SCENE IV.

The Same. Another Room in the Same.

Enter the French King, the Dauphin, the Duke of BOURBON, the Constable of France, and others.

Fr. King. 'Tis certain he hath pass'd the river Somme. Con. And if he be not fought withal, my lord,

Let us not live in France; let us quit all,

And give our vineyards to a barbarous people.

1

Dau. O Dieu vivant! shall a few sprays 1 of us,

Our scions, put in wild and savage stock,

Spirt up so suddenly into the clouds,

And overlook their grafters?

Bour. Normans, but bastard Normans, Norman bastards! Mort de ma vie, if they march along

Unfought withal, but I will sell my dukedom,

To buy a slobbery and a dirty farm

In that nook-shotten 2 isle of Albion.

Con. Dieu de batailles ! whence have they this mettle? Is not their climate foggy, raw, and dull;

On whom, as in despite, the Sun looks pale,
Killing their fruit with frowns? Can sodden water,
A drench for sur-rein'd jades,3 their barley-broth,
Decoct their cold blood to such valiant heat?

1 Sprays is shoots, sprigs, or sprouts; alluding to the origin of the AngloNorman stock.

2 Shotten signifies any thing projected; so nook-shotten isle is an isle that shoots out into capes, promontories, and necks of land, the very figure of Great Britain.

3 Sur-rein'd is probably over-ridden or over-strained. It was common to give horses, over-ridden or feverish, ground malt and hot water mixed, which was called a mash. — Barley-broth is probably meant as a Frenchman's sneer at English ale, or beer.

And shall our quick blood, spirited with wine,
Seem frosty? O, for honour of our land,

Let us not hang like roping icicles

Upon our houses' thatch, whiles a more frosty people
Sweat drops of gallant youth in our rich fields, —

Poor we may call them in their native lords !

Dau. By faith and honour,

Our madams mock at us, and plainly say

Our mettle is bred out.

Bour. They bid us to the English dancing-schools, And teach lavoltas high and swift corantos ;4

Saying our grace is only in our heels,

And that we are most lofty runaways.

Fr. King. Where is Montjoy the herald? speed him

hence;

Let him greet England with our sharp defiance. —

Up, princes! and, with spirit of honour edged
More sharper than your swords, hie to the field:
Charles Delabreth,5 High-Constable of France;
You Dukes of Orleans, Bourbon, and of Berri,
Alençon, Brabant, Bar, and Burgundy;
Jaques Chatillon, Rambures, Vaudemont,
Beaumont, Grandpré, Roussi, and Fauconberg,

4 The coranto was a lively dance for two persons. See Twelfth Night, page 40, note 22. — The lavolta was a dance of Italian origin, and seems to have been something like the modern waltz, only, perhaps, rather more so. It is thus described by Sir John Davies

A lofty jumping, or a leaping round,

Where arm in arm two dancers are entwin'd,

And whirl themselves with strict embracements bound,

And still their feet an anapest do sound.

5 This should be Charles D'Albret; but the metre would not admit of the change. Shakespeare followed Holinshed, who calls him Delabreth.

Foix, Lestrale, Bouciqualt, and Charolois;

High dukes, great princes, barons, lords, and knights,
For your great seats, now quit you of great shames.
Bar Harry England, that sweeps through our land
With pennons painted in the blood of Harfleur:
Rush on his host, as doth the melted snow
Upon the valleys, whose low vassal seat
The Alps doth spit and void his rheum upon :
Go down upon him, -you have power enough,
And in a captive chariot into Rouen

Bring him our prisoner.

Con.

This becomes the great.

Sorry am I his numbers are so few,

His soldiers sick, and famish'd in their march;
For I am sure, when he shall see our army,

He'll drop his heart into the sink of fear,

And, for achievement, offer us his ransom.7

Fr. King. Therefore, Lord Constable, haste on Montjoy; And let him say to England, that we send

To know what willing ransom he will give.

Prince Dauphin, you shall stay with us in Rouen.

Dau. Not so, I do beseech your Majesty.

Fr. King. Be patient; for you shall remain with us. Now forth, Lord Constable, and princes all,

And quickly bring us word of England's fall.

[Exeunt.

6 Quit for acquit; the sense being clear, release, or exonerate yourselves. See As You Like It, page 78, note 2.

7 That is, instead of achieving a victory over us, make a proposal to buy himself off with a ransom.

SCENE V. The English Camp in Picardy.

Enter, severally, GOWER and FLUELLEN.

Gow. How now, Captain Fluellen! come you from the bridge?

Flu. I assure you, there is very excellent services committed at the pridge.1

Gow. Is the Duke of Exeter safe?

Flu. The Duke of Exeter is as magnanimous as Agamemnon; and a man that I love and honour with my soul, and my heart, and my duty, and my life, and my living, and my uttermost power: he is not- Got be praised and plessed! -any hurt in the 'orld; but iantly, with excellent discipline. at the pridge, — I think in my very conscience he is as valiant a man as Mark Antony; and he is a man of no estimation in the 'orld; but I did see him do gallant service.

Gow. What do you call him?

keeps the pridge most valThere is an auncient there

Flu. He is call'd Auncient Pistol.

Gow. I know him not.

Flu. Here is the man.

Enter PISTOL.

Pist. Captain, I thee beseech to do me favours : The Duke of Exeter doth love thee well.

1 After Henry had passed the Somme, the French endeavoured to intercept him in his passage to Calais; and for that purpose attempted to break down the only bridge that there was over the small river of Ternois. But Henry, having notice of their design, sent a part of his troops before him, who, attacking and putting the French to flight, preserved the bridge till the whole English army arrived and passed over it.

Flu. Ay, I praise Got; and I have merited some love at his hands.

Pist. Bardolph, a soldier, firm and sound of heart,

Of buxom valour, hath, by cruel fate,

And giddy Fortune's furious fickle wheel,

That goddess blind,

That stands upon the rolling, restless stone,

Flu. By your patience, Auncient Pistol. Fortune is painted plind, with a muffler afore her eyes, to signify to you that Fortune is plind; and she is painted also with a wheel, to signify to you, which is the moral of it, that she is turning, and inconstant, and mutability, and variation and her foot, look you, is fixed upon a spherical stone, which rolls, and rolls, and rolls. In good truth, the poet makes a most excellent description of it: Fortune is an excellent moral.

Pist. Fortune is Bardolph's foe, and frowns on him ;
For he hath stolen a pax,3 and hangèd must 'a be,
A damned death!

Let gallows gape for dog; let man go free,
And let not hemp his windpipe suffocate:
But Exeter hath given the doom of death

For pax of little price.

Therefore, go speak; the duke will hear thy voice;

And let not Bardolph's vital thread be cut

With edge of penny cord and vile reproach:

2 In the Saxon and our elder English, buxom meant pliant, yielding, obedient; but it was also used for lusty, rampant. Pistol would be more likely to take the popular sense than one founded on etymology.

8 The pax is said to have been a small piece of plate, sometimes with the Crucifixion engraved or embossed upon it, which at a certain point in the Mass was offered to the laity to be kissed: Osculatorium was another name for it.