King Henry V

Enter the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of Ely.

CANTERBURY My lord, I’ll tell you, that self bill is urg’d Which in the eleventh year of the last king’s reign Was like, and had indeed against us passed But that the scambling and unquiet time Did push it out of farther question.

ELY But how, my lord, shall we resist it now?

CANTERBURY It must be thought on. If it pass against us, We lose the better half of our possession: For all the temporal lands, which men devout By testament have given to the Church, Would they strip from us; being valu’d thus: As much as would maintain, to the King’s honour, Full fifteen earls and fifteen hundred knights, Six thousand and two hundred good esquires; And, to relief of lazars and weak age, Of indigent faint souls past corporal toil, A hundred almshouses right well supplied; And to the coffers of the King beside, A thousand pounds by th’ year. Thus runs the bill.

ELY This would drink deep.

CANTERBURY ’Twould drink the cup and all.

ELY But what prevention?

CANTERBURY The King is full of grace and fair regard.

ELY And a true lover of the holy Church.

CANTERBURY The courses of his youth promis’d it not. The breath no sooner left his father’s body But that his wildness, mortified in him, Seemed to die too; yea, at that very moment Consideration like an angel came And whipped th’ offending Adam out of him, Leaving his body as a paradise T’ envelope and contain celestial spirits. Never was such a sudden scholar made, Never came reformation in a flood With such a heady currance scouring faults, Nor never Hydra-headed wilfulness So soon did lose his seat, and all at once, As in this king.

ELY We are blessed in the change.

CANTERBURY Hear him but reason in divinity And, all-admiring, with an inward wish You would desire the King were made a prelate; Hear him debate of commonwealth affairs, You would say it hath been all in all his study; List his discourse of war, and you shall hear A fearful battle rendered you in music; Turn him to any cause of policy, The Gordian knot of it he will unloose, Familiar as his garter; that, when he speaks, The air, a chartered libertine, is still, And the mute wonder lurketh in men’s ears To steal his sweet and honeyed sentences; So that the art and practic part of life Must be the mistress to this theoric: Which is a wonder how his Grace should glean it, Since his addiction was to courses vain, His companies unlettered, rude, and shallow, His hours filled up with riots, banquets, sports, And never noted in him any study, Any retirement, any sequestration From open haunts and popularity.

ELY The strawberry grows underneath the nettle, And wholesome berries thrive and ripen best Neighboured by fruit of baser quality; And so the Prince obscured his contemplation Under the veil of wildness, which, no doubt, Grew like the summer grass, fastest by night, Unseen, yet crescive in his faculty.

CANTERBURY It must be so, for miracles are ceased, And therefore we must needs admit the means How things are perfected.

ELY But, my good lord, How now for mitigation of this bill Urged by the Commons? Doth his Majesty Incline to it, or no?

CANTERBURY He seems indifferent, Or rather swaying more upon our part Than cherishing th’ exhibitors against us; For I have made an offer to his Majesty, Upon our spiritual convocation And in regard of causes now in hand, Which I have opened to his Grace at large, As touching France, to give a greater sum Than ever at one time the clergy yet Did to his predecessors part withal.

ELY How did this offer seem received, my lord?

CANTERBURY With good acceptance of his Majesty; Save that there was not time enough to hear, As I perceived his Grace would fain have done, The severals and unhidden passages Of his true titles to some certain dukedoms, And generally to the crown and seat of France, Derived from Edward, his great-grandfather.

ELY What was th’ impediment that broke this off?

CANTERBURY The French ambassador upon that instant Craved audience; and the hour, I think, is come To give him hearing. Is it four o’clock?

ELY It is.

CANTERBURY Then go we in, to know his embassy, Which I could with a ready guess declare Before the Frenchman speak a word of it.

ELY I’ll wait upon you, and I long to hear it.

[_Exeunt._]

Enter Exeter, Bedford and Westmorland.

BEDFORD ’Fore God, his Grace is bold, to trust these traitors.

EXETER They shall be apprehended by and by.

WESTMORLAND How smooth and even they do bear themselves! As if allegiance in their bosoms sat Crowned with faith and constant loyalty.

BEDFORD The King hath note of all that they intend, By interception which they dream not of.

