Flourish. Enter Chorus.
CHORUS.Thus with imagin’d wing our swift scene flies,In motion of no less celerityThan that of thought. Suppose that you have seenThe well-appointed king at Hampton pierEmbark his royalty, and his brave fleetWith silken streamers the young Phoebus fanning.Play with your fancies; and in them beholdUpon the hempen tackle ship-boys climbing;Hear the shrill whistle which doth order giveTo sounds confus’d; behold the threaden sails,Borne with the invisible and creeping wind,Draw the huge bottoms through the furrow’d sea,Breasting the lofty surge. O, do but thinkYou stand upon the rivage and beholdA city on the inconstant billows dancing;For so appears this fleet majestical,Holding due course to Harfleur. Follow, follow!Grapple your minds to sternage of this navy,And leave your England, as dead midnight still,Guarded with grandsires, babies, and old women,Either past or not arriv’d to pith and puissance.For who is he, whose chin is but enrich’dWith one appearing hair, that will not followThese cull’d and choice-drawn cavaliers to France?Work, work your thoughts, and therein see a siege;Behold the ordnance on their carriages,With fatal mouths gaping on girded Harfleur.Suppose the ambassador from the French comes back,Tells Harry that the King doth offer himKatharine his daughter, and with her, to dowry,Some petty and unprofitable dukedoms.The offer likes not; and the nimble gunnerWith linstock now the devilish cannon touches,
[Alarum, and chambers go off.]
And down goes all before them. Still be kind,And eke out our performance with your mind.
[Exit.]
SCENE I. France. Before Harfleur.
Alarum. Enter King Henry, Exeter, Bedford, Gloucester and Soldiers, with scaling-ladders.
KING HENRY.Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more,Or close the wall up with our English dead.In peace there’s nothing so becomes a manAs modest stillness and humility;But when the blast of war blows in our ears,Then imitate the action of the tiger;Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,Disguise fair nature with hard-favour’d rage;Then lend the eye a terrible aspect;Let it pry through the portage of the headLike the brass cannon; let the brow o’erwhelm itAs fearfully as does a galled rockO’erhang and jutty his confounded base,Swill’d with the wild and wasteful ocean.Now set the teeth and stretch the nostril wide,Hold hard the breath, and bend up every spiritTo his full height. On, on, you noblest English,Whose blood is fet from fathers of war-proof!Fathers that, like so many Alexanders,Have in these parts from morn till even fought,And sheath’d their swords for lack of argument.Dishonour not your mothers; now attestThat those whom you call’d fathers did beget you.Be copy now to men of grosser blood,And teach them how to war. And you, good yeomen,Whose limbs were made in England, show us hereThe mettle of your pasture; let us swearThat you are worth your breeding, which I doubt not;For there is none of you so mean and base,That hath not noble lustre in your eyes.I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips,Straining upon the start. The game’s afoot!Follow your spirit, and upon this chargeCry, “God for Harry! England and Saint George!”
[Exeunt. Alarum, and chambers go off.]
SCENE II. The same.
Enter Nym, Bardolph, Pistol and Boy.
BARDOLPH.On, on, on, on, on! To the breach, to the breach!
NYM.Pray thee, corporal, stay. The knocks are too hot; and, for mine ownpart, I have not a case of lives. The humour of it is too hot; that isthe very plain-song of it.
PISTOL.The plain-song is most just, for humours do abound.Knocks go and come; God’s vassals drop and die; And sword and shield, In bloody field, Doth win immortal fame.
BOY.Would I were in an alehouse in London! I would give all my fame for apot of ale and safety.
PISTOL.And I. If wishes would prevail with me, My purpose should not fail with me, But thither would I hie.
BOY. As duly, But not as truly, As bird doth sing on bough.
Enter Fluellen.
FLUELLEN.Up to the breach, you dogs! Avaunt, you cullions!
[Driving them forward.]
PISTOL.Be merciful, great Duke, to men of mould.Abate thy rage, abate thy manly rage,Abate thy rage, great Duke!Good bawcock, bate thy rage; use lenity, sweet chuck!
NYM.These be good humours! Your honour wins bad humours.
[Exeunt all but Boy.]
