Of that victorious stock: and let us fear
The native mightiness and fate of him7.

Enter a Messenger.

Mess. Ambassadors from Henry king of England Do crave admittance to your majesty.

Fr. King. We'll give them present audience.
Go, and bring them.

[Exeunt Mess. and certain Lords. You see, this chase is hotly follow'd, friends.

Dau. Turn head, and stop pursuit; for coward dogs Most spend their mouths, when what they seem to threaten,

Runs far before them. Good my sovereign,
Take up the English short; and let them know
Of what a monarchy you are the head;

Self-love, my liege, is not so vile a sin
As self-neglecting.

Re-enter Lords, with EXETER and Train.

Fr. King.

From our brother England?

Exe. From him; and thus he greets your majesty. He wills you, in the name of God Almighty, That you divest yourself, and lay apart The borrow'd glories, that, by gift of heaven, By law of nature, and of nations, 'long To him, and to his heirs; namely, the crown, And all wide-stretched honours that pertain, By custom and the ordinance of times,

Unto the crown of France. That you may know, 'Tis no sinister, nor no awkward claim,

Pick'd from the worm-holes of long-varnish'd days,

7 i.e. what is allotted him by destiny. Thus Virgil, speaking of the future deeds of the descendants of Æneas:

'Attollens humeris famamque et fata nepotem.'

8 i.e. bark; the sportsman's term.

Nor from the dust of old oblivion rak'd,
He sends
you this most memorable line9,

you

[Gives a paper.

In every branch truly demonstrative;
Willing you, overlook this pedigree;
And, when you find him evenly deriv'd
From his most fam'd of famous ancestors,
Edward the Third, he bids you
then resign
Your crown and kingdom, indirectly held
From him the native and true challenger.
Fr. King. Or else what follows?
Exe. Bloody constraint; for if
hide the crown
Even in your hearts, there will he rake for it;
And therefore in fierce tempest is he coming,
In thunder, and in earthquake, like a Jove:
(That, if requiring fail, he will compel);
And bids you, in the bowels of the Lord,
Deliver up the crown; and to take mercy
On the poor souls, for whom this hungry war
Opens his vasty jaws: and on your head
Turns he the widows' tears, the orphans' cries,
The dead men's blood, the pining maidens' groans,
For husbands, fathers, and betrothed lovers,
That shall be swallow'd in this controversy.
This is his claim, his threat'ning, and my message;
Unless the Dauphin be in presence here,
To whom expressly I bring greeting too.

Fr. King. For us, we will consider of this further: To-morrow shall you bear our full intent

Back to our brother England.

Dau. For the Dauphin, I stand here for him; What to him from England? Exe. Scorn, and defiance; slight regard, contempt, any thing that may not misbecome

And

'Memorable line;' this genealogy; this deduction of his

lineage.

The mighty sender, doth he prize you at.

Thus says my king: and, if your father's highness
Do not, in grant of all demands at large,
Sweeten the bitter mock you sent his majesty,
He'll call you to so hot an answer for it,
That caves and womby vaultages of France
Shall chide 10 your trespass, and return your mock

In second accent of his ordnance.

Dau. Say, if my father render fair reply,
It is against my will: for I desire
Nothing but odds with England; to that end,
As matching to his youth and vanity,

I did present him with those Paris balls.

Exe. He'll make your Paris Louvre shake for it, Were it the mistress court of mighty Europe: And, be assur'd, you'll find a difference (As we, his subjects, have in wonder found), Between the promise of his greener days, And these he masters now; now he weighs time, Even to the utmost grain; which you shall read In your own losses, if he stay in France.

Fr. King. To-morrow shall you know our mind at full.

Exe. Despatch us with all speed, lest that our king Come here himself to question our delay;

For he is footed in this land already.

Fr. King. You shall be soon despatch'd, with fair conditions:

A night is but small breath, and little pause,
To answer matters of this consequence.

[Exeunt.

10 Shall chide your trespass.' To chide is to resound, to echo; 'As doth a rock against the chiding flood.'

King Henry VIII.

ACT III.

Enter CHORUS.

Chor. Thus with imagin'd wing our swift scene flies, In motion of no less celerity

Than that of thought. Suppose, that you have seen
The well appointed king at Hampton pier1
Embark his royalty; and his brave fleet

With silken streamers the young Phœbus fanning.
Play with your fancies; and in them behold,
Upon the hempen tackle, ship-boys climbing:
Hear the shrill whistle, which doth order give
To sounds confus'd: behold the threaden sails,
Borne with the invisible and creeping wind,
Draw the huge bottoms through the furrow'd sea,
Breasting the lofty surge: O, do but think,
You stand upon the rivage, and behold
A city on the inconstant billows dancing;
For so appears this fleet majestical,

Holding due course to Harfleur. Follow, follow!
Grapple your minds to sternage3 of this navy;

The well appointed king at Hampton pier.' 'Well appointed,' that is, well furnished with all necessaries of war. Thus in King Henry VI. Part III.:—

And very well appointed, as I thought,

March'd towards Saint Albans.'

The old copies read Dover pier:' but the poet himself, and all accounts, and even the Chronicles which he followed, say that the king embarked at Southampton. A minute account still exists among the records of the town; and it is remarkable that a low level plain where the army encamped is now covered by the sea, and called Westport.

2 Rivage, the bank, or shore; rivage, Fr.

3 To sternage of this navy.' The stern, or sternage, being the hinder part of the ship. The meaning of this passage is Let your minds follow this navy.' The stern was anciently synonymous to rudder. The sterne of a ship, gubernaculum,'—Buret.

And leave your England, as dead midnight, still,
Guarded with grandsires, babies, and old women,
Either past, or not arriv'd to, pith and puissance:
For who is he, whose chin is but enrich'd
With one appearing hair, that will not follow
These cull'd and choice-drawn cavaliers to France?
Work, work, your thoughts, and therein see a siege:
Behold the ordnance on their carriages,

With fatal mouths gaping on girded Harfleur. Suppose, the ambassador from the French comes back;

Tells Harry-that the king doth offer him
Katharine his daughter; and with her, to dowry,
Some petty and unprofitable dukedoms.

The offer likes not: and the nimble gunner
With linstock now the devilish cannon touches,
[Alarum; and Chambers go off.
Still be kind,

And down goes all before them.
And eke out our performance with

your mind.

[Exit.

SCENE I. The same. Before Harfleur.

Alarums. Enter KING HENRy, Exeter, BedFORD, GLOSTER, and Soldiers, with Scaling Ladders.

K. Hen. Once more unto the breach, dear friends,

once more;

Or close the wall up with our English dead!

In

peace, there's nothing so becomes a man, As modest stillness and humility:

But when the blast of war blows in our ears,

4 Linstock' is here put for a match; but it was, strictly speaking, the staff to which the match for firing ordnance was fixed.

5 Chambers,' small pieces of ordnance. See King Henry VIII. Act i. Sc. 3.