The Complete Works of William Shakespeare Part 163

Arrest them to the answer of the law; And G.o.d acquit them of their practices!

EXETER. I arrest thee of high treason, by the name of Richard Earl of Cambridge.

I arrest thee of high treason, by the name of Henry Lord Scroop of Masham.

I arrest thee of high treason, by the name of Thomas Grey, knight, of Northumberland.

SCROOP. Our purposes G.o.d justly hath discover'd, And I repent my fault more than my death; Which I beseech your Highness to forgive, Although my body pay the price of it.

CAMBRIDGE. For me, the gold of France did not seduce, Although I did admit it as a motive The sooner to effect what I intended; But G.o.d be thanked for prevention, Which I in sufferance heartily will rejoice, Beseeching G.o.d and you to pardon me.

GREY. Never did faithful subject more rejoice At the discovery of most dangerous treason Than I do at this hour joy o'er myself, Prevented from a d.a.m.ned enterprise.

My fault, but not my body, pardon, sovereign.

KING HENRY. G.o.d quit you in his mercy! Hear your sentence.

You have conspir'd against our royal person, Join'd with an enemy proclaim'd, and from his coffers Receiv'd the golden earnest of our death; Wherein you would have sold your king to slaughter, His princes and his peers to servitude, His subjects to oppression and contempt, And his whole kingdom into desolation.

Touching our person seek we no revenge; But we our kingdom's safety must so tender, Whose ruin you have sought, that to her laws We do deliver you. Get you therefore hence, Poor miserable wretches, to your death; The taste whereof G.o.d of his mercy give You patience to endure, and true repentance Of all your dear offences. Bear them hence.

Exeunt CAMBRIDGE, SCROOP, and GREY, guarded Now, lords, for France; the enterprise whereof Shall be to you as us like glorious.

We doubt not of a fair and lucky war, Since G.o.d so graciously hath brought to light This dangerous treason, lurking in our way To hinder our beginnings; we doubt not now But every rub is smoothed on our way.

Then, forth, dear countrymen; let us deliver Our puissance into the hand of G.o.d, Putting it straight in expedition.

Cheerly to sea; the signs of war advance; No king of England, if not king of France!

Flourish. Exeunt

SCENE III.

Eastcheap. Before the Boar's Head tavern

Enter PISTOL, HOSTESS, NYM, BARDOLPH, and Boy

HOSTESS. Prithee, honey-sweet husband, let me bring thee to Staines.

PISTOL. No; for my manly heart doth earn.

Bardolph, be blithe; Nym, rouse thy vaunting veins; Boy, bristle thy courage up. For Falstaff he is dead, And we must earn therefore.

BARDOLPH. Would I were with him, wheresome'er he is, either in heaven or in h.e.l.l!

HOSTESS. Nay, sure, he's not in h.e.l.l: he's in Arthur's bosom, if ever man went to Arthur's bosom. 'A made a finer end, and went away an it had been any christom child; 'a parted ev'n just between twelve and one, ev'n at the turning o' th' tide; for after I saw him fumble with the sheets, and play with flowers, and smile upon his fingers' end, I knew there was but one way; for his nose was as sharp as a pen, and 'a babbl'd of green fields. 'How now, Sir John!' quoth I 'What, man, be o' good cheer.' So 'a cried out 'G.o.d, G.o.d, G.o.d!' three or four times. Now I, to comfort him, bid him 'a should not think of G.o.d; I hop'd there was no need to trouble himself with any such thoughts yet.

So 'a bade me lay more clothes on his feet; I put my hand into the bed and felt them, and they were as cold as any stone; then I felt to his knees, and so upward and upward, and all was as cold as any stone.

NYM. They say he cried out of sack.

HOSTESS. Ay, that 'a did.

BARDOLPH. And of women.

HOSTESS. Nay, that 'a did not.

BOY. Yes, that 'a did, and said they were devils incarnate.

HOSTESS. 'A could never abide carnation; 'twas a colour he never liked.

BOY. 'A said once the devil would have him about women.

HOSTESS. 'A did in some sort, indeed, handle women; but then he was rheumatic, and talk'd of the Wh.o.r.e of Babylon.

BOY. Do you not remember 'a saw a flea stick upon Bardolph's nose, and 'a said it was a black soul burning in h.e.l.l?

BARDOLPH. Well, the fuel is gone that maintain'd that fire: that's all the riches I got in his service.

NYM. Shall we shog? The King will be gone from Southampton.

PISTOL. Come, let's away. My love, give me thy lips.

Look to my chattles and my moveables; Let senses rule. The word is 'Pitch and Pay.'

Trust none; For oaths are straws, men's faiths are wafer-cakes, And Holdfast is the only dog, my duck.

Therefore, Caveto be thy counsellor.

Go, clear thy crystals. Yoke-fellows in arms, Let us to France, like horse-leeches, my boys, To suck, to suck, the very blood to suck.