EXETER Nay, but the man that was his bed-fellow, Whom he hath dull’d and cloy’d with gracious favours, That he should, for a foreign purse, so sell His sovereign’s life to death and treachery.

Trumpets sound. Enter King Henry, Scroop, Cambridge and Grey.

KING HENRY Now sits the wind fair, and we will aboard. My Lord of Cambridge, and my kind Lord of Masham, And you, my gentle knight, give me your thoughts. Think you not that the powers we bear with us Will cut their passage through the force of France, Doing the execution and the act For which we have in head assembled them?

SCROOP No doubt, my liege, if each man do his best.

KING HENRY I doubt not that, since we are well persuaded We carry not a heart with us from hence That grows not in a fair consent with ours, Nor leave not one behind that doth not wish Success and conquest to attend on us.

CAMBRIDGE Never was monarch better fear’d and lov’d Than is your Majesty. There’s not, I think, a subject That sits in heart-grief and uneasiness Under the sweet shade of your government.

GREY True; those that were your father’s enemies Have steep’d their galls in honey, and do serve you With hearts create of duty and of zeal.

KING HENRY We therefore have great cause of thankfulness, And shall forget the office of our hand Sooner than quittance of desert and merit According to the weight and worthiness.

SCROOP So service shall with steeled sinews toil, And labour shall refresh itself with hope, To do your Grace incessant services.

KING HENRY We judge no less. Uncle of Exeter, Enlarge the man committed yesterday, That rail’d against our person. We consider It was excess of wine that set him on, And on his more advice we pardon him.

SCROOP That’s mercy, but too much security. Let him be punish’d, sovereign, lest example Breed, by his sufferance, more of such a kind.

KING HENRY O, let us yet be merciful.

CAMBRIDGE So may your Highness, and yet punish too.

GREY Sir, You show great mercy if you give him life After the taste of much correction.

KING HENRY Alas, your too much love and care of me Are heavy orisons ’gainst this poor wretch! If little faults, proceeding on distemper, Shall not be wink’d at, how shall we stretch our eye When capital crimes, chew’d, swallow’d, and digested, Appear before us? We’ll yet enlarge that man, Though Cambridge, Scroop, and Grey, in their dear care And tender preservation of our person, Would have him punish’d. And now to our French causes. Who are the late commissioners?

CAMBRIDGE I one, my lord. Your Highness bade me ask for it today.

SCROOP So did you me, my liege.

GREY And I, my royal sovereign.

KING HENRY Then, Richard Earl of Cambridge, there is yours; There yours, Lord Scroop of Masham; and, sir knight, Grey of Northumberland, this same is yours. Read them, and know I know your worthiness. My Lord of Westmorland, and uncle Exeter, We will aboard tonight.—Why, how now, gentlemen! What see you in those papers that you lose So much complexion?—Look ye, how they change! Their cheeks are paper.—Why, what read you there, That have so cowarded and chas’d your blood Out of appearance?

CAMBRIDGE I do confess my fault, And do submit me to your Highness’ mercy.

GREY, SCROOP. To which we all appeal.

