Текст книги "William Shakespeare: The Complete Works 2nd Edition"

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5.5 Flourish. Enter King Edward, Richard Duke of Gloucester, and George Duke of Clarence with Queen Margaret, the Earl of Oxford, and the Duke of Somerset, guarded

KING EDWARD

Now here a period of tumultuous broils.

Away with Oxford to Hames Castle straight;

For Somerset, off with his guilty head.

Go bear them hence—I will not hear them speak.

OXFORD

For my part, I’ll not trouble thee with words.

Exit, guarded

SOMERSET

Nor I, but stoop with patience to my fortune.

Exit, guarded

QUEEN MARGARET

So part we sadly in this troublous world

To meet with joy in sweet Jerusalem.

KING EDWARD

Is proclamation made that who finds Edward

Shall have a high reward and he his life?

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER

It is, and lo where youthful Edward comes.

Enter Prince Edward, guarded

KING EDWARD

Bring forth the gallant—let us hear him speak.

What, can so young a thorn begin to prick?

Edward, what satisfaction canst thou make

For bearing arms, for stirring up my subjects,

And all the trouble thou hast turned me to?

PRINCE EDWARD

Speak like a subject, proud ambitious York.

Suppose that I am now my father’s mouth—

Resign thy chair, and where I stand, kneel thou,

Whilst I propose the self-same words to thee,

Which, traitor, thou wouldst have me answer to.

QUEEN MARGARET

Ah, that thy father had been so resolved.

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER

That you might still have worn the petticoat

And ne’er have stolen the breech from Lancaster.

PRINCE EDWARD

Let Aesop fable in a winter’s night—

His currish riddles sorts not with this place.

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER

By heaven, brat, I’ll plague ye for that word.

QUEEN MARGARET

Ay, thou wast born to be a plague to men.

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER

For God’s sake take away this captive scold.

PRINCE EDWARD

Nay, take away this scolding crookback rather.

KING EDWARD

Peace, wilful boy, or I will charm your tongue.

GEORGE OF CLARENCE (to Prince Edward)

Untutored lad, thou art too malapert.

PRINCE EDWARD

I know my duty—you are all undutiful.

Lascivious Edward, and thou, perjured George,

And thou, misshapen Dick—I tell ye all

I am your better, traitors as ye are,

And thou usurp’st my father’s right and mine.

KING EDWARD

Take that, the likeness of this railer here.

King Edward stabs Prince Edward

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER

Sprawl’st thou? Take that, to end thy agony.

Richard stabs Prince Edward

GEORGE OF CLARENCE

And there’s for twitting me with perjury.

George stabs Prince Edward, ⌈who dies⌉

QUEEN MARGARET

O, kill me too!

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER Marry, and shall.

He offers to kill her

KING EDWARD

Hold, Richard, hold—for we have done too much.

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER

Why should she live to fill the world with words?

Queen Margaret faints

KING EDWARD

What—doth she swoon? Use means for her recovery.

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER (aside to George)

Clarence, excuse me to the King my brother.

I’ll hence to London on a serious matter.

Ere ye come there, be sure to hear some news.

GEORGE OF CLARENCE (aside to Richard) What? What?

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER (aside to George)

The Tower, the Tower. Exit

QUEEN MARGARET

O Ned, sweet Ned—speak to thy mother, boy.

Canst thou not speak? O traitors, murderers!

They that stabbed Caesar shed no blood at all,

Did not offend, nor were not worthy blame,

If this foul deed were by to equal it.

He was a man—this, in respect, a child;

And men ne’er spend their fury on a child.

What’s worse than murderer that I may name it?

No, no, my heart will burst an if I speak;

And I will speak that so my heart may burst.

Butchers and villains! Bloody cannibals!

How sweet a plant have you untimely cropped!

You have no children, butchers; if you had,

The thought of them would have stirred up remorse.

But if you ever chance to have a child,

Look in his youth to have him so cut off

As, deathsmen, you have rid this sweet young Prince!

KING EDWARD

Away with her—go, bear her hence perforce.

QUEEN MARGARET

Nay, never bear me hence—dispatch me here.