BOY. And that's but unwholesome food, they say.

PISTOL. Touch her soft mouth and march.

BARDOLPH. Farewell, hostess. [Kissing her]

NYM. I cannot kiss, that is the humour of it; but adieu.

PISTOL. Let housewifery appear; keep close, I thee command.

HOSTESS. Farewell; adieu. Exeunt

SCENE IV.

France. The KING'S palace

Flourish. Enter the FRENCH KING, the DAUPHIN, the DUKES OF BERRI and BRITAINE, the CONSTABLE, and others

FRENCH KING. Thus comes the English with full power upon us; And more than carefully it us concerns To answer royally in our defences.

Therefore the Dukes of Berri and of Britaine, Of Brabant and of Orleans, shall make forth, And you, Prince Dauphin, with all swift dispatch, To line and new repair our towns of war With men of courage and with means defendant; For England his approaches makes as fierce As waters to the sucking of a gulf.

It fits us, then, to be as provident As fear may teach us, out of late examples Left by the fatal and neglected English Upon our fields.

DAUPHIN. My most redoubted father, It is most meet we arm us 'gainst the foe; For peace itself should not so dull a kingdom, Though war nor no known quarrel were in question, But that defences, musters, preparations, Should be maintain'd, a.s.sembled, and collected, As were a war in expectation.

Therefore, I say, 'tis meet we all go forth To view the sick and feeble parts of France; And let us do it with no show of fear- No, with no more than if we heard that England Were busied with a Whitsun morris-dance; For, my good liege, she is so idly king'd, Her sceptre so fantastically borne By a vain, giddy, shallow, humorous youth, That fear attends her not.

CONSTABLE. O peace, Prince Dauphin!

You are too much mistaken in this king.

Question your Grace the late amba.s.sadors With what great state he heard their emba.s.sy, How well supplied with n.o.ble counsellors, How modest in exception, and withal How terrible in constant resolution, And you shall find his vanities forespent Were but the outside of the Roman Brutus, Covering discretion with a coat of folly; As gardeners do with ordure hide those roots That shall first spring and be most delicate.

DAUPHIN. Well, 'tis not so, my Lord High Constable; But though we think it so, it is no matter.

In cases of defence 'tis best to weigh The enemy more mighty than he seems; So the proportions of defence are fill'd; Which of a weak and n.i.g.g.ardly projection Doth like a miser spoil his coat with scanting A little cloth.

FRENCH KING. Think we King Harry strong; And, Princes, look you strongly arm to meet him.

The kindred of him hath been flesh'd upon us; And he is bred out of that b.l.o.o.d.y strain That haunted us in our familiar paths.

Witness our too much memorable shame When Cressy battle fatally was struck, And all our princes capdv'd by the hand Of that black name, Edward, Black Prince of Wales; Whiles that his mountain sire- on mountain standing, Up in the air, crown'd with the golden sun- Saw his heroical seed, and smil'd to see him, Mangle the work of nature, and deface The patterns that by G.o.d and by French fathers Had twenty years been made. This is a stern Of that victorious stock; and let us fear The native mightiness and fate of him.

Enter a MESSENGER

MESSENGER. Amba.s.sadors from Harry King of England Do crave admittance to your Majesty.

FRENCH KING. We'll give them present audience. Go and bring them.

Exeunt MESSENGER and certain LORDS You see this chase is hotly followed, friends.

DAUPHIN. Turn head and stop pursuit; for coward dogs 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

FRENCH KING. From our brother of England?

EXETER. From him, and thus he greets your Majesty: He wills you, in the name of G.o.d Almighty, That you divest yourself, and lay apart The borrowed glories that by gift of heaven, By law of nature and of nations, 'longs 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 days, Nor from the dust of old oblivion rak'd, 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 deriv'd From his most fam'd of famous ancestors, Edward the Third, he bids you then resign Your crown and kingdom, indirectly held From him, the native and true challenger.

FRENCH KING. Or else what follows?

EXETER. b.l.o.o.d.y constraint; for if you hide the crown 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 privy maidens' groans, For husbands, fathers, and betrothed lovers, That shall be swallowed in this controversy.

This is his claim, his threat'ning, and my message; Unless the Dauphin be in presence here, To whom expressly I bring greeting too.

FRENCH KING. For us, we will consider of this further; To-morrow shall you bear our full intent Back to our brother of England.

DAUPHIN. For the Dauphin: I stand here for him. What to him from England?

EXETER. Scorn and defiance, slight regard, contempt, And anything that may not misbecome The mighty sender, doth he prize you at.

Thus says my king: an 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 trespa.s.s and return your mock In second accent of his ordinance.

DAUPHIN. 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 b.a.l.l.s.

EXETER. He'll make your Paris Louvre shake for it, Were it the mistress court of mighty Europe; And be a.s.sur'd 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.