King Henry the Fifth

KATH. Non, je reciterai à vous promptement: de hand, de fingres, de mails,—

ALICE. De nails, madame.

KATH. De nails, de arm, de ilbow.

ALICE. Sauf votre honneur, de elbow.

KATH. Ainsi dis-je; de elbow, de nick, et de sin. Maintenant, je reciterai une autre fois ma leçon ensemble : de hand, de fingres, de nails, de arm, de elbow, de nick, de sin.

ALICE. Excellent, madame !

KATH. C'est assez pour une fois : allons-nous à dîner. [Exeunt.

SCENE V. The same.

Enter the FRENCH KING, the DAUPHIN, the DUKE OF
BOURBON, the Constable of France, and others.
FR. KING. 'Tis certain he hath pass'd the river Somme.
CON. And if he be not fought withal, my lord,

Let us not live in France; let us quit all,

And give our vineyards to a barbarous people.

DAU. 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 ?

BOUR. Normans, but bastard Normans, Norman bas

Mort de ma vie ! if they march along

[tards!

Unfought withal, but I will sell my dukedom,

To buy a slobbery and a dirty farm

In that nook-shotten isle of Albion.

CON. 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 icicles

Upon our houses' thatch, whiles a more frosty people
Sweat drops of gallant youth in our rich fields!
Poor we may call them in their native lords.

DAU. By faith and honour,

Our madams mock at us, and plainly say
Our mettle is bred out, and they will give
Their bodies to the lust of English youth

To new-store France with bastard warriors.

BOUR. 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.

FR. KING. Where is Montjoy, the herald? speed him hence:

;

Let him greet England with our sharp defiance.
Up, princes! and, with spirit of honour edged
More sharper than your swords, hie to the field:
Charles Delabreth, high constable of France
You Dukes of Orleans, Bourbon, and of Berri,
Alençon, Brabant, Bar, and Burgundy;
Jacques Chatillon, Rambures, Vaudemont,
Beaumont, Grandpré, Roussi, and Fauconbridge,
Foix, Lestrale, Bouciqualt, 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 land
With pennons painted in the blood of Harfleur :
Rush on his host, as doth the melted snow
Upon the valleys, whose low vassal seat
The Alps doth spit and void his rheum upon :
Go down upon him-you have power enough-
And in a captive chariot into Rouen

Bring him our prisoner.

CON.

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 fear,

And for achievement offer us his ransom.

FR. KING. Therefore, lord constable, haste on Montjoy,

And let him say to England that we send

To know what willing ransom he will give.

Prince Dauphin, you shall stay with us in Rouen.

DAU. Not so, I do beseech your majesty.

FR. 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.

Gow. How now, Captain Fluellen! come you from the bridge?

FLU. I assure you, there is very excellent services committed at the pridge.

Gow. Is the Duke of Exeter safe?

FLU. The Duke of Exeter is as magnanimous as Agamemnon; and a man that I love and honour with my soul, and my heart, and my duty, and my life, and my livings, and my uttermost powers: he is not-Got be praised and plessed!-any hurt in the 'orld; but keeps the pridge most valiantly, with excellent discipline. There is an aunchient lieutenant there at the pridge-I think in my very conscience he is as valiant à man as Mark Antony; and he is a man of no estimation in the 'orld; but I did see him do gallant service.

Gow. What do you call him?

FLU. He is called Aunchient Pistol.
Gow. I know him not.

Enter PISTOL.

FLU. Here is the man.

PIST. Captain, I thee beseech to do me favours : The Duke of Exeter doth love thee well.

FLU. Ay, I praise Got; and I have merited some love

at his hands.

PIST. Bardolph, a soldier, firm and sound of heart, Of buxom valour, hath, by cruel fate,

And giddy Fortune's furious fickle wheel,

That goddess blind,

That stands upon the rolling, restless stone

FLU. By your patience, Aunchient Pistol. Fortune is painted plind, with a muffler afore her eyes, to signify to you that Fortune is plind; and she is painted also with a wheel, to signify to you, which is the moral of it, that she is turning, and inconstant, and mutability, and variation; and her foot, look you, is fixed upon a spherical stone, which rolls, and rolls, and rolls: in good truth, the poet makes a most excellent description of it: Fortune is an excellent moral.

;

PIST. 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 death
For pax of little price.

Therefore, go speak; the duke will hear thy voice;
And let not Bardolph's vital thread be cut

With edge of penny cord and vile reproach:
Speak, captain, for his life, and I will thee requițe.
FLU. Aunchient Pistol, I do partly understand your
meaning.

PIST. Why then, rejoice therefore.

FLU. Certainly, aunchient, it is not a thing to rejoice at ; for if, look you, he were my brother, I would desire the duke to use his goot pleasure, and put him to execution; for discipline ought to be used.

PIST. Die and be damn'd! and figo for thy friendship! FLU. It is well.

PIST. The fig of Spain!

FLU. Very good.

[Exit.

Gow. Why, this is an arrant counterfeit rascal; I remember him now; a bawd, a cutpurse.

FLU. I'll assure you, 'a uttered as prave 'ords at the pridge as you shall see 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.

Gow. Why, 'tis 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 great commanders' names: and they will learn you by rote where services were done; at such and such a sconce, at such a breach, at such a convoy; who came off bravely, who was shot, who disgraced, what terms the enemy stood on; and this they con perfectly in the phrase of war, which they trick up with new-tuned oaths: and what a beard of the general's cut and a horrid suit of the camp will do among foaming bottles and alewashed wits, is wonderful to be thought on! But you must learn to known such slanders of the age, or else you may be marvellously mistook.

FLU. I tell you what, Captain Gower; I do perceive he

is not the man that he would gladly make show to the 'orld he is; if I find a hole in his coat, I will tell him my mind. [Drum heard.] Hark you, the king is coming, and I must speak with him from the pridge.

Enter KING HENRY, GLOUCESTER, and Soldiers. FLU. Got pless your majesty!

K. HEN. How now, Fluellen! camest thou from the bridge?

FLU. Ay, so please your majesty. The Duke of Exeter has very gallantly maintained the pridge: the French is gone off, look you; and there is gallant and most prave passages: marry, th' athversary was have possession of the pridge; but he is enforced to retire, and the Duke of Exeter is master of the pridge: I can tell your majesty, the duke is a prave man.

K. HEN. What men have you lost, Fluellen? FLU. The perdition of th' athversary hath been very great, reasonable great: marry, for my part, I think the duke hath lost never a man, but one that is like to be executed for robbing a church, one Bardolph, if your majesty know the man: his face is all bubukles, and whelks, and knobs, and flames o' fire: and his lips plows at his nose, and it is like a coal of fire, sometimes plue and sometimes red; but his nose is executed, and his fire's out.

K. HEN. We would have all such offenders so cut off: and we give express charge, that in our marches through the country, there be nothing compelled from the villages, nothing taken but paid for, none of the French upbraided or abused in disdainful language; for when lenity and cruelty play for a kingdom, the gentler gamester is the soonest winner.

Tucket. Enter MONTJOY.

MONT. You know me by my habit.

III

K. HEN. Well then, I know thee: what shall I know of thee?

MONT. My master's mind.

K. HEN. Unfold it.

MONT. Thus says my king: Say thou to Harry of England: Though we seemed dead, we did but sleep: advantage is a better soldier than rashness. Tell him we could

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