Henry V (The Play, Historical Background and Analysis of the Character in the Play). William HazlittЧитать онлайн книгу.
smoothed on our way.
Then forth, dear countrymen! Let us deliver
Our puissance into the hand of God,
Putting it straight in expedition.
Cheerly to sea! The signs of war advance!
No king of England, if not king of France!
[Flourish.]
[Exeunt.]
SCENE III.
London. Before a tavern.
[Enter Pistol, Nym, Bardolph, Boy, and Hostess.]
HOSTESS.
Prithee, honey, sweet husband, let me bring thee to Staines.
PISTOL.
No; for my manly heart doth yearn.
Bardolph, be blithe; Nym, rouse thy vaunting veins;
Boy, bristle thy courage up; for Falstaff he is dead,
And we must yearn therefore.
BARDOLPH. Would I were with him, wheresome’er he is, either in heaven or in hell!
HOSTESS. Nay, sure, he’s not in hell. He’s in Arthur’s bosom, if ever man went to Arthur’s bosom. ‘A made a finer end and went away an it had been any christom child. ‘A parted even just between twelve and one, even at the turning o’ the tide: for after I saw him fumble with the sheets, and play with flowers, and smile upon his fingers’ ends, I knew there was but one way; for his nose was as sharp as a pen, and ‘a babbled of green fields. “How now, Sir John!” quoth I; “what, man! be o’ good cheer.” So ‘a cried out, “God, God, God!” three or four times. Now I, to comfort him, bid him ‘a should not think of God; I hop’d there was no need to trouble himself with any such thoughts yet. So ‘a bade me lay more clothes on his feet. I put my hand into the bed and felt them, and they were as cold as any stone; then I felt to his knees, [and they were as cold as any stone;] and so upward and upward, and all was as cold as any stone.
NYM.
They say he cried out of sack.
HOSTESS.
Ay, that ‘a did.
BARDOLPH.
And of women.
HOSTESS.
Nay, that ‘a did not.
BOY.
Yes, that ‘a did; and said they were devils incarnate.
HOSTESS.
‘A could never abide carnation; ‘twas a colour he never liked.
BOY.
‘A said once, the devil would have him about women.
HOSTESS. ‘A did in some sort, indeed, handle women; but then he was rheumatic, and talk’d of the whore of Babylon.
BOY. Do you not remember, ‘a saw a flea stick upon Bardolph’s nose, and ‘a said it was a black soul burning in hell-fire?
BARDOLPH. Well, the fuel is gone that maintain’d that fire. That’s all the riches I got in his service.
NYM.
Shall we shog? The King will be gone from Southampton.
PISTOL.
Come, let’s away. My love, give me thy lips.
Look to my chattels and my movables.
Let senses rule; the word is “Pitch and Pay.”
Trust none;
For oaths are straws, men’s faiths are wafer-cakes
And hold-fast is the only dog, my duck;
Therefore, Caveto be thy counsellor.
Go, clear thy crystals. Yokefellows in arms,
Let us to France; like horse-leeches, my boys,
To suck, to suck, the very blood to suck!
BOY.
And that’s but unwholesome food, they say.
PISTOL.
Touch her soft mouth, and march.
BARDOLPH.
Farewell, hostess.
[Kissing her.]
NYM.
I cannot kiss; that is the humour of it; but, adieu.
PISTOL.
Let housewifery appear. Keep close, I thee command.
HOSTESS.
Farewell; adieu.
[Exeunt.]
SCENE IV.
France. The King’s palace.
[Flourish. Enter the French King, the Dauphin, the Dukes of Berri and Bretagne [the Constable, and others.]
FRENCH KING.
Thus comes the English with full power upon us,
And more than carefully it us concerns
To answer royally in our defences.
Therefore the Dukes of Berri and of Bretagne,
Of Brabant and of Orleans, shall make forth,
And you, Prince Dauphin, with all swift dispatch,
To line and new repair our towns of war
With men of courage and with means defendant;
For England his approaches makes as fierce
As waters to the sucking of a gulf.
It fits us then to be as provident
As fears may teach us out of late examples
Left by the fatal and neglected English
Upon our fields.
DAUPHIN.
My most redoubted father,
It is most meet we arm us ‘gainst the foe;
For peace itself should not so dull a kingdom,
Though war nor no known quarrel were in question,
But that defences, musters, preparations,
Should be maintain’d, assembled, and collected,
As were a war in expectation.
Therefore, I say, ‘tis meet we all go forth
To view the sick and feeble parts of France.
And let us do it with no show of fear;
No, with no more than if we heard that England
Were busied with a Whitsun morris-dance;
For, my good liege, she is so idly king’d,
Her sceptre so fantastically borne
By a vain, giddy, shallow, humorous youth,
That fear attends her not.
CONSTABLE.
O peace, Prince Dauphin!
You are too much mistaken in this king.
Question your Grace the late ambassadors
With what great state he heard their embassy,
How well supplied with noble counsellors,
How modest in exception, and withal