DUKE OF GLOUCESTER, Brothers to the King. LEWIS, the Dauphin.
CHARLES THE SIXTH, King of France.
DUKES OF BURGUNDY, ORLEANS, and BOUR
MONTJOY, a French Herald.
DUKE OF EXETER, Uncle to the King.
DUKE OF YORK, Cousin to the King.
EARLS OF SALISBURY, WESTMORELAND, and RAMBURES and GRANDPRÉ, French Lords.
ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY.
BISHOP OF ELY.
EARL OF CAMBRIDGE.
LORD SCROOP.
SIR THOMAS ERPINGHAM, GOWER, FLUELLEN, MACMORRIS, JAMY, Officers in King Henry's Army.
BATES, COURT, WILLIAMS, Soldiers in the
PISTOL, NYM, BARDOLPH. Boy.
Governor of Harfleur.
Ambassadors to the King of England.
ISABEL, Queen of France.
KATHARINE, Daughter to Charles and Isabel. ALICE, a Lady attending on the Princess Katharine.
Hostess of the Boar's Head Tavern, formerly Mistress Quickly, and now married to Pistol.
Lords, Ladies, Officers, French and English Soldiers, Citizens, Messengers, and Attendants.
SCENE.-England; afterwards France.
Piece out our imperfections with your thoughts:
Into a thousand parts divide one man,
Chor. O! for a Muse of fire, that would as- And make imaginary puissance;
But that the scambling and unquiet time 4 Which is a wonder how his Grace should glean Did push it out of further question.
Hear him debate of commonwealth affairs,
You would say it hath been all in all his study:
List his discourse of war, and you shall hear
A fearful battle render'd you in music:
Turn him to any cause of policy,
The Gordian knot of it he will unloose,
Familiar as his garter; that, when he speaks,
The air, a charter'd libertine, is still,
And the mute wonder lurketh in men's ears,
To steal his sweet and honey'd sentences;
So that the art and practic part of life
Must be the mistress to this theoric:
Ely. How did this offer seem receiv'd, my lord?
Cant. With good acceptance of his majesty; Save that there was not time enough to
As I perceiv'd his Grace would fain have done, -
The severals and unhidden passages
Of his true titles to some certain dukedoms,
And generally to the crown and seat of France,
Deriv'd from Edward, his great-grandfather. 89
Ely. What was the impediment that broke
this off?
Cant. The French ambassador upon that instant
Ely. I'll wait upon you, and I long to hear it. [Exeunt.
There left behind and settled certain French;
Who, holding in disdain the German women 48
For some dishonest manners of their life,
Establish'd then this law; to wit, no female
Should be inheritrix in Salique land:
Which Salique, as I said, 'twixt Elbe and Sala,
Is at this day in Germany call'd Meisen.
Then doth it well appear the Salique law
Was not devised for the realm of France;
Nor did the French possess the Salique land 56
Until four hundred one-and-twenty years
After defunction of King Pharamond,
Idly suppos'd the founder of this law;
Who died within the year of our redemption 60
Four hundred twenty-six; and Charles the Great
Subdu'd the Saxons, and did seat the French
Beyond the river Sala, in the year
Eight hundred five. Besides, their writers say,
King Pepin, which deposed Childeric,
Did, as heir general, being descended
Of Blithild, which was daughter to King Clothair,
Make claim and title to the crown of France. 68
Hugh Capet also, who usurp'd the crown
Cant. The sin upon my head, dread sove-
reign!
For in the book of Numbers is it writ:
'When the son dies, let the inheritance
Descend unto the daughter.' Gracious lord, 100
Stand for your own; unwind your bloody flag;
Look back into your mighty ancestors:
Go, my dread lord, to your great-grandsire's tomb,
From whom you claim; invoke his war-like
spirit,
104
And your great-uncle's, Edward the Black Prince,
Who on the French ground play'd a tragedy,
Making defeat on the full power of France;
Whiles his most mighty father on a hill
Stood smiling to behold his lion's whelp
Forage in blood of French nobility.
But lay down our proportions to defend Against the Scot, who will make road upon us With all advantages.
Cant. They of those marches, gracious sovereign,
Shall be a wall sufficient to defend
Our inland from the pilfering borderers.
K. Hen. We do not mean the coursing snatchers only,
But fear the main intendment of the Scot, 144
Who hath been still a giddy neighbour to us;
For you shall read that my great-grandfather
Never went with his forces into France
But that the Scot on his unfurnish'd kingdom
Came pouring, like the tide into a breach,
With ample and brim fulness of his force,
Galling the gleaned land with hot essays,
Girding with grievous siege castles and towns;
That England, being empty of defence,
Hath shook and trembled at the ill neighbour-
Exe. It follows then the cat must stay at home:
Yet that is but a crush'd necessity;
Since we have locks to safeguard necessaries 176
And pretty traps to catch the petty thieves.
While that the armed hand doth fight abroad
The advised head defends itself at home:
For government, though high and low and
lower,
Put into parts, doth keep in one consent,
Congreeing in a full and natural close,
Like music.
Cant. Therefore doth heaven divide
The state of man in divers functions,
Setting endeavour in continual motion;
Whereof take you one quarter into France,
His present and your pains we thank you for:
And you withal shall make all Gallia shake. 216 When we have match'd our rackets to these
If we, with thrice such powers left at home, Cannot defend our own doors from the dog, Let us be worried and our nation lose
The name of hardiness and policy.
K. Hen. Call in the messengers sent from
the Dauphin.
[Exit an Attendant.
Now are we well resolv'd; and by God's help,
And yours, the noble sinews of our power,
France being ours, we'll bend it to our awe 224
Or break it all to pieces: or there we'll sit,
Ruling in large and ample empery
O'er France and all her almost kingly dukedoms,
Or lay these bones in an unworthy urn,
228
Tombless, with no remembrance over them:
Either our history shall with full mouth
Speak freely of our acts, or else our grave,
Like Turkish mute, shall have a tongueless
But tell the Dauphin I will keep my state,
Be like a king and show my sail of greatness
When I do rouse me in my throne of France:
For that I have laid by my majesty
And plodded like a man for working-days,
But I will rise there with so full a glory
That I will dazzle all the eyes of France,
Yea, strike the Dauphin blind to look on us. 280
And tell the pleasant prince this mock of his
Hath turn'd his balls to gun-stones; and his soul
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