Act III, Scene 7

The French camp, near Agincourt:

[Enter the Constable of France, the LORD RAMBURES,] [p]ORLEANS, DAUPHIN, with others]

• Constable of France. Tut! I have the best armour of the world. Would it were day!

• Duke of Orleans. You have an excellent armour; but let my horse have his due. 1645

• Constable of France. It is the best horse of Europe.

• Duke of Orleans. Will it never be morning?

• Lewis the Dauphin. My lord of Orleans, and my lord high constable, you
  talk of horse and armour?

• Duke of Orleans. You are as well provided of both as any prince in the world. 1650

• Lewis the Dauphin. What a long night is this! I will not change my
  horse with any that treads but on four pasterns.
  Ca, ha! he bounds from the earth, as if his
  entrails were hairs; le cheval volant, the Pegasus,
  chez les narines de feu! When I bestride him, I 1655
  soar, I am a hawk: he trots the air; the earth
  sings when he touches it; the basest horn of his
  hoof is more musical than the pipe of Hermes.

• Duke of Orleans. He's of the colour of the nutmeg.

• Lewis the Dauphin. And of the heat of the ginger. It is a beast for 1660
  Perseus: he is pure air and fire; and the dull
  elements of earth and water never appear in him, but
  only in Patient stillness while his rider mounts
  him: he is indeed a horse; and all other jades you
  may call beasts. 1665

• Constable of France. Indeed, my lord, it is a most absolute and excellent horse.

• Lewis the Dauphin. It is the prince of palfreys; his neigh is like the
  bidding of a monarch and his countenance enforces homage.

• Duke of Orleans. No more, cousin.

• Lewis the Dauphin. Nay, the man hath no wit that cannot, from the 1670
  rising of the lark to the lodging of the lamb, vary
  deserved praise on my palfrey: it is a theme as
  fluent as the sea: turn the sands into eloquent
  tongues, and my horse is argument for them all:
  'tis a subject for a sovereign to reason on, and for 1675
  a sovereign's sovereign to ride on; and for the
  world, familiar to us and unknown to lay apart
  their particular functions and wonder at him. I
  once writ a sonnet in his praise and began thus:
  'Wonder of nature,'— 1680

• Duke of Orleans. I have heard a sonnet begin so to one's mistress.

• Lewis the Dauphin. Then did they imitate that which I composed to my
  courser, for my horse is my mistress.

• Duke of Orleans. Your mistress bears well.

• Lewis the Dauphin. Me well; which is the prescript praise and 1685
  perfection of a good and particular mistress.

• Constable of France. Nay, for methought yesterday your mistress shrewdly
  shook your back.

• Lewis the Dauphin. So perhaps did yours.

• Constable of France. Mine was not bridled. 1690

• Lewis the Dauphin. O then belike she was old and gentle; and you rode,
  like a kern of Ireland, your French hose off, and in
  your straight strossers.

• Constable of France. You have good judgment in horsemanship.

• Lewis the Dauphin. Be warned by me, then: they that ride so and ride 1695
  not warily, fall into foul bogs. I had rather have
  my horse to my mistress.

• Constable of France. I had as lief have my mistress a jade.

• Lewis the Dauphin. I tell thee, constable, my mistress wears his own hair.

• Constable of France. I could make as true a boast as that, if I had a sow 1700
  to my mistress.

• Lewis the Dauphin. 'Le chien est retourne a son propre vomissement, et
  la truie lavee au bourbier;' thou makest use of any thing.

• Constable of France. Yet do I not use my horse for my mistress, or any
  such proverb so little kin to the purpose. 1705

• Rambures. My lord constable, the armour that I saw in your tent
  to-night, are those stars or suns upon it?

• Constable of France. Stars, my lord.

• Lewis the Dauphin. Some of them will fall to-morrow, I hope.

• Constable of France. And yet my sky shall not want. 1710

• Lewis the Dauphin. That may be, for you bear a many superfluously, and
  'twere more honour some were away.

