51–2 off … come] Rowe subst.; off, you know to come Q; off: you know, to come F 55] Q; not in F 56 By my troth] Q; Why F 58 i’good truth] Q; in good troth F

  59–60 What the goodyear! a mild imprecation, probably akin to ‘What the devil!’ According to the OED, ‘goodyear’ denotes ‘some undefined malefic power or agency’ (sb. b).

  60–1 One … vessel ‘A woman is the weaker vessel’ was proverbial and derived from 1 Peter, 3.7 (Dent, W655). The Hostess yokes it to the cliché that ‘Women are made to bear’ (TS 2.1.200), in which the implied objects of bearing are children, household burdens and men. Here, she admonishes Doll to suffer indignities in silence – that is, to put up with Falstaff. In addition to denoting a woman’s body, vessel is a pun meaning (1) a receptacle or container, or (2) a merchant ship – on both of which meanings Doll plays at 63–6.

  63 empty vessel a ship with no cargo, or a woman’s body unoccupied sexually

  64 hogshead literally, a wine barrel; figuratively, a swinish lout. Doll implies that so weak a vessel as she may not be able to bear the weight of Falstaff.

  64–5 merchant’s … stuff shipload of Bordeaux wine; merchant’s venture alludes to the risk of losing both ship and cargo at sea.

  65–6 hulk … hold transport ship with more cargo crammed below decks; so, figuratively, a hulking man with so fat a gut. The image of Doll as a vessel is here silently transferred to Falstaff: cf. 1.1.19.

  68.1 *F does not clarify which, if either, of the drawers who speak at the opening of the scene returns; in Q, however, it may be inferred that because Francis is regularly named in SPs, the unnamed drawer enters here.

  69 Ancient Pistol Ensign Pistol: a military rank, but perhaps, as with Corporal Bardolph, an honorific title either self-conferred or conferred by Captain Falstaff. All three titles are inappropriate and unearned (Jorgensen, World, 65). Pistol, however, is appropriately named. The early pistol was a noisy weapon likely to go off at half-cock; and if pronounced Peesel or ‘Pizzle’ (as the Hostess insists at 162), it is a pun on a slang term for penis as well: hence, Ancient Pistol can mean ‘old prick’. Davison suggests a possible derivation from the Italian pistolfo, which John Florio defined in 1611 as ‘a roguing beggar, a cantler, an upright man that liveth by cozenage’.

  60 goodyear] Q (goodyere), F (good-yere) 60 SD] Rowe (after 62), Hudson; not in QF 65 Bordeaux] QF (Burdeux) 69 Pistol’s] Q; Pistoll is F

  71 swaggering bullying, boastful. Pistol is stereotyped as a ‘roaring boy’, a traditional braggart soldier or miles gloriosus who, according to Dekker’s Diuels Last Will and Testament (Non-Dramatic, 3.354), is noted for ‘swaggering, or swearing three pil’d oathes in a Tauerne’. Humphreys cites Nashe’s Terrors of the Night, which admonishes such quarrellers, who ‘beare the name of souldiers, and liue baselie swaggering in euerie ale-house, hauing no other exhibition but from harlots and strumpets’, to ‘seeke some newe trade, and leaue whoring and quarrelling, least besides the nightly guilt of youre owne banqurout consciences, Bridewell or Newgate prooue the ende of your caueleering’ (Works, 1.384). Chapman, in Achilles Shield (1598, sig. B2), identifies swaggering as a ‘new word’ privileged ‘with much imitation’.

  72 It he

  74–5 I’ll no A verb such as ‘allow’ is understood.

  76 the very best people of repute. The Hostess is defensive about her reputation: cf. 84–96.

  80 pacify yourself be satisfied; keep quiet

  83 Tilly-fally a silly exclamation akin to ‘nonsense’ or ‘fiddlesticks’. Cf. TN 2.3.77: ‘Tilly-vally, lady!’

  ne’er tell me an expression of incredulity or impatience

  83–4 *An … ’a Q’s syntax does not make sense. Humphreys was the first editor to accept Maxwell’s emendation of Q’s ‘swaggrer’ to swagger a (a = he), words which might easily have been misread by a compositor. Q’s ampersand (‘&’) for An (= if), furthermore, would seem to require a conditional clause to follow: Maxwell’s emendation provides that. F omits ‘and’, thus allowing the Hostess simply to repeat her warning from 76–7.

