Enter a Messenger.

MESS. The English are embattled, you French peers.

CON. To horse, you gallant princes! straight to horse!

Do but behold yond poor and starved band,
And your
fair show shall suck away their souls,
Leaving them but the shales and husks of men.
There is not work enough for all our hands;
Scarce blood enough in all their sickly veins,
To give each naked curtle-axe a stain,
That our French gallants shall to-day draw out,
And sheath for lack of sport. Let us but blow on
them,

The vapour
'Tis positive 'gainst all exceptions, lords,
That our superfluous lackeys, and our peasants,—
Who, in unnecessary action, swarm
About our squares of battle,-were enow
To purge this field of such a hilding foe,
Though we, upon this mountain's basis by
Took stand for idle speculation:
But that our honours must not.
A very little-little let us do,
And all is done. Then let the trumpets sound
The tucket-sonance, and the note to mount;
For our approach shall so much dare the field,
That England shall couch down in fear, and yield.

of our valour will o'erturn them.

Enter GRANDPRÉ.

What's to say?

GRAND. Why do you stay so long, my lords of
France?

Yond island carrions,(1) desperate of their bones,
Ill-favour'dly become the morning field:
Their ragged curtains poorly are let loose,
And our air shakes them passing scornfully.
Big Mars seems bankrupt in their beggar'd host,
And faintly through a rusty beaver peeps.
The horsemen sit like fixed candlesticks,
With torch-staves in their hand: and their poor
jades

Lob down their heads, dropping the hides and hips,

The gum down-roping from their pale-dead

a The gimmal-bit-] Spelt Iymold, in the old text. A bit in two parts; and so called from the Latin gemellus, double or twinned. b1 stay but for my guard; on, &c.] A correspondent of Mr. Knight's ingeniously suggests, what certainly seems called for by the context, that we ought to read,

"I stay but for my guidon.-To the field!"

The emendation is enforced, too, by a passage in Holinshed, where, speaking of the French, he says, "They thought themselves so sure of victory, that diverse of the noblemen made such haste towards the battle, that they left many of their servants and men of war behind them, and some of them would not once

Lies foul with chaw'd grass, still and motionless;
And their executors, the knavish crows,
Fly o'er them, all impatient for their hour.
Description cannot suit itself in words,

To demonstrate the life of such a battle
In life so lifeless as it shows itself.

CON. They have said their prayers, and they stay for death.

DAU. Shall we go send them dinners and fresh suits,

And give their fasting horses provender,
And after fight with them?

CON. I stay but for my guard; on, to the field:

I will the banner from a trumpet take,
And use it for my haste. Come, come away!
The sun is high, and we outwear the day.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III.-The English Camp.

Enter the English Host; GLOUCESTER, 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 threescore thousand.

EXE. There's five to one; besides, they all are fresh.

SAL. God's arm strike with us! 'tis a fearful odds.

c

God buy' 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,-warriors all, adieu!
BED. Farewell, good Salisbury, and good luck
go with thee!

EXE. Farewell, kind lord; fight valiantly today:

And yet I do thee wrong to mind thee of it,"
For thou art fram'd of the firm truth of valour.
[Exit SALISBURY,
BED. He is as full of valour, as of kindness,
Princely in both.
WEST.

O that we now had here

stay for their standards; as amongst other the Duke of Brabant when his standard was not come, caused a banner to be taken from a trumpet, and fastened to a speare, the which he comanded to be borne before him, instead of a standard."

e God buy' gou, princes all;] God buy' is the same as our "Good-bye," a corruption of "God be with you;" and in this instance, for the sake of the metre, the old form of it should be retained.

d And yet I do thee wrong, &c.] The last two lines in this speech are annexed to the preceding one of Bedford in the folio: the present arrangement was suggested by Thirlby.

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 die in that man's company,
That fears his fellowship to die with us.
This day is call'd-the feast of Crispian : (2)
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam'd,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that outlives this day, and sees old age,"
Will yearly on the vigil feast his friends,*
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

MONT. Once more I come to know of thee, king Harry,

mercy,

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
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.

K. HEN.
Who hath sent thee now?
MONT. The constable of France.
K. HEN. I pray thee, bear my
back;

Bid them achieve me, and then sell

former answer

my bones.

• Familiar in their mouths as household words,-] So the quartos. In the folio the line runs,

"Familiar in his mouth as household words."

d Shall gentle his condition:] "King Henry V. inhibited any person but such as had a right by inheritance, or grant, to assume coats of arms, except those who fought with him at the battle of Agincourt; and, I think, these last were allowed the chief seats of honour at all feasts and publick meetings."-TOLLET.

Good God! why should they mock poor fellows thus?

The man that once did sell the lion's skin While the beast liv'd, 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 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 fam'd; 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 bullet's grazing,*
Break out into a second course of mischief,
Killing in relapse of mortality.