BOY.As young as I am, I have observ’d these three swashers. I am boy tothem all three; but all they three, though they would serve me, couldnot be man to me; for indeed three such antics do not amount to a man.For Bardolph, he is white-liver’d and red-fac’d; by the means whereof’a faces it out, but fights not. For Pistol, he hath a killing tongueand a quiet sword; by the means whereof ’a breaks words, and keepswhole weapons. For Nym, he hath heard that men of few words are thebest men; and therefore he scorns to say his prayers, lest ’a should bethought a coward. But his few bad words are match’d with as few gooddeeds; for ’a never broke any man’s head but his own, and that wasagainst a post when he was drunk. They will steal anything, and call itpurchase. Bardolph stole a lute-case, bore it twelve leagues, and soldit for three half-pence. Nym and Bardolph are sworn brothers infilching, and in Calais they stole a fire-shovel. I knew by that pieceof service the men would carry coals. They would have me as familiarwith men’s pockets as their gloves or their handkerchers; which makesmuch against my manhood, if I should take from another’s pocket to putinto mine; for it is plain pocketing up of wrongs. I must leave them,and seek some better service. Their villainy goes against my weakstomach, and therefore I must cast it up.
[Exit.]
Enter Gower and Fluellen.
GOWER.Captain Fluellen, you must come presently to the mines.The Duke of Gloucester would speak with you.
FLUELLEN.To the mines! Tell you the Duke, it is not so good to come to themines; for, look you, the mines is not according to the disciplines ofthe war. The concavities of it is not sufficient; for, look you, theathversary, you may discuss unto the Duke, look you, is digt himselffour yard under the countermines. By Cheshu, I think ’a will plow upall, if there is not better directions.
GOWER.The Duke of Gloucester, to whom the order of the siege is given, isaltogether directed by an Irishman, a very valiant gentleman, i’ faith.
FLUELLEN.It is Captain Macmorris, is it not?
GOWER.I think it be.
FLUELLEN.By Cheshu, he is an ass, as in the world. I will verify as much in hisbeard. He has no more directions in the true disciplines of the wars,look you, of the Roman disciplines, than is a puppy-dog.
Enter Macmorris and Captain Jamy.
GOWER.Here ’a comes; and the Scots captain, Captain Jamy, with him.
FLUELLEN.Captain Jamy is a marvellous falorous gentleman, that is certain; andof great expedition and knowledge in the anchient wars, upon myparticular knowledge of his directions. By Cheshu, he will maintain hisargument as well as any military man in the world, in the disciplinesof the pristine wars of the Romans.
JAMY.I say gud-day, Captain Fluellen.
FLUELLEN.God-den to your worship, good Captain James.
GOWER.How now, Captain Macmorris! have you quit the mines?Have the pioneers given o’er?
MACMORRIS.By Chrish, la! ’tish ill done! The work ish give over, the trompetsound the retreat. By my hand I swear, and my father’s soul, the workish ill done; it ish give over. I would have blowed up the town, soChrish save me, la! in an hour. O, ’tish ill done, ’tish ill done; bymy hand, ’tish ill done!
FLUELLEN.Captain Macmorris, I beseech you now, will you voutsafe me, look you, afew disputations with you, as partly touching or concerning thedisciplines of the war, the Roman wars, in the way of argument, lookyou, and friendly communication; partly to satisfy my opinion, andpartly for the satisfaction, look you, of my mind, as touching thedirection of the military discipline; that is the point.
JAMY.It sall be vary gud, gud feith, gud captains bath: and I sall quit youwith gud leve, as I may pick occasion; that sall I, marry.
MACMORRIS.It is no time to discourse, so Chrish save me. The day is hot, and theweather, and the wars, and the King, and the Dukes. It is no time todiscourse. The town is beseech’d, and the trumpet call us to thebreach, and we talk, and, be Chrish, do nothing. ’Tis shame for us all.So God sa’ me, ’tis shame to stand still; it is shame, by my hand; andthere is throats to be cut, and works to be done; and there ish nothingdone, so Chrish sa’ me, la!
