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No, not all these, thrice-gorgeous ceremony,
Not all these, laid in bed majestical,

Can sleep so soundly as the wretched slave;
Who, with a body fill'd, and vacant mind,
Gets him to rest, cramm'd with distressful bread;1
Never sees horrid night, the child of hell;
But, like a lackey, from the rise to set,
Sweats in the eye of Phoebus, and all night
Sleeps in Elysium; next day, after dawn,
Doth rise, and help Hyperion to his horse;
And follows so the ever-running year
With profitable labour, to his grave:
And, but for ceremony, such a wretch,
Winding up days with toil, and nights with sleep,
Had the fore-hand and vantage of a king.
The slave, a member of the country's peace,
Enjoys it; but in gross brain little wots,
What watch the king keeps to maintain the peace,
Whose hours the peasant best advantages.3
Enter ERPINGHAM.

Erp. My lord, your nobles, jealous of your ab-
sence,

Seek through your camp to find you.
K. Hen.

Good old knight,

Collect them all together at my tent:
I'll be before thee.

Erp.
I shall do't, my lord. [Exit.
K. Hen. O God of battles! steel my soldiers'

hearts!

Possess them not with fear: take from them now
The sense of reckoning of the opposed numbers:
Pluck their hearts from them not to-day, O Lord!
O not to-day! Think not upon the fault
My father made in compassing the crown!
I Richard's body have interred new ;
And on it have bestow'd more contrite tears,
Than from it issued forced drops of blood.
Five hundred poor I have in yearly pay,
Who twice a day their wither'd hands hold up
Toward heaven, to pardon blood; and I have built
Two chantries, where the sad and solemn priests
Sing still for Richard's soul. More will I do:
Though all that I can do, is nothing worth;
Since that my penitence comes after all,
Imploring pardon.

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Dau. Montez a cheval :-My horse! valet! lao

quay ? ha!

Orl. O'brave spirit!

Dau. Via !-les eaux et la terre

Orl. Rien puis? l'air et le feu-
Dau. Ciel! cousin Orleans..
Enter Constable.

Now, my lord Constable.

Con. Hark, how our steeds for present service neigh.

Dau. Mount them, and make incision in their
hides;

That their hot blood may spin in English eyes,
And doubt them with superfluous courage: Ha!
Ram. What, will you have them weep our
horses' blood?

How shall we then behold their natural tears?
Enter a Messenger.

Mess. The English are embattled, you French
peers.

Con. To horse, you gallant princes! straight to
Do but behold yon poor and starved band,
horse!
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-ax a stain,
That our French gallants shall to-day draw out,
And sheath 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?
little little let us do,

A very

And all is done. Then let the trumpets sound
The tucket-sonuance,1° and the note to mount:
For our approach shall so much dare the field,
That England shall couch down in fear, and yield.
Enter GRANDPRE.

Grand. Why do you stay so long, my lords of
France?

Yon island carrions, 11 desperate of their bones,
Ill-favour'dly 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.

8 About our squares of battle.' Thus in Antony and
Cleopatra :-
6 no practice had

1- cramm'd with distressful bread.' However oddly this may sound to modern ears, it was suffi ciently intelligible to our ancestors. Distressful bread is the bread or food of poverty; Mensa angusta. Johnson observes that these lines are exquisitely pleasing. To sweat in the eye of Phoebus,' and 'to sleep in Ely-Thus in All's Well that Ends Well, the French lords sium,' are expressions very poetical.

2 Apollo. See Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 2.

3 He little knows at the expense of how much royal vigilance that peace, which brings most advantage to the peasant, is maintained. To advantage is a verb used by Shakspeare in other places. It was formerly in general use.

4 The late editions exhibit the passage thus:-take from them now

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The sense of reckoning, if the opposed numbers
Pluck their hearts from them!-Not to-day, O Lord,
O not to-day, think not upon,' &c.

5 Two chantries. One of these was for Carthusian monks, and was called Bethlehem; the other was for religious men and women of the order of Saint Bridget, and was named Sion. They were on opposite sides of the Thames, and adjoined the royal manor of Sheen, now called Richmond.