KING HENRY The mercy that was quick in us but late, By your own counsel is suppress’d and kill’d. You must not dare, for shame, to talk of mercy, For your own reasons turn into your bosoms, As dogs upon their masters, worrying you. See you, my princes and my noble peers, These English monsters! My Lord of Cambridge here, You know how apt our love was to accord To furnish him with an appertinents Belonging to his honour; and this man Hath, for a few light crowns, lightly conspir’d And sworn unto the practices of France To kill us here in Hampton; to the which This knight, no less for bounty bound to us Than Cambridge is, hath likewise sworn. But, O What shall I say to thee, Lord Scroop? thou cruel, Ingrateful, savage, and inhuman creature! Thou that didst bear the key of all my counsels, That knew’st the very bottom of my soul, That almost mightst have coin’d me into gold, Wouldst thou have practis’d on me for thy use,— May it be possible that foreign hire Could out of thee extract one spark of evil That might annoy my finger? ’Tis so strange, That, though the truth of it stands off as gross As black and white, my eye will scarcely see it. Treason and murder ever kept together, As two yoke-devils sworn to either’s purpose, Working so grossly in a natural cause That admiration did not whoop at them; But thou, ’gainst all proportion, didst bring in Wonder to wait on treason and on murder; And whatsoever cunning fiend it was That wrought upon thee so preposterously Hath got the voice in hell for excellence; And other devils that suggest by treasons Do botch and bungle up damnation With patches, colours, and with forms being fetch’d From glist’ring semblances of piety. But he that temper’d thee bade thee stand up, Gave thee no instance why thou shouldst do treason, Unless to dub thee with the name of traitor. If that same demon that hath gull’d thee thus Should with his lion gait walk the whole world, He might return to vasty Tartar back, And tell the legions, “I can never win A soul so easy as that Englishman’s.” O, how hast thou with jealousy infected The sweetness of affiance! Show men dutiful? Why, so didst thou. Seem they grave and learned? Why, so didst thou. Come they of noble family? Why, so didst thou. Seem they religious? Why, so didst thou. Or are they spare in diet, Free from gross passion or of mirth or anger, Constant in spirit, not swerving with the blood, Garnish’d and deck’d in modest complement, Not working with the eye without the ear, And but in purged judgement trusting neither? Such and so finely bolted didst thou seem. And thus thy fall hath left a kind of blot To mark the full-fraught man and best indued With some suspicion. I will weep for thee; For this revolt of thine, methinks, is like Another fall of man. Their faults are open. Arrest them to the answer of the law; And God acquit them of their practices!

EXETER I arrest thee of high treason, by the name of Richard Earl of Cambridge. I arrest thee of high treason, by the name of Henry Lord Scroop of Masham. I arrest thee of high treason, by the name of Thomas Grey, knight, of Northumberland.

SCROOP Our purposes God justly hath discover’d, And I repent my fault more than my death, Which I beseech your Highness to forgive, Although my body pay the price of it.

CAMBRIDGE For me, the gold of France did not seduce, Although I did admit it as a motive The sooner to effect what I intended. But God be thanked for prevention, Which I in sufferance heartily will rejoice, Beseeching God and you to pardon me.

GREY Never did faithful subject more rejoice At the discovery of most dangerous treason Than I do at this hour joy o’er myself, Prevented from a damned enterprise. My fault, but not my body, pardon, sovereign.

KING HENRY God quit you in his mercy! Hear your sentence. You have conspir’d against our royal person, Join’d with an enemy proclaim’d, and from his coffers Received the golden earnest of our death; Wherein you would have sold your king to slaughter, His princes and his peers to servitude, His subjects to oppression and contempt, And his whole kingdom into desolation. Touching our person seek we no revenge; But we our kingdom’s safety must so tender, Whose ruin you have sought, that to her laws We do deliver you. Get you therefore hence, Poor miserable wretches, to your death, The taste whereof God of his mercy give You patience to endure, and true repentance Of all your dear offences! Bear them hence.

[_Exeunt Cambridge, Scroop and Grey, guarded._]

Now, lords, for France; the enterprise whereof Shall be to you, as us, like glorious. We doubt not of a fair and lucky war, Since God so graciously hath brought to light This dangerous treason lurking in our way To hinder our beginnings. We doubt not now But every rub is smoothed on our way. Then forth, dear countrymen! Let us deliver Our puissance into the hand of God, Putting it straight in expedition. Cheerly to sea! The signs of war advance! No king of England, if not king of France!

[_Flourish. Exeunt._]

Flourish. Enter the French King, the Dauphin, the Dukes of Berry and Brittany, the Constable and others.

FRENCH KING Thus comes 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 Brittany, Of Brabant and of Orleans, shall make forth, And you, Prince Dauphin, with all swift dispatch, 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 fears may teach us out of late examples Left by the fatal and neglected English Upon our fields.

DAUPHIN 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.

CONSTABLE 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 forespent 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.

DAUPHIN Well, ’tis not so, my Lord High Constable; But though we think it so, it is no matter. 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.

FRENCH 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 captiv’d 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 smil’d 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.

MESSENGER Ambassadors from Harry King of England Do crave admittance to your Majesty.

FRENCH KING We’ll give them present audience. Go, and bring them.

[_Exeunt Messenger and certain Lords._]

You see this chase is hotly follow’d, friends.

DAUPHIN 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 As self-neglecting.

Enter Exeter.

FRENCH KING From our brother of England?

