Act III, Scene 6

The English camp in Picardy.

[Enter GOWER and FLUELLEN, meeting]

• Gower. How now, Captain Fluellen! come you from the bridge?

• Fluellen. I assure you, there is very excellent services
  committed at the bridge.

• Gower. Is the Duke of Exeter safe? 1465

• Fluellen. The Duke of Exeter is as magnanimous as Agamemnon;
  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
  blessed!—any hurt in the world; but keeps the 1470
  bridge most valiantly, with excellent discipline.
  There is an aunchient 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 did see him do as 1475
  gallant service.

• Gower. What do you call him?

• Fluellen. He is called Aunchient Pistol.

• Gower. I know him not.

[Enter PISTOL]

• Fluellen. Here is the man.

• Pistol. Captain, I thee beseech to do me favours:
  The Duke of Exeter doth love thee well.

• Fluellen. Ay, I praise God; and I have merited some love at
  his hands. 1485

• Pistol. 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— 1490

• Fluellen. By your patience, Aunchient Pistol. Fortune is
  painted blind, with a muffler afore her eyes, to
  signify to you that Fortune is blind; and she is
  painted also with a wheel, to signify to you, which
  is the moral of it, that she is turning, and 1495
  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. 1500

• Pistol. Fortune is Bardolph's foe, and frowns on him;
  For he hath stolen a pax, and hanged must a' be:
  A damned death!
  Let gallows gape for dog; let man go free
  And let not hemp his wind-pipe suffocate: 1505
  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: 1510
  Speak, captain, for his life, and I will thee requite.

• Fluellen. Aunchient Pistol, I do partly understand your meaning.

• Pistol. Why then, rejoice therefore.

• Fluellen. Certainly, aunchient, it is not a thing to rejoice
  at: for if, look you, he were my brother, I would 1515
  desire the duke to use his good pleasure, and put
  him to execution; for discipline ought to be used.

• Pistol. Die and be damn'd! and figo for thy friendship!

• Fluellen. It is well.

• Pistol. The fig of Spain! 1520

[Exit]

• Fluellen. Very good.

• Gower. Why, this is an arrant counterfeit rascal; I
  remember him now; a bawd, a cutpurse.

• Fluellen. I'll assure you, a' uttered as brave words at the 1525
  bridge 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.

• Gower. Why, 'tis a gull, a fool, a rogue, that now and then
  goes to the wars, to grace himself at his return 1530
  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 1535
  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: and what
  a beard of the general's cut and a horrid suit of
  the camp will do among foaming bottles and 1540
  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.

• Fluellen. I tell you what, Captain Gower; I do perceive he is
  not the man that he would gladly make show to the 1545
  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. 1550
  [Drum and colours. Enter KING HENRY, GLOUCESTER, and Soldiers]
  God pless your majesty!

• Henry V. How now, Fluellen! camest thou from the bridge?

• Fluellen. Ay, so please your majesty. The Duke of Exeter has
  very gallantly maintained the pridge: the French is 1555
  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 1560
  prave man.

• Henry V. What men have you lost, Fluellen?

• Fluellen. 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 1565
  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 o'
  fire: and his lips blows at his nose, and it is like
  a coal of fire, sometimes plue and sometimes red; 1570
  but his nose is executed and his fire's out.

• Henry V. 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 1575
  French upbraided or abused in disdainful language;
  for when lenity and cruelty play for a kingdom, the
  gentler gamester is the soonest winner.

[Tucket. Enter MONTJOY]

• Montjoy. You know me by my habit. 1580

• Henry V. Well then I know thee: what shall I know of thee?

• Montjoy. My master's mind.

• Henry V. Unfold it.

• Montjoy. Thus says my king: Say thou to Harry of England:
  Though we seemed dead, we did but sleep: advantage 1585
  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 1590
  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 disgrace we have digested; which in
  weight to re-answer, his pettiness would bow under. 1595
  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 1600
  tell him, for conclusion, he hath betrayed his
  followers, whose condemnation is pronounced. So far
  my king and master; so much my office.

• Henry V. What is thy name? I know thy quality.

• Montjoy. Montjoy. 1605

• Henry V. 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 1610
  Unto an enemy of craft and vantage,
  My people are with sickness much enfeebled,
  My numbers lessened, and those few I have
  Almost no better than so many French;
  Who when they were in health, I tell thee, herald, 1615
  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; 1620
  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. 1625
  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: 1630
  We would not seek a battle, as we are;
  Nor, as we are, we say we will not shun it:
  So tell your master.

• Montjoy. I shall deliver so. Thanks to your highness.

[Exit]

• Duke of Gloucester. I hope they will not come upon us now.

• Henry V. 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. 1640

[Exeunt]