6 Via, an exclamation of encouragement, on, away; of Italian origin.

7 That their hot blood may spin in English eyes, And doubt them with superfluous courage.'

In the brave squares of battle.' 9A hilding foe' is a paltry, cowardly, base foe.

call Bertram'a hilding.

the field as if they were going out only to chase for sport. 10 The tucket sonuance,' &c. He uses the terms of To dare the field is a phrase in falconry. Birds are dared when by the falcon in the air they are terrified from rising so as to be taken by hand. Such an easy capture the lords expected to make of the English. The tucket-sonuance was a flourish on the trumpet as a signal to prepare to march. The phrase is derived from the Italian toccata, a prelude or flourish, and suonanza, a sound, a resounding. Thus in the Devil's Law Case, 1623, two tuckets by two several trumpets.

11 Yon island carrions.' The description of the English is founded on Holinshed's melancholy account, speaking of the march from Harfleur to Agincourt:-this journey; their victual was in a manner all spent, The Englishmen were brought into great misery in take, for their enemies were ever at hand to give them and now could they get none:-rest none could they allarmes daily it rained, and nightly it freezed; of fewel there was great scarcity, but of fluxes great plenty;

This is the reading of the folio which Malone has alter-money they had enough, but wares to bestow it upon,

ed to dout, i. e. do out in provincial language. It ap. pears to me that there is no reason for the substitution.

for their releife or comforte, had they little or none."
12 Their ragged curtains are their colours.

Their horsemen sit like fixed candlesticks,'
With torch-staves in their hand: and their poor
jades

Lob down their heads, dropping 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.
n life so lifeless as it shows itself.

Con. They have said their prayers, and they stay

for death.

Dau. Shall we go send them dinners, and fresh
suits,

And give their fasting horses provender,
And after fight with them?

It yearns me not, if men my garments wear;
Such outward things dwell not in my desires
But, if it be a sin to covet honour,
I am the most offending soul alive.
No, 'faith, my coz, wish not a man from England:
God's peace! I would not lose so great an honour,
As one man more, methinks, would share from me,
For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more.
Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host,
That he, which hath no stomach to this fight,
Let him depart; his passport shall be made,
And crowns for convoy put into his purse:
We would not die in that man's company
That fears his fellowship to die with us.
This day is call'd-the feast of Crispian :"
He, that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam'd,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He, that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his friends,
And say to morrow is Saint Crispian:
Then will he strip his sleeve, and show his scars,

Con. I sta but for my guard ;3 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.
SCENE III. The English Camp. Enter the Eng-And say, these wounds I had on Crispin's day.

lish Host; GLOSTER, BEDFORD, EXETER,
SALISBURY, and WESTMORELAND.
Glo. Where is the king?

Bed. The king himself is rode to view their

battle.

West. Of fighting men they have full threescore thousand.

Exe. There's five to one; besides, they all are
fresh.

Sal. God's arm strike with us! 'tis a fearful odds.
God be with you, princes all; I'll to my charge;
If we no more meet, till we meet in heaven,
Then, joyfully, my noble lord of Bedford,—
My dear lord Gloster,-and my good lord Exeter,
And my kind kinsman,*-warriors all, adieu !
Bed. Farewell, good Salisbury; and good luck
go with thee!

Exe. Farewell, kind lord; fight valiantly to-day:
And yet I do thee wrong, to mind thee of it,
For thou art fram'd of the firm truth of valour.
[Exit SALISBURY.
Bed. He is as full of valour, as of kindness;
Princely in both.
West.

O that we now had here

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What's he, that wishes so?
My cousin Westmoreland ?-No, my fair cousin :
If we are mark'd to die, we are enough
To do our country loss; and if to live,
The fewer men, the greater share of honour.
God's will! I pray thee, wish not one man more.
By Jove, I am not covetous for gold;

Nor care I, who doth feed upon my cost;

But he'll remember, with advantages,
Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,

What feats he did that day; Then shall our names,
Familiar in their mouths as household words —

Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloster,
Be in their flowing cups freshly remember'd:
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
But we in it shall be remembered:
From this day to the ending of the world,"
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he, to-day that sheds his blood with me,
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile
This day shall gentle his condition:19
Shall think themselves accurs'd, they were not
And gentlemen in England, now a bed,

here:

And hold their manhoods cheap, while any speaks,
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.
Enter SALISBURY.