EXETER 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 borrowed glories that by gift of heaven, By law of nature and of nations, ’longs 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 rak’d, He sends you this most memorable line, In every branch truly demonstrative; Willing you overlook this pedigree; And when you find him evenly deriv’d From his most fam’d of famous ancestors, Edward the Third, he bids you then resign Your crown and kingdom, indirectly held From him, the native and true challenger.

FRENCH KING Or else what follows?

EXETER Bloody constraint; for if you hide the crown Even in your hearts, there will he rake for it. 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 Turning the widows’ tears, the orphans’ cries, The dead men’s blood, the pining maidens’ groans, For husbands, fathers, and betrothed lovers, That shall be swallowed in this controversy. This is his claim, his threat’ning, and my message; Unless the Dauphin be in presence here, To whom expressly I bring greeting too.

FRENCH KING For us, we will consider of this further. Tomorrow shall you bear our full intent Back to our brother of England.

DAUPHIN For the Dauphin, I stand here for him. What to him from England?

EXETER Scorn and defiance. Slight regard, contempt, And anything 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 of it That caves and womby vaultages of France Shall chide your trespass and return your mock In second accent of his ordinance.

DAUPHIN 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.

EXETER He’ll make your Paris Louvre shake for it, Were it the mistress-court of mighty Europe; And, be assur’d, 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.

FRENCH KING Tomorrow shall you know our mind at full.

[_Flourish._]

EXETER Dispatch us with all speed, lest that our king Come here himself to question our delay; For he is footed in this land already.

FRENCH 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.

[_Exeunt._]

Flourish. Enter Chorus.

CHORUS Thus with imagin’d 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 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 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 arriv’d 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 off._]

And down goes all before them. Still be kind, And eke out our performance with your mind.

[_Exit._]

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 own part, I have not a case of lives. The humour of it is too hot; that is the 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 a pot 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 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-liver’d and red-fac’d; by the means whereof ’a faces it out, but fights not. For Pistol, he hath a killing tongue and a quiet sword; by the means whereof ’a breaks words, and keeps whole weapons. For Nym, he hath heard that men of few words are the best men; and therefore he scorns to say his prayers, lest ’a should be thought a coward. But his few bad words are match’d with as few good deeds; for ’a never broke any man’s head but his own, and that was against a post when he was drunk. They will steal anything, and call it purchase. Bardolph stole a lute-case, bore it twelve leagues, and sold it for three half-pence. Nym and Bardolph are sworn brothers in filching, and in Calais they stole a fire-shovel. I knew by that piece of service the men would carry coals. They would have me as familiar with men’s pockets as their gloves or their handkerchers; which makes much against my manhood, if I should take from another’s pocket to put into mine; for it is plain pocketing up of wrongs. I must leave them, and seek some better service. Their villainy goes against my weak stomach, 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 the mines; for, look you, the mines is not according to the disciplines of the war. The concavities of it is not sufficient; for, look you, the athversary, you may discuss unto the Duke, look you, is digt himself four yard under the countermines. By Cheshu, I think ’a will plow up all, if there is not better directions.

GOWER The Duke of Gloucester, to whom the order of the siege is given, is altogether 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 his beard. 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; and of great expedition and knowledge in the anchient wars, upon my particular knowledge of his directions. By Cheshu, he will maintain his argument as well as any military man in the world, in the disciplines of 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 trompet sound the retreat. By my hand I swear, and my father’s soul, the work ish ill done; it ish give over. I would have blowed up the town, so Chrish save me, la! in an hour. O, ’tish ill done, ’tish ill done; by my hand, ’tish ill done!

FLUELLEN Captain Macmorris, I beseech you now, will you voutsafe me, look you, a few disputations with you, as partly touching or concerning the disciplines of the war, the Roman wars, in the way of argument, look you, and friendly communication; partly to satisfy my opinion, and partly for the satisfaction, look you, of my mind, as touching the direction of the military discipline; that is the point.

JAMY It sall be vary gud, gud feith, gud captains bath: and I sall quit you with 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 the weather, and the wars, and the King, and the Dukes. It is no time to discourse. The town is beseech’d, and the trumpet call us to the breach, 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; and there is throats to be cut, and works to be done; and there ish nothing done, so Chrish sa’ me, la!