JAMY.By the mess, ere theise eyes of mine take themselves to slomber, I’llde gud service, or I’ll lig i’ the grund for it; ay, or go to death;and I’ll pay’t as valorously as I may, that sall I suerly do, that isthe breff and the long. Marry, I wad full fain heard some question’tween you tway.
FLUELLEN.Captain Macmorris, I think, look you, under your correction, there isnot many of your nation—
MACMORRIS.Of my nation! What ish my nation? Ish a villain, and a bastard, and aknave, and a rascal? What ish my nation? Who talks of my nation?
FLUELLEN.Look you, if you take the matter otherwise than is meant, CaptainMacmorris, peradventure I shall think you do not use me with thataffability as in discretion you ought to use me, look you, being asgood a man as yourself, both in the disciplines of war, and in thederivation of my birth, and in other particularities.
MACMORRIS.I do not know you so good a man as myself. So Chrish save me,I will cut off your head.
GOWER.Gentlemen both, you will mistake each other.
JAMY.Ah! that’s a foul fault.
[A parley sounded.]
GOWER.The town sounds a parley.
FLUELLEN.Captain Macmorris, when there is more better opportunity to berequired, look you, I will be so bold as to tell you I know thedisciplines of war; and there is an end.
[Exeunt.]
SCENE III. Before the gates.
The Governor and some citizens on the walls; the English forces below. Enter King Henry and his train.
KING HENRY.How yet resolves the governor of the town?This is the latest parle we will admit;Therefore to our best mercy give yourselves,Or like to men proud of destructionDefy us to our worst; for, as I am a soldier,A name that in my thoughts becomes me best,If I begin the battery once again,I will not leave the half-achieved HarfleurTill in her ashes she lie buried.The gates of mercy shall be all shut up,And the flesh’d soldier, rough and hard of heart,In liberty of bloody hand shall rangeWith conscience wide as hell, mowing like grassYour fresh fair virgins and your flow’ring infants.What is it then to me, if impious War,Array’d in flames like to the prince of fiends,Do with his smirch’d complexion all fell featsEnlink’d to waste and desolation?What is’t to me, when you yourselves are cause,If your pure maidens fall into the handOf hot and forcing violation?What rein can hold licentious wickednessWhen down the hill he holds his fierce career?We may as bootless spend our vain commandUpon the enraged soldiers in their spoilAs send precepts to the leviathanTo come ashore. Therefore, you men of Harfleur,Take pity of your town and of your people,Whiles yet my soldiers are in my command,Whiles yet the cool and temperate wind of graceO’erblows the filthy and contagious cloudsOf heady murder, spoil, and villainy.If not, why, in a moment look to seeThe blind and bloody soldier with foul handDefile the locks of your shrill-shrieking daughters;Your fathers taken by the silver beards,And their most reverend heads dash’d to the walls;Your naked infants spitted upon pikes,Whiles the mad mothers with their howls confus’dDo break the clouds, as did the wives of JewryAt Herod’s bloody-hunting slaughtermen.What say you? Will you yield, and this avoid,Or, guilty in defence, be thus destroy’d?
GOVERNOR.Our expectation hath this day an end.The Dauphin, whom of succours we entreated,Returns us that his powers are yet not readyTo raise so great a siege. Therefore, great King,We yield our town and lives to thy soft mercy.Enter our gates; dispose of us and ours;For we no longer are defensible.
KING HENRY.Open your gates. Come, uncle Exeter,Go you and enter Harfleur; there remain,And fortify it strongly ’gainst the French.Use mercy to them all. For us, dear uncle,The winter coming on, and sickness growingUpon our soldiers, we will retire to Calais.Tonight in Harfleur will we be your guest;Tomorrow for the march are we addrest.
Flourish. The King and his train enter the town.
SCENE IV. The French King’s palace.
Enter Katharine and Alice, an old Gentlewoman.
KATHARINE.Alice, tu as été en Angleterre, et tu parles bien le langage.
ALICE.Un peu, madame.
KATHARINE.Je te prie, m’enseignez; il faut que j’apprenne à parler.Comment appelez-vous la main en anglais?
ALICE.La main? Elle est appelée de hand.
KATHARINE.De hand. Et les doigts?
