under your correction, there is not many of your

nation

Mac. Of my nation? What ish my nation? ish a villain, and a bastard, and a knave, and a rascal ? What ish my nation? Who talks of my nation?

Flu. Look you, if you take the matter otherwise than is meant, captain Macmorris, peradventure, I shall think you do not use me with that affability as in discretion you ought to use me, look you; being as goot a man as yourself, both in the disciplines of wars, and in the derivation of my birth, and in other particularities.

Mac. I do not know you so good a man as myself: so Chrish save me, I will cut off your head. Gow. Gentlemen both, you will mistake each other.

Jamy. Au! that's a foul fault.

[A Parley sounded. Gow. The town sounds a parley.

Flu. Captain Macmorris, when there is more better opportunity to be required, look you, I will be so bold as to tell you, I know the disciplines of war; and there is an end." Exeunt.

SCENE III.

The same. Before the Gates of Harfleur.

The Governour and some Citizens on the Walls; the English Forces below. Enter King HENRY and his Train.

K. Hen. How yet resolves the governour of the town?

there is an end.] It were to be wished, that the poor merriment of this dialogue had not been purchased with so much profaneness. JOHNSON.

This is the latest parle we will admit :
Therefore, to our best mercy give yourselves;
Or, like to men proud of destruction,
Defy us to our worst: for, as I am a soldier,
(A name, that, in my thoughts, becomes me best,)
If I begin the battery once again,

I will not leave the half-achieved Harfleur,

Till in her ashes she lie buried.

The gates of mercy shall be all shut up;

And the flesh'd soldier,-rough and hard of heart,In liberty of bloody hand, shall range

With conscience wide as hell; mowing like grass
Your fresh-fair virgins, and your flowering infants.
What is it then to me, if impious war,-

Array'd in flames, like to the prince of fiends,—
Do, with his smirch'd complexion, all fell feats
Enlink'd to waste and desolation ?8

What is't to me, when you yourselves are cause,
If your pure maidens fall into the hand

Of hot and forcing violation?

What rein can hold licentious wickedness,

When down the hill he holds his fierce career?
We may as bootless spend our vain command
Upon the enraged soldiers in their spoil,
As send precepts to the Leviathan

To come ashore. Therefore, you men of Harfleur,
Take pity of your town, and of your people,
Whiles yet my soldiers are in my command;
Whiles yet the cool and temperate wind of grace
O'erblows the filthy and contagious clouds
Of deadly murder, spoil, and villainy.

8

---fell feats

Enlink'd to waste and desolation?] All the savage practices naturally concomitant to the sack of cities.

9 Whiles yet the cool and temperate wind of grace

O'erblows the filthy and contagious clouds-] This is a very harsh metaphor. To overblow is to drive away, or to keep off.

If not, why, in a moment, look to see
The blind and bloody soldier with foul hand
Defile the locks of your shrill-shrieking daughters;
Your fathers taken by the silver beards,

And their most reverend heads dash'd to the walls;
Your naked infants spitted upon pikes;

Whiles the mad mothers with their howls confus'd
Do break the clouds, as did the wives of Jewry
At Herod's bloody-hunting slaughtermen.
What say you? will you yield, and this avoid?
Or, guilty in defence, be thus destroy'd?

Gov. Our expectation hath this day an end:
The Dauphin, whom of succour we entreated,
Returns us-that his powers are not yet ready
To raise so great a siege. Therefore, dread king,
We yield our town, and lives, to thy soft mercy:
Enter our gates; dispose of us, and ours;
For we no longer are defensible.

K. Hen. Open your gates.-Come, uncle Exeter,
Go you and enter Harfleur; there remain,
And fortify it strongly 'gainst the French:

Use
mercy to them all. For us, dear uncle,—
The winter coming on, and sickness growing
Upon our soldiers, we'll retire to Calais.
To-night in Harfleur will we be your guest;
To-morrow for the march are we addrest.'

[Flourish. The King, &c. enter the Town.

are we addrest.] i. e. prepared.

SCENE IV.2

Roüen. A Room in the Palace.

Enter KATHARINE and ALICE.

Kath. Alice, tu as esté en Angleterre, et tu parles bien le language.

Alice. Un peu, madame.

Kath. Je te prie, m'enseignez; il faut que j'apprenne à parler.

main, en Anglois?

Comment appellez vous la

Alice. La main? elle est appellée, de hand
Kath. De hand. Et les doigts?

Alice. Les doigts? ma foy, je oublie les doigts; mais je me souviendray. Les doigts? je pense, qu'ils sont appellé de fingres; ouy, de fingres.

Kath. La main, de hand; les doigts, de fingres. Je pense, que je suis le bon escolier. J'ay gagné deux mots d'Anglois vistement. Comment appellez vous les ongles?

Alice. Les ongles? les appellons, de nails.

Kath. De nails. Escoutez; dites moy, si je parle bien de hand, de fingres, de nails.

Alice. C'est bien dit, madame; il est fort bon Anglois.

Kath. Dites moy en Anglois, le bras.

Alice. De arm, madame.

2 Scene IV.] This scene is mean enough, when it is read; but the grimaces of two French women, and the odd accent with which they uttered the English, made it divert upon the stage. It may be observed, that there is in it not only the French language, but the French spirit. Alice compliments the princess upon her knowledge of four words, and tells her that she pronounces like the English themselves. The Princess suspects no deficiency in her instructress, nor the instructress in herself. Throughout the whole scene there may be found French servility, and French vanity. JOHNSON.

Kath. Et le coude.

Alice. De elbow.

Kath. De elbow. Je m'en faitz la repetition de tous les mots, que vous m'avez appris dès a present. Alice. Il est trop difficile, madame, comme je pense. Kath. Excusez moy, Alice; escoutez: De hand, de fingre, de nails, de arm, de bilbow.

Alice. De elbow, madame.

Kath. O Seigneur Dieu! je m'en oublie; De elbow. Comment appellez vous le col?

Alice. De neck, madame.

Kath. De neck: Et le menton?

Alice. De chin.

Kath. De sin. Le col, de neck: le menton, de sin. Alice. Ouy. Sauf vostre honneur; en verité, vous prononces les mots aussi droict que les natifs d'Angleterre.

Kath. Je ne doute point d'apprendre par la grace de Dieu; et en peu de temps.

Alice. N'avez vous pas deja oublié ce que je vous ay enseignée ?

Kath. Non, je reciteray à vous promptement. De hand, de fingre, de mails,

Alice. De nails, madame.

Kath. De nails, de arme, de ilbow.

Alice. Sauf vostre honneur, de elbow.

Kath. Ainsi dis je; de elbow, de neck, et de sin: Comment appellez vous le pieds et la robe?

Alice. De foot, madame; et de con.

Kath. De foot, et de con? O Seigneur Dieu ! ces sont mots de son mouvais, corruptible, grosse, et impudique, et non pour les dames d'honneur d'user: Je ne voudrois prononcer ces mots devant les Seigneurs de France, pour tout le monde. Il faut de foot, & de con, neant-moins. Je reciterai une autre fois ma leçon ensemble: De hand, de fingre, de nails, de arm, de elbow, de neck, de sin, de foot, de con.