JAMY By the mess, ere theise eyes of mine take themselves to slomber, I’ll de 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 is the 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 is not many of your nation—

MACMORRIS Of my nation! What ish my nation? Ish a villain, and a bastard, and a knave, and a rascal? What ish my nation? Who talks of my nation?

FLUELLEN Look you, if you take the matter otherwise than is meant, Captain Macmorris, peradventure I shall think you do not use me with that affability as in discretion you ought to use me, look you, being as good a man as yourself, both in the disciplines of war, and in the derivation 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 be required, look you, I will be so bold as to tell you I know the disciplines of war; and there is an end.

[_Exeunt._]

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. Les doigts? 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 le bon écolier; j’ai gagné deux mots d’anglais vitement. Comment appelez-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’avez appris 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, de bilbow.

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 aussi droit que les natifs d’Angleterre._

KATHARINE _Je ne doute point d’apprendre, par la grâce de Dieu, et en peu de temps._

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 le pied et la robe?_

ALICE De foot, _madame; et_ de coun.

KATHARINE De foot _et_ de coun! _O Seigneur Dieu! ils sont les mots de son mauvais, corruptible, gros, et impudique, et non pour les dames d’honneur d’user. Je ne voudrais prononcer ces mots devant les seigneurs de France pour tout le monde. Foh!_ le foot _et_ le coun! _Néanmoins, je réciterai une autre fois ma leçon ensemble:_ d’hand, de fingres, 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._]

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 all And 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 along Unfought withal, but I will sell my dukedom, To buy a slobbery and a dirty farm In 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 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.

DAUPHIN 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.

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 edged More 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 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.

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 fear And for achievement offer us his ransom.

FRENCH 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.

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._]

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 I love 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 and blessed!—any hurt in the world; but keeps the bridge most valiantly, with excellent discipline. There is an anchient lieutenant there at the pridge, I think in my very conscience he is as valiant a man as Mark Antony; and he is a man of no estimation in the world, but I did see him 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 fate And 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 a muffler afore his eyes, to signify to you that Fortune is blind; 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.

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 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 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 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.

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 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 disgrac’d, 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 ale-wash’d wits, is wonderful to be thought on. But you must learn to know such slanders of the age, or else you may be marvellously mistook.

FLUELLEN I tell you what, Captain Gower; I do perceive he is not the man that he would gladly make show to the world 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.

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 gallantly maintain’d 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.

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 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 blows 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.

KING HENRY We would have all such offenders so cut off; and we give express charge, that in our marches through the country, there be nothing compell’d 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.

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 him we could have rebuk’d him at Harfleur, but that we thought not good to bruise an injury till it were full ripe. Now we speak upon our cue, and our voice is imperial. England shall repent his folly, see his weakness, and admire our sufferance. Bid him therefore consider of his ransom; which must proportion the losses we have borne, the subjects we have lost, the disgrace we have digested; which in weight to re-answer, his pettishness would bow under. For our losses, his exchequer is too poor; for the effusion of our blood, the muster of his kingdom too faint a number; and for our disgrace, his own person, kneeling at our feet, but a weak and worthless satisfaction. To this add defiance; and tell him, for conclusion, he hath betrayed his followers, whose condemnation is pronounc’d. So far my King and master; so much my office.

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 Calais Without impeachment; for, to say the sooth, Though ’tis no wisdom to confess so much Unto an enemy of craft and vantage, My people are with sickness much enfeebled, My numbers lessen’d, and those few I have Almost no better than so many French; Who when they were in health, I tell thee, herald, I thought upon one pair of English legs Did march three Frenchmen. Yet, forgive me, God, That I do brag thus! This your air of France Hath 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 neighbour Stand 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 blood Discolour; 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._]

Enter the Dauphin, Orleans, Rambures and others.

ORLEANS The sun doth gild our armour; up, my lords!

DAUPHIN _Monte à cheval!_ My horse, _varlet! laquais_, ha!

ORLEANS O brave spirit!

DAUPHIN _Via, les eaux et terre!_

ORLEANS _Rien puis? L’air et feu?_

DAUPHIN _Cieux_, cousin Orleans.

Enter Constable.

Now, my Lord Constable!

CONSTABLE Hark, how our steeds for present service neigh!

DAUPHIN Mount them, and make incision in their hides, That their hot blood may spin in English eyes, And dout them with superfluous courage, ha!

