Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

I sall quit* you with gud leve, as I may pick occasion; that sall I, marry,

Mac. It is no time to discourse, so Chrish save me, the day is hot, and the weather, and the wars, and the king, and the dukes; it is no time to discourse. The town is beseeched, and the trumpet calls us to the breach; and we talk, and, by Chrish, do nothing; 'tis shame for us all: so God sa' me, 'tis shame to stand still; it is shame, by my hand: and there is throats to be cut, and works to be done; and there ish nothing done, so Chrish sa3 me, la.

Jamy. By the mess, ere theise eyes of mine tak themselves to slumber, aile do gude service, or aile ligge i' the grund for it; ay, or go to death; and aile pay it as valorously as I may, that sall I surely do, that is the breff and the long: Marry, I wad full fain heard some question 'tween you tway.

Flu. Captain Macmorris, I think, look you, under your correction, there is not many of your nation

Mac. Of my nation? What ish my nation? ish a villain, and a bastard, and a knave, and a rascal? What ish my nation ? Who talks of my nation?

Flu. Look you, if you take the matter otherwise than is meant, captain Macmorris, peradventure, I shall think you do not use me with that affability as in discretion you ought to use me, look you; being as goot a man as yourself, both in the disciplines of wars, and in the derivation of my birth, and in other particularities.

Mac. I do not know you so good a man as myself: so Chrish save me, I will cut off your head.

Gow. Gentlemen both, you will mistake each other.
Jamy. Au! that's a foul fault.

Gow. The town sounds a parley.

[A parley sounded.

Flu. Captain Macmorris, when there is more better opportunity to be required, look you, I will be so bold as to tell you, I know the disciplines of war; and there is an end.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III.-The same. Before the gates of Harfleur.

The GOVERNOR and some Citizens on the Walls; the English Forces below. Enter KING HENRY and his Train.

K. Hen. How yet resolves the governor of the town? This is the latest parle we will admit:

Therefore, to our best mercy give yourselves;

Or, like to men proud of destruction,

Defy us to our worst: for, as I am a soldier

(A name, that, in my thoughts, becomes me best),

If I begin the battery once again,

I will not leave the half-achieved Harfleur,

Till in her ashes she lie buried.

The gates of mercy shall be all shut up;

And the flesh'd soldier,-rough and hard of heart,

* Requite, answer.

In liberty of bloody hand, shall range

With conscience wide as hell; mowing like grass
Your fresh fair virgins, and your flowering infants.
What is it then to me, if impious war,-

Array'd in flames, like to the prince of fiends,-
Do, with his smirch'd* complexion, all fell feats
Enlink'd to waste and desolation ?

What is't to me, when you yourselves are cause,
If your pure maidens fall into the hand
Of hot and forcing violation?

What rein can hold licentious wickedness,
When down the hill he holds his fierce career?
We may as bootless spend our vain command
Upon the enraged soldiers in their spoil,

As send precepts to the Leviathan

To come ashore. Therefore, you men of Harfleur,
Take pity of your town, and of your people,
Whiles yet my soldiers are in my command;
Whiles yet the cool and temperate wind of grace
O'er-blows the filthy and contagious clouds
Of deadly murder, spoil, and villany.

If not, why, in a moment, look to see
The blind and bloody soldier with foul hand
Defile the locks of your shrill-shrieking daughters;
Your fathers taken by the silver beards,

And their most reverend heads dash'd to the walls;
Your naked infants spitted upon pikes;

Whiles the mad mothers with their howls confused
Do break the clouds, as did the wives of Jewry
At Herod's bloody-hunting slaughtermen.
What say you? will you yield, and this avoid?
Or, guilty in defence, be thus destroy'd?

Gov. Our expectation hath this day an end:
The Dauphin, whom of sucour we entreated,
Returns us-that his powers are not yet ready
To raise so great a siege. Therefore, dread king,
We yield our town, and lives to thy soft mercy:
Enter our gates; dispose of us, and ours;
For we no longer are defensible.

K. Hen. Open your gates.-Come, uncle Exeter,
Go you and enter Harfleur; there remain,
And fortify it strongly against the French:
Use mercy to them all. For us, dear uncle,-
The winter coming on, and sickness growing
Upon our soldiers,-we'll retire to Calais.
To-night in Harfleur will we be your guest;
To-morrow for the march are we addrest.†

Soiled.

[Flourish. The King, &c. enter the Town. † Prepared.

SCENE IV-Roüen. A Room in the Palace.

Enter KATHARINE and ALICE.