Sal. My sovereign lord, bestow yourself with
speed;
The French are bravely11 in their battles set,
And will with all expedience1 charge on us.

K. Hen. All things are ready, if our minds be so.
West. Perish the man, whose mind is backward
now!

K. Hen. Thou dost not wish more help from Eng land, cousin?

West. God's will, my liege, 'would you and I
alone,

Without more help, might fight this battle out!
K. Hen. Why, now thou hast unwish'd five thou-
sand men ;13

9 With advantages.' Old men, notwithstanding the 1 Ancient candlesticks were often in the form of hu-natural forgetfulness of old age, shall remember their man figures, holding the socket for the lights, in their extended hands.

feats of this day, and remember to tell them with advantage. Age is commonly boastful, and inclined to magnify past acts and past times.

2 The gimmal bit was probably a bit in which two parts or links were united, as in the gimmal ring, so 9From this day to the ending,' &c. Johnson has a called because they were double linked, from gemel-note on this passage, which concludes by saying that lus, Lat. 'the civil wars have left in the nation scarcely any tra31 stay but for my guard. Dr. Johnson and Mr.dition of more ancient history.' Steevens were of opinion that guard here means rather 10 i. e. shall advance him to the rank of a gentleman. something of ornament, than an attendant or attendants. King Henry V. inhibited any person but such as had a 4 And my kind kinsman.' This is addressed to right by inheritance or grant, from bearing coats of arms, Westmoreland by the speaker, who was Thomas Mon-except those who fought with him at the battle of Agintacute, earl of Salisbury: he was not in point of fact re- court; and these last were allowed the chief seats at all lated to Westmoreland, there was only a kind of con- feasts and public meetings. nection by marriage between their families.

12 i. e. expedition.

11 i. e. in a braving manner. To go bravely is to 5 In the quarto this speech is addressed to Warwick. look aloft; and to go gaily, desiring to have the preThe incongruity of praying like a Christian and swear-eminence: Speciose ingredi'; faire le brave, ing like a heathen, which Johnson objects against, arose from the necessary conformation to the statute 3 James I. c xxi. against introducing the sacred name on the stage. The players omitted it where they could, and where the metre would not allow of the omission they Bubstituted some other word in its place.

6 To yearn is to grieve or vex.

13thou hast unwished five thousand men. By wishing only thyself and me, thou hast wished five thou sand men away. The poet, inattentive to numbers, purs five thousand, but in the last scene the French are said to be full three score thousand, which Exeter declares to be five to one; the numbers of the English are vari

7 The feast of Crispian.' The battle of Agincourt ously stated; Holinshed makes them fifteen thousand, was fought upon the 25th of October, 1415.

others but nine thousand.

KING HENRY V.

Which likes me better, than to wish us one.-
You know your places: God be with you all!

Tucket. Enter MONTJOY.

Mont. Once more I come to know of thee, King
Harry,

If for thy ransom thou wilt now compound,
Before thy most assured overthrow:
For, certainly, thou art so near the gulf,
Thou needs must be englutted. Besides, in mercy,
The Constable desires thee-thou wilt mind1
Thy followers of repentance; that their souls
May make a peaceful and a sweet retire
From off these fields, where (wretches) their poor
bodies

Must lie and fester.

K. Hen.

Who hath sent thee now?
Mont. The Constable of France.

K. Hen. I pray thee, bear my former answer

back;

Bid them achieve me, and then sell my bones.
Good God! why should they mock poor fellows

thus?

The man, that once did sell the lion's skin
While the beast liv'd, was kill'd with hunting him.
A many of our bodies shall, no doubt,
Find native graves; upon the which, I trust,
Shall witness live in brass of this day's work:
And those that leave their valiant bones in France,
Dying like men, though buried in your dunghills,
They shall be fam'd; for there the sun shall greet
them,

And draw their honours reeking up
Leaving their earthly parts to choke your clime,
to heaven;
The smell whereof shall breed a plague in France.
Mark then abounding valour in our English;
That, being dead, like to the bullet's grazing,
Break out into a second course of mischief,
Killing in relapse of mortality.