Here sheathe thy sword—I’ll pardon thee my death.

What? Wilt thou not? Then, Clarence, do it thou.

GEORGE OF CLARENCE

By heaven, I will not do thee so much ease.

QUEEN MARGARET

Good Clarence, do; sweet Clarence, do thou do it.

GEORGE OF CLARENCE

Didst thou not hear me swear I would not do it?

QUEEN MARGARET

Ay, but thou usest to forswear thyself.

‘Twas sin before, but now ’tis charity.

What, wilt thou not? Where is that devil’s butcher,

Hard-favoured Richard? Richard, where art thou?

Thou art not here. Murder is thy atms-deed—

Petitioners for blood thou ne‘er putt’st back.

KING EDWARD

Away, I say—t charge ye, bear her hence.

QUEEN MARGARET

So come to you and yours as to this Prince!

Exit, guarded

KING EDWARD Where’s Richard gone?

GEORGE OF CLARENCE

To London all in post—⌈aside⌉ and as I guess,

To make a bloody supper in the Tower.

KING EDWARD

He’s sudden if a thing comes in his head.

Now march we hence. Discharge the common sort

With pay and thanks, and let’s away to London,

And see our gentle Queen how well she fares.

By this I hope she hath a son for me. Exeunt

5.6 Enter on the walls King Henry the Sixth, reading a book, Richard Duke of Gloucester, and the Lieutenant of the Tower

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER

Good day, my lord. What, at your book so hard?

KING HENRY

Ay, my good ford—‘my lord’, I should say, rather.

‘Tis sin to flatter; ‘good’ was little better.

‘Good Gloucester’ and ‘good devil’ were alike,

And both preposterous—therefore not ‘good lord’.

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER (to the Lieutenant)

Sirrah, leave us to ourselves. We must confer.

Exit Lieutenant

KING HENRY

So flies the reckless shepherd from the wolf;

So first the harmless sheep doth yield his fleece,

And next his throat unto the butcher’s knife.

What scene of death hath Roscius now to act?

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER

Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind;

The thief doth fear each bush an officer.

KING HENRY

The bird that hath been limèd in a bush

With trembling wings misdoubteth every bush.

And I, the hapless male to one sweet bird,

Have now the fatal object in my eye

Where my poor young was limed, was caught and

killed.

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER

Why, what a peevish fool was that of Crete,

That taught his son the office of a fowl!

And yet, for all his wings, the fool was drowned.

KING HENRY

I, Daedalus; my poor boy, Icarus;

Thy father, Minos, that denied our course;

The sun that seared the wings of my sweet boy,

Thy brother Edward; and thyself, the sea,

Whose envious gulf did swallow up his life.

Ah, kill me with thy weapon, not with words!

My breast can better brook thy dagger’s point

Than can my ears that tragic history.

But wherefore dost thou come? Is’t for my life?

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER

Think’st thou I am an executioner?

KING HENRY

A persecutor I am sure thou art;

If murdering innocents be executing,

Why, then thou art an executioner.

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER

Thy son I killed for his presumption.

KING HENRY

Hadst thou been killed when first thou didst presume,

Thou hadst not lived to kill a son of mine.

And thus I prophesy: that many a thousand

Which now mistrust no parcel of my fear,

And many an old man’s sigh, and many a widow‘s,

And many an orphan’s water-standing eye—

Men for their sons’, wives for their husbands‘,

Orphans for their parents’ timeless death—

Shall rue the hour that ever thou wast born.

The owl shrieked at thy birth—an evil sign;

The night-crow cried, aboding luckless time;

Dogs howled, and hideous tempests shook down trees;

The raven rooked her on the chimney’s top;

And chatt’ring pies in dismal discords sung.

Thy mother felt more than a mother’s pain,

And yet brought forth less than a mother’s hope—

To wit, an indigested and deformed lump,

Not like the fruit of such a goodly tree.

Teeth hadst thou in thy head when thou wast born,

To signify thou cam‘st to bite the world;

And if the rest be true which I have heard

Thou cam’st—

RICHARD

I’ll hear no more. Die, prophet, in thy speech,

He stabs him

For this, amongst the rest, was I ordained.

