The Complete Works

Enter a MESSENGER MESSENGER. My Lord High Constable, the English lie within fifteen hundred paces of your tents. CONSTABLE. Who hath measur'd the ground? MESSENGER. The Lord Grandpre. CONSTABLE. A valiant and most expert gentleman. Would it were day! Alas, poor Harry of England! he longs not for the dawning as we do. ORLEANS. What a wretched and peevish fellow is this King of England, to mope with his fat-brain'd followers so far out of his knowledge! CONSTABLE. If the English had any apprehension, they would run away. ORLEANS. That they lack; for if their heads had any intellectual armour, they could never wear such heavy head-pieces. RAMBURES. That island of England breeds very valiant creatures; their mastiffs are of unmatchable courage. ORLEANS. Foolish curs, that run winking into the mouth of a Russian bear, and have their heads crush'd like rotten apples! You may as well say that's a valiant flea that dare eat his breakfast on the lip of a lion. CONSTABLE. Just, just! and the men do sympathise with the mastiffs in robustious and rough coming on, leaving their wits with their wives; and then give them great meals of beef and iron and steel; they will eat like wolves and fight like devils. ORLEANS. Ay, but these English are shrewdly out of beef. CONSTABLE. Then shall we find to-morrow they have only stomachs to eat, and none to fight. Now is it time to arm. Come, shall we about it? ORLEANS. It is now two o'clock; but let me see- by ten We shall have each a hundred Englishmen. Exeunt <> ACT IV. PROLOGUE. Enter CHORUS CHORUS. Now entertain conjecture of a time When creeping murmur and the poring dark Fills the wide vessel of the universe. From camp to camp, through the foul womb of night, The hum of either army stilly sounds, That the fix'd sentinels almost receive The secret whispers of each other's watch. Fire answers fire, and through their paly flames Each battle sees the other's umber'd face; Steed threatens steed, in high and boastful neighs Piercing the night's dull ear; and from the tents The armourers accomplishing the knights, With busy hammers closing rivets up, Give dreadful note of preparation. The country cocks do crow, the clocks do ton, And the third hour of drowsy morning name. Proud of their numbers and secure in soul, The confident and over-lusty French Do the low-rated English play at dice; And chide the cripple tardy-gaited night Who like a foul and ugly witch doth limp So tediously away. The poor condemned English, Like sacrifices, by their watchful fires Sit patiently and inly ruminate The morning's danger; and their gesture sad Investing lank-lean cheeks and war-worn coats Presenteth them unto the gazing moon So many horrid ghosts. O, now, who will behold The royal captain of this ruin'd band Walking from watch to watch, from tent to tent, Let him cry 'Praise and glory on his head!' For forth he goes and visits all his host; Bids them good morrow with a modest smile, And calls them brothers, friends, and countrymen. Upon his royal face there is no note How dread an army hath enrounded him; Nor doth he dedicate one jot of colour Unto the weary and all-watched night; But freshly looks, and over-bears attaint With cheerful semblance and sweet majesty; That every wretch, pining and pale before, Beholding him, plucks comfort from his looks; A largess universal, like the sun, His liberal eye doth give to every one, Thawing cold fear, that mean and gentle all Behold, as may unworthiness define, A little touch of Harry in the night. And so our scene must to the battle fly; Where- O for pity!- we shall much disgrace With four or five most vile and ragged foils, Right ill-dispos'd in brawl ridiculous, The name of Agincourt. Yet sit and see, Minding true things by what their mock'ries be. Exit SCENE I. France. The English camp at Agincourt Enter the KING, BEDFORD, and GLOUCESTER KING HENRY. Gloucester, 'tis true that we are in great danger; The greater therefore should our courage be. Good morrow, brother Bedford. God Almighty! There is some soul of goodness in things evil, Would men observingly distil it out; For our bad neighbour makes us early stirrers, Which is both healthful and good husbandry. Besides, they are our outward consciences And preachers to us all, admonishing That we should dress us fairly for our end. Thus may we gather honey from the weed, And make a moral of the devil himself. Enter ERPINGHAM Good morrow, old Sir Thomas Erpingham: A good soft pillow for that good white head Were better than a churlish turf of France. ERPINGHAM. Not so, my liege; this lodging likes me better, Since I may say 'Now lie I like a king.' KING HENRY. 