  73–4 No … faith,] Q; not in F 74 among] Q; amongst F 80 Pray ye] Q; ‘Pray you F 83 ne’er] Q; neuer F An] Q (&); not in F 84 swagger, ’a] Ard2 (Maxwell); swaggrer Q; Swaggerer F

  85 Master … debuty The spelling of ‘deputy’ in Q probably reveals the Hostess’s pronunciation. Tisick (or ‘phthisic’), meaning consumptive or racked by a cough, makes a satirical name for a deputy, a petty magistrate who served a City ward in the same capacity as an alderman. Apparently Tisick has summoned the Hostess for keeping a disorderly house; the warning she received would explain why she is so defensive about her reputation. The discursive style of her speech, with its interruptions and piling up of homely detail, recalls that of her speech at 2.1.84–102 and is much like that of Juliet’s Nurse in RJ 1.3.16–48.

  88 Master Dumbe probably an allusion the Puritan term ‘dumb dogs’ for those unzealous clergymen who did not preach their own sermons, or failed to preach at all: ‘Their watchemen are all blinde: they haue no knowledge: they are all domme dogs: thei can not barke’ (Isaiah, 56.10, Geneva Bible).

  89 receive … civil admit (to your tavern) only those who behave decently

  90 are … name have earned a bad reputation. The Hostess has protested her own good name at 75.

  91 whereupon the reason why

  honest spoken of a woman, honest usually means chaste. Here, it means respectable.

  94 companions fellows; probably said contemptuously

  95 bless you say ‘Bless me!’, or make the sign of the cross; i.e. be shocked

  97 tame cheater cant phrase for a con artist who appears innocuous so as not to dissuade others from gaming with him, as opposed to a swaggerer who might drive them off with quarrelling

  99 swagger quarrel

  barbary hen guinea fowl, whose feathers are easily ruffled; also slang for a prostitute

  85 debuty t’other] Q; Deputie, the other F 86 ’twas] Q; it was F Wed’sday] Q (wedsday); Wednesday F 87 i’good faith] Q (I good faith); ay, good faith Cam2; not in F 88 Dumbe] Q, F (Dombe) 90 said]1 Q; sayth F ’a] Q; hee F 98 i’faith] Q; hee F 99 He’ll] Q (heele); hee will F

  102–3 I … cheater By distinguishing an honest man from a cheater, the Hostess seems to understand the latter to be dishonest: see 97n. But immorality does not seem to bother her; swaggering does. Warburton (after Theobald) spied another Quicklyism here, arguing that she confuses cheater with escheater, the collector of escheats due to the Crown.

  104 by my troth Though most editors punctuate so that this phrase belongs to the clause that follows, Q punctuates so that it reaffirms the previous declaration.

  I … worse ‘I feel ill.’

  106 I warrant you See 2.1.22n.

  108–9 1an … leaf as if I were an aspen leaf: a proverbial simile (Dent, L140)

  109.1 *Q’s ‘Bardolfes boy’ may be a compositor’s misreading of ‘Bardolfe & boy’, for otherwise Bardolph’s entrance would not be noted. The boy could be Bardolph’s own attendant, but more likely he is Falstaff’s page, who accompanied Bardolph at 2.2.66 and would probably do so again here.

  111–13 I … hostess The puns yoking military and sexual behaviour begun at 51 resume here, this time focusing on the multiple potentials of Pistol’s name (see 69n.): charge means both to offer a toast and to load a pistol; discharge means to empty the cup, to fire the pistol and to ejaculate – with the Hostess in each instance receiving the shots. Other plays of the period had similar puns. Cf. John Cooke, Green’s Tu Quoque: ‘Purse: Here, Mistress Tickleman, shall I charge you? Tickle: Do your worst, serjeant’ (Dodsley, 11.197); Chapman, Gentleman Usher: ‘Come pledge me wench, for I am drie againe, / And strait will charge your widdowhod fresh ifaith’ (2.1.18 – 19); and Webster, Duchess of Malfi: ‘a Switzer … with a pistol in his great cod-piece’ (2.2.36–8).

  101 SD] Capell; not in QF 104 by my troth.] Q; not in F 108 an ’twere] Q (and twere); if it were F 109.1] Rowe subst.; Enter antient Pistol, and Bardolfes boy. Q; Enter Pistol, and Bardolph and his Boy. F 110 God save] Q; ’Saue F

  114–15 with two bullets literally, from his pistol; metaphorically, from his testicles or, by extension, with two shots of semen

  116 pistol-proof ‘immune to pricks, pox, pregnancy, and Pistol himself’ (Williams, Glossary, 58)

  116–17 not … her (1) not injure her in any way (not hardly = scarcely); but also (2) not harm her with your hardness, with hardly as a bawdy pun on erection

  118 I’ll … bullets The Hostess seems to mistake bullets for a term like proofs, meaning, in context, small measures of distilled spirits; but the sexual innuendo suggests that she is unwilling to swallow Pistol’s semen. That she realizes the banter is bawdy becomes clear when she protests, ‘For no man’s pleasure, I’ (119–20).

  121–3 Then … me? Rebuffed by the Hostess, Pistol decides to toast (charge) Doll instead (to you). Doll, however, takes charge to mean sexually accost.