KING HENRY

Ay, and for much more slaughter after this.

O, God forgive my sins, and pardon thee. He dies

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER

What—will the aspiring blood of Lancaster

Sink in the ground? I thought it would have mounted.

See how my sword weeps for the poor King’s death.

O, may such purple tears be alway shed

From those that wish the downfall of our house!

If any spark of life be yet remaining,

Down, down to hell, and say I sent thee thither—

He stabs him again

I that have neither pity, love, nor fear.

Indeed, ‘tis true that Henry told me of,

For I have often heard my mother say

I came into the world with my legs forward.

Had I not reason, think ye, to make haste,

And seek their ruin that usurped our right?

The midwife wondered and the women cried

‘O, Jesus bless us, he is born with teeth !—

And so I was, which plainly signified

That I should snarl and bite and play the dog.

Then, since the heavens have shaped my body so,

Let hell make crooked my mind to answer it.

I had no father, I am like no father;

I have no brother, I am like no brother;

And this word, ‘love’, which greybeards call divine,

Be resident in men like one another

And not in me—I am myself alone.

Clarence, beware; thou kept’st me from the light—

But I will sort a pitchy day for thee.

For I will buzz abroad such prophecies

That Edward shall be fearful of his life,

And then, to purge his fear, I’ll be thy death.

Henry and his son are gone; thou, Clarence, art next;

And by one and one I will dispatch the rest,

Counting myself but bad till I be best.

I’ll throw thy body in another room

And triumph, Henry, in thy day of doom.

Exit with the body

5.7 ⌈A chair of state.⌉ Flourish. Enter King Edward, Lady Gray his Queen, George Duke off Clarence, Richard Duke of Gloucester, the Lord Hastings, a nurse carrying the infant Prince Edward, and attendants

KING EDWARD

Once more we sit in England’s royal throne,

Repurchased with the blood of enemies.

What valiant foemen, like to autumn’s corn,

Have we mowed down in tops of all their pride!

Three dukes of Somerset, threefold renowned

For hardy and undoubted champions;

Two Cliffords, as the father and the son;

And two Northumbertands—two braver men

Ne’er spurred their coursers at the trumpet’s sound.

With them, the two brave bears, Warwick and

Montague,

That in their chains fettered the kingly lion

And made the forest tremble when they roared.

Thus have we swept suspicion from our seat

And made our footstool of security.

(To Lady Gray)

Come hither, Bess, and let me kiss my boy.

The nurse brings forth the infant prince. King Edward kisses him

Young Ned, for thee, thine uncles and myself

Have in our armours watched the winter’s night,

Went all afoot in summer’s scalding heat,

That thou mightst repossess the crown in peace;

And of our labours thou shalt reap the gain.

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER (aside)

I’ll blast his harvest, an your head were laid;

For yet I am not looked on in the world.

This shoulder was ordained so thick to heave;

And heave it shall some weight or break my back.

Work thou the way, and thou shalt execute.

KING EDWARD

Clarence and Gloucester, love my lovely queen;

And kiss your princely nephew, brothers, both.

GEORGE OF CLARENCE

The duty that I owe unto your majesty

I seal upon the lips of this sweet babe.

He kisses the infant prince

LADY GRAY

Thanks, noble Clarence—worthy brother, thanks.

RICHARD OF GLOUCESTER

And that I love the tree from whence thou sprang’st,

Witness the loving kiss I give the fruit.

He kisses the infant prince

(Aside) To say the truth, so Judas kissed his master,

And cried ‘All hail!’ whenas he meant all harm.

KING EDWARD

Now am I seated as my soul delights,

Having my country’s peace and brothers’ loves.

GEORGE OF CLARENCE

What will your grace have done with Margaret?

René her father, to the King of France

Hath pawned the Sicils and Jerusalem,

And hither have they sent it for her ransom.

KING EDWARD

Away with her, and waft her hence to France.

And now what rests but that we spend the time

With stately triumphs, mirthful comic shows,

Such as befits the pleasure of the court?

Sound drums and trumpets—fareweti, sour annoy!

For here, I hope, begins our lasting joy.