'Tis good for men to love their present pains Upon example; so the spirit is eased; And when the mind is quick'ned, out of doubt The organs, though defunct and dead before, Break up their drowsy grave and newly move With casted slough and fresh legerity. Lend me thy cloak, Sir Thomas. Brothers both, Commend me to the princes in our camp; Do my good morrow to them, and anon Desire them all to my pavilion. GLOUCESTER. We shall, my liege. ERPINGHAM. Shall I attend your Grace? KING HENRY. No, my good knight: Go with my brothers to my lords of England; I and my bosom must debate awhile, And then I would no other company. ERPINGHAM. The Lord in heaven bless thee, noble Harry! Exeunt all but the KING KING HENRY. God-a-mercy, old heart! thou speak'st cheerfully. Enter PISTOL PISTOL. Qui va la? KING HENRY. A friend. PISTOL. Discuss unto me: art thou officer, Or art thou base, common, and popular? KING HENRY. I am a gentleman of a company. PISTOL. Trail'st thou the puissant pike? KING HENRY. Even so. What are you? PISTOL. As good a gentleman as the Emperor. KING HENRY. Then you are a better than the King. PISTOL. The King's a bawcock and a heart of gold, A lad of life, an imp of fame; Of parents good, of fist most valiant. I kiss his dirty shoe, and from heart-string I love the lovely bully. What is thy name? KING HENRY. Harry le Roy. PISTOL. Le Roy! a Cornish name; art thou of Cornish crew? KING HENRY. No, I am a Welshman. PISTOL. Know'st thou Fluellen? KING HENRY. Yes. PISTOL. Tell him I'll knock his leek about his pate Upon Saint Davy's day. KING HENRY. Do not you wear your dagger in your cap that day, lest he knock that about yours. PISTOL. Art thou his friend? KING HENRY. And his kinsman too. PISTOL. The figo for thee, then! KING HENRY. I thank you; God be with you! PISTOL. My name is Pistol call'd. Exit KING HENRY. It sorts well with your fierceness. Enter FLUELLEN and GOWER GOWER. Captain Fluellen! FLUELLEN. So! in the name of Jesu Christ, speak fewer. It is the greatest admiration in the universal world, when the true and aunchient prerogatifes and laws of the wars is not kept: if you would take the pains but to examine the wars of Pompey the Great, you shall find, I warrant you, that there is no tiddle-taddle nor pibble-pabble in Pompey's camp; I warrant you, you shall find the ceremonies of the wars, and the cares of it, and the forms of it, and the sobriety of it, and the modesty of it, to be otherwise. GOWER. Why, the enemy is loud; you hear him all night. FLUELLEN. If the enemy is an ass, and a fool, and a prating coxcomb, is it meet, think you, that we should also, look you, be an ass, and a fool, and a prating coxcomb? In your own conscience, now? GOWER. I will speak lower. FLUELLEN. I pray you and beseech you that you will. Exeunt GOWER and FLUELLEN KING HENRY. Though it appear a little out of fashion, There is much care and valour in this Welshman. Enter three soldiers: JOHN BATES, ALEXANDER COURT, and MICHAEL WILLIAMS COURT. Brother John Bates, is not that the morning which breaks yonder? BATES. I think it be; but we have no great cause to desire the approach of day. WILLIAMS. We see yonder the beginning of the day, but I think we shall never see the end of it. Who goes there? KING HENRY. A friend. WILLIAMS. Under what captain serve you? KING HENRY. Under Sir Thomas Erpingham. WILLIAMS. A good old commander and a most kind gentleman. I pray you, what thinks he of our estate? KING HENRY. Even as men wreck'd upon a sand, that look to be wash'd off the next tide. BATES. He hath not told his thought to the King? KING HENRY. No; nor it is not meet he should. For though I speak it to you, I think the King is but a man as I am: the violet smells to him as it doth to me; the element shows to him as it doth to me; all his senses have but human conditions; his ceremonies laid by, in his nakedness he appears but a man; and though his affections are higher mounted than ours, yet, when they stoop, they stoop with the like wing. Therefore, when he sees reason of fears, as we do, his fears, out of doubt, be of the same relish as ours are; yet, in reason, no man should possess him with any appearance of fear, lest he, by showing it, should dishearten his army. BATES. He may show what outward courage he will; but I believe, as cold a night as 'tis, he could wish himself in Thames up to the neck; and so I would he were, and I by him, at all adventures, so we were quit here. KING HENRY. By my troth, I will speak my conscience of the King: I think he would not wish himself anywhere but where he is. BATES. Then I would he were here alone; so should he be sure to be ransomed, and a many poor men's lives saved. KING HENRY. I dare say you love him not so ill to wish him here alone, howsoever you speak this, to feel other men's minds; methinks I could not die anywhere so contented as in the King's company, his cause being just and his quarrel honourable. WILLIAMS. That's more than we know. BATES. Ay, or more than we should seek after; for we know enough if we know we are the King's subjects. If his cause be