ALICE.Les doigts? Ma foi, j’oublie les doigts; mais je me souviendrai. Lesdoigts? Je pense qu’ils sont appelés de fingres; oui, de fingres.
KATHARINE.La main, de hand; les doigts, de fingres. Je pense que je suis lebon écolier; j’ai gagné deux mots d’anglais vitement. Commentappelez-vous les ongles?
ALICE.Les ongles? Nous les appelons de nails.
KATHARINE.De nails. Écoutez; dites-moi, si je parle bien: de hand, de fingres,et de nails.
ALICE.C’est bien dit, madame; il est fort bon anglais.
KATHARINE.Dites-moi l’anglais pour le bras.
ALICE.De arm, madame.
KATHARINE.Et le coude?
ALICE.D’elbow.
KATHARINE.D’elbow. Je m’en fais la répétition de tous les mots que vous m’avezappris dès à présent.
ALICE.Il est trop difficile, madame, comme je pense.
KATHARINE.Excusez-moi, Alice. Écoutez: d’hand, de fingres, de nails, d’arm, debilbow.
ALICE.D’elbow, madame.
KATHARINE.O Seigneur Dieu, je m’en oublie! D’elbow.Comment appelez-vous le col?
ALICE.De nick, madame.
KATHARINE.De nick. Et le menton?
ALICE.De chin.
KATHARINE.De sin. Le col, de nick; le menton, de sin.
ALICE.Oui. Sauf votre honneur, en vérité, vous prononcez les mots aussidroit que les natifs d’Angleterre.
KATHARINE.Je ne doute point d’apprendre, par la grâce de Dieu, et en peu detemps.
ALICE.N’avez-vous pas déjà oublié ce que je vous ai enseigné?
KATHARINE.Non, je réciterai à vous promptement: d’hand, de fingres, de mails,—
ALICE.De nails, madame.
KATHARINE.De nails, de arm, de ilbow.
ALICE.Sauf votre honneur, de elbow.
KATHARINE.Ainsi dis-je, d’elbow, de nick, et de sin. Comment appelez-vous lepied et la robe?
ALICE.De foot, madame; et de coun.
KATHARINE.De foot et de coun! O Seigneur Dieu! ils sont les mots de sonmauvais, corruptible, gros, et impudique, et non pour les damesd’honneur d’user. Je ne voudrais prononcer ces mots devant lesseigneurs de France pour tout le monde. Foh! le foot et le coun!Néanmoins, je réciterai une autre fois ma leçon ensemble: d’hand, defingres, de nails, d’arm, d’elbow, de nick, de sin, de foot, de coun.
ALICE.Excellent, madame!
KATHARINE.C’est assez pour une fois. Allons-nous à dîner.
[Exeunt.]
SCENE V. The same.
Enter the King of France, the Dauphin, the Duke of Bourbon, the Constable of France and others.
FRENCH KING.’Tis certain he hath pass’d the river Somme.
CONSTABLE.And if he be not fought withal, my lord,Let us not live in France; let us quit allAnd give our vineyards to a barbarous people.
DAUPHIN.O Dieu vivant! shall a few sprays of us,The emptying of our fathers’ luxury,Our scions put in wild and savage stock,Spirt up so suddenly into the clouds,And overlook their grafters?
BOURBON.Normans, but bastard Normans, Norman bastards!Mort de ma vie, if they march alongUnfought withal, but I will sell my dukedom,To buy a slobbery and a dirty farmIn that nook-shotten isle of Albion.
CONSTABLE.Dieu de batailles, where have they this mettle?Is not their climate foggy, raw, and dull,On whom, as in despite, the sun looks pale,Killing their fruit with frowns? Can sodden water,A drench for sur-rein’d jades, their barley-broth,Decoct their cold blood to such valiant heat?And shall our quick blood, spirited with wine,Seem frosty? O, for honour of our land,Let us not hang like roping iciclesUpon our houses’ thatch, whiles a more frosty peopleSweat drops of gallant youth in our rich fields!Poor we may call them in their native lords.
DAUPHIN.By faith and honour,Our madams mock at us, and plainly sayOur mettle is bred out, and they will giveTheir bodies to the lust of English youthTo new-store France with bastard warriors.
