Which, like a mighty whiffler' 'fore the king,
Seems to prepare his way: so let him land;
And, solemnly, see him set on to London.
So swift a pace hath thought, that even now
You may imagine him upon Black-heath:
Where that his lords desire him, to have borne
His bruised helmet, and his bended sword,
Before him, through the city: he forbids it,
Being free from vainness and self-glorious pride;
Giving full trophy, signal, and ostent,
Quite from himself, to God. But now behold,
In the quick forge and working-house of thought,
How London doth pour out her citizens!
The mayor, and all his brethren in best sort,-
Like to the senators of antique Rome,
With the plebeians swarming at their heels,-
Go forth, and fetch their conquering Cæsar in:
As, by a lower but by loving likelihood',
Were now the general* of our gracious empress
(As, in good time, he may) from Ireland coming,
Bringing rebellion broached' on his sword,

How many would the peaceful city quit, [cause,
To welcome him? Much more, and much more
Did they this Harry. Now in London place him ;
(As yet the lamentaion of the French
Invites the king of England's stay at home:
The emperor's coming in behalf of France,
To order peace between them) and omit
All the occurrences, whatever chanc'd,
'Till Harry's back-return again to France;
There must we bring him; and myself have play'd
The interim, by remembring you-'tis past.
Then brook abridgment; and your eyes advance
After your thoughts, straight back again to France.
SCENE I.

The English Camp in France.

Enter Fluellen, and Gower.

Gow. Nay, that's right; but why wear you your leek to-day? Saint Davy's day is past.

5

Flu. 'Tis no matter for his swellings, nor his turkey-cocks.--Got pless you, antient Pistol! you scurvy, lowsy knave, Got pless you!

Pist. Ha! art thou Bedlam? dost thou thirst,
base Trojan,

To have me fold up Parca's fatal web1?
Hence! I am qualmish at the smell of leek.

Flu.I peseech you heartily, scurvy, lowsy knave, at my desires, and my request, and my petitions, 10 to eat, look you, this leek; because, look you, you do not love it, nor your affections, and your appetites, and your digestions, does not agree with it, I would desire you to eat it.

15

Pist. Not for Cadwallader, and all his goats.
Fiu. There is one goat for you. [strikes him.]
Will you be so goot, scaki knave, as eat it?
Pist. Base Trojan, thou shalt die.

Flu. You say very true, scald knave, when Got's will is: I will desire you to live in the mean time, 20 and eat your victuals; come, there is sauce for it.[Strikes him.] You call'd me yesterday, mountain squire; but I will make you to-day a squire of low degree. I pray you fall to; if you can mock a leek, you can eat a leek. [him.

25

30

35

40

Flu. There is occasions and causes why and wherefore in all things: I will tell you, as my friend, captain Gower; the rascally, scald, peggarly, lowsy, pragging knave, Pistol,-which you and yourself, and all the 'orld, know to be no pet-45 ter than a fellow, look you now, of no meritshe is come to me, and prings me pread and salt yesterday, look you, and pid me eat my leak: it was in a place where I could not preed no contentions with him: but I will be so pold as to wear 50 it in my cap'till I see him once again, and then I will tell him a little piece of my desires. Enter Pistol.

Gow. Why, here he comes, swelling like a turkey-cock.

Gow. Enough, captain; you have astonish'd Flu. I say, I will make him eat some part of my leek, or I will peat his pate four days:-Pite, I pray you; it is goot for your green wound, and your ploody coxcomb.

Pist. Must I bite?

Flu. Yes, certainly; and out of doubt, and out of questions too, and ambiguities.

Pist. By this leek, I will most horribly revenge; I eat, and eat, I swear.

Flu. Eat, I pray you: will you have some more sauce to your leck? there is not enough leek to swear by.

Pist. Quiet thy cudgel; thou dost see, I eat. Flu. Much goot do you, scald knave, heartily. Nay, pray you, throw none away; the skin is goot for your proken coxcomb. When you take occasions to see leeks hereafter, I pray you, mock at them; that is all.

