Enter the English 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 three-score thou-
sand.

Exe. There's five to one; besides, they all are fresh.
Sal. God's arm strike with us! 'tis a fearful odds.

Go b' wi' 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,1 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 framed of the firm truth of valour.

[Exit SALISBURY.

Bed. He is as full of valour as of kindness; Princely in both.

Enter King HENRY.

West.

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?

The Earl of

1 The kind kinsman here addressed is Westmoreland.

Salisbury was Thomas Montacute: he was in fact not related to Westmoreland; but their families were connected by marriage.

My cousin Westmoreland?—No, my fair cousin : 2
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;

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 live in that man's company
That fears his fellowship to die with us.
This day is call'd the feast of Crispian : 3

2 Westmoreland's first wife was aunt to the King by his grandfather's side; she being one of several children of John of Ghent by Catharine Swynford; all born out of wedlock, but afterwards legitimated. They took the name of Beaufort, from Beaufort Castle, in France, where they were born.

8 The battle of Agincourt was fought the 25th of October, 1415. The saints who gave name to the day were Crispin and Crispianus, brothers, born at Rome, from whence they travelled to Soissons, in France, about the year 303, to propagate Christianity, but, that they might not be chargeable to others for their maintenance, they exercised the trade of shoemakers: the governor of the town, discovering them to be Christians, ordered them to be beheaded. Hence they have become the patron saints of shoemakers.

He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a-tip-toe when this 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 4 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 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,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be rememberéd,

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 : 5

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.

4 The vigil of a holy day was the watch that was kept the night before. Something of the old custom survives in the celebration of Christmas eve.

That is, shall make him a gentleman. King Henry V. inhibited any person, but such as had a right by inheritance or grant, from bearing coatsof-arms, except those who fought with him at the battle of Agincourt.

132

KING HENRY THE FIFTH.

ACT IV.

To hue

Re-enter SALISBURY.

Sal. My sovereign lord, bestow yourself with speed:

6

The French are bravely in their battles set,

And will with all expedience charge on us.
King. All things are ready, if our minds be so. V

West. Perish the man whose mind is backward now! King. Thou dost not wish more help from England, coz? West. God's will! my liege, would you and I alone, Without more help, might fight this battle out!

King. Why, now thou hast unwish'd five thousand men ;8 Which likes me better than to wish us one.

You know your places: God be with you all!

J

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 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.

Who hath sent thee now?

6 Bravely is in a braving manner; defiantly.

7 Expedience for expedition, speed. The usage was common.

་་

8" By wishing only thyself and me, thou hast wished five thousand men away." The Poet, inattentive to numbers, puts 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 variously stated; Holinshed makes them fifteen thousand, others but nine thousand.

ALA

Mont. The Constable of France,

King. 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 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 9 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 bullets grazing,
Break out into a second course of mischief,
Killing in rélapse of mortality.10

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:

9 Alluding to the plates of brass formerly let into tombstones.

10 "Relapse of mortality" is simply the falling-back or returning of the mortal body to its original dust.—This high strain must be set down, I think, among the Poet's instances of overboldness. Certainly, nothing but his prodigious momentum of thought and poetry could carry us fairly through such a strain; hardly even that.