RAMBURES What, will you have them weep our horses’ blood? How shall we, then, behold their natural tears?

Enter a Messenger.

MESSENGER The English are embattl’d, you French peers.

CONSTABLE To horse, you gallant princes! straight to horse! Do but behold yon poor and starved band, And your fair show shall suck away their souls, Leaving them but the shales and husks of men. There is not work enough for all our hands; Scarce blood enough in all their sickly veins To give each naked curtle-axe a stain, That our French gallants shall today draw out, And sheathe for lack of sport. Let us but blow on them, The vapour of our valour will o’erturn them. ’Tis positive ’gainst all exceptions, lords, That our superfluous lackeys and our peasants, Who in unnecessary action swarm About our squares of battle, were enough To purge this field of such a hilding foe, Though we upon this mountain’s basis by Took stand for idle speculation, But that our honours must not. What’s to say? A very little little let us do, And all is done. Then let the trumpets sound The tucket sonance and the note to mount; For our approach shall so much dare the field That England shall crouch down in fear and yield.

Enter Grandpré.

GRANDPRÉ. Why do you stay so long, my lords of France? Yond island carrions, desperate of their bones, Ill-favouredly become the morning field. Their ragged curtains poorly are let loose, And our air shakes them passing scornfully. Big Mars seems bankrupt in their beggar’d host, And faintly through a rusty beaver peeps; The horsemen sit like fixed candlesticks With torch-staves in their hand; and their poor jades Lob down their heads, drooping the hides and hips, The gum down-roping from their pale-dead eyes, And in their pale dull mouths the gimmal bit Lies foul with chew’d grass, still, and motionless; And their executors, the knavish crows, Fly o’er them, all impatient for their hour. Description cannot suit itself in words To demonstrate the life of such a battle, In life so lifeless as it shows itself.

CONSTABLE They have said their prayers, and they stay for death.

DAUPHIN Shall we go send them dinners and fresh suits And give their fasting horses provender, And after fight with them?

CONSTABLE I stay but for my guard; on to the field! I will the banner from a trumpet take, And use it for my haste. Come, come, away! The sun is high, and we outwear the day.

[_Exeunt._]

Alarum. Excursions. Enter Pistol, French Soldier and Boy.

PISTOL Yield, cur!

FRENCH SOLDIER _Je pense que vous êtes le gentilhomme de bonne qualité._

PISTOL _Qualité? Caleno custore me!_ Art thou a gentleman? What is thy name? Discuss.

FRENCH SOLDIER _O Seigneur Dieu!_

PISTOL O, Signieur Dew should be a gentleman. Perpend my words, O Signieur Dew, and mark: O Signieur Dew, thou diest on point of fox, Except, O signieur, thou do give to me Egregious ransom.

FRENCH SOLDIER _O, prenez miséricorde! Ayez pitié de moi!_

PISTOL Moy shall not serve; I will have forty moys, Or I will fetch thy rim out at thy throat In drops of crimson blood.

FRENCH SOLDIER _Est-il impossible d’échapper la force de ton bras?_

PISTOL Brass, cur! Thou damned and luxurious mountain goat, Offer’st me brass?

FRENCH SOLDIER _O pardonnez-moi!_

PISTOL Say’st thou me so? Is that a ton of moys? Come hither, boy; ask me this slave in French What is his name.

BOY _Écoutez. Comment êtes-vous appelé?_

FRENCH SOLDIER _Monsieur le Fer._

BOY He says his name is Master Fer.

PISTOL Master Fer! I’ll fer him, and firk him, and ferret him. Discuss the same in French unto him.

BOY I do not know the French for fer, and ferret, and firk.

PISTOL Bid him prepare; for I will cut his throat.

FRENCH SOLDIER _Que dit-il, monsieur?_

BOY _Il me commande à vous dire que vous faites vous prêt, car ce soldat ici est disposé tout à cette heure de couper votre gorge._

PISTOL Owy, cuppele gorge, permafoy, Peasant, unless thou give me crowns, brave crowns; Or mangled shalt thou be by this my sword.

FRENCH SOLDIER _O, je vous supplie, pour l’amour de Dieu, me pardonner! Je suis le gentilhomme de bonne maison; gardez ma vie, et je vous donnerai deux cents écus._

PISTOL What are his words?