Pist. Good.

Flu. Ay, leeks is goot :-Hold you, there is a groat to heal your pate.

Pist. Me a groat!

Flu. Yes, verily, and in truth, you shall take it; or I have another lock in my pocket, which you shall eat,

Pist. I take thy groat, in earnest of revenge. Flu. If I owe you any thing, I will pay you in cudgels; you shall be a woodmonger, and buy nothing of me but cudgels. Got be wi' you, and 155 keep you, and heal your pate.

[Exit.

'A whiffler is an officer who walks first in processions, or before persons in high stations, on occasions of ceremony. The name is still retained in London, and there is an officer so called that walks before their companies on the 9th of November, or what is vulgarly called Lord Mayor's Day. Likelihood for similitude. *The earl of Essex in the reign of queen Elizabeth. i. e. spitted, transfixed. The meaning is, dost thou desire to have me put thee to death? > That is, according to Dr. Johnson, I will bring thee to the ground. Other commentators think it alludes to an old metrical romance, which was very popular among our countrymen in ancient times, entitled, The Squires of low Degree. That is, you have stunned him with the blow.

Pist

Pist. All hell shall stir for this.

Gow. Go, go; you are a counterfeit cowardly knave. Will you mock at an ancient tradition,— begun upon an honourable respect, and worn as a memorable trophy of predeceas'd valour, and 5 dare not avouch in your deeds any of your words? I have seen you glecking and gailing at this gentleman twice or thrice. You thought, because he could not speak English in the native garb, he could not therefore handle an English cudgel: you 10 find it otherwise; and, henceforth, let a Welsh correction teach you a good English condition. Fare ye well.

Pist. Doth fortune play the huswife' with me

Since then my office hath so far prevail'd,
That, face to face, and royal eye to eye,
You have congreeted; let it not disgrace me,
If I demand, before this royal view,
What rub, or what impediment, there is,
Why that the naked, poor, and mangled peace,
Dear nurse of arts, plenties, and joyful births,
Should not, in this best garden of the world,
Our fertile France, put up her lovely visage?
Alas! she hath from France too long been chas'd;
And all her husbandry doth lie in heaps,
Corrupting in its own fertility.

Her vine, the merry chearer of the heart,
Upruned dies: her hedges even-pleach'd,
15 Like prisoners wildly over-grown with hair,
Put forth disorder'd twigs: her fallow leas
The darnel, hemlock, and rank fumitory,
Doth root upon; while that, the coulter rusts,
That should deracinate such savag'ry:

20 The even mead that erst brought sweetly forth
The freckled cowslip, burnet, and green clover,
Wanting the scythe, all uncorrected, rank,
Conceives by idleness; and nothing teems,
But hateful docks, rough thistles, kecksies, burs,
Losing both beauty and utility.

25

The French Court, at Trois in Champagne.
Enter at one door, King Henry, Exeter, Bedford,
Warwick, and other Lords; at another, the
French King, Queen Isabel, Princess Katha-30
rine, the Duke of Burgundy, and other French.
K. Henry. Peace to this meeting, wherefore we

are met!

Unto our brother France, and to our sister,-
Health and fair time of day:-joy and good wishes 35
To our most fair and princely cousin Katharine;—|
And (as a branch and member of this royalty,
By whom this great assembly is contriv')
We do salute you, duke of Burgundy;-
And, princes French, and peers, health to you all! 40
Fr.King. Right joyousare we to behold your face,
Most worthy brother England; fairly met:-
So are you, princes English, every one.

2. Isa. So happy be the issue, brother England,
Of this good day, and of this gracious meeting,
As we are now glad to behold your eyes;
Your eyes which hitherto have borne in them
Against the French, that met them in their bent,
The fatal balls of murdering basilisks:
The venom of such looks, we fairly hope,
Have lost their quality; and that this day
Shall change all griefs, and quarrels, into love.

