Steed threatens steed, in high and boastful neighs
Piercing the night's dull ear; and, from the tents,
The armourers accomplishing the knights,
With clink of hammers closing rivets up,
Give dreadful note of preparation.
Proud of their numbers, and secure in soul,
The confident and over-lusty French,
For the low-rated English play at dice,
And chide the cripple tardy-gaited night,
Who, like a foul and ugly witch, doth limp
So tediously away. The poor condemned English,
Like sacrifices, by their fires of watch
With patience sit, and inly ruminate

The morning's danger. Forth, with early care,
The royal captain of this ruin'd band

Walks through his host, and visits every watch,
Bids them good morrow with a cheerful smile,
And calls them brothers, friends, and countrymen.
Upon his royal face, there is no note

How dread an army hath enrounded him
Nor doth he dedicate one jot of colour
Unto the weary and all-watched night;
But freshly looks and overbears attaint;
That every wretch, pining and pale before,
Beholding him, plucks comfort from his looks:
A largess universal, like the sun,

His liberal eye doth give to every one,
Thawing cold fear: and, gentle hearers all,
Attend while we unworthily define
A little touch of Harry in the night:
And then our scene must to the battle fly.

The first of these promised scenes is the English camp before day-break: king Henry comes in, speaking to his brother Gloster: and at the next moment they meet their other brother: others enter during the scene.

[K. Henry.] Gloster, 'tis true that we are in great danger;
And greater therefore should our courage be.—
Good morrow, brother Bedford. Heaven be prais'd,
There is some soul of goodness in things evil,

Would men observingly distil it out;

For our bad neighbour makes us early stirrers,
Which is both healthful and good husbandry:
Besides, they are our outward consciences,
And preachers to us all; admonishing
That we should dress us fairly for our end.
Good morrow, old Sir Thomas Erpingham :
A good soft pillow for that good white head
Were better than a churlish turf of France.

[Erpingham.] Not so, my liege; this lodging likes me better, Since I can say,—now lodge I like a king.

[K. Henry.] God-a-mercy, old heart! thou speakest cheerLend me thy cloak, Sir Thomas.-Brothers both [fully. Commend me to the princes in our camp:

Do my good morrow to them; and anon
Desire them all to my pavilion.

[Erpingham.] Shall I attend your grace?

[K. Henry.] No, good Sir Thomas;

Go with my brothers to my lords of England:
I and my bosom must debate awhile,
And then I would no other company.

The king muffles himself in the cloak he has borrowed, and, unseen, listens to the discourse of those who pass across the first are Fluellen and Gower; who encounter in the dark:

[Gower.] Captain Fluellen!

[Fluellen.] Speak lower, or the true and ancient prerogatifs and laws of the wars is not kept. If you would take the pains to examine the wars of Pompey the Great, you shall find, I warrant you, that there is no tiddle-taddle nor pipple-papple in Pompey's camp.

[Gower.] Why, the enemy is loud; you have heard him all night.

[Fluellen.] If the enemy is an ass, and a fool, and a prating coxcomb, is it meet, think you, that we should also,

look you, be an ass, and a fool, and a prating coxcomb; in your own conscience, now?

[Gower.] Well, I will speak lower.

[Fluellen.] I pray you, and peseech you, that you will. They pass on and Henry says to himself:

[K. Henry.] Though it appear a little out of fashion, There is much care and valour in this Welshman.

Three soldiers, Bates, Williams, and another, pass across :

[Williams.] Brother John Bates, is not that the morning which breaks yonder?

[Bates.] I think it be; but we have no great cause to desire the approach of day.

[Williams.] Why, no; we see the beginning, but I think we shall never see the end of it.-Who goes there? The king muffles himself more closely, and answers: [K. Henry.] A friend.

[Williams.] Under what captain serve you?

[K. Henry.] Under Sir Thomas Erpingham.

[Williams.] A good old commander, and a most kind gentleman: I pray you, what thinks he of our estate? [K. Henry.] Even as men wrecked upon a sand, that look to be washed off the next tide.

[Williams.] He hath not told his thought to the king?

[K. Henry.] No; and it is meet he should not; for though I speak it to you, I think the king is but a man, as I am; and therefore, when he sees reason of fears, as we do, his fears, out of all doubt, are of the same relish as ours are. Yet, in reason, no man should possess him with an appearance of fear; lest, by showing it, he should dishearten his army.

[Williams.] He may show what outward courage he will; but, I believe, as cold a night as 'tis, he could wish himself in the Thames up to the neck; and so I would he were, and I by the side of him, so we were quit here.

[K. Henry.] By my troth, I will speak my mind of the king; I think he would not wish himself any where but where he is.

[Williams.] Then would he were here alone! so should he be sure to be ransomed, and many poor men's lives spared.

[K. Henry.] I dare say you love him not so ill, to wish him here alone: howsoever, you speak this to feel other men's minds: methinks I could not die anywhere so contented as in the king's company; his cause being just, and his quarrel honourable.

[Williams.] That's more than we know.

[Bates.] Ay, and more than we should seek to know. We know enough, if we know we are the king's subjects. If his cause is wrong, our obedience to the king wipes the crime of it out of us.

[Williams.] But if the cause be not good, the king himself hath a very heavy reckoning to make, when all those legs, and arms, and heads, chopped off in a battle, shall join together again at the latter day, and cry all— We died at such a place; some swearing; some crying for a surgeon; some upon their wives left poor behind them; some upon the debts they owe; some upon their children rawly left. I am afraid there are few die well that die in battle; for how can they charitably dispose of anything when blood is their argument? Now if these men do not die well, it will be a black matter for the king that led them to it, whom to disobey were against all proportion of subjection.

[K. Henry.] So, if a son that is by his father sent about merchandise, do sinfully miscarry upon the sea, the

imputation of his wickedness, by your rule, should be imposed upon the father that sent him. But this is not so the king is not bound to answer for the particular manner of death of each of his soldiers; nor the father of the son. Every subject's soul is his own : therefore should every soldier in a war do as a sick man in his bed,--wash his conscience; and, dying so, death is an advantage; or, not dying, he is blessed in the preparation made.

[Bates.] 'Tis certain, every man that dies ill, the ill is
upon his own head; the king is not to answer for that.
[Williams.] Well, I do not desire he should answer for
me; and yet I determine to fight lustily for him.
Come, brother Bates.
[a pause.]

[K. Henry.] Upon the king! let us our lives, our souls,
Our sins, lay on the king; we must bear all!
Oh, hard, oh, hard condition, born with greatness !
What infinite heart's ease must kings neglect
That private men enjoy!—and what have kings
That privates have not too, save ceremony?
And what art thou, thou idol Ceremony?
Art thou aught else but place, degree, and form,
Creating fear and awe in other men ;
Thyself less happy in thy being fear'd

Than they in fearing thee? Be sick, great Greatness,
And call on Ceremony to give thee cure.

Canst thou, when thou commandst the beggar's knee,
Command the health of it? No, thou proud dream,
That play'st so subtly with a king's repose;

I am a king, and find thee: and I know,
'Tis not the balm, the sceptre, and the ball,
The sword, the mace, the crown imperial,-
No, not all these, O gorgeous Ceremony,
Not all these laid in bed majestical,
Can sleep so soundly as the wretched slave,
Who, with a body fill'd and vacant mind,
Gets him to rest:

Sweats in the eye of Phoebus, and all night