Fluellen.
Gow.
How now, captain Fluellen? come you from
the bridge?
Flu.
I assure you, there is very excellent services
committed at the pridge.
Gow.
Is the duke of Exeter safe?
Flu.
The duke of Exeter is as magnanimous as Agamemnon;
-- 514 --
and a man that I love and honour with my
soul, and my heart, and my duty, and my life, and my
living, and my uttermost power: he is not (God be
praised, and plessed!) any hurt in the world; but keeps
the pridge most valiantly, with excellent discipline.
There is an ancient, lieutenant, there at the pridge,—I
think, in my very conscience, he is as valiant a man as
Mark Antony, and he is a man of no estimation in the
world; but I did see him do as gallant service.
Gow.
What do you call him?
Flu.
He is called ancient Pistol.
Gow.
I know him not.
Enter Pistol.
Flu.
Here is the man6 note.
Pist.
Captain, I thee beseech to do me favours:
The duke of Exeter doth love thee well.
Flu.
Ay, I praise Got; and I have merited some
love at his hands.
Pist.
Bardolph, a soldier, firm and sound of heart,
And of buxom valour, hath, by cruel fate
And giddy fortune's furious fickle wheel,
That goddess blind,
That stands upon the rolling restless stone,—
Flu.
By your patience, ancient Pistol. Fortune is
painted plind, with a muffler afore her eyes, to signify
to you that fortune is plind; and she is painted also
with a wheel, to signify to you, which is the moral of
it, that she is turning, and inconstant, and mutability,
and variation: and her foot, look you, is fixed upon a
spherical stone, which rolls, and rolls, and rolls. In
good truth, the poet makes a most excellent description
of it: fortune, is an excellent moral.
-- 515 --
Pist.
Fortune is Bardolph's foe, and frowns on him;
For he hath stol'n a pax7 note, and hanged must 'a be.
A damned death!
Let gallows gape for dog, let man go free,
And let not hemp his wine-pipe suffocate.
But Exeter hath given the doom of death,
For pax of little price:
Therefore, go speak, the duke will hear thy voice,
And let not Bardolph's vital thread be cut
With edge of penny cord, and vile reproach:
Speak, captain, for his life, and I will thee requite.
Flu.
Ancient Pistol, I do partly understand your
meaning.
Pist.
Why then, rejoice therefore.
Flu.
Certainly, ancient, it is not a thing to rejoice
at; for if, look you, he were my brother, I would
desire the duke to use his goot pleasure, and put him
to execution, for discipline ought to be used.
Pist.
Die and be damn'd; and fico for thy friendship!
Flu.
It is well.
Pist.
The fig of Spain!
[Exit Pistol.
Flu.
Very good8 note
.
Gow.
Why, this is an arrant counterfeit rascal: I
remember him now; a bawd; a cutpurse.
Flu.
I'll assure you, 'a utter'd as prave words at the
pridge, as you shall see in a summer's day. But it is
very well, what he has spoke to me; that is well, I
warrant you, when time is serve.
-- 516 --
Gow.
Why, 'tis a gull, a fool, a rogue; that now and
then goes to the wars, to grace himself at his return
into London under the form of a soldier. And such
fellows are perfect in the great commanders' names, and
they will learn you by rote where services were done;
—at such and such a sconce, at such a breach, at such
a convoy; who came off bravely, who was shot, who
disgraced, what terms the enemy stood on: and this
they con perfectly in the phrase of war, which they
trick up with new-tuned oaths: 11Q0671 and what a beard of
the general's cut, and a horrid suit of the camp, will do
among foaming bottles, and ale-washed wits, is wonderful
to be thought on. But you must learn to know
such slanders of the age, or else you may be marvellously
mistook.
Flu.
I tell you what, captain Gower; I do perceive,
he is not the man that he would gladly make
show to the world he is: if I find a hole in his coat, I
will tell him my mind. [Drum heard.] Hark you, the
king is coming, and I must speak with him from the
pridge.