BOY He prays you to save his life. He is a gentleman of a good house; and for his ransom he will give you two hundred crowns.

PISTOL Tell him my fury shall abate, and I The crowns will take.

FRENCH SOLDIER _Petit monsieur, que dit-il?_

BOY _Encore qu’il est contre son jurement de pardonner aucun prisonnier; néanmoins, pour les écus que vous lui avez promis, il est content à vous donner la liberté, le franchisement._

FRENCH SOLDIER _Sur mes genoux je vous donne mille remerciements; et je m’estime heureux que je suis tombé entre les mains d’un chevalier, je pense, le plus brave, vaillant, et très distingué seigneur d’Angleterre._

PISTOL Expound unto me, boy.

BOY He gives you upon his knees, a thousand thanks; and he esteems himself happy that he hath fallen into the hands of one, as he thinks, the most brave, valorous, and thrice-worthy _seigneur_ of England.

PISTOL As I suck blood, I will some mercy show. Follow me!

BOY _Suivez-vous le grand capitaine._

[_Exeunt Pistol and French Soldier._]

I did never know so full a voice issue from so empty a heart; but the saying is true, “The empty vessel makes the greatest sound.” Bardolph and Nym had ten times more valour than this roaring devil i’ the old play, that everyone may pare his nails with a wooden dagger; and they are both hang’d; and so would this be, if he durst steal anything adventurously. I must stay with the lackeys with the luggage of our camp. The French might have a good prey of us, if he knew of it; for there is none to guard it but boys.

[_Exit._]

Enter Constable, Orleans, Bourbon, Dauphin and Rambures.

CONSTABLE _O diable!_

ORLEANS _O Seigneur! le jour est perdu, tout est perdu!_

DAUPHIN _Mort de ma vie!_ all is confounded, all! Reproach and everlasting shame Sits mocking in our plumes.

[_A short alarum._]

_O méchante Fortune!_ Do not run away.

CONSTABLE Why, all our ranks are broke.

DAUPHIN O perdurable shame! Let’s stab ourselves, Be these the wretches that we play’d at dice for?

ORLEANS Is this the king we sent to for his ransom?

BOURBON Shame and eternal shame, nothing but shame! Let’s die in honour! Once more back again! And he that will not follow Bourbon now, Let him go hence, and with his cap in hand, Like a base pandar, hold the chamber door Whilst by a slave, no gentler than my dog, His fairest daughter is contaminated.

CONSTABLE Disorder, that hath spoil’d us, friend us now! Let us on heaps go offer up our lives.

ORLEANS We are enough yet living in the field To smother up the English in our throngs, If any order might be thought upon.

BOURBON The devil take order now! I’ll to the throng. Let life be short, else shame will be too long.

[_Exeunt._]

Alarum. Enter King Henry and his train, with prisoners.

KING HENRY Well have we done, thrice valiant countrymen. But all’s not done; yet keep the French the field.

EXETER The Duke of York commends him to your Majesty.

KING HENRY Lives he, good uncle? Thrice within this hour I saw him down; thrice up again, and fighting. From helmet to the spur all blood he was.

EXETER In which array, brave soldier, doth he lie, Larding the plain; and by his bloody side, Yoke-fellow to his honour-owing wounds, The noble Earl of Suffolk also lies. Suffolk first died; and York, all haggled over, Comes to him, where in gore he lay insteeped, And takes him by the beard; kisses the gashes That bloodily did yawn upon his face. He cries aloud, “Tarry, my cousin Suffolk! My soul shall thine keep company to heaven; Tarry, sweet soul, for mine, then fly abreast, As in this glorious and well-foughten field We kept together in our chivalry.” Upon these words I came and cheer’d him up. He smil’d me in the face, raught me his hand, And, with a feeble gripe, says, “Dear my lord, Commend my service to my sovereign.” So did he turn and over Suffolk’s neck He threw his wounded arm and kiss’d his lips; And so espous’d to death, with blood he seal’d A testament of noble-ending love. The pretty and sweet manner of it forc’d Those waters from me which I would have stopp’d; But I had not so much of man in me, And all my mother came into mine eyes And gave me up to tears.

KING HENRY I blame you not; For, hearing this, I must perforce compound With mistful eyes, or they will issue too.