Let me speak proudly;-Tell the Constable,
We are but warriors for the working-day:
Our gayness, and our gilt, are all besmirch'd
With rainy marching in the painful field;
There's not a piece of feather in our host,
(Good argument, I hope, we shall not fly,)
And time hath worn us into slovenry:
But, by the mass, our hearts are in the trim:
And my poor soldiers tell me-yet ere night
They'll be in fresher robes; or they will pluck
The gay new coats o'er the French soldiers' heads,
And turn them out of service. If they do this
(As, if God please, they shall,) my ransom then
Will soon be levied. Herald, save thou thy labour;
Come thou no more for ransom, gentle herald;
They shall have none, I swear, but these my joints;

1 i. e. remind.

2 i. e. in brazen plates, anciently let into tombstones.
3 Mark then abounding valour in our English;
That being dead, like to the bullet's grazing,
Break out into a second course of mischief,
Killing in relapse of mortality.'

Theobald, with over busy zeal for emendation, changed
abounding into a bounding, and found the allusion ex-
ceedingly beautiful, comparing the revival of the Eng.
lish valour to the rebounding of a cannon ball. There
is, as usual, an idle controversy between Malone and
Steevens, the one preferring the old reading; and the
other, from a spirit of opposition to his rival, which ever
guided him, supporting Theobald's alteration.

4 i. e. golden show, superficial gilding.

5 The Duke of York. This Edward duke of York has already appeared in King Richard II. under the title of duke of Aumerle. He was the son of Edmond Langley, the duke of York of the same play, who was the fifth son of King Edward III. Richard, earl of Cambridge, who appears in the second act of this play, was younger brother to this Edward duke of York. 6 The vaward is the vanguard.

7 Callino, castore me! The jargon of the old copies where these words are printed Qualitie calmie custure me-was changed by former editors into 'Quality, call you me? construe me.' Caleno custure me, mentioned as the burthen of a song Malone found in A Handful of Plesant Delites,' 1584. And Mr. 65

Which if they have, as I will leave 'em to them,
Shall yield them little, tell the Constable.

513

Mont. I shall, King Harry. And so fare thee well:

Thou never shalt hear herald any more.

K. Hen. I fear, thou'lt once more come again
[Erit.
for ransom.

The leading of the vaward.
Enter the Duke of York.
York. My lord, most humbly on my knee I beg

K. Hen. Take it, brave York.-Now, soldiers,
march away :-

And how thou pleasest, God, dispose the day!

[Exeunt. SCENE IV. The Field of Battle. Alarums: Excursions. Enter French Soldier, PISTOL, and Boy.

Pist. Yield, cur..

Fr. Sol. Je pense, que vous estes le gentilhomme de

bonne qualité.

Pist. Quality? Callino, castore me!" art thou a gentleman? What is thy name? discuss.

Fr. Sol. O seigneur Dieu !

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

Fr. Sol. O, prennez misericorde! ayez pitié de moy!
Pist. Moy shall not serve, I will have forty moys;
For I will fetch thy rim out at throat,

In drops of crimson blood.

Fr. Sol. Est-il impossible d' eschapper la force de ton bras?

Pist. Brass, cur!

Thou damned and luxurious mountain goat,
Offer'st me brass?

Fr. Sol. O pardonnez

moy

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Pist. Say'st thou me so? is that a ton of

moys ?10

Come hither, boy; Ask me this slave, in French,
What is his name.

Boy. Escoutez; Comment estes-vous appellé ?
Fr. Sol. Monsieur le Fer.

Boy. He says, his name is-master Fer.
Pist. 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 fer-
ret and firk.

Pist. Bid him prepare, for I will cut his throat.
Fr. Sol. Que dit-il, monsieur ?

Boswell discovered that it was an old Irish song, which
Boy. Il me commande de vous dire que vous faites
is printed in Playford's Musical Companion, 1667 or
1673:-

Callino, Callino, Callino, castore me,
Eva ee, eva ee, loo, loo, Too lee.'
The words are said to mean 'Little girl of my heart for
ever and ever." "
supplications, nor were they meant to have any; Pis-
They have, it is true (says Mr. Bos-
well,) no great connection with the poor Frenchman's
tol, instead of attending to him, contemptuously hums a
tune.

word for a sword. Generally old for; it was applied
8-thou diest on point of fox. Fox is an old cart
to the old English broadsword.

