Mistress Page, remember you your cue.

Mrs. Page. 
I warrant thee; if I do not act it, hiss me.

[Exit.]

Mrs. Ford. 
Go to, then; we’ll use this unwholesome humidity, this gross watery
pumpion; we’ll teach him to know turtles from jays.

[Enter Falstaff.]

Falstaff. 
‘Have I caught thee, my heavenly jewel?’ Why, now let me die, for
I have lived long enough:  this is the period of my ambition: 
O this blessed hour!

Mrs. Ford. 
O, sweet Sir John!

Falstaff.  Mistress Ford, I cannot cog, I cannot prate, Mistress Ford.  Now shall I sin in my wish; I would thy husband were dead.  I’ll speak it before the best lord, I would make thee my lady.

Mrs. Ford. 
I your lady, Sir John!  Alas, I should be a pitiful
lady.

Falstaff.  Let the court of France show me such another.  I see how thine eye would emulate the diamond; thou hast the right arched beauty of the brow that becomes the ship-tire, the tire-valiant, or any tire of Venetian admittance.

Mrs. Ford. 
A plain kerchief, Sir John; my brows become nothing else; nor that
well neither.

Falstaff.  By the Lord, thou art a traitor to say so:  thou wouldst make an absolute courtier; and the firm fixture of thy foot would give an excellent motion to thy gait in a semi-circled farthingale.  I see what thou wert, if Fortune thy foe were not, Nature thy friend.  Come, thou canst not hide it.

Mrs. Ford. 
Believe me, there’s no such thing in me.

Falstaff.  What made me love thee?  Let that persuade thee there’s something extraordinary in thee.  Come, I cannot cog and say thou art this and that, like a many of these lisping hawthorn-buds that come like women in men’s apparel, and smell like Bucklersbury in simple-time; I cannot; but I love thee, none but thee; and thou deservest it.

Mrs. Ford. 
Do not betray me, sir; I fear you love Mistress Page.

Falstaff. 
Thou mightst as well say I love to walk by the Counter-gate, which
is as hateful to me as the reek of a lime-kiln.

Mrs. Ford. 
Well, heaven knows how I love you; and you shall one day find it.

Falstaff. 
Keep in that mind; I’ll deserve it.

Mrs. Ford. 
Nay, I must tell you, so you do; or else I could not be in that mind.

Robin. [Within] Mistress Ford!  Mistress Ford! here’s Mistress Page at the door, sweating and blowing and looking wildly, and would needs speak with you presently.

Falstaff. 
She shall not see me; I will ensconce me behind the arras.

Mrs. Ford. 
Pray you, do so; she’s a very tattling woman.

[Falstaff hides himself.]