K. Henry. To cry amento that, thus we appear. 2. Isa. You English princes all, I do salute you. Bur. My duty to you both, on equal love, Great kings of France and England! That I have labour'd

With all my wits, my pains, and strong endeavours,
To bring your most imperial majesties
Unto this bar1, and royal interview,
Your mightiness on both parts best can witness.

And as our vineyards, fallows, meads, and hedges,
Defective in their natures, grow to wildness;
Even so our houses, and ourselves, and children,
Have lost, or do not learn, for want of time,
The sciences that should become our country;
But grow, like savages,-as soldiers will,
That nothing do but meditate on blood,-
To swearing, and stern looks, diffus'd' attire,
And every thing that seems unnatural.
Which to reduce into our former favour",
You are assembled: and my speech intreats
That I may know the let, why gentle peace
Should not expel these inconveniencies,
And bless us with her former qualities.

K. Henry. If, duke of Burgundy, you would
the peace,

Whose want gives growth to the imperfections
Which you have cited, you must buy that peace
With full accord to all our just demands;

45 Whose tenors and particular effects

50

You have, enschedul'd briefly, in your hands. Bur. The king hath heard them; to the which, as yet,

There is no answer made.

K. Henry. Well then, the peace,
Which you before so urg'd, lies in his answer.

Fr. King. I have but with a cursorary eye
O'er-glanc'd the articles: pleaseth your grace
To appoint some of your council presently
55 To sit with us once more, with better heed
To re-survey them, we will, suddenly,
Pass, or accept, and peremptory answer.

K. Henry. Brother, we shall.-Go, uncle
Exeter,-

60 And brother Clarence,--and you,brother Gloster,--
Warwick,-and Huntington,-go with the king:

1i. e. scoffing, sneering. Gleek was a game at cards. i. e. the jilt. Huswife is here used in an i. e. to this barrier; to this place of congress. 4 To deracinate is to torce up by the.

ill sense.

roots. i. e. wild, irregular, extravagant. i. e. former appearance.

And

And take with you free power, to ratify,
Augment, or alter, as your wisdoms best
Shall see advantageable for our dignity,
Any thing in, or out of, our demands;
And we'll consign thereto.-Will you, fair sister,
Go with the princes, or stay here with us?

2. Isa. Our gracious brother, I will go with
them;

Haply, a woman's voice may do some good,
When articles, too nicely urg'd, be stood on.

K. Henry. Yet leave our cousin Katharine here
with us:

She is our capital demand, compris'd
Within the fore-rank of our articles.

2. Isa. She hath good leave.

5

for my love, or bound my horse for her favours, I could lay on like a butcher, and sit like a jack-anapes, never off: But, before God, Kate, I cannot look greenly, nor gasp out my eloquence, nor I have no cunning in protestation; only downright oaths, which I never use 'till urg'd, nor never break for urging. If thou can'st love a fellow of this temper, Kate, whose face is not worth sunburning, that never looks in his glass for love of 10 any thing he sees there, let mine eye be thy cook. I speak to thee plain soldier: If thou can'st love me for this, take me: if not, to say to thee-that I shall die, 'tis true;-but for thy love, by the Lord, no; yet I love thee too. And while thou [Exeunt. 15 liv'st, dear Kate, take a fellow of plain and uncoined constancy'; for he perforce must do thee right, because he hath not the gift to woo in other places: for these fellows of infinite tongue, that can rhime themselves into ladies' favours,-they 20 do always reason themselves out again. What! a speaker is but a prater; a rhyme is but a ballad. A good leg will fall; a straight back will stoop: Ja black beard will turn white; a curl'd/pate will grow bald; a fair face will whither; a full eye will wax hollow: but a good heart, Kate, is the sun and the moon; or, rather, the sun, and not the moon; for it shines bright, and never changes, but keeps his course truly. If thou would have such a one, take me: And take me, take a sol30 dier; take a soldier, take a king: And what say'st thou then to my love? Speak, my fair, and fairly, I pray thee.