Pistol

9 For I will fetch thy rim out at thy throat.
is not very scrupulous in the nicety of his language, he
very clear what our ancestors meant by it; Bishop
uses rim (rymme) for the intestines generally. It is not
Wilkins defines it 'the membrane of the belly;' Florio
makes it the omentum, a fat pannicle, caule, sewet,
rim, or kell, wherein the bowels are lapt. Holmes, in
his Acad. of Armory, calls the peritoneum 'the paunch
or rim of the belly. Which is defined by others to be
the inner rine of the belly. It was not therefore the
diaphragm or midriff, as Steevens supposed.

moydore (itself a corruption of moeda d'oro,) at least
10 Pistol's moy is probably a vulgar corruption of
we have no better solution to offer. The moydore was
current in England for about 27s

to jerk are words of the same import.
11 To firk is to beat or scourge ; fouetter, to yerk an

vous prest; car ce soldat icy est disposé tout à cette heure de couper vostre gorge.

Pist. Ouy, couper gorge, par ma foy, pesant,
Unless thou give me crowns, brave crowns;
Or mangled shalt thou be by this my sword.

Fr. Sol. O, je vous supplie pour l'amour de Dieu, me pardonner! Je suis gentilhomme de bonne maison: gardez ma vie, et je vous donneray deux cents escus. Pist. 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.

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

Fr. Sol. Petit monsieur, que dit-il?

par

Boy. Encore qu'il est contre son jurement, de donner aucun prisonnier; neantmoins, pour les escus que vous l'avez promis, il est content de vous donner la liberté, le franchisement.

:

Fr. Sol. Sur mes genoux, je vous donne mille remerciemens et je m'estime heureux que je suis tombé entre les mains d'un chevalier, je pense, le plus brave, valiant, et très distingué seigneur d'Angle

terre.

Pist. 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 (as he thinks) the most brave, valorous, and thrice worthy signieur of England. Pist. As I suck blood, I will some mercy show. Follow me, cur. [Exit PISTOL. Boy. Suivez-vous le grand capitaine. [Exit 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 every one may pare his nails with a wooden dagger, and they are both hanged; and so would this be, if he durst steal any thing 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.

SCENE V. Another Part of the Field of Battle. Alarums. Enter Dauphin, ORLEANS, BOURBON, Constable, RAMBURES, and others.

Con. O diable!

Orl. O seigneur !-le jour est perdu, tout est perdu! Dau. Mort de ma vie! all is confounded, all! Reproach and everlasting shame Sits mocking in our plumes.--O meschante fortune!-Do not run away. [A short Alarum. Why, all our ranks are broke. Dau. O perdurable shame!--let's stab ourselves. Be these the wretches that we play'd at dice for? Orl. Is this the king we sent to for his ransom? Bour. Shame, and eternal shame, nothing but shame!

Con.

3

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

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

[Exeunt. SCENE VI. Another Part of the Field. Alarums. Enter KING HENRY and Forces; EXETER, and others.

K. Hen. Well have we done, thrice-valiant coun

trymen :

But all's not done, yet keep the French the field. Exe. The duke of York commends him to your majesty.

I

K. Hen. Lives he, good uncle? thrice, within this hour,

saw him down; thrice up again, and fighting; From helmet to the spur, all blood he was.

Ere. 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 insteep'd, And takes him by the beard; kisses the gashes, That bloodily did yawn upon his face; And cries aloud,-Tarry, dear 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, my service to my sovereign.

Commend

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 fore'd
Those waters from me, which I would have stopp'd:
But I had not so much of man in me,
mother came into mine eyes,

But all And

my gave me up to tears. K. Hen.

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. SCENE VII. Another Part of the Field. Alar ums. Enter FLUELLEN and GOWER. Flu. Kill the poys and the luggage! 'tis expressly against the law of arms: 'tis as arrant a piece of knavery, mark you now, as can be offered in the 'orld In your conscience now, is it not?

