Boy. He gives you, upon his knees, a thousand thanks: and he esteems himself happy that he hath fallen into the hands of (as he thinks) the most brave, valorous, and thrice-worthy signieur of England.

Pist. As I suck blood, I will some mercy show.— Follow me, cur. [Exit PISTOL.

Boy. Suivez-vous le grand capitaine.

[Exit French Soldier. I did never know so full a voice issue from so empty a heart: but the saying is true,-The empty vessel makes the greatest sound. Bardolph, and Nym, had ten times more valour than this roaring devil i'the old play, that every one may pare his nails with a wooden dagger; and they are both hanged; and so would this be, if he durst steal any thing adventurously. I must stay with the lackeys, with the luggage of our camp: the French might have a good prey of us, if he knew of it; for there is none to guard it, but boys. [Exit.

SCENE V.

Another Part of the Field of Battle.

Alarums.

Enter Dauphin, ORLEANS, BOUrbon, Constable, RAMBURES, and Others.

Con. O diable!

Orl. O seigneur !—le jour est perdu, tout est perdu! this roaring devil i'the old play, that every one may pare his nails with a wooden dagger.' See note on Twelfth Night, Act iv. Sc. 2. In the old play of The Taming of a Shrew, one of the players says My lord, we must have a little vinegar to make our devil roar.' Ho! ho! and Ah! ha! seem to have been the exclamations constantly given to the devil, who is, in the old mysteries, as turbulent and vainglorious as Pistol. The Vice or fool, among other indignities, used to threaten to pare his nails with his dagger of lath; the devil being supposed from choice to keep his claws long and sharp. Thus in Camden's Remaines, 1615:

'I will follow mine own minde and mine old trade,
Who shall let me? The devil's nailes are unpar'd.'

Dau. Mort de ma vie! all is confounded, all!
Reproach and everlasting shame

Sits mocking in our plumes.-O meschante fortune!—
Do not run away.
[A short Alarum.
Con.
Why, all our ranks are broke.
Dau. O perdurable shame!—let's stab ourselves.
Be these the wretches that we play'd at dice for?
Orl. Is this the king we sent to for his ransome?
Bour. Shame, and eternal shame, nothing but
shame!

Let us die in fight1: Once more back again;
And he that will not follow Bourbon now,

Let him go hence, and, with his cap in hand,
Like a base pander, hold the chamber-door,
Whilst by a slave, no gentler than my dog,
His fairest daughter is contaminate.

Con. Disorder, that hath spoil'd us, friend us now! Let us, in heaps, go offer up our lives

Unto these English, or else die with fame 3.
Orl. We are enough, yet living in the field,
To smother up the English in our throngs,
If any order might be thought upon.

Bour. The devil take order now! I'll to the throng; Let life be short; else, shame will be too long.

[Exeunt.

SCENE VI. Another Part of the Field.

Alarums. Enter KING HENRY and Forces; ExETER, and Others.

K. Hen. Well have we done, thrice-valiant countrymen :

But all's not done, yet keep the French the field.

The old copy wants the word fight, which was supplied by Malone. Theobald proposed let us die instant,' which Steevens adopted.

2 i. e. who has no more gentility.

3 This line is from the quartos.

Exe. The duke of York commends him to your

majesty.

K. Hen. Lives he, good uncle? thrice, within this hour,

I saw him down; thrice up again, and fighting;
From helmet to the spur, all blood he was.

Exe. In which array (brave soldier) doth he lie,
Larding the plain: and by his bloody side,
(Yoke fellow to his honour-owing wounds)
The noble earl of Suffolk also lies.

Suffolk first died, and York, all haggled over,
Comes to him, where in gore he lay insteep'd,
And takes him by the beard; kisses the gashes,
That bloodily did yawn upon his face;

And cries aloud,-Tarry, dear cousin Suffolk! ·
My soul shall thine keep company to heaven:
Tarry, sweet soul, for mine, then fly abreast;
As, in this glorious and well foughten field,
We kept together in our chivalry!