[_Alarum._]

But hark! what new alarum is this same? The French have reinforc’d their scatter’d men. Then every soldier kill his prisoners; Give the word through.

[_Exeunt._]

Enter Fluellen and Gower.

GOWER Nay, that’s right; but why wear you your leek today? Saint Davy’s day is past.

FLUELLEN There is occasions and causes why and wherefore in all things. I will tell you ass my friend, Captain Gower. The rascally, scald, beggarly, lousy, pragging knave, Pistol, which you and yourself and all the world know to be no petter than a fellow, look you now, of no merits, he is come to me and prings me pread and salt yesterday, look you, and bid me eat my leek. It was in a place where I could not breed no contention with him; but I will be so bold as to wear it in my cap till I see him once again, and then I will tell him a little piece of my desires.

Enter Pistol.

GOWER Why, here he comes, swelling like a turkey-cock.

FLUELLEN ’Tis no matter for his swellings nor his turkey-cocks. God pless you, Anchient Pistol! you scurvy, lousy knave, God pless you!

PISTOL Ha! art thou bedlam? Dost thou thirst, base Trojan, To have me fold up Parca’s fatal web? Hence! I am qualmish at the smell of leek.

FLUELLEN I peseech you heartily, scurfy, lousy knave, at my desires, and my requests, and my petitions, to eat, look you, this leek. Because, look you, you do not love it, nor your affections and your appetites and your digestions does not agree with it, I would desire you to eat it.

PISTOL Not for Cadwallader and all his goats.

FLUELLEN There is one goat for you. [_Strikes him._] Will you be so good, scald knave, as eat it?

PISTOL Base Trojan, thou shalt die.

FLUELLEN You say very true, scald knave, when God’s will is. I will desire you to live in the mean time, and eat your victuals. Come, there is sauce for it. [_Strikes him._] You call’d me yesterday mountain-squire; but I will make you today a squire of low degree. I pray you, fall to; if you can mock a leek, you can eat a leek.

GOWER Enough, captain; you have astonish’d him.

FLUELLEN I say, I will make him eat some part of my leek, or I will peat his pate four days. Bite, I pray you; it is good for your green wound and your ploody coxcomb.

PISTOL Must I bite?

FLUELLEN Yes, certainly, and out of doubt and out of question too, and ambiguities.

PISTOL By this leek, I will most horribly revenge. I eat and eat, I swear—

FLUELLEN Eat, I pray you. Will you have some more sauce to your leek? There is not enough leek to swear by.

PISTOL Quiet thy cudgel; thou dost see I eat.

FLUELLEN Much good do you, scald knave, heartily. Nay, pray you, throw none away; the skin is good for your broken coxcomb. When you take occasions to see leeks hereafter, I pray you, mock at ’em; that is all.

PISTOL Good.

FLUELLEN Ay, leeks is good. Hold you, there is a groat to heal your pate.

PISTOL Me a groat!

FLUELLEN Yes, verily and in truth you shall take it; or I have another leek in my pocket, which you shall eat.

PISTOL I take thy groat in earnest of revenge.

FLUELLEN If I owe you anything I will pay you in cudgels. You shall be a woodmonger, and buy nothing of me but cudgels. God be wi’ you, and keep you, and heal your pate.

[_Exit._]

PISTOL All hell shall stir for this.

GOWER Go, go; you are a couterfeit cowardly knave. Will you mock at an ancient tradition, begun upon an honourable respect, and worn as a memorable trophy of predeceased valour, and dare not avouch in your deeds any of your words? I have seen you gleeking and galling at this gentleman twice or thrice. You thought, because he could not speak English in the native garb, he could not therefore handle an English cudgel. You find it otherwise; and henceforth let a Welsh correction teach you a good English condition. Fare ye well.

[_Exit._]

PISTOL Doth Fortune play the huswife with me now? News have I, that my Doll is dead i’ the spital Of malady of France; And there my rendezvous is quite cut off. Old I do wax; and from my weary limbs Honour is cudgell’d. Well, bawd I’ll turn, And something lean to cutpurse of quick hand. To England will I steal, and there I’ll steal; And patches will I get unto these cudgell’d scars, And swear I got them in the Gallia wars.

[_Exit._]