King Henry the Fifth Part 12

[_Exit, R.H._

_K. Hen._ It sorts[5] well with your fierceness.

_Enter FLUELLEN, L.H., and crosses to R., and GOWER, U.E.R.H., following hastily._

_Gow._ Captain Fluellen!

_Flu._ (R.C.) So! in the name of Heaven, speak lower.[6] It is the greatest admiration in the universal 'orld, when the true and auncient prerogatifes and laws of the wars is not kept: if you would take the pains but to examine the wars of Pompey the Great, you shall find, I warrant you, that there is no tiddle taddle, or pibble pabble in Pompey's camp.

_Gow._ (L.C.) Why, the enemy is loud; you heard him all night.

_Flu._ If the enemy is an a.s.s, and a fool, and a prating c.o.xcomb, is it meet, think you, that we should also, look you, be an a.s.s, and a fool, and a prating c.o.xcomb, in your own conscience, now?

_Gow._ I will speak lower.

_Flu._ I pray you, and beseech you, that you will.

[_Exeunt GOWER and FLUELLEN, R.H._

_K. Hen._ Though it appear a little out of fas.h.i.+on, there is much care and valour in this Welshman.

_Enter BATES and WILLIAMS, L.H._

_Will._ 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.

_Will._ We see yonder the beginning of the day, but, I think, we shall never see the end of it.--Who goes there?

_K. Hen._ A friend.

[_Comes down, R._

_Will._ Under what captain serve you?

_K. Hen._ Under Sir Thomas Erpingham.

_Will._ A good old commander, and a most kind gentleman: I pray you, what thinks he of our estate?

_K. Hen._ Even as men wrecked upon a sand, that look to be washed off the next tide.

_Bates._ (L.) He hath not told his thought to the king?

_K. Hen._ No; nor it is not meet he should. (_Crosses to centre._) For, though I speak it to you, I think the king is but a man, as I am: the violet smells to him as it doth to me; the element shows to him as it doth to me; all his senses have but human conditions:[7] therefore when he sees reason of fears, as we do, his fears, out of doubt, be of the same relish as ours are: Yet, in reason, no man should possess him with any appearance of fear, lest he, by showing it, should dishearten his army.

_Bates._ 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 him, at all adventures, so we were quit here.

_K. Hen._ (C.) By my troth, I will speak my conscience of the king: I think he would not wish himself any where but where he is.

_Bates._ (L.) Then 'would he were here alone; so should he be sure to be ransomed, and a many poor men's lives saved.

_K. Hen._ 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 any where so contented as in the king's company; his cause being just, and his quarrel honourable.[8]

_Will._ (R.) That's more than we know.

_Bates._ Ay, or more than we should seek after; for we know enough, if we know we are the king's subjects: if his cause be wrong, our obedience to the king wipes the crime of it out of us.

_Will._ But if the cause be not good, the king himself hath a heavy rekoning to make, when all those legs and arms and heads, chopped off in battle, shall join together at the latter day,[9] and cry all--We died at such 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.[10] I am afeard there are few die well that die in battle; for how can they charitably dispose of any thing, 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. Hen._ 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 his father that sent him:--But this is not so: the king is not bound to answer the particular endings of his soldiers, nor the father of his son, for they purpose not their death, when they purpose their services. Every subject's duty is the king's; but every subject's soul is his own. Therefore should every soldier in the wars do as every sick man in his bed, wash every mote out of his conscience: and dying so, death is to him advantage; or not dying, the time was blessedly lost wherein such preparation was gained.

_Will._ 'Tis certain, every man that dies ill, the ill is upon his own head; the king is not to answer for it.

_Bates._ I do not desire he should answer for me; and yet I determine to fight l.u.s.tily for him.

_K. Hen._ I myself heard the king say he would not be ransomed.

_Will._ Ay, he said so, to make us fight cheerfully: but, when our throats are cut, he may be ransomed, and we ne'er the wiser.

_K. Hen._ If I live to see it, I will never trust his word after.

_Will._ That's a perilous shot out of an elder gun, that a poor and private displeasure can do against a monarch! you may as well go about to turn the sun to ice with fanning in his face with a peac.o.c.k's feather. You'll never trust his word after! come, 'tis a foolish saying.

_K. Hen._ Your reproof is something too round:[11] I should be angry with you, if the time were convenient.

_Will._ Let it be a quarrel between us, if you live.

_K. Hen._ I embrace it.

_Will._ How shall I know thee again?

_K. Hen._ Give me any gage of thine, and I will wear it in my bonnet: then, if ever thou darest acknowledge it, I will make it my quarrel.

_Will._ Here's my glove: give me another of thine.

_K. Hen._ There.

_Will._ This will I also wear in my cap: if ever thou come to me and say, after to-morrow. _This is my glove_, by this hand, I will take thee a box on the ear.

_K. Hen._ If ever I live to see it, I will challenge it.

_Will._ Thou darest as well be hanged.

_K. Hen._ Well, I will do it, though I take thee in the king's company.

_Will._ Keep thy word: fare thee well.

_Bates._ Be friends, you English fools, be friends: (_Crosses to_ WILLIAMS, R.) we have French quarrels enough, if you could tell how to reckon.