Pist. Let housewifery appear; keep close, I thee command. Quick. Farewell; adieu.
SCENE IV.-France. A Room in the French King's Palace.
Enter the French KING attended; the DAUPHIN, the Duke of BURGUNDY, the CONSTABLE, and others.
Fr. King. Thus come the English, with full power upon us; And more than carefully it us concerns,
To answer royally in our defences.
Therefore the dukes of Berry and of Bretagne,
Of Brabant, and of Orleans, shall make forth,-
And you, prince Dauphin,-with all swift despatch,
To line, and new repair, our towns of war,
With men of courage, and with means defendant:
For England his approaches makes as fierce,
As waters to the sucking of a gulf.
It fits us then, to be as provident
As fear may teach us, cut of late examples
Left by the fatal and neglected English
Upon our fields.
Dau. My most redoubted father,
It is most meet we arm us 'gainst the foe:
For peace itself should not so dull a kingdom
(Though war, nor no known quarrel, were in question),
But that defences, musters, preparations,
Should be maintain'd, assembled, and collected,
As were a war in expectation.
Therefore, I say, 'tis meet we all go forth,
To view the sick and feeble parts of France:
And let us do it with no show of fear;
No, with no more, than if we heard that England
Were busied with a Whitsun morris-dance:
For, my good liege, she is so idly king'd,
Her sceptre so fantastically borne
By a vain, giddy, shallow, humorous youth,
That fear attends her not.
Con. O peace, prince Dauphin!
You are too much mistaken in this king:
Question your grace the late ambassadors,-
With what great state he heard their embassy,
How well supplied with noble counsellors,
How modest in exception,* and, withal,
How terrible in constant resolution,-
And you shall find, his vanities fore-spent t
Were but the outside of the Roman Brutus,
Covering discretion with a coat of folly;
As gardeners do with ordure hide those roots
That shall first spring, and be most delicate.
Dau. Well, 'tis not so, my lord high constable,
But though we think it so, it is no matter:
* Diffident in objection.
In cases of defence, 'tis best to weigh
The enemy more mighty than he seems,
So the proportions of defence are fill'd;
Which, of a weak and niggardly projection,
Doth, like a miser, spoil his coat, with scanting
A little cloth.
Fr. King. Think we king Harry strong;
And, princes, look, you strongly arm to meet him.
The kindred of him hath been flesh'd upon us;
And he is bred out of that bloody strain,*
That haunted us in our familiar paths:
Witness our too much memorable shame,
When Cressy battle fatally was struck,
And all our princes captived, by the hand
Of that black name, Edward black prince of Wales;
Whiles that his mountain sire,-on mountain standing,
Up in the air, crown'd with the golden sun,-
Saw his heroical seed, and smiled to see him
Mangle the work of nature, and deface
The patterns that by God and by French fathers
Had twenty years been made. This is a stem
Of that victorious stock; and let us fear
The native mightiness and fate of him.
Enter a MESSENGER.
Mess. Ambassadors from Henry king of England
Do crave admittance to your majesty.
Fr. King. We'll give them present audience. Go, and bring [Exeunt MESSENGER and certain LORDS.
You see, this chase is hotly follow'd, friends.
Dau. Turn head, and stop pursuit: for coward dogs
Most spend their mouths,t 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.
I stand here for him; What to him from England?
Exe. Scorn, and defiance; slight regard, contempt,
And anything that may not misbecome
The mighty sender, doth he prize you at.
Thus says my king: and, 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 reply,
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 those 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; which you shall read
In your own losses, if he stay in France.
Fr. King. To-morrow shall you know our mind at full.
Exe. Despatch 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 despatch'd, with fair conditions: A night is but small breath, and little pause,
To answer matters of this consequence.
Cho. 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 Phoebus 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: O, 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 sternaget 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
Katherine 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 off. And down goes all before them. Still be kind, And eke out our performance with your mind.
SCENE I-The same. Before Harfleur
Alarums. Enter KING HENRY, EXETER, BEDFORD, GLOSTER, and SOLDIERS, with scaling-ladders.
K. Hen. 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 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 sheath'd 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.
Small pieces of ordnance.
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