Kath. Alice, tu as esté en Angleterre, et tu parles bien le language.

Alice. Un peu, madame.

Kath. Je te prie, m'enseignez; il faut que j'apprenne à parler. Comment appellez vous la main, en Anglois?

Alice. La main? elle est appellée, de hand.

Kath. De hand. Et les doigts?

Alice. Les doigts? ma foy, je oublie les doigts; mais je me souviendray. Les doigts? je pense, qu'ils sont appellé de fingres; ouy, de fingres.

Kath. La main, de hand; les doigts, de fingres. Je pense, que je suis le bon escolier. J'ay gagné deux mots d'Anglois vistement. Comment appellez vous les ongles?

Alice. Les ongles? les appellons, de nails.

Kath. De nails. Escoutez; dites moy, si je parle bien: de hand, de fingres, de nails.

Alice. C'est bien dit, madame; il est fort bon Anglois.

Kath. Dites moy en Anglois, le bras.

Alice. De arm, madame.

Kath. Et le coude?

Alice. De elbow.

Kath. De elbow. Je m'en faitz la repetition de tous les mots, que vous m'avez appris dès à present.

Alice. Il est trop difficile, madame, comme je pense.

Kath. Excusez moy, Alice; escoutez: De hand, de fingre, de nails, de arm, de bilbow,

Alice. De elbow, madame.

Kath. O Seigneur Dieu! je m'en oublie ; De elbow. Comment appellez vous le col?

Alice. De neck, madame.

Kath. De neck: Et le menton?

Alice. De chin.

Kath. De sin. Le col, de neck; le menton, de sin.

Alice. Ouy. Sauf vostre honneur: en verité, vous prononces les mots aussi droict que les natifs d'Angleterre.

Kath. Je ne doute point d'apprendre par la grace de Dieu; et en peu de temps.

Alice. N'avez vous pas deja oublié ce que je vous ay enseignée? Kath. Non, je reciteray à vous promptement. De hand, de fingre, de mails,

Alice. De nails, madame.

Kath. De nails, de arme, de ilbow.

Alice. Sauf vostre honneur, de elbow.

Kath. Ainsi dis je; de elbow, de neck, et de sin: Comment appelez vous le pieds et la robe?

Alice. De foot, madame; et de con.

Kath. De foot, et de con? O Seigneur Dieu! ces sont mots de son mauvais, corruptible, grosse, et impudique, et non pour les

dames d'honneur d'user: Je ne voudrois prononcer ces mots devant les Seigneurs de France, pour tout le monde. Il faut de foot, et de con, neant-moins. Je reciterai une autre fois ma leçon ensemble: De hand, de fingre, de nails, de arm, de elbow, de neck, de sin, de foot, de con.

Alice. Excellent, madame!

Kath. C'est assez pour une fois; allons nous à disner.

[Exeunt.

SCENE V-The same. Another Room in the same.

Enter the French KING, the DAUPHIN, Duke of BOURBON, the
CONSTABLE of France, and others.

Fr. King. Tis certain, he hath pass'd the river Some.
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.

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

The emptying of our fathers' luxury,*

Our scions, put in wild and savaget 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-shottent isle of Albion.

Con. Dieu de battailes! where 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, their barley-broth,
Decoct their cold blood to such valiant heat?

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; and they will give
Their bodies to the lust of English youth,

To new-store France with bastard warriors.

Bour. They bid us to the English dancing-schools,

And teach lavoltas || high, and swift corantos;

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.

* Lust.

+ Sylvan; sauvage.

Projected.

§ Overstrained.

An Italian dance.

Up, princes; and, with spirit of honour edged,
More sharper than your swords, hie to the field:
Charles De-la-bret, high constable of France;
You dukes of Orleans, Bourbon, and of Berry,
Alençon, Brabant, Bar, and Burgundy;
Jaques Chatillion, Rambures, Vaudemont,
Beaumont, Grandpré, Roussi, and Fauconberg,
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 Roüen

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.

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 Roüen.
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.

SCENE VI-The English Camp in Picardy.

Enter GOWER and FLUELLEN.

[Exeunt.

Gow. How now, captain Fluellen ? come you from the bridge? Flu. I assure you, there is very excellent service committed at the pridge.

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 livings, and my uttermost powers: he is not (God be praised and plessed!) any hurt in the orld; but keeps the pridge most valiantly, with excellent discipline. There is an ancient there at the pridge,-I think, in my very conscience, he is as valiant 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?

Flu. He is called-ancient Pistol.

Gow. I know him not.

* Pendants, small flags.

« ZurückWeiter »