no laughter either is, or is
intended to be, raised upon the score of _Falstaff_'s Cowardice. For after
all, it is not singularly ridiculous that an old inactive man of no boast,
as far as appears, or extraordinary pretensions to valour, should
endeavour to save himself by flight from the assault of two bold and
vigorous assailants. The very Players, who are, I think, the very worst
judges of _Shakespeare_, have been made sensible, I suppose from long
experience, that there is nothing in this transaction to excite any
extraordinary laughter; but this they take to be a defect in the
management of their author, and therefore I imagine it is, that they hold
themselves obliged to supply the vacancy, and fill it up with some low
buffoonery of their own. Instead of the dispatch necessary on this
occasion, they bring _Falstaff_, _stuffing and all_, to the very front of
the stage; where, with much mummery and grimace, he seats himself down,
with a canvas money-bag in his hand, to divide the spoil. In this
situation he is attacked by the Prince and _Poins_, whose tin swords hang
idly in the air and delay to strike till the _Player Falstaff_, who seems
more troubled with flatulence than fear, is able to rise: which is not
till after some ineffectual efforts, and with the assistance (to the best
of my memory) of one of the thieves, who lingers behind, in spite of
terror, for this friendly purpose; after which, without any resistance on
his part, he is goaded off the stage like a fat ox for slaughter by these
_stony-hearted_ drivers in _buckram_. I think he does not _roar_;--perhaps
the player had never perfected himself in the tones of a bull-calf. This
whole transaction should be shewn between the interstices of a back scene:
The less we see in such cases, the better we conceive. Something of
resistance and afterwards of celerity in flight we should be made
witnesses of; the _roar_ we should take on the credit of _Poins_. Nor is
there any occasion for all that bolstering with which they fill up the
figure of _Falstaff_; they do not distinguish betwixt humourous
exaggeration and necessary truth. The Prince is called _starveling_,
_dried neat's tongue_, _stock-fish_, and other names of the same nature.
They might with almost as good reason search the glass-houses for some
exhausted stoker to furnish out a Prince of _Wales_ of sufficient
correspondence to this picture.

We next come to the scene of _Falstaff_'s braggadocioes. I have