Y Ddraig Goch

The Lord in heaven bless thee, noble Harry!
     

    Exeunt all but KING HENRY

KING HENRY V

    God-a-mercy, old heart! thou speak'st cheerfully.

    Enter PISTOL

PISTOL

    Qui va la?

KING HENRY V

    A friend.

PISTOL

    Discuss unto me; art thou officer?
    Or art thou base, common and popular?

KING HENRY V

    I am a gentleman of a company.

PISTOL

    Trail'st thou the puissant pike?

KING HENRY V

    Even so. What are you?

PISTOL

    As good a gentleman as the emperor.

KING HENRY V

    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 V

    Harry le Roy.

PISTOL

    Le Roy! a Cornish name: art thou of Cornish crew?

KING HENRY V

    No, I am a Welshman.

PISTOL

    Know'st thou Fluellen?

KING HENRY V

    Yes.

PISTOL

    Tell him, I'll knock his leek about his pate
    Upon Saint Davy's day.

KING HENRY V

    Do not you wear your dagger in your cap that day,
    lest he knock that about yours.

PISTOL

    Art thou his friend?

KING HENRY V

    And his kinsman too.

PISTOL

    The figo for thee, then!

KING HENRY V

    I thank you: God be with you!

PISTOL

    My name is Pistol call'd.

    Exit

KING HENRY V

    It sorts well with your fierceness.

    Enter FLUELLEN and GOWER

GOWER

    Captain Fluellen!

FLUELLEN

    So! in the name of Jesu Christ, speak lower. It is
    the greatest admiration of 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 toddle
    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 V

    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 V

    A friend.

WILLIAMS

    Under what captain serve you?

KING HENRY V

    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 V

    Even as men wrecked upon a sand, that look to be
    washed off the next tide.

BATES

    He hath not told his thought to the king?

KING HENRY V

    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 V

    By my troth, I will speak my conscience of the king:
    I think he would not wish himself any where 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 V

    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 any where 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 kings 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, chopped off in 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 any thing, 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; whom to disobey were against all proportion of
    subjection.

KING HENRY V

    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 irreconciled 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 vengeance;
    so that here men are punished 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 it.

BATES

    But I do not desire he should answer for me; and
    yet I determine to fight lustily for him.

KING HENRY V

    I myself heard the king say he would not be ransomed.

WILLIAMS

    Ay, he said so, to make us fight cheerfully: but
    when our throats are cut, he may be ransomed, and we
    ne'er the wiser.

KING HENRY V

    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 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 V

    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 V

    I embrace it.

WILLIAMS

    How shall I know thee again?

KING HENRY V

    Give me any gage of thine, and I will wear it in my
    bonnet: then, if ever thou darest acknowledge it, I
    will make it my quarrel.

WILLIAMS

    Here's my glove: give me another of thine.

KING HENRY V

    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 V

    If ever I live to see it, I will challenge it.

WILLIAMS

    Thou darest as well be hanged.

KING HENRY V

    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 V

    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 idle 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!
    Think'st 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 title 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 Phoebus 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 HENRY V

    Good old knight,
    Collect them all together at my tent:
    I'll be before thee.

ERPINGHAM

    I shall do't, my lord.

    Exit

KING HENRY V

    O God of battles! steel my soldiers' hearts;
    Possess them not with fear; take from them now
    The sense of reckoning, if the 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 anew;
    And on it have bestow'd 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 V

    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



KING HENRY V

    I tell thee truly, herald,
    I know not if the day be ours or no;
    For yet a many of your horsemen peer
    And gallop o'er the field.

MONTJOY

    The day is yours.

KING HENRY V

    Praised be God, and not our strength, for it!
    What is this castle call'd that stands hard by?

MONTJOY

    They call it Agincourt.

KING HENRY V

    Then call we this the field of Agincourt,
    Fought on the day of Crispin Crispianus.

FLUELLEN

    Your grandfather of famous memory, an't please your
    majesty, and your great-uncle Edward the Plack
    Prince of Wales, as I have read in the chronicles,
    fought a most prave pattle here in France.

KING HENRY V

    They did, Fluellen.