BOURBON.They bid us to the English dancing-schools,And teach lavoltas high, and swift corantos;Saying our grace is only in our heels,And that we are most lofty runaways.
FRENCH KING.Where is Montjoy the herald? Speed him hence.Let him greet England with our sharp defiance.Up, princes! and, with spirit of honour edgedMore sharper than your swords, hie to the field!Charles Delabreth, High Constable of France;You Dukes of Orleans, Bourbon, and of Berry,Alençon, Brabant, Bar, and Burgundy;Jacques Chatillon, Rambures, Vaudemont,Beaumont, Grandpré, Roussi, and Fauconbridge,Foix, Lestrale, Boucicault, and Charolois;High dukes, great princes, barons, lords, and knights,For your great seats now quit you of great shames.Bar Harry England, that sweeps through our landWith pennons painted in the blood of Harfleur.Rush on his host, as doth the melted snowUpon the valleys, whose low vassal seatThe Alps doth spit and void his rheum upon.Go down upon him, you have power enough,And in a captive chariot into RouenBring him our prisoner.
CONSTABLE.This becomes the great.Sorry am I his numbers are so few,His soldiers sick and famish’d in their march;For I am sure, when he shall see our army,He’ll drop his heart into the sink of fearAnd for achievement offer us his ransom.
FRENCH KING.Therefore, Lord Constable, haste on Montjoy,And let him say to England that we sendTo know what willing ransom he will give.Prince Dauphin, you shall stay with us in Rouen.
DAUPHIN.Not so, I do beseech your Majesty.
FRENCH KING.Be patient, for you shall remain with us.Now forth, Lord Constable and princes all,And quickly bring us word of England’s fall.
[Exeunt.]
SCENE VI. The English camp in Picardy.
Enter Gower and Fluellen, meeting.
GOWER.How now, Captain Fluellen! come you from the bridge?
FLUELLEN.I assure you, there is very excellent services committed at the bridge.
GOWER.Is the Duke of Exeter safe?
FLUELLEN.The Duke of Exeter is as magnanimous as Agamemnon; and a man that Ilove and honour with my soul, and my heart, and my duty, and my life,and my living, and my uttermost power. He is not—God be praised andblessed!—any hurt in the world; but keeps the bridge most valiantly,with excellent discipline. There is an anchient lieutenant there at thepridge, I think in my very conscience he is as valiant a man as MarkAntony; and he is a man of no estimation in the world, but I did seehim do as gallant service.
GOWER.What do you call him?
FLUELLEN.He is call’d Anchient Pistol.
GOWER.I know him not.
Enter Pistol.
FLUELLEN.Here is the man.
PISTOL.Captain, I thee beseech to do me favours.The Duke of Exeter doth love thee well.
FLUELLEN.Ay, I praise God; and I have merited some love at his hands.
PISTOL.Bardolph, a soldier, firm and sound of heart,And of buxom valour, hath by cruel fateAnd giddy Fortune’s furious fickle wheel,That goddess blind,That stands upon the rolling restless stone—
FLUELLEN.By your patience, Anchient Pistol. Fortune is painted blind, with amuffler afore his eyes, to signify to you that Fortune is blind; andshe is painted also with a wheel, to signify to you, which is the moralof it, that she is turning, and inconstant, and mutability, andvariation; and her foot, look you, is fixed upon a spherical stone,which rolls, and rolls, and rolls. In good truth, the poet makes a mostexcellent description of it. Fortune is an excellent moral.
PISTOL.Fortune is Bardolph’s foe, and frowns on him;For he hath stolen a pax, and hanged must ’a be,—A damned death!Let gallows gape for dog; let man go free,And let not hemp his windpipe suffocate.But Exeter hath given the doom of deathFor pax of little price.Therefore, go speak; the Duke will hear thy voice;And let not Bardolph’s vital thread be cutWith edge of penny cord and vile reproach.Speak, captain, for his life, and I will thee requite.
FLUELLEN.Anchient Pistol, I do partly understand your meaning.
PISTOL.Why then, rejoice therefore.
FLUELLEN.Certainly, anchient, it is not a thing to rejoice at; for if, look you,he were my brother, I would desire the Duke to use his good pleasure,and put him to execution; for discipline ought to be used.
