Complete Plays, The
Page 193
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 called the feast of Crispian:
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when the day is named,
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 Crispin’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 remember’d.
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 remember’d;
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 accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.
Re-enter Salisbury
Salisbury
My sovereign lord, bestow yourself with speed:
The French are bravely in their battles set,
And will with all expedience charge on us.
King Henry V
All things are ready, if our minds be so.
Westmoreland
Perish the man whose mind is backward now!
King Henry V
Thou dost not wish more help from England, coz?
Westmoreland
God’s will! my liege, would you and I alone,
Without more help, could fight this royal battle!
King Henry V
Why, now thou hast unwish’d five thousand men;
Which likes me better than to wish us one.
You know your places: God be with you all!
Tucket. Enter Montjoy
Montjoy
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 mind
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.
King Henry V
Who hath sent thee now?
Montjoy
The Constable of France.
King Henry V
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 lived, was killed 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 famed; for there the sun shall greet them,
And draw their honours reeking up to heaven;
Leaving their earthly parts to choke your clime,
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 will 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;
Which if they have as I will leave ’em them,
Shall yield them little, tell the constable.
Montjoy
I shall, King Harry. And so fare thee well:
Thou never shalt hear herald any more.
Exit
King Henry V
I fear thou’lt once more come again for ransom.
Enter York
York
My lord, most humbly on my knee I beg
The leading of the vaward.
King Henry V
Take it, brave York. Now, soldiers, march away:
And how thou pleasest, God, dispose the day!
Exeunt
SCENE IV. THE FIELD OF BATTLE.
Alarum. Excursions. Enter Pistol, French Soldier, and Boy
Pistol
Yield, cur!
French Soldier
Je pense que vous etes gentilhomme de bonne qualite.
Pistol
Qualtitie calmie custure 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 misericorde! ayez pitie 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’echapper 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
Ecoutez: comment etes-vous appele?
French Soldier
Monsieur le Fer.
Boy
He says his name is Master Fer.
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br /> 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 de vous dire que vous faites vous pret; car ce soldat ici est dispose tout a 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 gentilhomme de bonne maison: gardez ma vie, et je vous donnerai deux cents ecus.
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, neanmoins, pour les ecus que vous l’avez promis, il est content de vous donner la liberte, le franchisement.
French Soldier
Sur mes genoux je vous donne mille remercimens; et je m’estime heureux que je suis tombe entre les mains d’un chevalier, je pense, le plus brave, vaillant, et tres distingue 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 signieur 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 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.
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. O merchante fortune!
Do not run away.
A short alarum
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 us 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 pander, 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 enow 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
SCENE VI. ANOTHER PART OF THE FIELD.
Alarums. Enter King Henry and forces, Exeter, and others
King Henry V
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 V
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 insteep’d,
And takes him by the beard; kisses the gashes
That bloodily did spawn 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 smiled me in the face, raught me his hand,
And, with a feeble gripe, says ‘Dear my lord,
Commend my service to me sovereign.’
So did he turn and over Suffolk’s neck
He threw his wounded arm and kiss’d his lips;
And so espoused to death, with blood he seal’d
A testament of noble-ending love.
The pretty and sweet manner of it forced
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 V
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 reinforced their scatter’d men:
Then every soldier kill his prisoners:
Give the word through.
Exeunt
SCENE VII. ANOTHER PART OF THE FIELD.
Enter Fluellen and Gower
Fluellen
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 offer’t; in your conscience, now, is it not?
Gower
’Tis certain there’s not a boy left alive; and the cowardly rascals that ran from the battle ha’ 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 gallant king!
Fluellen
Ay, he was porn at Monmouth, Captain Gower. What call you the town’s name where Alexander the Pig was born!
Gower
Alexander the Great.
Fluellen
Why, I pray you, is not pig great? the pig, or the great, or the mighty, or the huge, or the magnanimous, are all one reckonings, save the phrase is a little variations.
Gower
I think Alexander the Great was born in Macedon; his father was called Philip of Macedon, as I take it.
Fluellen
I think it is in Macedon where Alexander is porn. I tell you, captain, if you look in the
maps of the ’orld, I warrant you sall find, in the comparisons between Macedon and Monmouth, that the situations, look you, is both alike. There is a river in Macedon; and there is also moreover a river at Monmouth: it is called Wye at Monmouth; but it is out of my prains what is the name of the other river; but ’tis all one, ’tis alike as my fingers is to my fingers, and there is salmons in both. If you mark Alexander’s life well, Harry of Monmouth’s life is come after it indifferent well; for there is figures in all things. Alexander, God knows, and you know, in his rages, and his furies, and his wraths, and his cholers, and his moods, and his displeasures, and his indignations, and also being a little intoxicates in his prains, did, in his ales and his angers, look you, kill his best friend, Cleitus.
Gower
Our king is not like him in that: he never killed any of his friends.
Fluellen
It is not well done, mark you now take the tales out of my mouth, ere it is made and finished. I speak but in the figures and comparisons of it: as Alexander killed his friend Cleitus, being in his ales and his cups; so also Harry Monmouth, being in his right wits and his good judgments, turned away the fat knight with the great belly-doublet: he was full of jests, and gipes, and knaveries, and mocks; I have forgot his name.
Gower
Sir John Falstaff.
Fluellen
That is he: I’ll tell you there is good men porn at Monmouth.
Gower
Here comes his majesty.
Alarum. Enter King Henry, and forces; Warwick, Gloucester, Exeter, and others
King Henry V
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 skirr away, as swift as stones
Enforced from the old Assyrian slings:
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
Exeter
Here comes the herald of the French, my liege.
Gloucester
His eyes are humbler than they used to be.
King Henry V
How now! what means this, herald? know’st thou not
That I have fined these bones of mine for ransom?
Comest thou again for ransom?
Montjoy
No, great king:
I come to thee for charitable licence,
That we may wander o’er this bloody field
To look our dead, and then to bury them;
To sort our nobles from our common men.