wrong, our obedience to the King wipes the crime of it out of us. WILLIAMS. But if the cause be not good, the King himself hath a heavy reckoning to make when all those legs and arms and heads, chopp'd off in a battle, shall join together at the latter day and cry all 'We died at such a place'- some swearing, some crying for a surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their children rawly left. I am afeard there are few die well that die in a battle; for how can they charitably dispose of anything when blood is their argument? Now, if these men do not die well, it will be a black matter for the King that led them to it; who to disobey were against all proportion of subjection. KING HENRY. So, if a son that is by his father sent about merchandise do sinfully miscarry upon the sea, the imputation of his wickedness, by your rule, should be imposed upon his father that sent him; or if a servant, under his master's command transporting a sum of money, be assailed by robbers and die in many irreconcil'd iniquities, you may call the business of the master the author of the servant's damnation. But this is not so: the King is not bound to answer the particular endings of his soldiers, the father of his son, nor the master of his servant; for they purpose not their death when they purpose their services. Besides, there is no king, be his cause never so spotless, if it come to the arbitrement of swords, can try it out with all unspotted soldiers: some peradventure have on them the guilt of premeditated and contrived murder; some, of beguiling virgins with the broken seals of perjury; some, making the wars their bulwark, that have before gored the gentle bosom of peace with pillage and robbery. Now, if these men have defeated the law and outrun native punishment, though they can outstrip men they have no wings to fly from God: war is His beadle, war is His vengeance; so that here men are punish'd for before-breach of the King's laws in now the King's quarrel. Where they feared the death they have borne life away; and where they would be safe they perish. Then if they die unprovided, no more is the King guilty of their damnation than he was before guilty of those impieties for the which they are now visited. Every subject's duty is the King's; but every subject's soul is his own. Therefore should every soldier in the wars do as every sick man in his bed- wash every mote out of his conscience; and dying so, death is to him advantage; or not dying, the time was blessedly lost wherein such preparation was gained; and in him that escapes it were not sin to think that, making God so free an offer, He let him outlive that day to see His greatness, and to teach others how they should prepare. WILLIAMS. 'Tis certain, every man that dies ill, the ill upon his own head- the King is not to answer for it. BATES. I do not desire he should answer for me, and yet I determine to fight lustily for him. KING HENRY. I myself heard the King say he would not be ransom'd. WILLIAMS. Ay, he said so, to make us fight cheerfully; but when our throats are cut he may be ransom'd, and we ne'er the wiser. KING HENRY. If I live to see it, I will never trust his word after. WILLIAMS. You pay him then! That's a perilous shot out of an elder-gun, that a poor and a private displeasure can do against a monarch! You may as well go about to turn the sun to ice with fanning in his face with a peacock's feather. You'll never trust his word after! Come, 'tis a foolish saying. KING HENRY. Your reproof is something too round; I should be angry with you, if the time were convenient. WILLIAMS. Let it be a quarrel between us if you live. KING HENRY. I embrace it. WILLIAMS. How shall I know thee again? KING HENRY. Give me any gage of thine, and I will wear it in my bonnet; then if ever thou dar'st acknowledge it, I will make it my quarrel. WILLIAMS. Here's my glove; give me another of thine. KING HENRY. There. WILLIAMS. This will I also wear in my cap; if ever thou come to me and say, after to-morrow, 'This is my glove,' by this hand I will take thee a box on the ear. KING HENRY. If ever I live to see it, I will challenge it. WILLIAMS. Thou dar'st as well be hang'd. KING HENRY. Well, I will do it, though I take thee in the King's company. WILLIAMS. Keep thy word. Fare thee well. BATES. Be friends, you English fools, be friends; we have French quarrels enow, if you could tell how to reckon. KING HENRY. Indeed, the French may lay twenty French crowns to one they will beat us, for they bear them on their shoulders; but it is no English treason to cut French crowns, and to-morrow the King himself will be a clipper. Exeunt soldiers Upon the King! Let us our lives, our souls, Our debts, our careful wives, Our children, and our sins, lay on the King! We must bear all. O hard condition, Twin-born with greatness, subject to the breath Of