF

  There’s neither honesty, manhood, nor good fellowship in thee, nor thou cam’st not of the blood royal, if thou darest not stand for ten shillings.

  PRINCE HENRY

  125

  Well then, once in my days I’ll be a madcap.

  FALSTAFF

  Why, that’s well said.

  PRINCE HENRY

  Well, come what will, I’ll tarry at home.

  FALSTAFF

  By the Lord, I’ll be a traitor then when thou art king.

  PRINCE HENRY

  I care not.

  POINS

  130

  Sir John, I prithee, leave the Prince and me alone. I will lay him down such reasons for this adventure that he shall go.

  FALSTAFF

  Well, God give thee the spirit of persuasion, and him the ears of profiting, that what thou speakest may move, and what he hears may be believed, that the true prince may, for

  135

  recreation sake, prove a false thief, for the poor abuses of the time want countenance. Farewell. You shall find me in Eastcheap.

  PRINCE HENRY

  Farewell, thou latter spring. Farewell, All-hallown summer.

  Exit FALSTAFF

  POINS

  140

  Now, my good sweet honey lord, ride with us tomorrow. I have a jest to execute that I cannot manage alone. Falstaff, Peto, Bardolph, and Gadshill shall rob those men that we have already waylaid. Yourself and I will not be there. And when they have the booty, if you and I do not rob them, cut

  145

  this head off from my shoulders.

  PRINCE HENRY

  How shall we part with them in setting forth?

  POINS

  Why, we will set forth before or after them, and appoint them a place of meeting, wherein it is at our pleasure to fail; and then will they adventure upon the exploit themselves,

  150

  which they shall have no sooner achieved but we’ll set upon them.

  PRINCE HENRY

  Yea, but ’tis like that they will know us by our horses, by our habits, and by every other appointment to be ourselves.

  POINS

  Tut, our horses they shall not see; I’ll tie them in the wood.

  155

  Our vizards we will change after we leave them. And, sirrah, I have cases of buckram for the nonce, to immask our noted outward garments.

  PRINCE HENRY

  Yea, but I doubt they will be too hard for us.

  POINS

  Well, for two of them, I know them to be as true-bred

  160

  cowards as ever turned back; and for the third, if he fight longer than he sees reason, I’ll forswear arms. The virtue of this jest will be the incomprehensible lies that this same fat rogue will tell us when we meet at supper: how thirty at least he fought with, what wards, what blows, what extremities

  165

  he endured; and in the reproof of this lies the jest.

  PRINCE HENRY

  Well, I’ll go with thee. Provide us all things necessary and meet me tomorrow night in Eastcheap. There I’ll sup. Farewell.

  POINS

  Farewell, my lord.

  Exit POINS

  PRINCE HENRY

  170

  I know you all, and will awhile uphold

  The unyoked humor of your idleness.

  Yet herein will I imitate the sun,

  Who doth permit the base contagious clouds

  To smother up his beauty from the world,

  175

  That, when he please again to be himself,

  Being wanted, he may be more wondered at

  By breaking through the foul and ugly mist

  Of vapors that did seem to strangle him.

  If all the year were playing holidays,

  180

  To sport would be as tedious as to work,

  But when they seldom come, they wished for come,

  And nothing pleaseth but rare accidents.

  So when this loose behavior I throw off

  And pay the debt I never promisèd,

  185

  By how much better than my word I am,

  By so much shall I falsify men’s hopes;

  And, like bright metal on a sullen ground,

  My reformation, glitt’ring o’er my fault,

  Shall show more goodly and attract more eyes

  190

  Than that which hath no foil to set it off.

  I’ll so offend to make offense a skill,

  Redeeming time when men think least I will.

  Exit

  ACT 1, SCENE 2

  Modern Text

  HENRY, PRINCE of Wales and Sir John FALSTAFF enter.

  FALSTAFF

  Hal, what time is it, my boy?

  PRINCE HENRY

  You are so wasted from drinking booze and loosening your pants after lunch and sleeping on benches all afternoon that you don’t even remember how to ask for what you really want to know. What the hell does it matter to you what time it is? Unless hours were glasses of wine, minutes were chickens, clocks were whores’ tongues, sundials were whorehouse signs and the sun itself were a hot woman in a flame-colored dress, I don’t see any reason why you would need to know the time.

  FALSTAFF

  Now you’re talking, Hal. Thieves like us operate at night, by the moon and stars, and not by the sun. I hope, pretty boy, that when you become king, God save your Grace—or maybe I should just call you “Your Majesty,” since you don’t have any grace—

  PRINCE HENRY

  None?

  FALSTAFF

  No, I swear. Not even enough to say grace before a snack.

  PRINCE HENRY

  Come on, out with it. Get to the point.

  FALSTAFF

  Okay then, pretty boy. Whey you become king, don’t let those of us who work at night be blamed for wasting daylight by sleeping through it. Give us fancy names: “Servants of the Moon Goddess Diana;” “Gentlemen of Shadows;” “Lunar Laborers.” Make people admire us for being well behaved. After all, we’re governed by the same force that governs the tides—the pale and cool moon, who lights our way as we sneak around.

  PRINCE HENRY

  Well said. And you’re right—our luck ebbs and flows like the tide, because, like the sea, we’re governed by the moon. I’ll prove it. Imagine a bag of gold, brilliantly swiped on a Monday night and extravagantly spent on a Tuesday morning. You snatch it, shouting, “Hand it off!” and spend it, calling, “Bring it on!” It’s like the gallows: one minute you’re at the bottom of the ladder—low tide. The next, you’re swinging from the top—high tide!

  FALSTAFF

  By God that’s right, my boy! And by the way, isn’t the hostess of the tavern a delicious woman?

  PRINCE HENRY

  Sweet as honey from Hybla, you dirty old man. And isn’t a sheriff’s uniform a pretty durable outfit?

  FALSTAFF

  What’s that supposed to mean, you crazy man? You’re in the mood for jokes? Why are you talking to me about a sheriff’s uniform?

  PRINCE HENRY

  Well, why the hell are you asking me about the hostess of the tavern?

  FALSTAFF

  You’ve asked her for the bill enough times.

  PRINCE HENRY