  123 scurvy companion scurvy, meaning covered with scabs, was a term of abuse: worthless, contemptible. For companion, see 94n.

  124–5 lack-linen mate fellow who cannot afford a shirt or, possibly, underwear. Cf. the inventory of Poins’s linen at 2.2.14–24.

  125, 130 mouldy literally, covered with mould, as at 146; figuratively, decaying or rotten – clearly one of Doll’s favourite insults

  125–6 meat … master Containing a pun on ‘mete’ and possibly on mate, for the words would have been nearly homophonic, this was proverbial for ‘too good for you’ (Dent, M837); but meat understood as ‘flesh’ keeps up the bawdy innuendo. Doll privileges Falstaff over Bardolph (your master) but in the process defines herself as a possession, and her value as a factor of her owner’s rank in the male hierarchy.

  127 I know you perhaps implying that he could reveal things to Doll’s discredit

  116 pistol-proof; sir,] pistoll proofe: sir, Q; Pistoll-proofe (Sir) F; pistol-proof, sir; Capell not] Q; not in F 118 2I’ll] Q; I will F

  128 cutpurse pickpocket, thief

  filthy bung thieves’ cant for a pickpocket: bung means purse. Melchiori speculates that filthy may originally have been ‘filch’; so, ‘filch-bung’. Since a bung also was a plug for a barrel (cf. Ham 5.1.194), the term may have had scatalogical force, as in the crude epithet bung-hole (for arsehole).

  130 chaps cheeks

  an … cuttle if you try your dirty tricks; ‘cuttle’ or ‘cuttle-bung’ was a cant term for a knife used to slit the straps holding purses, which usually hung from the girdle.

  saucy impertinent, rude

  131 bottle-ale possibly meaning cheap ale. Cf. small beer (2.2.6).

  131–2 basket-hilt stale juggler unfashionable buffoon (stale juggler) of the sort found at country fairs, who entertained the crowd by fencing with swords fitted with hilts in the shape of a basket to protect the hand: thus, an impostor

  132 Since when probably (1) ‘Since when have you known me, as you claim?’ (127), but possibly (2) ‘Since when have you been a soldier?’

  133 two … shoulder points were tags or laces used to fasten armour to the chest (cf. 1.1.53), so Doll is probably ridiculing Pistol’s makeshift military uniform. Melchiori speculates that she may be deriding her lack-linen mate (124–5), much as Falstaff does his recruits in 1H4 4.2.41–4, for wearing two napkins instead of a shirt (which he cannot afford) and securing them by points across the shoulder to make a half-shirt.

  Much! an expression of scornful incredulity: ‘What a lot you have to show (for your soldiership)!’

  134 murder your ruff Prostitutes during Elizabeth’s reign were known for wearing large ruffs around their necks, and the tearing off (murder) of such ruffs signified sexual assault in drama of the period. As an item of costume, the ruff is anachronistic in this play.

  136–7 The reason that these lines are omitted in F is unclear: they are bawdy, but no bawdier than many others. Davison suggests that the compositor’s eye-skip may have been responsible.

  136 go off more sexual play on Pistol’s name: (1) fire, and (2) ejaculate

  137 Discharge … company leave us; with a pun on discharge (see 111–13n.)

  138 Captain The Hostess, perhaps to pacify him, inflates Pistol’s rank, but her echo of Falstaff’s warning at 136–7 continues the double entendre.

  130 an] Q (and); if F 132–3 God’s light] Q; what F 134 God … but] Q; not in F 136–7] Q; not in F

  142 truncheon you out ‘truncheon’ (a club or cudgel) used as a verb: i.e. ‘beat you out of their ranks’

  142–4 for … them Pistol is not guilty as charged: the Hostess, not he himself, has commissioned him captain. Doll’s accusations, however, were warranted by bogus captains satirized in numerous other plays, in whose company an audience might justifiably have placed Pistol.

  144 slave term of contempt akin to rogue

  146–7 stewed … cakes scraps from brothels and pastry shops; stewed prunes were associated with brothels because they were thought to be ‘part of the cure for venereal disease’ and possibly a preventative against it, according to W. Clowes, The Cure of … Lues Venerea (1596), 161. Ard2 cites Dekker, Seven Deadly Sinnes (Non-Dramatic, 2.44), ‘a house where they set stewed Prunes before you’, and extended discussion of Mistress Elbow’s craving for stewed prunes in MM 2.1.88–112. The term came to signify bawds – Falstaff insults Mistress Quickly by comparing her to ‘a stewed prune’ in 1H4 3.3.112–13 – and brothels were commonly called ‘the stews’ (cf. 1.2.55). Williams (Glossary, 61) identifies cake as a term used for ‘woman in her sexual capacity’: thus dried cakes may mean whores past their prime – a term Doll employs to continue belittling Pistol’s sexual prowess.