PISTOL.Die and be damn’d! and fico for thy friendship!
FLUELLEN.It is well.
PISTOL.The fig of Spain.
[Exit.]
FLUELLEN.Very good.
GOWER.Why, this is an arrant counterfeit rascal. I remember him now; a bawd,a cutpurse.
FLUELLEN.I’ll assure you, ’a uttered as prave words at the pridge as you shallsee in a summer’s day. But it is very well; what he has spoke to me,that is well, I warrant you, when time is serve.
GOWER.Why, ’t is a gull, a fool, a rogue, that now and then goes to the wars,to grace himself at his return into London under the form of a soldier.And such fellows are perfect in the great commanders’ names; and theywill learn you by rote where services were done; at such and such asconce, at such a breach, at such a convoy; who came off bravely, whowas shot, who disgrac’d, what terms the enemy stood on; and this theycon perfectly in the phrase of war, which they trick up with new-tunedoaths: and what a beard of the general’s cut and a horrid suit of thecamp will do among foaming bottles and ale-wash’d wits, is wonderful tobe thought on. But you must learn to know such slanders of the age, orelse you may be marvellously mistook.
FLUELLEN.I tell you what, Captain Gower; I do perceive he is not the man that hewould gladly make show to the world he is. If I find a hole in hiscoat, I will tell him my mind. [Drum heard.] Hark you, the King iscoming, and I must speak with him from the pridge.
Drum and colours. Enter King Henry, Gloucester and his poor soldiers.
God bless your Majesty!
KING HENRY.How now, Fluellen! cam’st thou from the bridge?
FLUELLEN.Ay, so please your Majesty. The Duke of Exeter has very gallantlymaintain’d the pridge. The French is gone off, look you; and there isgallant and most prave passages. Marry, th’ athversary was havepossession of the pridge; but he is enforced to retire, and the Duke ofExeter is master of the pridge. I can tell your Majesty, the Duke is aprave man.
KING HENRY.What men have you lost, Fluellen?
FLUELLEN.The perdition of the athversary hath been very great, reasonable great.Marry, for my part, I think the Duke hath lost never a man, but onethat is like to be executed for robbing a church, one Bardolph, if yourMajesty know the man. His face is all bubukles, and whelks, and knobs,and flames o’ fire; and his lips blows at his nose, and it is like acoal of fire, sometimes plue and sometimes red; but his nose isexecuted, and his fire’s out.
KING HENRY.We would have all such offenders so cut off; and we give expresscharge, that in our marches through the country, there be nothingcompell’d from the villages, nothing taken but paid for, none of theFrench upbraided or abused in disdainful language; for when lenity andcruelty play for a kingdom, the gentler gamester is the soonest winner.
Tucket. Enter Montjoy.
MONTJOY.You know me by my habit.
KING HENRY.Well then I know thee. What shall I know of thee?
MONTJOY.My master’s mind.
KING HENRY.Unfold it.
MONTJOY.Thus says my King: Say thou to Harry of England: Though we seem’d dead,we did but sleep; advantage is a better soldier than rashness. Tell himwe could have rebuk’d him at Harfleur, but that we thought not good tobruise an injury till it were full ripe. Now we speak upon our cue, andour voice is imperial. England shall repent his folly, see hisweakness, and admire our sufferance. Bid him therefore consider of hisransom; which must proportion the losses we have borne, the subjects wehave lost, the disgrace we have digested; which in weight to re-answer,his pettishness would bow under. For our losses, his exchequer is toopoor; for the effusion of our blood, the muster of his kingdom toofaint a number; and for our disgrace, his own person, kneeling at ourfeet, but a weak and worthless satisfaction. To this add defiance; andtell him, for conclusion, he hath betrayed his followers, whosecondemnation is pronounc’d. So far my King and master; so much myoffice.
KING HENRY.What is thy name? I know thy quality.
MONTJOY.Montjoy.