FLUELLEN

    Your majesty says very true: if your majesties is
    remembered of it, the Welshmen did good service in a
    garden where leeks did grow, wearing leeks in their
    Monmouth caps; which, your majesty know, to this
    hour is an honourable badge of the service; and I do
    believe your majesty takes no scorn to wear the leek
    upon Saint Tavy's day.

KING HENRY V

    I wear it for a memorable honour;
    For I am Welsh, you know, good countryman.

FLUELLEN

    All the water in Wye cannot wash your majesty's
    Welsh plood out of your pody, I can tell you that:
    God pless it and preserve it, as long as it pleases
    his grace, and his majesty too!

KING HENRY V

    Thanks, good my countryman.

FLUELLEN

    By Jeshu, I am your majesty's countryman, I care not
    who know it; I will confess it to all the 'orld: I
    need not to be ashamed of your majesty, praised be
    God, so long as your majesty is an honest man.

KING HENRY V

    God keep me so! Our heralds go with him:
    Bring me just notice of the numbers dead
    On both our parts. Call yonder fellow hither.

    Points to WILLIAMS. Exeunt Heralds with Montjoy

EXETER

    Soldier, you must come to the king.

KING HENRY V

    Soldier, why wearest thou that glove in thy cap?

WILLIAMS

    An't please your majesty, 'tis the gage of one that
    I should fight withal, if he be alive.

KING HENRY V

    An Englishman?

WILLIAMS

    An't please your majesty, a rascal that swaggered
    with me last night; who, if alive and ever dare to
    challenge this glove, I have sworn to take him a box
    o' th' ear: or if I can see my glove in his cap,
    which he swore, as he was a soldier, he would wear
    if alive, I will strike it out soundly.

KING HENRY V

    What think you, Captain Fluellen? is it fit this
    soldier keep his oath?

FLUELLEN

    He is a craven and a villain else, an't please your
    majesty, in my conscience.

KING HENRY V

    It may be his enemy is a gentleman of great sort,
    quite from the answer of his degree.

FLUELLEN

    Though he be as good a gentleman as the devil is, as
    Lucifer and Belzebub himself, it is necessary, look
    your grace, that he keep his vow and his oath: if
    he be perjured, see you now, his reputation is as
    arrant a villain and a Jacksauce, as ever his black
    shoe trod upon God's ground and his earth, in my
    conscience, la!

KING HENRY V

    Then keep thy vow, sirrah, when thou meetest the fellow.

WILLIAMS

    So I will, my liege, as I live.

KING HENRY V

    Who servest thou under?

WILLIAMS

    Under Captain Gower, my liege.

FLUELLEN

    Gower is a good captain, and is good knowledge and
    literatured in the wars.

KING HENRY V

    Call him hither to me, soldier.

WILLIAMS

    I will, my liege.

    Exit

KING HENRY V

    Here, Fluellen; wear thou this favour for me and
    stick it in thy cap: when Alencon and myself were
    down together, I plucked this glove from his helm:
    if any man challenge this, he is a friend to
    Alencon, and an enemy to our person; if thou
    encounter any such, apprehend him, an thou dost me love.

FLUELLEN

    Your grace doo's me as great honours as can be
    desired in the hearts of his subjects: I would fain
    see the man, that has but two legs, that shall find
    himself aggrieved at this glove; that is all; but I
    would fain see it once, an please God of his grace
    that I might see.

KING HENRY V

    Knowest thou Gower?

FLUELLEN

    He is my dear friend, an please you.

KING HENRY V

    Pray thee, go seek him, and bring him to my tent.

FLUELLEN

    I will fetch him.

    Exit

KING HENRY V

    My Lord of Warwick, and my brother Gloucester,
    Follow Fluellen closely at the heels:
    The glove which I have given him for a favour
    May haply purchase him a box o' th' ear;
    It is the soldier's; I by bargain should
    Wear it myself. Follow, good cousin Warwick:
    If that the soldier strike him, as I judge
    By his blunt bearing he will keep his word,
    Some sudden mischief may arise of it;
    For I do know Fluellen valiant
    And, touched with choler, hot as gunpowder,
    And quickly will return an injury:
    Follow and see there be no harm between them.
    Go you with me, uncle of Exeter.

    Exeunt




SCENE I. France. The English camp.

    Enter FLUELLEN and GOWER

GOWER

    Nay, that's right; but why wear you your leek today?
    Saint Davy's day is past.