every fool, whose sense no more can feel But his own wringing! What infinite heart's ease Must kings neglect that private men enjoy! And what have kings that privates have not too, Save ceremony- save general ceremony? And what art thou, thou idol Ceremony? What kind of god art thou, that suffer'st more Of mortal griefs than do thy worshippers? What are thy rents? What are thy comings-in? O Ceremony, show me but thy worth! What is thy soul of adoration? Art thou aught else but place, degree, and form, Creating awe and fear in other men? Wherein thou art less happy being fear'd Than they in fearing. What drink'st thou oft, instead of homage sweet, But poison'd flattery? O, be sick, great greatness, And bid thy ceremony give thee cure! Thinks thou the fiery fever will go out With titles blown from adulation? Will it give place to flexure and low bending? Canst thou, when thou command'st the beggar's knee, Command the health of it? No, thou proud dream, That play'st so subtly with a king's repose. I am a king that find thee; and I know 'Tis not the balm, the sceptre, and the ball, The sword, the mace, the crown imperial, The intertissued robe of gold and pearl, The farced tide running fore the king, The throne he sits on, nor the tide of pomp That beats upon the high shore of this world- 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; Never sees horrid night, the child of hell; But, like a lackey, from the rise to set Sweats in the eye of Pheebus, 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. Enter ERPINGHAM ERPINGHAM. My lord, your nobles, jealous of your absence, Seek through your camp to find you. KING. Good old knight, Collect them all together at my tent: I'll be before thee. ERPINGHAM. I shall do't, my lord. Exit KING. O God of battles, steel my soldiers' hearts, Possess them not with fear! Take from them now The sense of reck'ning, if th' 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 bestowed 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. Enter GLOUCESTER GLOUCESTER. My liege! KING HENRY. My brother Gloucester's voice? Ay; I know thy errand, I will go with thee; The day, my friends, and all things, stay for me. Exeunt SCENE II. The French camp Enter the DAUPHIN, ORLEANS, RAMBURES, and others ORLEANS. The sun doth gild our armour; up, my lords! DAUPHIN. Montez a cheval! My horse! Varlet, laquais! Ha! ORLEANS. O brave spirit! DAUPHIN. Via! Les eaux et la terre- ORLEANS. Rien puis? L'air et le feu. DAUPHIN. Ciel! 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 to-day 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 enow 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 couch down in fear and yield. Enter GRANDPRE GRANDPRE. 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, dropping the hides and hips, The gum down-roping from their pale-dead eyes, And in their pale dull mouths the gimmal'd bit Lies foul with chaw'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 guidon. 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 GLOUCESTER, BEDFORD, EXETER, ERPINGHAM, with all his host; SALISBURY and WESTMORELAND GLOUCESTER. Where is the King? BEDFORD. The King himself is rode to view their battle. WESTMORELAND. Of fighting men they have full three-score thousand. EXETER. There's five to one; besides, they all are fresh. SALISBURY. God's arm strike with us! 'tis a fearful odds. God bye 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 Gloucester, and my good Lord Exeter, And my kind kinsman- warriors all, adieu! BEDFORD. Farewell, good Salisbury; and good luck go with thee! EXETER. 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 BEDFORD. He is as full of valour as of kindness; Princely in both. Enter the KING WESTMORELAND. O that we now had here But one ten thousand of those men in England That do no work to-day! KING. What's he that wishes so? My cousin Westmoreland? No, my fair cousin; If we are mark'd to die, we are enow 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; 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 neighbours, And say 'To-morrow is Saint Crispian.' Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars, And say 'These wounds I had on Crispian's day.' Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot, But he'll remember, with advantages, What feats he did that day. Then shall our names, Familiar in his mouth as household words- Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter, Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester- Be in their flowing cups freshly rememb'red. This story shall the good man teach his son; And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by, From this day to the ending of the world, But we in it shall be remembered- 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 whiles any speaks That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.