Gow. 'Tis certain, there's not a boy left alive; and the cowardly rascals, that ran from the battle, have done this slaughter: besides, they have burned and carried away all that was in the king's tent; wherefore the king, most worthily, hath caused every soldier to cut his prisoner's throat." O, 'tis a

Let us die in fight: 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 pander, hold the chamber-door,
Whilst by a slave, no gentler than my dog,
His fairest daughter is contaminate.
Con. Disorder, that hath spoil'd us, friend us now! gallant king!
Let us, in heaps, go offer up our lives
Unto these English, or else die with fame.4

1 'this roaring devil i' the old play, that every one may pare his nails with a wooden dagger. See note on Twelfth Night, Act iv. Sc. 2. In the old play of The Taming of a Shrew, one of the players says, My lord, we must have a little vinegar to make our devil roar. Ho! ho! and Ah! ha! seem to have been the exclamations constantly given to the devil, who is, in the old mysteries, as turbulent and vainglorious as Pistol. The Vice or fool, among other indignities, used to threaten to pare his nails with his dagger of lath; the devil being supposed from-choice to keep his claws long and sharp. 2 The old copy wants the word fight, which was supplied by Malone. Theobald proposed let us die inlant, which Steevens adopted.

Flu. Av, he was porn at Monmouth, captain Gower: What call you the town's name, where Alexander the pig was born?

3 i. e. who has no more gentility.

4 This line is from the quartos.

6

5 i. e. reached. But all my mother came into my eyes, And gave me up to tears.' Thus the quarto. The folio reads 'And all,' &c. Bid has here the force of but that,

7 Caused every soldier to cut his prisoner's throat' The king killed his prisoners (says Johnson) because he expected another battle, and he had not sufficient men to guard one army and fight another. Gower's reason is, as we see, different. Shakspeare followed Holinshed, who gives both reasons for Henry's conduct, but has chosen to make the king mention one of them

and Gower the other.

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don, as I take it.

Besides, we'll cut the throats of those we have;'
And not a man of them, that we shall take,
Shall taste our mercy:-Go, and tell them so.
Enter MONTJOY.

Ere. Here comes the herald of the French, my
liege.

Glo. His eves are humbler than they us'd to be. K. Hen. How now, what means this, herald? know'st thou not,

Flu. I think, it is in Macedon, where Alexander is porn. I tell you, captain,-If you look in the That I have fin'd these bones of mine for ransom? maps of the 'orld, I warrant, you shall find, in the Com'st thou again for ransom? comparisons between Macedon and Monmouth, that Mont. No, great king: the situations, look you, is both alike. There is a I'come to thee for charitable licence, river in Macedon; and there is also moreover a That we may wander o'er this bloody field, river at Monmouth: it is called Wye, at Mon-To book our dead, and then to bury them; mouth: but it is out of my prains, what is the name To sort our nobies from our common men; of the other river; but 'tis all one, 'tis so like as my For many of our princes (woe the while!) fingers is to my fingers, and there is salmons in Lie drown'd and soak'd in mercenary blood both. If you mark Alexander's life well, Harry of (So do our vulgar drench their peasant limbs Monmouth's life is come after it indifferent well; In blood of princes;) and their wounded steeds for there is figures in all things. Alexander (God Fret fetlock deep in gore, and, with wild rage, knows, and you know,) in his rages, and his furies, Yerk out their armed heels at their dead masters, and his wraths, and his cholers, and his moods, and Killing them twice. O, give us leave, great king, his displeasures, and his indignations, and also be-To view the field in safety, and dispose ing a little intoxicates in his prains, did, in his ales Of their dead bodies. and his angers, look you, kill his pest friend, Clytus. Gow. Our king is not like him in that; he never killed any of his friends.

Flu. It is not well done, mark you now, to take tales out of my mouth, ere it is made an end and finished. I speak but in the figures and comparisous of it: A's Alexander is kill his friend Clytus, being in his ales and his cups; so also Harry Monmouth, being in his right wits and his goot judg ments, is turn away the fat knight with the great pelly-doublet: he was full of jests, and gipes, and knaveries, and mocks; I am forgot his name." Gow. Sir John Falstaff.

Flu. That is he: I can tell you, there is goot men porn at Monmouth.

Gow. Here comes his majesty.

Alarum. Enter KING HENRY, with a Part of th
English Forces; WARWICK, GLOSTER, EXE
TER, and others.