Manent King Henry, Katharine, and a Lady.
K. Henry. Fair Katharine, and most fair!
Will you vouchsafe to teach a soldier terms,
Such as will enter at a lady's ear,
And plead his love-suit to her gentle heart?
Kath. Your majesty shall mock at me; I can-
not speak your England.

K. Henry. O fair Katharine, if you will love me soundly with your French heart, I will be glad to hear you confess it brokenly with your English tongue. Do you like me, Kate?

Kath: Pardnonez moy, I cannot tell vat islike me.

K. Henry. An angel is like you, Kate; and you are like an angel.

Kath. Que dit-il? que je suis semblable à les anges?

Lady. Ouy, crayment, (sauf rostre grace)| ainsi dit-il.

25

K. Henry. I said so, dear Katharine; and I35 must not blush to affirm it.

Kath. Obon Dieu! des langues des hommes sont pleines des tromperies.

K. Henry. What says she, fair one? that the tongues of men are full of deceit ?

Lady. Ouy; dat de tongues of de mans is be full of deceits: dat is de princess.

140

K. Henry. The princess is the better Englishwoman. I'faith, Kate, my wooing is fit for thy understanding: I am glad, thou canst speak no 45 better English; for, if thou couldst, thou wouldst find me such a plain king, that thou wouldst think, I had sold my farm to buy my crown. I know no ways to mince it in love, but directly to say—| I love you: then, if you urge me further than to 50 say-Do you in faith? I wear out my suit. Give me your answer; i'faith, do; and so clap hands, and a bargain: How say you, lady?

Kath. Is it possible dat I should love the enemy of France?

K. Hen. No; it is not possible, that you should love the enemy of France, Kate: but, in loving me, you should love the friend of France; for I love France so well, that I will not part with a village of it; I will have it all mine: and, Kate, when France is mine, and I am yours, then yours is France, and you are mine.

Kath. I cannot tell vat is dat.

K. Henry. No, Kate? I will tell thee in French; which, I am sure, will hang upon my tongue like a new-married wife about her husband's neck, hardly to be shook off. Quand j'ay la possession de France, & quand vous avez la possession de moi,(let me see, what then? Saint Denis be my speed!) -donc vostre est France, & vous estes mienne. It is as easy for me, Kate, to conquer the kingdom, as to speak so much more French: I shall never move thee in French, unless it be to laugh at me. Kath. Sauf vostre honneur, le Francois, que vous parlez, est meilleur que l'Anglois lequel je parle.

Kath. Sauf vostre honneur, me understand well. K. Henry. Marry, if you would put me to 55 verses, or to dance for your sake, Kate, why you undid me: for the one, I have neither words nor measure; and for the other, I have no strength in measure: yet a reasonable measure in strength.glish? Can'st thou love me? If I could win a lady at leap-frog, or by vaulting 60 Kath. I cannot tell. into my saddle with my armour on my back, under the correction of bragging be it spoken, I should quickly leap into a wife. Or, if I might buffet

K. Hen. No, faith, is't not, Kate; but thy speaking of my tongue, and I thine, most truly falsely, must needs be granted to me much at one. But, Kate, dost thou understand thus much En

K. Heary. Can any of your neighbours tell, Kate? I'll ask them. Come, I know, thou lovest Ime: and at night when you come into your closet,

i, e. real and true constancy, unrefined and unadorned.

you'il

foy, je ne veux point que vous abbaissez vostre
grandeur, en baisant la main d'une vostre indigne
serviteure; excusez moy, je vous supplie, mon
tres puissant seigneur.

