A murderer, and a villain;
A slave, that is not twentieth part the tythe
Of your precedent lord:-a vice of kings:
A cutpurse of the empire and the rule;
That from a shelf the precious diadem stole,
And put it in his pocket!
'Tis he, I ken the manner of his gait; He rises on the toe: that spirit of his In aspiration lifts him from the earth.
Now all the youth of England are on fire,
And silken dalliance in the wardrobe lies;
Now thrive the armourers, and honour's thought
Reigns solely in the breast of every man.
Now, for the bare-pick'd bone of majesty,
Doth dogged War bristle his angry crest,
And snarleth in the gentle eyes of Peace:
Now powers from home, and discontent at home,
Meet in one line; and vast confusion waits
(As doth a raven on a sick-fallen beast)
The imminent decay of wrested pomp.
Tell me, he that knows,
Why are such daily cast of brazen cannon,
And foreign mart for implements of war?
Why such impress of ship-wrights, whose sore task
Does not divide the Sunday from the week?
What might be toward, that this sweaty haste
Doth make the night joint-labourer with the day;
Who is't that can inform me ?
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-favoured 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.
For the love of all the gods,
Let's leave the hermit pity with our mother;
And when we have our armours buckled on,
The venom'd vengeance ride upon our swords.
Know, the gallant monarch is in arms;
And like an eagle o'er his aeiry towers,
To souse annoyance that comes near his nest.
He is their god; he leads them like a thing,
Made by some other deity than nature,
That shapes man better: and they follow him,
Against us brats, with no less confidence,
Than boys pursuing summer butterflies,
Or butchers killing flies.
He hath fought to-day,
As if a god, in hate of mankind, had
Destroy'd in such a shape.
I care not for thee, Kate; this is no world,
To play with mammets, and to tilt with lips:
We must have bloody-noses, and crack'd crowns,
And pass them current too.-Gods me, my horse!
Therefore be deaf to my unpitied folly,
And all the gods go with you! upon your sword
Sit laurel victory! and smooth success
Be strew'd before your feet!
To the dark house, and the detested wife.
That chase thee from thy country, and expose
Those tender limbs of thine to the event
Of the none-sparing war? and is it I
That drive thee from the sportive court, where thou Wast shot at with fair eyes, to be the mark
With man's blood paint the ground, gules, gules:
Religious canons, civil laws are cruel;
Then what should war be?
The blind and bloody soldier with foul hand
Defile the locks of your shrill-shrieking daughters;
Your fathers taken by the silver beards,
And their most reverend heads dash'd to the walls;
Your naked infants spitted upon pikes;
Whiles the mad mothers with their howls confus'd Do break the clouds.
The gates of mercy shall be all shut up;
And the flesh'd soldier,-rough and hard of heart,-
In liberty of bloody hand, shall range
With conscience wide as hell; mowing like grass
Your fresh fair virgins and your flow'ring infants.
The cannons have their bowels full of wrath
And ready mounted are they, to spit forth
Their iron indignation 'gainst your walls.
Now on, you noblest English,
Whose blood is fetch'd 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.
I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips,
Straining upon the start. The game's a-foot;
Follow your spirit; and, upon this charge,
Cry-God for Harry, England, and St. George!
Dying like men, tho' buried in your dunghills,
They shall be fam'd; for there the sun shall greet them,
And draw their honours reeking up to heaven;
Leaving their earthly parts to choak your clime.
Let not thy sword skip one :
Pity not honour'd age for his white beard,
He is an usurer: Strike me the counterfeit matron ;
It is her habit only that is honest,
Herself's a bawd: Let not the virgin's cheek
Make soft thy trenchant sword; for those milk-paps,
That through the window-bars bore at men's eyes,
Are not within the leaf of pity writ,
But set them down horrible traitors.
I'll use the advantage of my pow'r,
And lay the summer's dust with show'rs of blood,
Rain'd from the wounds of slaughter'd Englishmen.
What, stand'st thou idle here ? lend me thy sword;
Many a nobleman lies stark and stiff
Under the hoofs of vaunting enemies,
Whose deaths are unreveng'd.
To arms! be champion of our church!
Or let the church, our mother, breathe her curse,
A mother's curse, on her revolting son.
Then, in the name of God, and all these rights,
Advance your standards, draw your willing swords :
For me, the ransom of
bold attempt
Shall be this cold corpse on the earth's cold face;
But if I thrive, the gain of my attempt
The least of you shall share his part thereof.
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:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs'd, they were not here;
And hold their manhoods cheap, while any speaks,
That fought with us upon St. Crispin's day.
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 shew his scars,
And say, these wounds I had on Crispin's day.
forget; yet shall not all forget,
But they'll remember, with advantages,
What feats they did that day.
'Tis positive 'gainst all exception, Lords,
That our superfluous lacqueys, and our peasants,
Who, in unnecessary action, swarm
About our squares of battle, were enough
this field of such a hilding foe.
Our soldiers,-like the night-owl's lazy flight,
Or like a lazy thrasher with a flail,—
Fell gently down, as if they struck their friends.
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