KING HENRY.Thou dost thy office fairly. Turn thee back,And tell thy King I do not seek him now,But could be willing to march on to CalaisWithout impeachment; for, to say the sooth,Though ’tis no wisdom to confess so muchUnto an enemy of craft and vantage,My people are with sickness much enfeebled,My numbers lessen’d, and those few I haveAlmost no better than so many French;Who when they were in health, I tell thee, herald,I thought upon one pair of English legsDid march three Frenchmen. Yet, forgive me, God,That I do brag thus! This your air of FranceHath blown that vice in me. I must repent.Go therefore, tell thy master here I am;My ransom is this frail and worthless trunk,My army but a weak and sickly guard;Yet, God before, tell him we will come on,Though France himself and such another neighbourStand in our way. There’s for thy labour, Montjoy.Go, bid thy master well advise himself.If we may pass, we will; if we be hind’red,We shall your tawny ground with your red bloodDiscolour; and so, Montjoy, fare you well.The sum of all our answer is but this:We would not seek a battle, as we are;Nor, as we are, we say we will not shun it.So tell your master.
MONTJOY.I shall deliver so. Thanks to your Highness.
[Exit.]
GLOUCESTER.I hope they will not come upon us now.
KING HENRY.We are in God’s hands, brother, not in theirs.March to the bridge; it now draws toward night.Beyond the river we’ll encamp ourselves,And on tomorrow bid them march away.
[Exeunt.]
SCENE VII. The French camp, near Agincourt.
Enter the Constable of France, the Lord Rambures, Orleans, Dauphin with others.
CONSTABLE.Tut! I have the best armour of the world.Would it were day!
ORLEANS.You have an excellent armour; but let my horse have his due.
CONSTABLE.It is the best horse of Europe.
ORLEANS.Will it never be morning?
DAUPHIN.My Lord of Orleans, and my Lord High Constable, you talk of horse andarmour?
ORLEANS.You are as well provided of both as any prince in the world.
DAUPHIN.What a long night is this! I will not change my horse with any thattreads but on four pasterns. Ch’ha! He bounds from the earth, as if hisentrails were hairs; le cheval volant, the Pegasus, qui a lesnarines de feu! When I bestride him, I soar, I am a hawk. He trots theair; the earth sings when he touches it; the basest horn of his hoof ismore musical than the pipe of Hermes.
ORLEANS.He’s of the colour of the nutmeg.
DAUPHIN.And of the heat of the ginger. It is a beast for Perseus. He is pureair and fire; and the dull elements of earth and water never appear inhim, but only in patient stillness while his rider mounts him. He isindeed a horse, and all other jades you may call beasts.
CONSTABLE.Indeed, my lord, it is a most absolute and excellent horse.
DAUPHIN.It is the prince of palfreys; his neigh is like the bidding of amonarch, and his countenance enforces homage.
ORLEANS.No more, cousin.
DAUPHIN.Nay, the man hath no wit that cannot, from the rising of the lark tothe lodging of the lamb, vary deserved praise on my palfrey. It is atheme as fluent as the sea; turn the sands into eloquent tongues, andmy horse is argument for them all. ’Tis a subject for a sovereign toreason on, and for a sovereign’s sovereign to ride on; and for theworld, familiar to us and unknown, to lay apart their particularfunctions and wonder at him. I once writ a sonnet in his praise andbegan thus: “Wonder of nature,”—
ORLEANS.I have heard a sonnet begin so to one’s mistress.
DAUPHIN.Then did they imitate that which I compos’d to my courser, for my horseis my mistress.
ORLEANS.Your mistress bears well.
DAUPHIN.Me well; which is the prescript praise and perfection of a good andparticular mistress.
CONSTABLE.Nay, for methought yesterday your mistress shrewdly shook your back.
DAUPHIN.So perhaps did yours.
CONSTABLE.Mine was not bridled.
DAUPHIN.O then belike she was old and gentle; and you rode, like a kern ofIreland, your French hose off, and in your strait strossers.
CONSTABLE.You have good judgment in horsemanship.
DAUPHIN.Be warn’d by me, then; they that ride so and ride not warily, fall intofoul bogs. I had rather have my horse to my mistress.
CONSTABLE.I had as lief have my mistress a jade.
DAUPHIN.I tell thee, Constable, my mistress wears his own hair.
CONSTABLE.I could make as true a boast as that, if I had a sow to my mistress.
