That
    rascal hath removed my horse, and tied him I know not
    where. If I travel but four foot by the square further afoot, I
    shall break my wind. Well, I doubt not but to die a fair death
    for all this, if I scape hanging for killing that rogue. I have
    forsworn his company hourly any time this two-and-twenty
    year, and yet I am bewitched with the rogue’s company. If the
    rascal have not given me medicines to make me love him, I’ll
    be hanged; it could not be else: I have drunk medicines. Poins,
    Hal, a plague upon you both! Bardolph! Peto! I’ll starve ere I
    rob a foot further. An ’twere not as good a deed as to drink, to
    turn true man and to leave these rogues, I am the veriest
    varlet that ever chewed with a tooth. Eight yards of uneven
    ground is threescore and ten miles afoot with me, and the
    stony-hearted villains know it well enough. A plague upon’t
    when thieves cannot be true one to another!

They whistle

    Whew! A plague light upon you all!

The Prince, Poins, Peto and Bardolph come forward

    Give me my horse, you rogues. Give me
    my horse, and be hanged!

PRINCE HENRY   Peace, ye fat-guts! Lie down, lay thine ear close to
    the ground and list if thou can hear the tread of travellers.

FALSTAFF   Have you any levers to lift me up again, being down?
    I’ll not bear mine own flesh so far afoot again for all the coin
    in thy father’s exchequer. What a plague mean ye to colt me
    thus?

PRINCE HENRY   Thou liest. Thou art not colted, thou art uncolted.

FALSTAFF   I prithee, good Prince Hal, help me to my horse,
    good king’s son.

PRINCE HENRY   Out, you rogue! Shall I be your ostler?

FALSTAFF   Go, hang thyself in thine own heir-apparent garters!
    If I be ta’en, I’ll peach for this. An I have not ballads made on
    all and sung to filthy tunes, let a cup of sack be my poison.
    When a jest is so forward, and afoot too! I hate it.

Enter Gadshill

GADSHILL   Stand.

FALSTAFF   So I do, against my will.

POINS   O, ’tis our setter. I know his voice.

BARDOLPH   What news?

GADSHILL   Case ye, case ye; on with your vizards. There’s money
    of the king’s coming down the hill, ’tis going to the king’s
    exchequer.

FALSTAFF   You lie, you rogue, ’tis going to the King’s Tavern.

GADSHILL   There’s enough to make us all.

FALSTAFF   To be hanged.

PRINCE HENRY   You four shall front them in the narrow lane.
    Ned and I will walk lower; if they scape from your encounter,
    then they light on us.

PETO   But how many be of them?

GADSHILL   Some eight or ten.

FALSTAFF   Will they not rob us?

PRINCE HENRY   What, a coward, Sir John Paunch?

FALSTAFF   Indeed, I am not John of Gaunt, your grandfather;
    but yet no coward, Hal.

PRINCE HENRY   We’ll leave that to the proof.

POINS   Sirrah Jack, thy horse stands behind the hedge.
    When thou need’st him, there thou shalt find him. Farewell,
    and stand fast.

FALSTAFF   Now cannot I strike him, if I should be hanged.

PRINCE HENRY   Ned, where are our disguises?

To Poins

POINS   Here, hard by. Stand close.

To Prince Henry

[Exeunt Prince Henry and Poins]

FALSTAFF   Now, my masters, happy man be his dole, say I.
    Every man to his business.

Enter Travellers

FIRST TRAVELLER   Come, neighbour. The boy shall lead our horses
    down the hill. We’ll walk afoot awhile, and ease our legs.

THIEVES   Stay!

TRAVELLERS   Jesu bless us!

FALSTAFF   Strike, down with them! Cut the villains’ throats.
    Ah, whoreson caterpillars, bacon-fed knaves! They hate us
    youth, down with them, fleece them.

TRAVELLERS   O, we are undone, both we and ours for ever!

FALSTAFF   Hang ye, gorbellied knaves, are you undone? No, ye
    fat chuffs, I would your store were here! On, bacons, on!
    What, ye knaves? Young men must live. You are grand-
    jurors, are ye? We’ll jure ye, i’faith.

Here they rob them and bind them   [Exeunt]

Enter the Prince and Poins

PRINCE HENRY   The thieves have bound the true men. Now could
    thou and I rob the thieves and go merrily to London, it would
    be argument for a week, laughter for a month and a good jest
    for ever.

POINS   Stand close. I hear them coming.

Enter Thieves again

FALSTAFF   Come, my masters, let us share, and then to horse
    before day. An the prince and Poins be not two arrant
    cowards, there’s no equity stirring. There’s no more valour
    in that Poins than in a wild duck.

PRINCE HENRY   Your money!

POINS   Villains!

As they are sharing, the Prince and Poins set upon them. They all run
    away, leaving the booty behind them

PRINCE HENRY   Got with much ease. Now merrily to horse.
    The thieves are scattered and possessed with fear
    So strongly that they dare not meet each other:
    Each takes his fellow for an officer.
    Away, good Ned. Falstaff sweats to death,
    And lards the lean earth as he walks along.
    Were’t not for laughing, I should pity him.

POINS   How the rogue roared!

Exeunt

Act 2 Scene 3

running scene 6

Location: Hotspur’s estate (historically, Warkworth Castle in Northumberland)

Enter Hotspur, solus, reading a letter

HOTSPUR   ‘But for mine own part, my lord, I could be well
    contented to be there, in respect of the love I bear your
    house.’ He could be contented: why is he not, then? In
    respect of the love he bears our house. He shows in this, he
    loves his own barn better than he loves our house. Let me see
    some more.