| ACT III SCENE VI | The English camp in Picardy. | |
| | Enter GOWER and FLUELLEN, meeting. | |
| GOWER | How now, Captain Fluellen! come you from the bridge? | |
| FLUELLEN | I assure you, there is very excellent services | |
| | committed at the bridge. | |
| GOWER | Is the Duke of Exeter safe? | 5 |
| FLUELLEN | 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-God be praised and | |
| | blessed!--any hurt in the world; but keeps the | 10 |
| | bridge most valiantly, with excellent discipline. | |
| | There is an aunchient lieutenant there 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 world; but did see him do as | 15 |
| | gallant service. | |
| GOWER | What do you call him? | |
| FLUELLEN | He is called Aunchient Pistol. | |
| GOWER | I know him not. | |
| | Enter PISTOL | |
| FLUELLEN | Here is the man. | 20 |
| PISTOL | Captain, I thee beseech to do me favours: | |
| | The Duke of Exeter doth love thee well. | |
| FLUELLEN | Ay, I praise God; and I have merited some love at | |
| | his hands. | |
| PISTOL | Bardolph, a soldier, firm and sound of heart, | 25 |
| | And of buxom valour, hath, by cruel fate, | |
| | And giddy Fortune's furious fickle wheel, | |
| | That goddess blind, | |
| | That stands upon the rolling restless stone-- | |
| FLUELLEN | By your patience, Aunchient Pistol. Fortune is | 30 |
| | painted blind, with a muffler afore her eyes, to | |
| | signify to you that Fortune is blind; 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 | 35 |
| | 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. | |
| PISTOL | Fortune is Bardolph's foe, and frowns on him; | 40 |
| | For he hath stolen a pax, and hanged must a' be: | |
| | A damned death! | |
| | Let gallows gape for dog; let man go free | |
| | And let not hemp his wind-pipe suffocate: | |
| | But Exeter hath given the doom of death | 45 |
| | 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: | |
| | Speak, captain, for his life, and I will thee requite. | 50 |
| FLUELLEN | Aunchient Pistol, I do partly understand your meaning. | |
| PISTOL | Why then, rejoice therefore. | |
| FLUELLEN | Certainly, aunchient, it is not a thing to rejoice | |
| | at: for if, look you, he were my brother, I would | |
| | desire the duke to use his good pleasure, and put | 55 |
| | him to execution; for discipline ought to be used. | |
| PISTOL | Die and be damn'd! and figo for thy friendship! | |
| FLUELLEN | It is well. | |
| PISTOL | The fig of Spain! | |
| | Exit. | |
| FLUELLEN | Very good. | 60 |
| GOWER | Why, this is an arrant counterfeit rascal; I | |
| | remember him now; a bawd, a cutpurse. | |
| FLUELLEN | I'll assure you, a' uttered as brave words at the | |
| | bridge as you shall see in a summer's day. But it | |
| |
is very well; what he has spoke to me, that is well, | 65 |
| | I warrant you, when time is serve. | |
| GOWER | Why, 'tis a gull, a fool, a rogue, that now and then | |
| | goes to the wars, to grace himself at his return | |
| | into London under the form of a soldier. And such | |
| | fellows are perfect in the great commanders' names: | 70 |
| | and they will learn you by rote where services were | |
| | done; at such and such a sconce, at such a breach, | |
| | at such a convoy; who came off bravely, who was | |
| | shot, who disgraced, what terms the enemy stood on; | |
| | and this they con perfectly in the phrase of war, | 75 |
| | which they trick up with new-tuned oaths: and what | |
| | a beard of the general's cut and a horrid suit of | |
| | the camp will do among foaming bottles and | |
| | ale-washed wits, is wonderful to be thought on. But | |
| | you must learn to know such slanders of the age, or | 80 |
| | else you may be marvellously mistook. | |
| FLUELLEN | I tell you what, Captain Gower; I do perceive he is | |
| | not the man that he would gladly make show to the | |
| | world he is: if I find a hole in his coat, I will | |
| | tell him my mind. | 85 |
| | Drum heard | |
| | Hark you, the king is coming, and I must speak with | |
| | him from the pridge. | |
| | Drum and colours. Enter KING HENRY, GLOUCESTER, and Soldiers. | |
| | God pless your majesty! | |
| KING HENRY V | How now, Fluellen! camest thou from the bridge? | |
| FLUELLEN | Ay, so please your majesty. The Duke of Exeter has | 90 |
| | very gallantly maintained the pridge: the French is | |
| | gone off, look you; and there is gallant and most | |
| | prave passages; marry, th' athversary was have | |