• Constable of France. Even as your horse bears your praises; who would
  trot as well, were some of your brags dismounted.

• Lewis the Dauphin. Would I were able to load him with his desert! Will 1715
  it never be day? I will trot to-morrow a mile, and
  my way shall be paved with English faces.

• Constable of France. I will not say so, for fear I should be faced out of
  my way: but I would it were morning; for I would
  fain be about the ears of the English. 1720

• Rambures. Who will go to hazard with me for twenty prisoners?

• Constable of France. You must first go yourself to hazard, ere you have them.

• Lewis the Dauphin. 'Tis midnight; I'll go arm myself.

[Exit]

• Duke of Orleans. The Dauphin longs for morning. 1725

• Rambures. He longs to eat the English.

• Constable of France. I think he will eat all he kills.

• Duke of Orleans. By the white hand of my lady, he's a gallant prince.

• Constable of France. Swear by her foot, that she may tread out the oath.

• Duke of Orleans. He is simply the most active gentleman of France. 1730

• Constable of France. Doing is activity; and he will still be doing.

• Duke of Orleans. He never did harm, that I heard of.

• Constable of France. Nor will do none to-morrow: he will keep that good name still.

• Duke of Orleans. I know him to be valiant.

• Constable of France. I was told that by one that knows him better than 1735
  you.

• Duke of Orleans. What's he?

• Constable of France. Marry, he told me so himself; and he said he cared
  not who knew it

• Duke of Orleans. He needs not; it is no hidden virtue in him. 1740

• Constable of France. By my faith, sir, but it is; never any body saw it
  but his lackey: 'tis a hooded valour; and when it
  appears, it will bate.

• Duke of Orleans. Ill will never said well.

• Constable of France. I will cap that proverb with 'There is flattery in friendship.' 1745

• Duke of Orleans. And I will take up that with 'Give the devil his due.'

• Constable of France. Well placed: there stands your friend for the
  devil: have at the very eye of that proverb with 'A
  pox of the devil.'

• Duke of Orleans. You are the better at proverbs, by how much 'A 1750
  fool's bolt is soon shot.'

• Constable of France. You have shot over.

• Duke of Orleans. 'Tis not the first time you were overshot.

[Enter a Messenger]

• Messenger. My lord high constable, the English lie within 1755
  fifteen hundred paces of your tents.

• Constable of France. Who hath measured the ground?

• Messenger. The Lord Grandpre.

• Constable of France. A valiant and most expert gentleman. Would it were
  day! Alas, poor Harry of England! he longs not for 1760
  the dawning as we do.

• Duke of Orleans. What a wretched and peevish fellow is this king of
  England, to mope with his fat-brained followers so
  far out of his knowledge!

• Constable of France. If the English had any apprehension, they would run away. 1765

• Duke of Orleans. That they lack; for if their heads had any
  intellectual armour, they could never wear such heavy
  head-pieces.

• Rambures. That island of England breeds very valiant
  creatures; their mastiffs are of unmatchable courage. 1770

• Duke of Orleans. Foolish curs, that run winking into the mouth of a
  Russian bear and have their heads crushed like
  rotten apples! You may as well say, that's a
  valiant flea that dare eat his breakfast on the lip of a lion.

• Constable of France. Just, just; and the men do sympathize with the 1775
  mastiffs in robustious and rough coming on, leaving
  their wits with their wives: and then give them
  great meals of beef and iron and steel, they will
  eat like wolves and fight like devils.

• Duke of Orleans. Ay, but these English are shrewdly out of beef. 1780

• Constable of France. Then shall we find to-morrow they have only stomachs
  to eat and none to fight. Now is it time to arm:
  come, shall we about it?

• Duke of Orleans. It is now two o'clock: but, let me see, by ten
  We shall have each a hundred Englishmen. 1785

[Exeunt]