  147–8 these villains base-minded scoundrels such as Pistol who, according to Doll, denigrate language by giving reputable words disreputable meanings. Shakespeare indulges in wry irony, since no scene in the entire canon plays with bawdy double entendres more than this one.

  148–50 1as … ill-sorted The word occupy fell into bad company (ill-sorted) when it became a popular euphemism for fornicate, as it is, Cowl observes (Ard1), in Heywood’s 2 If You Know Not Me, You Know No Body: ‘a prentise must not occupy for himself but for his master… . And he cannot occupy for his master, without the consent of his mistris’ (Heywood, 1.311); and in RJ 2.4.98–9: ‘for I was come to the whole depth of my tale and meant indeed to occupy the argument no longer’. In Discoveries, Jonson, a strange bedfellow for Doll, echoes her complaint that ‘Many, out of their owne obscene Apprehensions, refuse proper and fit words; as occupie, nature, and the like’ (8.610). The OED verifies this observation by illustrating how quickly occupy fell into disuse: 194 quotations exemplify its use in the 16th century, and only eight in the 17th (Cam2). Doll’s censure of the term is especially ironic, given her occupation. Cf. similar wordplay with accommodated, 3.2.66–72.

  141 An] Q (and); If F 147 God’s light] Q; not in F 148–50 word1 … ill-sorted]Q; word Captaine odious F

  150–1 need look to’t better beware

  153 Hark thee hither As ‘hark’ means ‘give ear’, Falstaff may be urging Doll to listen to him; more likely, he is beckoning to her to prevent a fray with Pistol.

  154 Corporal Pistol bestows a rank upon Bardolph beyond his deserts, much as the Hostess has done for him (cf. 138). Bardolph holds no military rank in 1H4 or MW, though in H5 Nym addresses him as Lieutenant (2.1.2).

  155 tear tear apart; do violent injury to. Pistol’s threat to Doll’s ruff is now transferred to her person: cf. 134–5.

  157–200 *In a sudden metamorphosis, Pistol’s language hereafter parodies the exaggerated heroic diction of plays written in the 1580s and early 1590s by Greene, Peele, Kyd, Marlowe and others – a fustian that was mercilessly mocked in John Eliot’s Ortho-epia Gallica (1593), whose Braggart provided a prototype for Pistol (see Lever, ‘French’). Though a few specific sources for Pistol’s lines are recorded here, the humour of his rant lies in its absurdly eclectic hodgepodge of classical tags, songs and bombast – in its burlesque of an outmoded style rather than particular passages. Through it, Shakespeare exposes Pistol’s soldiership as no more than theatrical imposture, the misremembered scraps of unfashionable plays. Editors since Pope and Capell have chosen to change all Pistol’s fustian – printed as prose in QF – into parodic verse lines: the textual notes record some of their decisions about what constitutes (often irregular) lines of iambic verse. But as George Wright has demonstrated, prose can often scan as iambic pentameter, and Pistol’s speech, though relentlessly iambic, does not have the hallmarks of verse: ‘The point seems to be that Pistol has heard such iambic rant in the theater and has adopted it as his personal style without realizing that for words to be verse they must come not only in iambs but in lines. Pistol’s iambic word-strings are often not pentameter or hexameter or anything’ (110–11). Thus there is no good reason to deviate from QF by printing Pistol’s speeches as anything other than prose.

  157–9 To … also an echo of the infernal imagery found in plays such as Peele’s Battle of Alcazar, in which Muly Mahamet personifies Erebus, son of Chaos and Night, as a hell full of torments, tortures, plagues and pains (2.2.73–97); Locrine, in which cursed ghosts are dragged through the foul rivers of Erebus (3.6.65–6); Marlowe’s 1 Tamburlaine, with a similar allusion to ‘the blasted banks of Erebus’ (5.1.244); Greene’s Alphonsus, King of Arragon, in which ‘Plutoes loathsome lake’ probably figures as the River Styx (3.955: Greene, 13.368); and Kyd’s Spanish Tragedy, where Hieronimo vows to ‘Knock at the dismal gates of Pluto’s court’ (3.13.110).

  151 to’t] Q; to it F 155 of] Q; on F 157–61] prose QF; Capell lines first! / deep, / also. / Down! / here? / ; Oxf lines first / hand, / deep, / also. / I. / faitours! / here? / 157 damned] Q (damnd), F (damn’d), Rowe

  159 Hold … line a proverbial tag from angling (Dent, H589) which wishes the fisherman good luck; perhaps taken from a ballad couplet, ‘Hold hook and line, / Then all is mine’. A similar reference in KL 3.6.6–7, ‘Nero is an angler in the lake of darkness’, suggests that Pistol’s line may follow from his allusion to Pluto’s lake (157–8).