Saw his heroical seed, and smiled to see him
Mangle the work of nature, and deface
The patterns that by God and by French fathers
Had twenty years been made. This is a stem
Of that victorious stock; and let us fear
The native mightiness and fate of him.
Mess. Ambassadors from Harry king of England
Do crave admittance to your majesty.
Fr. King. We'll give them present audience. Go, and bring them.
[Exeunt Messenger and certain Lords. You see, this chase is hotly follow'd, friends. Dau. Turn head, and stop pursuit: for coward
Most spend their mouths, when what they seem to threaten
Runs far before them. Good my sovereign,
Take up the English short; and let them know
Of what a monarchy you are the head:
Self-love, my liege, is not so vile a sin
As self-neglecting.
Re-enter Lords, with EXETER and Train.
From our brother England? Exe. From him; and thus he greets your majesty.
He wills you, in the name of God Almighty,
That you divest yourself and lay apart
The borrow'd glories, that, by gift of Heaven,
By law of nature, and of nations, 'long
To him, and to his heirs; namely, the crown,
And all wide-stretched honours that pertain,
By custom and the ordinance of times,
Unto the crown of France. That you may know 'Tis no sinister nor no awkward claim,
Pick'd from the worm-holes of long-vanish'd
Nor from the dust of old oblivion raked,
He sends you this most memorable line,
[Gives a paper.
In every branch truly demonstrative;
Willing you, overlook this pedigree:
And, when you find him evenly derived
From his most famed of famous ancestors,
Edward the third, he bids you then resign
Your crown and kingdom, indirectly held
From him the native and true challenger.
Fr. King. Or else what follows?
Exe. Bloody constraint; for if you hide the
Even in your hearts, there will he rake for it :
Therefore in fierce tempest is he coming,
In thunder, and in earthquake, like a Jove,
That, if requiring fail, he will compel;
And bids you, in the bowels of the Lord,
Deliver up the crown; and to take mercy
On the poor souls for whom this hungry war
Opens his vasty jaws: and on your head
Turning the widows' tears, the orphans' cries,
The dead men's blood, the pining maidens'
groans,
For husbands, fathers, and betrothed lovers,
That shall be swallow'd in this controversy.
This is his claim, his threatening, and my
message:
Unless the Dauphin be in presence here,
To whom expressly I bring greeting too.
Fr. King. For us, we will consider of this further:
To-morrow shall you bear our full intent
Back to our brother of England.
For the Dauphin, I stand here for him: what to him from England? Exe. Scorn and defiance; slight regard, contempt,
And anything that may not misbecome
The mighty sender, doth he prize you at.
Thus says my king: and, if your father's highness
Do not, in grant of all demands at large,
Sweeten the bitter mock you sent his majesty,
He'll call you to so hot an answer of it,
That caves and womby vaultages of France
Shall chide your trespass, and return your mock
In second accent of his ord(i)nance..
Dau. Say, if my father render fair return,
It is against my will: for I desire
Nothing but odds with England; to that end,
As matching to his youth and vanity,
I did present him with the Paris balls.
Exe. He'll make your Paris Louvre shake for it,
Were it the mistress court of mighty Europe:
And, be assured, you'll find a difference
(As we, his subjects, have in wonder found)
Between the promise of his greener days,
And these he masters now; now he weighs time,
Even to the utmost grain; that you shall read
In your own losses if he stay in France.
Fr. King. To-morrow shall you know our
Exe. Dispatch us with all speed, lest that our king
Come here himself to question our delay;
For he is footed in this land already.
Fr. King. You shall be soon dispatch'd, with fair conditions:
A night is but small breath, and little pause,
To answer matters of this consequence.
HUS with imagined wing our swift scene flies,
In motion of no less celerity
Than that of thought.
you have seen
The well-appointed king at Hampton pier
Embark his royalty; and his brave fleet
With silken streamers the young Phoebus fanning.
Play with your fancies; and in them behold,
Upon the hempen tackle ship-boys climbing:
Hear the shrill whistle which doth order give
To sounds confused: behold the threaden sails,
Borne with the invisible and creeping wind,
Draw the huge bottoms through the furrow'd sea,
Breasting the lofty surge: O, do but think
You stand upon the rivage, and behold
A city on the inconstant billows dancing;
For so appears this fleet majestical,
Holding due course to Harfleur. Follow, follow!
Grapple your minds to sternage of this navy;
And leave your England, as dead midnight still,
Guarded with grandsires, babies, and old women,
Either past, or not arrived to, pith and puissance:
For who is he, whose chin is but enrich'd
With one appearing hair, that will not follow
These cull'd and choice-drawn cavaliers to France?
Work, work your thoughts, and therein see a siege:
Behold the ordnance on their carriages,
With fatal mouths gaping on girded Harfleur. Suppose, the ambassador from the French comes back;
Tells Harry, that the king doth offer him Katharine his daughter; and with her, to dowry, Some petty and unprofitable dukedoms.
The offer likes not: and the nimble gunner With linstock now the devilish cannon touches, [Alarum; and chambers (small cannon) go off. And down goes all before them. Still be kind, And eke out our performance with your mind. [Exit.
SCENE I.-France. Before Harfleur.
Alarums. Enter KING HENRY, EXETER, BEDFORD, GLOSTER, and Soldiers, with scaling ladders.
K. Hen. Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
Or close the wall up with our English dead!
In peace, there's nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility:
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger;
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favour'd
Then lend the eye a terrible aspect;
Let it pry through the portage of the head,
Like the brass cannon; let the brow o'erwhelm it,
As fearfully as doth a galled rock
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