him my mind; hear you, the King is coming, and I muft fpeak with him from the pridge.

SCENE

Drum and Colours.

Flu.

VIII.

Enter the King, and his poor foldiers.

OD pless your Majefty.

K. Henry. How now, Fluellen, cam'st thou from the bridge?

Flu. I, fo please your Majefty: the Duke of Exeter has very gallantly maintain'd the pridge; the French is gone off, look you, and there is gallant and most prave paffages; marry, th' athversary was have poffeffion of the pridge, but he is enforced to retire, and the Duke of Exeter is mafter of the pridge: I can tell your Majefty, the Duke is a prave man.

K. Henry. What men have you lost, Fluellen ?

Flu. The perdition of th' athverfary hath been very great, very reasonable great; marry, for my part, I think, the Duke hath loft never a man but one that is like to be executed for robbing a church, one Bardolph, if your Majefty know the man: his face is all bubukles, and whelks, and knobs, and flames of fire; and his lips blows at his nofe, and it is like a coal of fire; fometimes plue, and fometimes red; but his nofe is executed, and his fire's out.

K Henry. We would have fuch offenders fo cut off; And give exprefs charge, that in all our march. There fhall be nothing taken from the villages, But fhall be paid for; and no French upbraided, Or yet abufed in difdainful language; When lenity and cruelty play for kingdoms, The gentler gamefter is the fooneft winner.

Tucket founds. Enter Mountjoy.

Mount. You know me by my habit.

K. Henry. Well then, I know thee; what fhall I

know of thee?

Mount.

Mount. My mafter's. mind.

K. Henry. Unfold it.

Mount. Thus fays my King: fay thou to Harry
England,

Although we feemed dead, we did but fleep:
Advantage is a better foldier than rafhnefs.
Tell him, we could at Harfleur have rebuk'd him;
But that we thought not good to bruise an injury,
'Till it were ripe. Now, fpeak we on our cue,
With voice imperial: England fhall repent
His folly, fee his weakness, and admire
Our fuff'rance. Bid him therefore to confider,
What must the ranfom be, which muft proportion
The loffes we have borne, the fubjects we
Have loft, and the difgrace we have digefted;
To answer which, his pettinefs would bow under.
First for our lofs, too poor is his Exchequer; ;
For the effufion of our blood, his army
Too faint a number; and for our difgrace,
Ev'n his own perfon kneeling at our feet
A weak and worthless fatisfaction.

To this, defiance add; and for conclufion,
Tell him he hath betray'd his followers,

Whofe condemnation is pronounc'd. So far
My King and mafter; and so much my office.

K. Henry. What is thy name? I know thy quality,
Mount. Mountjoy.

K. Henry. Thou doft 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 footh,
(Though 'tis no wifdom to confefs fo much
Unto an enemy of craft and vantage)
My people are with fickness much enfeebled,
My numbers leffen'd; and thofe few I have,
Almost no better than fo many French;

Who, when they were in health, I tell thee, herald,

I thought, upon one pair of English legs

Did march three Frenchman. 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 mafter, here I am;
My ranfom is this frail and worthless trunk;
My army but a weak and fickly guard:

Yet, God before, tell him we will come on,
Though France himself, and fuch another neighbour,
Stand in our way. There's for thy labour, Mountjoy.
Go, bid thy mafter well advise himself:

If we may pafs, we will; if we be hinder'd,
We fhall your tawny ground with your red blood
Difcolour and so, Mountjoy, fare you well.

:

The fum of all our anfwer is but this;
We would not feek a battle as we are,
Yet, as we are, we say, we will not fhun it:
So tell your mafter.

Mount. I fhall deliver fo: thanks to your Highness.

Exit.

Glou. I hope, they will not come upon us now.
K. Henry. 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.
SCENE IX.

The French Camp near Agincourt.

Enter the Conftable of France, the Lord Rambures, Orleans, Dauphin, with others.

Con.

TUT

UT, I have the best armour of the world.
Would it were day!

Orl. You have an excellent armour; but let my horfe have his due.

Con. It is the beft horfe of Europe.
Orl. Will it never be morning?

Dau.

Dau. My lord of Orleans, and my lord high Conftable, you talk of horse and armour,

Orl. You are as well provided of both, as any Prince in the world.

Dau. What a long night is this! I will not change. my horfe with any that treads but on four pasterns; ca, ha! le Cheval volant, the Pegafus, chez les Narines de feu! he bounds from the earth, as if his entrails were hairs; when I beftride him, I foar, I am a Hawk; he trots the air, the earth fings when he touches it; the basest horn of his hoof is more musical than the pipe of Hermes.

Orl. He's of the colour of the Nutmeg.

Dau. And of the heat of the ginger. It is a beaft for Perfeus; he is pure air and fire; and the dull elements of earth and water never appear in him, but only in patient ftilnefs while his rider mounts him; he is, indeed, a horfe; and all other beasts you may call jades.

Con. Indeed, my lord, it is a moft abfolute and excellent horse.

Dau. It is the prince of palfreys; his neigh is like the bidding of a monarch, and his countenance enforces homage.

Orl. No more, coufin.

Dau. Nay, the man hath no wit, that cannot, from the rifing of the lark to the lodging of the lamb, vary deferved praife on my palfrey; it is a theme as fluent as the fea: turn the fands into eloquent tongues, and my hoife is argument for them all; 'tis a fubject for a Sovereign to reafon on, and for a Sovereign's Sovereign to ride on; and for the world, familiar to us and unknown, to lay apart their particular functions and wonder at him. I once writ a fonnet in his praise, and began thus, Wonder of nature

Orl. I have heard a fonnet begin fo to one's mistress. Dau. Then did they imitate, that which I compos'd to my courfer, for my horfe is my miftrefs.

Your

Orl. Your mistress bears well.

Dau. Me, well;—which is the prescript praise, and perfection, of a good and particular mistress.

Con. Methought, yesterday your mistress shrewdly shook your back.

Dau. So, perhaps, did yours.

Con. Mine was not bridled.

Dau. O, then, belike, fhe was old and gentle; and you rode, like a Kern of Ireland, your French hose off, in your ftrait Troffers.

Con. You have good judgment in horsemanship.

Dau. Be warn'd by me then; they that ride fo and ride not warily, fall into foul bogs; I had rather have horse to my mistress.

my

Con. I had as lieve have my mistress a jade.

Dau. I tell thee, Conftable, my miftrefs wears her own hair.

Con. I could make as true a boast as that, if I had a Sow to my mistress.

Dau. Le chien eft retourné à fon propre vomiffement, & la truie lavée au bourbier; thou mak'ft use of any thing. Con. Yet do I not use my horfe for my mistress; or any fuch proverb, fo little kin to the purpofe.

Ram. My lord Conftable, the armour, that I saw in your tent to night, are those stars, or funs upon it? Con. Stars, my lord.

Dau. Some of them will fall to-morrow, I hope.
Con. And yet my fky fhall not want.

Dau. That may be, for you bear many fuperfluoufly; and 'twere more honour, fome were away.

Con. Ev'n as your horfe bears your praises, who would trot as well, were fome of your brags dif mounted.

Dau. Would I were able to load him with his defert. Will it never be day? I will trot to-morrow a mile, and my way fhall be paved with English faces.

Con. I will not fay fo, for fear I should be fac'd out

of

t