FLUELLEN

    There is occasions and causes why and wherefore in
    all things: I will tell you, asse my friend,
    Captain Gower: the rascally, scald, beggarly,
    lousy, pragging knave, Pistol, which you and
    yourself and all the world know to be no petter
    than a fellow, look you now, of no merits, he is
    come to me and prings me pread and salt yesterday,
    look you, and bid me eat my leek: it was in place
    where I could not breed no contention with him; but
    I will be so bold as to wear it in my cap till I see
    him once again, and then I will tell him a little
    piece of my desires.

    Enter PISTOL

GOWER

    Why, here he comes, swelling like a turkey-cock.

FLUELLEN

    'Tis no matter for his swellings nor his
    turkey-cocks. God pless you, Aunchient Pistol! you
    scurvy, lousy knave, God pless you!

PISTOL

    Ha! art thou bedlam? dost thou thirst, base Trojan,
    To have me fold up Parca's fatal web?
    Hence! I am qualmish at the smell of leek.

FLUELLEN

    I peseech you heartily, scurvy, lousy knave, at my
    desires, and my requests, and my petitions, to eat,
    look you, this leek: because, look you, you do not
    love it, nor your affections and your appetites and
    your digestions doo's not agree with it, I would
    desire you to eat it.

PISTOL

    Not for Cadwallader and all his goats.

FLUELLEN

    There is one goat for you.

    Strikes him
    Will you be so good, scauld knave, as eat it?

PISTOL

    Base Trojan, thou shalt die.

FLUELLEN

    You say very true, scauld knave, when God's will is:
    I will desire you to live in the mean time, and eat
    your victuals: come, there is sauce for it.

    Strikes him
    You called me yesterday mountain-squire; but I will
    make you to-day a squire of low degree. I pray you,
    fall to: if you can mock a leek, you can eat a leek.

GOWER

    Enough, captain: you have astonished him.

FLUELLEN

    I say, I will make him eat some part of my leek, or
    I will peat his pate four days. Bite, I pray you; it
    is good for your green wound and your ploody coxcomb.

PISTOL

    Must I bite?

FLUELLEN

    Yes, certainly, and out of doubt and out of question
    too, and ambiguities.

PISTOL

    By this leek, I will most horribly revenge: I eat
    and eat, I swear--

FLUELLEN

    Eat, I pray you: will you have some more sauce to
    your leek? there is not enough leek to swear by.

PISTOL

    Quiet thy cudgel; thou dost see I eat.

FLUELLEN

    Much good do you, scauld knave, heartily. Nay, pray
    you, throw none away; the skin is good for your
    broken coxcomb. When you take occasions to see leeks
    hereafter, I pray you, mock at 'em; that is all.

PISTOL

    Good.

FLUELLEN

    Ay, leeks is good: hold you, there is a groat to
    heal your pate.

PISTOL

    Me a groat!

FLUELLEN

    Yes, verily and in truth, you shall take it; or I
    have another leek in my pocket, which you shall eat.

PISTOL

    I take thy groat in earnest of revenge.

FLUELLEN

    If I owe you any thing, I will pay you in cudgels:
    you shall be a woodmonger, and buy nothing of me but
    cudgels. God b' wi' you, and keep you, and heal your pate.

    Exit

PISTOL

    All hell shall stir for this.

GOWER

    Go, go; you are a counterfeit cowardly knave. Will
    you mock at an ancient tradition, begun upon an
    honourable respect, and worn as a memorable trophy of
    predeceased valour and dare not avouch in your deeds
    any of your words? I have seen you gleeking and
    galling at this gentleman twice or thrice. You
    thought, because he could not speak English in the
    native garb, he could not therefore handle an
    English cudgel: you find it otherwise; and
    henceforth let a Welsh correction teach you a good
    English condition. Fare ye well.

    Exit

PISTOL

    Doth Fortune play the huswife with me now?
    News have I, that my Nell is dead i' the spital
    Of malady of France;
    And there my rendezvous is quite cut off.
    Old I do wax; and from my weary limbs
    Honour is cudgelled. Well, bawd I'll turn,
    And something lean to cutpurse of quick hand.
    To England will I steal, and there I'll steal:
    And patches will I get unto these cudgell'd scars,
    And swear I got them in the Gallia wars.

    Exit