The scene is the Old Boar’s Head (interior). The time midnight, succeeding the Gadshill engagement. The persons first present are the Prince of Wales and Mr. Poins, his obsequious companion in infamy. (It is quite right to abuse the Prince at this period of his life, when it was his own wish to be thought a scoundrel. When he becomes a great man, I hope I shall know how to conduct myself towards him with becoming respect.) They have been in London some hours. There are no travelling difficulties for princes. His Royal Highness has been amusing himself for a quarter of an hour or so by a series of practical jokes on a harmless waiter, which the Prince himself appears to have thought excessively clever, but which Shakspeare and the present writer have agreed to consider excessively stupid. Even the obliging Poins has not been able to see the jest. He is trying his hardest to discover it; and is determined to be convulsed with laughter, or perish in the attempt, when the landlord makes his appearance in the room, announcing the arrival of Sir John Falstaff and his followers. A word as to this landlord,--though, indeed, he is scarcely worth it. This is the first and last we hear of him. In the course of a few weeks we find his wife a perfectly reconciled widow, and sole mistress of the establishment. There are two hypotheses as to the sudden disappearance of her husband from the scene. The first--which I have already formally adopted--is, that, at the period alluded to, he was ailing,--probably from the fatal facility of the bar-parlour;--that he died soon afterwards; that he was a fool, and not worth regretting or remembering. The second is, that his fair helpmate (of whom we shall have much to say hereafter) being a credulous woman, with a defective sense of legal obligation, had been entrapped into a fragile marriage,--whereof the only consolation existed in its fragility. It is not of the slightest consequence: the vintner has made his sole appearance, and has been sent about his business to introduce Sir John Falstaff. Neither you nor I need care two-pence what became of him. At any rate, I don’t;--you, reader, being a free-born Englishman, are at liberty to do as you please. And now I will save myself the trouble of writing the next three or four pages, by allowing Shakspeare to speak for me without interruption. I shall be happy to hear anybody find fault with the substitution, and will even go so far as to consider it a compliment. Mr. Poins.--Welcome, Jack. Where hast thou been?