h you. Fare
ye well, Gentlemen both; I thank ye, I must a dozen miles to night._"--He
misuses, it is true, at this time the _King's Press damnably_; but that
does not concern me, at least not for the present; it belongs to other
parts of his character.--It appears then manifestly that _Shakespeare_
meant to shew _Falstaff_ as really using the utmost speed in his power; he
arrives almost literally _within the extremest inch of possibility_; and
if _Lancaster_ had not accelerated the event by a stroke of perfidy much
more subject to the imputation of Cowardice than the _Debauch_ of
_Falstaff_, he would have been time enough to have shared in the danger of
a fair and honest decision. But great men have, it seems, a privilege;
"_that in the __GENERAL'S__ but a choleric word, which in the __SOLDIER
WERE__ flat blasphemy._" Yet after all, _Falstaff_ did really come time
enough, as it appears, to join in the villainous triumphs of the day, to
take prisoner _Coleville of the dale, a most furious Knight and valorous
enemy_.--Let us look to the fact. If this incident should be found to
contain any striking proof of _Falstaff_'s Courage and Military fame, his
defence against _Lancaster_ will be stronger than the reader has even a
right to demand. _Falstaff_ encounters _Coleville_ in the field, and,
having demanded his name, is ready to assail him; but _Coleville_ asks him
if he is not Sir _John Falstaff_; thereby implying a purpose of surrender.
_Falstaff_ will not so much as furnish him with a pretence, and answers
only, that _he is as good a man_. "_Do you yield Sir, or shall I sweat for
you?_" "_I think_," says Coleville, "_you are Sir John Falstaff, and in
that thought yield me._" This fact, and the incidents with which it is
accompanied, speak loudly; it seems to have been contrived by the author
on purpose to take off a rebuke so authoritatively made by _Lancaster_.
The fact is set before our eyes to confute the censure: _Lancaster_
himself seems to give up his charge, tho' not his ill will; for upon
_Falstaff_'s asking leave to pass through Glostershire, and artfully
desiring that, upon _Lancaster_'s return to Court, _he might stand well in
his report, Lancaster_ seems in his answer to mingle malice and acquittal.
"_Fare ye well, Falstaff, I in my condition shall better speak of you than
you deserve._" "_I would_," says _Falstaff_, who is left behind in the
scene, "_You had but the wit; 'twere better than your Dukedom._" He
c