| | possession of the pridge; but he is enforced to | |
| | retire, and the Duke of Exeter is master of the | 95 |
| | pridge: I can tell your majesty, the duke is a | |
| | prave man. | |
| KING HENRY V | What men have you lost, Fluellen? | |
| FLUELLEN | The perdition of th' athversary hath been very | |
| | great, reasonable great: marry, for my part, I | 100 |
| | think the duke hath lost never a man, but one that | |
| | is like to be executed for robbing a church, one | |
| | Bardolph, if your majesty know the man: his face is | |
| | all bubukles, and whelks, and knobs, and flames o' | |
| | fire: and his lips blows at his nose, and it is like | 105 |
| | a coal of fire, sometimes plue and sometimes red; | |
| | but his nose is executed and his fire's out. | |
| KING HENRY V | We would have all such offenders so cut off: and we | |
| | give express charge, that in our marches through the | |
| | country, there be nothing compelled from the | 110 |
| | villages, nothing taken but paid for, none of the | |
| | French upbraided or abused in disdainful language; | |
| | for when lenity and cruelty play for a kingdom, the | |
| | gentler gamester is the soonest winner. | |
| | Tucket. Enter MONTJOY | |
| MONTJOY | You know me by my habit. | 115 |
| KING HENRY V | Well then I know thee: what shall I know of thee? | |
| MONTJOY | My master's mind. | |
| KING HENRY V | Unfold it. | |
| MONTJOY | Thus says my king: Say thou to Harry of England: | |
| | Though we seemed dead, we did but sleep: advantage | 120 |
| | is a better soldier than rashness. Tell him we | |
| | could have rebuked him at Harfleur, but that we | |
| | thought not good to bruise an injury till it were | |
| | full ripe: now we speak upon our cue, and our voice | |
| | is imperial: England shall repent his folly, see | 125 |
| | his weakness, and admire our sufferance. Bid him | |
| | therefore consider of his ransom; which must | |
| | proportion the losses we have borne, the subjects we | |
| | have lost, the disgrace we have digested; which in | |
| | weight to re-answer, his pettiness would bow under. | 130 |
| | For our losses, his exchequer is too poor; for the | |
| | effusion of our blood, the muster of his kingdom too | |
| | faint a number; and for our disgrace, his own | |
| | person, kneeling at our feet, but a weak and | |
| | worthless satisfaction. To this add defiance: and | 135 |
| | tell him, for conclusion, he hath betrayed his | |
| | followers, whose condemnation is pronounced. So far | |
| | my king and master; so much my office. | |
| KING HENRY V | What is thy name? I know thy quality. | |
| MONTJOY | Montjoy. | 140 |
| KING HENRY V | Thou dost thy office fairly. Turn thee back. | |
| | And tell thy king I do not seek him now; | |
| | But could be willing to march on to Calais | |
| | Without impeachment: for, to say the sooth, | |
| | Though 'tis no wisdom to confess so much | 145 |
| | Unto an enemy of craft and vantage, | |
| | My people are with sickness much enfeebled, | |
| | My numbers lessened, and those few I have | |
| | Almost no better than so many French; | |
| | Who when they were in health, I tell thee, herald, | 150 |
| | I thought upon one pair of English legs | |
| | Did march three Frenchmen. Yet, forgive me, God, | |
| | That I do brag thus! This your air of France | |
| | Hath blown that vice in me: I must repent. | |
| | Go therefore, tell thy master here I am; | 155 |
| | My ransom is this frail and worthless trunk, | |
| | My army but a weak and sickly guard; | |
| | Yet, God before, tell him we will come on, | |
| | Though France himself and such another neighbour | |
| | Stand in our way. There's for thy labour, Montjoy. | 160 |
| | Go bid thy master well advise himself: | |
| | If we may pass, we will; if we be hinder'd, | |
| | We shall your tawny ground with your red blood | |
| | Discolour: and so Montjoy, fare you well. | |
| | The sum of all our answer is but this: | 165 |
| | We would not seek a battle, as we are; | |
| | Nor, as we are, we say we will not shun it: | |
| | So tell your master. | |
| MONTJOY | I shall deliver so. Thanks to your highness. | |
| | Exit. | |
| GLOUCESTER | I hope they will not come upon us now. | 170 |
| KING HENRY V | We are in God's hand, brother, not in theirs. | |
| | March to the bridge; it now draws toward night: | |
| | Beyond the river we'll encamp ourselves, | |
| | And on to-morrow, bid them march away. | |
| | Exeunt | |