Enter King Henry, Gloster, and Soldiers9 note.
Flu.
Got pless your majesty!
K. Hen.
How now, Fluellen? cam'st thou from the
bridge?
Flu.
Ay, so please your majesty. The duke of Exeter
has very gallantly maintained the pridge: the French
is gone off, look you, and there is gallant and most
prave passages. Marry, th' athversary was have possession
of the pridge, but he is enforced to retire, and
the duke of Exeter is master of the pridge. I can tell
your majesty, the duke is a prave man.
-- 517 --
K. Hen.
What men have you lost, Fluellen?
Flu.
The perdition of th' athversary hath been very
great, reasonable great: marry, for my part, I think
the duke hath lost never a man, but one that is like
to be executed for robbing a church; one Bardolph, if
your majesty know the man: his face is all bubukles,
and whelks, and knobs, and flames of fire; and his lips
plows at his nose, and it is like a coal of fire, sometimes
plue, and sometimes red; but his nose is executed, and
his fire's out.
K. Hen.
We would have all such offenders so cut
off: and we give express charge, that in our marches
through the country, there be nothing compelled from
the villages, nothing taken but paid for; none of the
French upbraided, or abused in disdainful language, for
when lenity and cruelty play for a kingdom1 note, the gentler
gamester is the soonest winner.
Tucket. Enter Montjoy.
Mont.
You know me by my habit.
K. Hen.
Well then, I know thee: what shall I know of thee?
Mont.
My master's mind.
K. Hen.
Unfold it.
Mont.
Thus says my king:—Say thou to Harry of
England, Though we seemed dead, we did but sleep;
advantage is a better soldier than rashness. Tell him,
we could have rebuked him at Harfleur; but that we
thought not good to bruise an injury, till it were full
ripe: now we speak upon our cue, and our voice is
imperial. England shall repent his folly, see his weakness,
and admire our sufferance. Bid him, therefore,
consider of his ransom; which must proportion the
losses we have borne, the subjects we have lost, the
-- 518 --
disgrace we have digested; which, in weight to reanswer,
his pettiness would bow under. For our losses,
his exchequer is too poor; for the effusion of our blood,
the muster of his kingdom too faint a number; and for
our disgrace, his own person, kneeling at our feet, but
a weak and worthless satisfaction. To this add defiance;
and tell him, for conclusion, he hath betrayed his
followers, whose condemnation is pronounced. So far
my king and master: so much my office.
K. Hen.
What is thy name? I know thy quality.
Mont.
Montjoy.
K. Hen.
Thou dost 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 sooth,
Though 'tis no wisdom to confess so much
Unto an enemy of craft and vantage,
My people are with sickness much enfeebled;
My numbers lessen'd, and those few I have,
Almost no better than so many French:
Who, when they were in health, I tell thee, herald,
I thought upon one pair of English legs
Did march three Frenchmen.—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 master, here I am:
My ransom is this frail and worthless trunk,
My army but a weak and sickly guard;
Yet, God before, tell him we will come on,
Though France himself, and such another neighbour,
Stand in our way. There's for thy labour, Montjoy.
Go, bid thy master well advise himself:
If we may pass, we will; if we be hinder'd,
We shall your tawny ground with your red blood
Discolour: and so, Montjoy, fare you well.
The sum of all our answer is but this:
We would not seek a battle, as we are,
-- 519 --
Nor, as we are, we say, we will not shun it:
So tell your master.
Mont.
I shall deliver so. Thanks to your highness.
[Exit Montjoy.
Glo.
I hope they will not come upon us now.
K. Hen.
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.
J. Payne Collier [1842–1844], The works of William Shakespeare. The text formed from an entirely new collation of the old editions: with the various readings, notes, a life of the poet, and a history of the Early English stage. By J. Payne Collier, Esq. F.S.A. In eight volumes (Whittaker & Co. [etc.], London) [word count] [S10101].