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:
But, by the mass, our hearts are in the trim:
And my poor soldiers tell me yet ere night
They'll be in fresher robes, or they will pluck
The gay new coats o'er the French soldiers' heads,
And turn them out of service. If they do this,
(As, if God please, they shall,) my ransom then
Will soon be levied. Herald, save thou thy

a Shall witness live in brass-] The effigy, engraved on brass, of John Leventhorp, Esq. one of the heroes of Agincourt, who died in 1433, still remains in Sawbridgeworth church, Herts. b I fear thou wilt once more come again for ransom.] This is not in the quartos; and the folio has,

"I fear thou wilt once more come again for a ransom." e Quality! cality! construe me, art thou a gentleman ?] In the folio (the line is not found in the quartos) this is printed,"Qualitie calmie custure me." Malone, having met with "A Sonet of a Lover in the Praise of his Lady, to Calen o custure me, sung at every line's end," concluded that the incomprehensible jargon of the folio was nothing else than this very burden, and he arcordingly gave the line,

"Quality? Calen o custure me."

Subsequently, Boswell discovered that "Callino, castore me" is an old Irish song, still preserved in Playford's "Musical Companion." The line is now, therefore, usually printed,―

Enter the DUKE of YORK.

YORK. My lord, most humbly on my knee I beg

The leading of the vaward.

K. HEN. Take it, brave York.-Now, soldiers, march away:

And how thou pleasest, God, dispose the day! [Exeunt.

SCENE IV.-The Field of Battle.

Alarums; Excursions. Enter PISTOL, French Soldier, and Boy.

PIST. Yield, cur!

FR. SOL. Je pense, que vous êtes le gentilhomme de bonne qualité.

PIST. Quality! cality! construe me, art thou a gentleman? What is thy name? discuss!

FR. SOL. O seigneur Dieu !

PIST. O signieur Dew should be a gentleman:Perpend my words, O signieur Dew, and mark ;O signieur Dew, thou diest on point of fox,d Except, O signieur, thou do give to me Egregious ransom.

FR. SOL. O, prennez miséricorde! ayez pitié de moi ! [moys; PIST. Moy shall not serve, I will have forty For I will fetch thy rim out at thy throat, In drops of crimson blood.

e

FR. SOL. Est-il impossible d'échapper la force de ton bras?

This solution of the difficulty is certainly curious and very captivating; but to us the idea of Pistol holding a prisoner by the threat and quoting the fag end of a ballad at the same moment, is too preposterous, and in default of any better explanation of the mysterious syllables, we have adopted that of Warburton.

d On point of fox,-] The modern editors all agree in informing us that "Fox was an old cant word for a sword;" but why a sword was so called none of them appears to have been aware. The name was given from the circumstance that Andrea Ferrara, and, since his time, other foreign sword-cutlers, adopted a fox as the blade-mark of their weapons. Swords, with a running-fox rudely engraved on the blades, are still occasionally to be met with in the old curiosity-shops of London.

e For I will fetch thy rim out at thy throat,-] Rim was a term formerly used, not very definitively, for a part of the intestines; but Pistol's rim (the folio spells it rymme) was, perhaps, as Mr. Knight conjectured, no more than a word coined for the non e, in mimickry of the Frenchman's guttural pronunciation.

Boy. He says, his name is-master Fer. PIST. Master Fer! I'll fer him, and firk him, and ferret him:-discuss the same in French unto him.

Boy. I do not know the French for fer, and ferret, and firk.

PIST. Bid him prepare, for I will cut his throat.

FR. SOL. Que dit-il, monsieur?

Box. Il me commande de vous dire que vous faites vous prêt; car ce soldat ici est disposé tout à cette heure de couper votre gorge.

PIST. Oui, coupe le gorge, par ma foi,
pesant,

Unless thou give me crowns, brave crowns;
Or mangled shalt thou be by this my sword.

FR. SOL. O, je vous supplie, pour l'amour de Dieu, me pardonner! Je suis gentilhomme de bonne maison: gardez ma vie, et je vous donnerai deux cents écus.

PIST. What are his words?

Boy. He prays you to save his life: he is a gentleman of a good house, and for his ransom, ne will give you two hundred crowns.

PIST. Tell him my fury shall abate, And I the crowns will take.

FR. SOL. Petit monsieur, que dit-il ?

Box. Encore qu'il est contre son jurement de pardonner aucun prisonnier; néanmoins, pour

les écus que vous l'avez promis, il est content de vous donner la liberté, le franchisement.

FR. SOL. Sur mes genoux, je vous donne mille remercimens: et je m'estime heureux que je suis tombé entre les mains d'un chevalier, je pense, le plus brave, vaillant, et très distingué seigneur d'Angleterre.

PIST. Expound unto me, boy.

Boy. He gives you, upon his knees, a thousand thanks: and he esteems himself happy that he hath fallen into the hands of one, (as he thinks,) the most brave, valorous, and thrice-worthy signieur of England.

PIST. As I suck blood, I will some mercy show.Follow me!

[Exit PISTOL. Box. Suivez-vous le grand capitaine. [Exit French Soldier.

I did never know so full a voice issue from so empty a heart: but the saying is true,-The empty vessel makes the greatest sound. Bardolph and Nym had ten times more valour than this roaring devil i' the old play, that every one may pare his nails with a wooden dagger; (3) and they are both hanged; and so would this be, if he durst steal any thing adventurously. I must stay with the lackeys, with the luggage of our camp: the French might have a good prey of us, if he knew of it; for there is none to guard it, but boys.

[Exit.