K. Hen. Then I will kiss your lips, Kate.
Kath. Les dames, & damoiselles pour estre baisées
devant leur nopees,iln'est pas ecoutume de France.
K. Hen. Madan), my interpreter, what says she?
Lady. Dat is not be de fashion pour de ladies of

you'll question this gentlewoman about me; and I know, Kate, you will, to her, dispraise those parts in me, that you love with your heart; but good Kate, mock me mercifully; the rather, gentle princess, because I love thee cruelly. If ever 5 thou be'st mine, Kate, (as I have saving faith within me, tells me-thou shalt) I get thee with scambling', and thou must therefore needs prove a good soldier-breeder: shall not thou and I, be tween saint Denis and saint George, compound a1France,-I cannot tell what is, baiser, en English. boy, half French, half English, that shall go to Constantinople, and take the Turk by the beard shall we not? What say'st thou, my fair flowerde-luce?

Kath. I do not know dat.

15

K. Hen. No; 'tis hereafter to know, but now to promise: do but now promise, Kate, you wil endeavour for your French part of such a boy; and, for my English moiety, take the word of a king and a bachelor. How answer you, la plus belle 20 Katharinedu monde,montreschere & divinedéesse. Kath. Your majesté 'ave jausɛe French enough to deceive de most sage damoiselle dat is en France.

K. Hen. Now, ne upon my false French! By mine honour, in true English, I love thee, Kate; 25 by which honour I dare not swear, thou lovest me; yet my blood begins to flatter me that thou dost, notwithstanding the poor and untempering' effect of my visage. Now beshrew my father's ambition! he was thinking of civil wars when he 30 got me; therefore was I created with a stubborn outside, with an aspect of iron, that, when I come to woo ladies, I fright them. But, in faith, Kate, the elder I wax, the better I shall appear: my comfort is, that old age, that ill layer-up of beau-35 ty, can do no more spoil upon my face; thou hast me, if thou hast me, at the worst; and thou shalt] wear me, if thou wear me, better and better: and therefore tell ine, most fair Katharine, will you haveme? Put off your maiden blushes; avouch 40 the thoughts of your heart with the looks of an empress; take me by the hand, and say-Harry of England, I am thine: which word thou shalt no sooner bless mine ear withal, but I will tell thee aloud-England is thine, Ireland is thine, 45 France is thine, and Henry Plantagenet is thine; who, though I speak it before his face, if he be not fellow with the best king, thou shalt find the best king of good-fellows. Come, your answer in broken music; for thy voice is music, and thy 50 English broken: therefore, queen of all, Katharine, break thy mind to me in broken English.] Wilt thou have me?

Kath. Dat is, as it shall please de roy mon pere. K. Hen. Nay, it will please him well, Kate; it 55 shali please him, Kate.

Kath. Den it shall also content me.

K. Hen. To kiss.

Lady. Your majesty entendre bettre que moy.
K. Hen. It is not a fashion for the maids in
France to kiss before they are married, would she
Lady. Ouy, vrayment.

[say? K. Ilen. O, Kate, nice customs curt'sy to great kings. Dear Kate, you and I cannot be contin'd within the weak list of a country's fashion: we are the makers of manners, Kate; and the liberty, that follows our places, stops the mouth of all find-faults; as I will do yours, for upholding the nice fashion of your country, in denying me a kiss: therefore, patiently, and yielding-kissing her.] You have witchcraft in your lips, Kate: there is more eloquence in a sugar touch of them, than in the tongues of the French council; and they should sooner persuade Harry of England, than a general petition of monarchs. Here comes your father. Enter the French King and Queen, with French and English Lords.

Burg. God save your majesty! my royal cousin, teach you our princess English?

K. Hen. I would have her learn, my fair cousin, how perfectly I love her; and that is good English. Burg. Is she not apt?

K. Hen. Our tongue is rough, coz'; and my condition' is not smooth; so that, having weither the voice nor the heart of flattery about me, I cannot so conjure up the spirit of love in her, that he will appear in his true likeness.

Burg. Pardon the frankness of my mirth, if I answer you for that. If you would conjure in her, you must make a circle: if conjure up love in her, in his true likeness, he must appear naked, and blind: can you blame her then, being a maid yet rosy'd over with the virgin crimson of modesty, if she deny the appearance of a naked blind boy in her naked seeing self? It were, my lord, a hard condition for a maid to consign to.