DAUPHIN.“Le chien est retourné à son propre vomissement, et la truie lavée aubourbier.” Thou mak’st use of anything.
CONSTABLE.Yet do I not use my horse for my mistress, or any such proverb solittle kin to the purpose.
RAMBURES.My Lord Constable, the armour that I saw in your tent tonight, arethose stars or suns upon it?
CONSTABLE.Stars, my lord.
DAUPHIN.Some of them will fall tomorrow, I hope.
CONSTABLE.And yet my sky shall not want.
DAUPHIN.That may be, for you bear a many superfluously, and ’twere more honoursome were away.
CONSTABLE.Even as your horse bears your praises; who would trot as well, weresome of your brags dismounted.
DAUPHIN.Would I were able to load him with his desert! Will it never be day? Iwill trot tomorrow a mile, and my way shall be paved with Englishfaces.
CONSTABLE.I will not say so, for fear I should be fac’d out of my way. But Iwould it were morning; for I would fain be about the ears of theEnglish.
RAMBURES.Who will go to hazard with me for twenty prisoners?
CONSTABLE.You must first go yourself to hazard, ere you have them.
DAUPHIN.’Tis midnight; I’ll go arm myself.
[Exit.]
ORLEANS.The Dauphin longs for morning.
RAMBURES.He longs to eat the English.
CONSTABLE.I think he will eat all he kills.
ORLEANS.By the white hand of my lady, he’s a gallant prince.
CONSTABLE.Swear by her foot that she may tread out the oath.
ORLEANS.He is simply the most active gentleman of France.
CONSTABLE.Doing is activity; and he will still be doing.
ORLEANS.He never did harm, that I heard of.
CONSTABLE.Nor will do none tomorrow. He will keep that good name still.
ORLEANS.I know him to be valiant.
CONSTABLE.I was told that by one that knows him better than you.
ORLEANS.What’s he?
CONSTABLE.Marry, he told me so himself; and he said he car’d not who knew it.
ORLEANS.He needs not; it is no hidden virtue in him.
CONSTABLE.By my faith, sir, but it is; never anybody saw it but his lackey. ’Tisa hooded valour; and when it appears, it will bate.
ORLEANS.“Ill will never said well.”
CONSTABLE.I will cap that proverb with “There is flattery in friendship.”
ORLEANS.And I will take up that with “Give the devil his due.”
CONSTABLE.Well plac’d. There stands your friend for the devil; have at the veryeye of that proverb with “A pox of the devil.”
ORLEANS.You are the better at proverbs, by how much “A fool’s bolt is soonshot.”
CONSTABLE.You have shot over.
ORLEANS.’Tis not the first time you were overshot.
Enter a Messenger.
MESSENGER.My Lord High Constable, the English lie within fifteen hundred paces ofyour tents.
CONSTABLE.Who hath measur’d the ground?
MESSENGER.The Lord Grandpré.
CONSTABLE.A valiant and most expert gentleman. Would it were day! Alas, poorHarry of England, he longs not for the dawning as we do.
ORLEANS.What a wretched and peevish fellow is this King of England, to mopewith his fat-brain’d followers so far out of his knowledge!
CONSTABLE.If the English had any apprehension, they would run away.
ORLEANS.That they lack; for if their heads had any intellectual armour, theycould never wear such heavy head-pieces.
RAMBURES.That island of England breeds very valiant creatures. Their mastiffsare of unmatchable courage.
ORLEANS.Foolish curs, that run winking into the mouth of a Russian bear andhave their heads crush’d like rotten apples! You may as well say,that’s a valiant flea that dare eat his breakfast on the lip of a lion.
CONSTABLE.Just, just; and the men do sympathize with the mastiffs in robustiousand rough coming on, leaving their wits with their wives; and then,give them great meals of beef and iron and steel, they will eat likewolves and fight like devils.
ORLEANS.Ay, but these English are shrewdly out of beef.
CONSTABLE.Then shall we find tomorrow they have only stomachs to eat and none tofight. Now is it time to arm. Come, shall we about it?
ORLEANS.It is now two o’clock; but, let me see, by tenWe shall have each a hundred Englishmen.
[Exeunt.]