* Vide the writings of Froissart, Gr. P. R. James, and
others. The Italian poet Torquato Tasso has an able work not
wholly disconnected with the interesting subject of the
Crusades as these expeditions were termed.
Sir John lived in London—there can be no doubt of that. Had his name been John Dory instead of John Falstaff, the sea could not have been a more indispensable element to his existence than was the metropolitan atmosphere to him, surnamed and organised as he actually was. Where else could there have been found a Boar’s Head, with its accommodating hostess, its inexhaustible cellars, and still more (if the adjective can be said to admit of a comparative degree) inexhaustible credit? What other English city, district, or province, has ever, at any time of the world’s history, produced a hero-worshipping class so willing to pay liberal terms for the honour of even an ex-great man’s society. Where else in England have there ever been known such good dinners, such boon companions, and such accommodating tradespeople?
Talking of tradespeople (a subject to which I am by no means greatly addicted, suggesting, as it does, such painful memories and still more disagreeable possibilities) there is a document extant, the faithful transcript of an earlier document, no longer in existence, which will serve to throw some light on the position of Sir John Falstaff during this most obscure, and consequently most interesting, portion of his biography. It is a letter from Master Richard Whittington, mercer, some time Lord Mayor of London, addressed to Sir John Falstaff, in answer to a communication from that great man, which has unfortunately not been preserved. The epistle, as will be seen, is not dated; but the unmistakable allusion contained in it to King Henry the Fourth’s intended expedition to the Holy Land leaves no doubt that it must have been written in the winter of 1412-13. The shrewd, sarcastic tone of the letter (the orthography whereof in the following transcript has been modified for the convenience of the modern reader, in obedience to the rule invariably observed throughout this work) will, it is hoped, be found sufficiently characteristic of its distinguished writer, to dispense with any necessity for the production, as evidence, of the original manuscript, which was unfortunately destroyed in the ever-lamentable burning of the famous Whittington library, in Arundel Street, Strand, some two or three years since.
“TO MINE EXCELLENT FRIEND SIR JOHN FALSTAFF, KNIGHT, BE THESE DELIVERED.
“Right worshipful Sir John,
“Methinks, in future, I shall call you my cat. For as there be those who insist that I owe my standing as a good citizen and man of wealth to a certain cat which I took with me to Barbarie (where, Heaven be praised! I never was), who did there earn for me large sums in money, slaves, and jewels, by freeing the king’s chamber of mice and rats; so will you have it that I have risen to be alderman and mayor, to buy lands and endow churches, alone through having ridden on your crupper from Blackheath to the Southwark side of London Bridge, in the year of grace, 1364, when we were both lads, little wotting we should live to know each the other as old men. Now I call my patron to witness that I had never a cat that did aught for me beyond skimming the milk in my kitchen. I took with me to Flanders, and thence through France and Germany to the ignorant estates of the East, a certain Thrift or Judgment, which the witless have fabled into a cat, whereby I was enabled to point out to many foolish peoples the way to clear themselves of grievous pests and torments in government and common life, which might well be likened to rats and mice, for the which good services I was so well rewarded by the thankful rulers of those countries as to return to mine own with the means for large and honourable trading. But the vulgar will have it that it was not I myself, but the cat, effected all this. So would you have it, Sir John, that because I came to London a barefoot, ragged, herring-bodied scarecrow, and am now a man of substance (not in the flesh, Sir John; there you have still the best of me), I owe my advancement to you, who brought me half a dozen miles on the way. It was a pleasant ride,—I mind it well,—and a timely, for I was heartsore and footsore when you took me up. But I am a trader, Sir John, and keep books. And when I look over our account, I cannot but think that I have long ago paid for that ride at a rate of posting far beyond what my travels to Germany and the Asiatic countries (which the blockheads will have Barbarie) cost me altogether. Let us cast the sum. There was two shillings (out of the first four of my earning), soon after our coming to London, to replace your torn doublet, which you declared you dared not write to your lady mother about. * There was five marks on your coming of age, when you had bidden certain young noblemen of the court to meet you at the tavern, which I was fain to lend you, as you had lost the money set aside for their entertainment, the night before, at play. You wept so bitterly, and so feared me with threatening self-destruction, that I must needs do this though it forced me to put off my first slender venture with the Flemings. Then, when they knighted