K. Hen. Yet they do wink, and yield; as love Jis blind, and enforces.

Burg. They are then excus'd, my lord, when they see not what they do.

K. Hen. Then, good my lord, teach your cousin to consent to winking.

Burg. I will wink on her to consent, my lord, if you will teach her to know my meaning: for maids, well summer'd and warm kept, are like flies at Bartholomew-tide, blind, though they have Nath. Laissez,monseigneur, laissez,laissez: malooltheir eyes: and then they will endure handling,

K. Hen. Upon that I kiss your hand, and I call you-my queen.

1i. e. scrambling. Shakspeare has here committed an anachronism. The Turks were not possessed of Constantinople before the year 1453, when Henry V. had been dead thirty-one years, 3 Meaning, notwithstanding my face has no power to temper, i. e. soften you to my purpose. i. e.

my temper.

which before would not abide looking on.

K. Henry. This moral' ties me over to time, and a hot summer: and so I shall catch the fly, your cousin, in the latter end, and she must be blind too.

Burg. As love is, my lord, before it loves.

K. Henry. It is so: and you may, some of you, thank love for my blindness; who cannot see many a fair French city, for one fair French maid that stands in my way.

5

Fr. King. Yes, my lord, you see them per-10 spectively, the cities turn'd into a maid; for they are all girdled within maiden walls, that war hath never enter'd.

K. Henry. Shall Kate be my wife?

Fr. King. So please you.

K. Henry. I ain content; so the maiden cities you talk of, may wait on her: so the maid, that stood in the way for my wish, shall shew me the way to my will.

2. Isa. God, the best maker of all marriages,
Combine your hearts in one, your realms in one!
As man and wife, being two, are one in love,
So be there 'twixt your kingdoms such a spousal,
That never may ill office, or fell jealousy,

15 Which troubles oft the bed of blessed marriage,
Thrust in between the paction of these kingdoms,
To make divorce of their incorporate league;
That Englishmay as French, French Englishmen,
Receive each other!-God speak this Amen!
All. Amen!

Fr. King. We have consented to all terms of 20

reason.

K. Henry. Is't so, my lords of England? West. The king hath granted every article: His daughter, first; and then in sequel all, According to their firm proposed natures.

K. Henry. Prepare we for our marriage :-on which day,

My lord of Burgundy, we'll take your oath And all the peers', for surety of our leagues.→ 25 Then shall I swear to Kate, and you to me;And may our oaths well kept and prosp❜rous be! [Exeunt.

Exe. Only, he hath not yet subscribed this:—| Where your majesty demands,-That the king of France, having any occasion to write for matter of grant, shall name your highness in this form, and with this addition in French-Notre tres cher 30 filz Henry roy d'Angleterre, heretier de France : and thus in Latin,-Præclarissimus filius noster Henricus, rex Angliæ, & hæres Francia.

Fr. King. Yet this I have not, brother, so deny'd, But your request shall make me let it pass.

K. Henry. I pray you then, in love and dear
alliance,

Let that one article rank with the rest:
And, thereupon, give me your daughter.

35

Fr. King. Take her, fair son: and from her 40
blood raise up

Issue to me: that the contending kingdoms [pale
Of France and England, whose very shores look!

3

Enter Chorus.

Thus far, with rough, and all unable pen,
Our bending author hath pursu'd the story;
In little room confining mighty men,

Mangling by starts the full course of their glory.
Small time, but, in that small, most greatly liv'd
This star of England: fortune made his sword;
By which the world's best garden he atchiev'd,
And of it left his son imperial lord.
Henry the sixth, in infant bands crown'd king
Of France and England, did this king succeed;
Whose state so many had the managing,

That they lost France, and made his England
bleed:
[sake,
Which oft our stage hath shewn; and, for their
In your fair minds let this acceptance take.

That is, the application of this fable, the moral being the application of a fable. Meaning, by touching only on select parts.

* i. e. humble.

FIRST