K. Hen. I was not angry since I came to France
Until this instant.-Take a trumpet, herald;
Ride thou unto the horsemen on yon hill;
If they will fight with us, bid them come down,
Or void the field; they do offend our sight:
If they'll do neither, we will come to them;
And make them skirr1 away, as swift as stones
Enforced from the old Assyrian slings:

1 As Alexander,' &c. Steevens thinks that Shakspeare here ridicules the parallels of Plutarch: he appears to have been well read in Sir Thomas North's Translation.

2 Johnson observes, that this is the last time Falstaff can make sport. The poet was loath to part with him, and has continued his memory as long as he could,

I

K. Hen.

I tell thee truly, herald,
know not, if the day be ours, or no;
For yet a many of your horsemen peer,
And gallop o'er the field.
The day is yours.

Mont.
K. Hen. Praised be God, and not our strength,
for it!-
What is this castle call'd, that stands hard by?
Mont. They call it-Agincourt.

K. Hen. Then call we this-the field of Agin-
court,

Fought on the day of Crispin Crispianus.

Flu. Your grandfather of famous memory, an't please your majesty, and your great-uncle Edward the plack prince of Wales, as I have read in the chronicles, fought a most prave pattle here in France.

K. Hen. They did, Fluellen.

Flu. Your majesty says very true: If your maservice in a garden where leeks did grow, wearing jesties is remember'd of it, the Welshmen did goot feeks in their Monmouth caps; which, your majesty knows, to this hour is an honourable padge of the service; and, I do believe, your majesty takes no scorn to wear the leek upon Saint Tavy's day.

K. Hen. I wear it for a memorable honour:
For I am Welsh, you know, good countryman.
Flu. All the water in Wye cannot wash your

was ended, the Englishmen disposed themselves in or. der of battayle, ready to abide a new fielde, and also to invade and newly set on their enemies.--Some write, that the king perceiving his enemies in one parte to as semble together, as though they meant to give a new battle for preservation of the prisoners, sent to them a herault, commanding them either to deport out of his sight,or else to come forward at once and give battaile; promising herewith, that, if they did offer to fight 4 i. e. scour away. To run swiftly in various direc-agayne, not only those prisoners which his people al tions. It has the same meaning in Macbeth, Act. v. Sc.ready had taken, but also so many of them as in this

3 Richard Beauchamp, earl of Warwick. He did not, however, obtain that title till 1417, two years after the era of this play.

iii.

Skirr the country round.'

attack on his camp, stopped the slaughter, and was still able to save a great number. It was policy in Henry to intimidate the French by threatening to kill his prisoners, and occasioned them, in fact, to lay down their arms.

new conflicte, which they thus attempted, should full 5 Besides, we'll cut the throats of those we have.' into his hands, should die the death without redemp. Johnson accuses the poet of having made the king cut tion. The fact is, that notwithstanding the first order the throats of his prisoners twice over. Malone replies concerning the prisoners, they were not all put to death, that the incongruity, if it be one, is Holinshed's, for as appears from a subsequent passage, and the concur thus the matter is stated by him: While the battle was rent testimony of various historians, upon whose autho yet going on, about six hundred horsemen, who were rity Hume says that Henry, on discovering that his dan the first that fled, hearing that the English tents were ager was not so great as he at first apprehended from the good way distant from the army, without a suflicient guard, entered and pillaged the king's camp. When the outery of the lackies and boys which ran away for fear of the Frenchmen, thus spoiling the camp, came to the king's ears, he doubting lest his enemies should gather together again and begin a new fielde, and mis- 6 Monmouth, according to Fuller, was celebrated for trusting further that the prisoners would either be an its caps, which were particularly worn by soldiers. Tha aide to his enemies, or very enemies to their takers in- best caps were formerly made at Monmouth, where the deed, if they were suffered to live, contrary to his ac- copper's chapel still remains. He adds, If at this customed gentleness, commanded by sounde of trumpet day the phrase of wearing a Monmouth cap be taken in that every man upon pain of death should incontinent- a bad acception, I hope the inhabitants of that town will ly slea his prisoner. This was the first transaction. endeavour to disprove the occasion.' Worthies of Eng. Holinshed proceeds, When this lamentable slaughter |land, 1660, p. 50.

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