Upon these words I came, and cheer'd him up:
He smil❜d me in the face, raught1 me his hand,
And, with a feeble gripe, says,-Dear my lord,
Commend my service to my sovereign.

So did he turn, and over Suffolk's neck

He threw his wounded arm, and kiss'd his lips :
And so, espous'd to death, with blood he seal'd
A testament of noble-ending love.

The pretty and sweet manner of it forc'd

Those waters from me, which I would have stopp'd:

But I had not so much of man in me,

But all my mother came into mine eyes,

And gave me up to tears.

1 i. e. reached.

2

But all my mother came into my eyes,
And gave me up to tears.'

Thus the quarto. The folio reads And all,' &c. But has here

I blame you

not;

K. Hen.
For, hearing this, I must perforce compound
With mistful eyes, or they will issue too.—

[Alarum.

But, hark! what new alarum is this same?
The French have reinforc'd their scatter'd men:
Then every soldier kill his prisoners;
Give the word through.

[Exeunt.

SCENE VII. Another Part of the Field.

Alarums. Enter FLUELLEN and GOWER. Flu. Kill the poys and the luggage! 'tis expressly against the law of arms: 'tis as arrant a piece of knavery, mark you now, as can be offered in the 'orld: In your conscience now, is it not?

Gow. 'Tis certain, there's not a boy left alive; and the cowardly rascals, that ran from the battle, have done this slaughter: besides, they have burned and carried away all that was in the king's tent; wherefore the king, most worthily, hath caused every soldier to cut his prisoner's throat1. O, 'tis a gallant king!

Flu. Ay, he was porn at Monmouth, captain the force of but that. This thought was apparently in Milton's mind in the following passage, Paradise Lost, book ix:

His best of man, and gave him up to tears.'

And Dryden in his All for Love, Act i:

'I have not wept this forty years; but now
My mother comes afresh into my eyes,

I cannot help her softness.'

1 Caused every soldier to cut his prisoner's throat.' The king killed his prisoners (says Johnson) because he expected another battle, and he had not sufficient men to guard one army and fight another. Gower's reason is as we see different. Shakspeare followed Holinshed, who gives both reasons for Henry's conduct, but has chosen to make the king mention one of them and Gower the other.

Gower: What call you the town's name, where Alexander the pig was born?

Gow. Alexander the great.

Flu. Why, I pray you, is not pig, great? The pig, or the great, or the mighty, or the huge, or the magnanimous, are all one reckonings, save the phrase is a little variations.

Gow. I think, Alexander the great was born in Macedon; his father was called-Philip of Macedon, as I take it.

Flu. I think, it is in Macedon, where Alexander is porn. I tell you, captain,-If you look in the maps of the 'orld, I warrant, you shall find, in the comparisons between Macedon and Monmouth, that the situations, look you, is both alike. There is a river in Macedon; and there is also moreover a river at Monmouth: it is called Wye, at Monmouth: but it is out of my prains, what is the name of the other river; but 'tis all one, 'tis so like as my fingers is to my fingers, and there is salmons in both. If you mark Alexander's life well, Harry of Monmouth's life is come after it indifferent well; for there is figures in all things. Alexander (God knows, and you know), in his rages, and his furies, and his wraths, and his cholers, and his moods, and his displeasures, and his indignations, and also being a little intoxicates in his prains, did, in his ales and his angers, look you, kill his pest friend, Clytus.

Gow. Our king is not like him in that; he never killed any of his friends.

Flu. It is not well done, mark you now, to take tales out of my mouth, ere it is made an end and finished. I speak but in the figures and comparisons of it: As Alexander is kill his friend Clytus,

2 As Alexander,' &c. Steevens thinks that Shakspeare here ridicules the parallels of Plutarch, he appears to have been well read in Sir Thomas North's Translation.