You see this chase is hotly follow'd, friends.
DAU. Turn head, and stop pursuit ; for coward dogs Most spend their mouths when what they seem to threaten Runs far before them. Good my sovereign,
Take up the English short; and let them know Of what a monarchy you are the head: Self-love, my liege, is not so vile a sin
Re-enter Lords, with EXETER and Train. FR. KING. From our brother England?
EXE. From him; and thus he greets your majesty. He wills you, in the name of God Almighty, That you divest yourself, and lay apart The borrow'd glories that by gift of heaven, By law of nature and of nations, 'long
To him and to his heirs; namely, the crown And all wide-stretched honours that pertain, By custom and the ordinance of times, Unto the crown of France. That you may know 'Tis no sinister nor no awkward claim, Pick'd from the worm-holes of long-vanish'd days, Nor from the dust of old oblivion raked, He sends you this most memorable line, In every branch truly demonstrative; Willing you overlook this pedigree: And when you find him evenly derived From his most famed of famous ancestors, Edward the Third, he bids you then resign Your crown and kingdom, indirectly held From him the native and true challenger. FR. KING. Or else what follows?
EXE. Bloody constraint; for if you hide the crown Even in your hearts, there will he rake for it: And therefore in fierce tempest is he coming, In thunder and in earthquake, like a Jove; That, if requiring fail, he will compel; And bids you, in the bowels of the Lord, Deliver up the crown, and to take mercy On the poor souls for whom this hungry war Opens his vasty jaws; and on your head Turns he the widows' tears, the orphans' cries, The dead men's blood, the pining maidens' groans,
For husbands, fathers, and betrothed lovers, That shall be swallow'd in this controversy.
This is his claim, his threatening and my message; Unless the Dauphin be in presence here, To whom expressly I bring greeting too.
FR. KING. For us, we will consider of this further: To-morrow shall you bear our full intent
Back to our brother England.
DAU. I stand here for him: what to him from England? EXE. Scorn and defiance; slight regard, contempt, And any thing that may not misbecome The mighty sender, doth he prize you at.
Thus says my king; an if your father's highness Do not, in grant of all demands at large, Sweeten the bitter mock you sent his majesty, He'll call you to so hot an answer for it, That caves and womby vaultages of France Shall chide your trespass, and return your mock In second accent of his ordnance.
DAU. Say, if my father render fair return
It is against my will; for I desire
Nothing but odds with England: to that end, As matching to his youth and vanity,
I did present him with the Paris balls.
EXE. He'll make your Paris Louvre shake for it,
Were it the mistress-court of mighty Europe: And, be assured, you'll find a difference, As we, his subjects, have in wonder found, Between the promise of his greener days
And these he masters now: now he weighs time Even to the utmost grain: that you shall read In your own losses, if he stay in France.
FR. KING. To-morrow shall you know our mind at full. EXE. Dispatch us with all speed, lest that our king Come here himself to question our delay;
For he is footed in this land already.
FR. KING. You shall be soon dispatch'd with fair conditions:
A night is but small breath and little pause
To answer matters of this consequence.
CHOR. Thus with imagined wing our swift scene flies, In motion of no less celerity
Than that of thought. Suppose that you have seen The well-appointed king at Hampton pier Embark his royalty; and his brave fleet
With silken streamers the young Phœbus fanning : Play with your fancies, and in them behold Upon the hempen tackle ship-boys climbing; Hear the shrill whistle which doth order give To sounds confused; behold the threaden sails, Borne with the invisible and creeping wind, Draw the huge bottoms through the furrow'd sea, Breasting the lofty surge: 0, do but think You stand upon the rivage and behold A 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 arrived to pith and puissance; For who is he, whose chin is but enrich'd With one appearing hair, that will not follow These 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 him Katharine his daughter; and with her, to dowry, Some petty and unprofitable dukedoms. The offer likes not: and the nimble gunner With linstock now the devilish cannon touches,
[Alarum, and chambers go of. And down goes all before them. Still be kind, And eke out our performance with your mind.
SCENE I. France. Before Harfleur.
Enter KING HENRY, EXETER, BEDFORD, GLOUCESTER, and Soldiers, with scaling-ladders.
K. HEN. Once more unto the breach, dear friends,
Or close the wall up with our English dead! In peace there's nothing so becomes a man As 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 head Like the brass cannon; let the brow o'erwhelm it As fearfully as doth a galled rock
O'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 spirit To 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 sheathed their swords for lack of argument: Dishonour not your mothers; now attest
That 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 here The mettle of your pasture; let us swear
That 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 charge
Cry 'God for Harry, England, and Saint George!'
[Exeunt. Alarum, and chambers go off.
SCENE II. The same.
Enter NYM, BARDOLPH, PISTOL, and Boy.
BARD. On, on, on, on, on! to the breach, to the breach!
NYм. Pray thee, corporal, stay: the knocks are too hot; and, for mine own part, I have not a case of lives : the humour of it is too hot, that is the very plain-song of it.
PIST. 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 a pot of ale and safety.
If wishes would prevail with me,
My purpose should not fail with me,
But thither would I hie.
As duly,
But not as truly,
As bird doth sing on bough.
FLU. Up to the preach, you dogs! avaunt, you cullions!
[Driving them forward. PIST. 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 observed these three swashers. I am boy to them all three : but all they three, though they would serve me, could not be man to me; for indeed three such antics do not amount to a man. For Bardolph, he is white-livered and red-faced; by the means whereof 'a faces it out, but fights not. For Pistol, he hath
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