you, there was forty other marks, that you might present yourself becomingly at court. Ten marks on my being made mayor, that it might not be said I forgot an old friend who had helped me to my rise in life. Since then, at divers times, in silks, velvets, and moneys lent, eight hundred and forty-three pounds nine and elevenpence. Now, all this I have been told, time after time, I have owed you for bringing me to London, and putting me in the way of fortune. It hath been a dear ride to me, Sir John. Blackheath to London is, let us say, six-miles. A hundred and forty-one pounds eight shillings seven pence and a fraction is costly posting for times like these, Sir John. Methinks it is time I should hold myself quit of your debt, or that if any be still due you should forgive me the remainder. A truce to jesting, old friend Jack. I will lend thee no more money, and that is the plain truth of the matter. It is of no more use to thee than pearls to a pig. Thou art no more going to the Holy Land with King Henry than I am going thither behind thee on thy crupper (which Heaven forefend, considering the costliness of that mode of travel). Come thou hither to dine, sup, and sleep as often as may list thee, and thou art welcome to the best my roof can afford. But I am a trader, Sir Jack, and a keen one,—I give naught for naught. Sell us thy company, good-fellowship, merry jests and gentleness, and I will pay thee in kind (saving the jests and merry tales, wherein I am the bankrupt and thou the niggard miser). Show us thy jolly face and we will reflect it in endless bowls of as many wines as thou mayest name, like to a face in a chamber lined with tinted mirrors, till thou seest thyself million-fold, and of all colours. Mine honest wife and thy little playfellows, whom thou hast deserted, have been trained in my school. They join the outer world in calling thee foul names, since thou withholdest from them that familiarity which is their due. Dame Alice calls thee downright rogue,—that thou wilt not pay her the long arrears of society and converse thou owest her,—and for which she says she has a mind to pursue thee up and down every law court in Christendom. The little Jews have long arrears of caresses against thee, and are prone to insist on their bargain to the letter. Pay these debts, thou hardened prodigal, and we will see what can be effected for the future. As for money, thou shalt none of it, for it only serves to keep thee from us, wasting that of thy company which is our lawful right, as thine oldest friends, on thankless tavern roysterers who love thee not. I am now too old a merchant to repeat that kind of unprofitable venture.
* See ante, p. 108.
“I have again fallen into jesting, mine old friend, which methinks between aged men who love each other, on grave matters, should not be. If thou art in serious strait I will help thee as heretofore and while I live, and no man save ourselves the wiser; but the spirit of a weakly man, born to poverty and grown up in the need of turning all around him to his selfish advantage, will assert itself within me; and I cannot bear to serve thee that I may lose thee. When thou lackest naught (it is the shopman who states his debt) thou dost never think of the poor shambling youth of Blackheath, whom thou didst lift, not only into horseback, but out of despair and heart-sickness by the contagion of thy health, courage, and kindliness; and to whom at the turning point of his fortunes (for despair was then setting in) thou didst give a ride worth far more than many hundreds of pounds a mile. Whereas, ‘when thy purse is empty, thou art ever prompt to remember Master Richard Whittington, some time lord mayor of London and always a rich merchant and housekeeper. This is the only charge thou wilt ever hear me bring against thee; for it is the only thing in which thou hast ever wronged me—and I meddle not with other men’s debts or claims; but when one justly owes me that which I deem he can pay, I will ever urge it, though he were my brother.
“Dear, beloved, and, whatever the world may of thee (for I have the conceit that I look deeper into men’s natures than the thoughtless commonalty), honoured Sir John Falstaff, if money could win thee to be near me and mine—who love thee deservedly, and to whom thou hast never been aught but what is just and pure—thou shouldst have it from my well-stored coffers poured untold into thy pockets. But I have ever found it act as a spell that parts us. Remedy this if thou canst. Come and dwell with us—with all thine extravagancies and all thy retinue if thou wilt. Our cellars may perchance even hold out a year’s siege against the redoubtable Master Bardolph. All I stipulate is that thou shalt give me thy stalwart Jackanapes, Robin, to save from perdition, by placing him in the new school I am building; this for his own sake and more for that of two sober little kitchen-maidens of Mistress Alice’s, whom I should be loath to grow familiar with the kind of conversation I fear he must have picked up ere this in thine erratic progress.
“Briefly, Jack, I will not send thee the money thou demandest. Come and ask for it, and Dame Alice and I (with the bantlings to hold on by thy skirts) will do our best to keep thee from going away till thou gettest it.