The Merry Wives of Windsor eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 98 pages of information about The Merry Wives of Windsor.

The Merry Wives of Windsor eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 98 pages of information about The Merry Wives of Windsor.

Ford.  Marry, sir, we’ll bring you to Windsor, to one Master Brook, that you have cozened of money, to whom you should have been a pander:  over and above that you have suffered, I think to repay that money will be a biting affliction.

Mrs. Ford
Nay, husband, let that go to make amends;
Forget that sum, so we’ll all be friends.

Ford
Well, here’s my hand:  all is forgiven at last.

Page.  Yet be cheerful, knight; thou shalt eat a posset tonight at my house; where I will desire thee to laugh at my wife, that now laughs at thee.  Tell her, Master Slender hath married her daughter.

Mrs. Page. [Aside] Doctors doubt that; if Anne Page be my daughter, she is, by this, Doctor Caius’ wife.

[Enter slender.]

Slender
Whoa, ho! ho! father Page!

Page
Son, how now! how now, son! have you dispatched?

Slender
Dispatched!  I’ll make the best in Gloucestershire know on’t;
would I were hanged, la, else!

Page
Of what, son?

Slender.  I came yonder at Eton to marry Mistress Anne Page, and she’s a great lubberly boy:  if it had not been i’ the church, I would have swinged him, or he should have swinged me.  If I did not think it had been Anne Page, would I might never stir! and ’tis a postmaster’s boy.

Page
Upon my life, then, you took the wrong.

Slender.  What need you tell me that?  I think so, when I took a boy for a girl.  If I had been married to him, for all he was in woman’s apparel, I would not have had him.

Page
Why, this is your own folly.  Did not I tell you how you should
know my daughter by her garments?

Slender.  I went to her in white and cried ‘mum’ and she cried ‘budget’ as Anne and I had appointed; and yet it was not Anne, but a postmaster’s boy.

Evans
Jeshu!  Master Slender, cannot you see put marry poys?

Page
O I am vexed at heart:  what shall I do?

Mrs. Page.  Good George, be not angry:  I knew of your purpose; turned my daughter into green; and, indeed, she is now with the doctor at the deanery, and there married.

[Enter doctor caius.]

Caius.  Vere is Mistress Page?  By gar, I am cozened; I ha’ married un garcon, a boy; un paysan, by gar, a boy; it is not Anne Page; by gar, I am cozened.

Mrs. Page
Why, did you take her in green?

Caius
Ay, by gar, and ’tis a boy:  by gar, I’ll raise all Windsor.

[Exit.]

Ford
This is strange.  Who hath got the right Anne?

Page
My heart misgives me; here comes Master Fenton.

[Enter Fenton and Anne page.]

Copyrights
Project Gutenberg
The Merry Wives of Windsor from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.