SCENE II	London. An apartment of the Prince's.

	[Enter the PRINCE OF WALES and 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 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-coloured taffeta, I see no
	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 wandering knight so fair.' And,
	I prithee, sweet wag, 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
	prologue to an egg and butter.

PRINCE HENRY	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 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, 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 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	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	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 art heir apparent--But, I prithee, sweet
	wag, shall there be gallows standing in England when
	thou art king? and resolution thus fobbed 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	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
	humour 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	Or an old lion, or a lover's lute.

FALSTAFF	Yea, or the drone of a Lincolnshire bagpipe.