⌈Flourish.⌉ Exeunt

ADDITIONAL PASSAGES

A. Our edition adopts the 1595 version of 1.1.120-5 in the belief that it reflects an authorial revision; an edited text of the Folio alternative follows.

KING HENRY

Peace, thou—and give King Henry leave to speak.

WARWICK

Plantagenet shall speak first—hear him, lords,

And be you silent and attentive too,

For he that interrupts him shall not live.

KING HENRY ⌈to York⌉

Think’st thou that I will leave my kingly throne,

B. The 1595 text abridges 5.4.82.1-5.5.17, and may reflect authorial revision. An edited text of the abridged passage follows:

ALL THE LANCASTER PARTY

Saint George for Lancaster!

Alarums to the battle. ⌈The house of⌉ York flies, then the chambers are discharged. Then enter King Edward, George of Clarence, and Richard of Gloucester, and their followers: they make a great shout, and cry ‘For York! For York!’ Then Queen Margaret, Prince Edward, Oxford and Somerset are all taken prisoner. Flourish, and enter all again

KING EDWARD

Now here a period of tumultuous broils.

Away with Oxford to Hames Castle straight;

For Somerset, off with his guilty head.

Go, bear them hence—I will not hear them speak.

OXFORD

For my part, I’ll not trouble thee with words.

Exit, guarded

SOMERSET

Nor I, but stoop with patience to my death.

Exit, guarded

KING EDWARD (to Prince Edward)

Edward, what satisfaction canst thou make

For stirring up my subjects to rebellion?

PRINCE EDWARD

Speak like a subject, proud ambitious York.

HENRY VI PART ONE

BY WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE AND OTHERS

THE play printed here first appeared in the 1623 Folio, as The First Part of Henry VI; it tells the beginning of the story that is continued in The First Part of the Contention and in Richard Duke of York. Although in narrative sequence it belongs before those plays, there is good reason to believe that it was written after them. It is probably the ‘new’ play referred to as ‘harey the vj’ in the record of its performance on 3 March 1592 by Lord Strange’s Men. The box-office takings of £3 16s. 8d. were a record for the season, and the play was acted another fifteen times during the following ten months. Its success is mentioned in Thomas Nashe’s satirical pamphlet Piers Penniless, published later in 1592. Defending the drama against moralistic attacks, Nashe claims that plays based on ‘our English chronicles’ celebrate ‘our forefathers’ valiant acts’ and set them up as a ‘reproof to these degenerate effeminate days of ours’. By way of illustration he alludes specifically to the exploits of Lord Talbot, the principal English warrior in Henry VI Part One: ‘How would it have joyed brave Talbot, the terror of the French, to think that after he had lain two hundred years in his tomb he should triumph again on the stage, and have his bones new-embalmed with the tears of ten thousand spectators at least, at several times, who in the tragedian that represents his person imagine they behold him fresh bleeding!’ Nashe may have had personal reasons to puff this play: a variety of evidence suggests that Shakespeare wrote it in collaboration with at least two other authors; Nashe himself was probably responsible for Act 1. The passages most confidently attributed to Shakespeare are Act 2, Scene 4 and Act 4, Scene 2 to the death of Talbot at 4.7.32.

A mass of material, some derived from ‘English chronicles’, some invented, is packed into this play. It opens impressively with the funeral of Henry V, celebrated for unifying England and subjugating France; but his nobles are at loggerheads even over his coffin, and news rapidly arrives of serious losses in France. The rivalry displayed here between Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester—Protector of the infant Henry VI—and Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Winchester, plays an important part in both this play and The Contention, as does the conflict between Richard, Duke of York, and the houses of Somerset and Suffolk; in the Temple Garden scene (2.4), invented by Shakespeare, York’s and Somerset’s supporters symbolize their respective loyalties by plucking white and red roses. Their dissension weakens England’s military strength, but she has a great hero in Lord Talbot, whose nobility as a warrior is pitted against the treachery of the French, led by King Charles and Joan la Pucelle (Joan of Arc), here—following the chronicles—portrayed as a witch and a whore. Historical facts are freely manipulated: Joan was burnt in 1431, though the play’s authors have her take part in a battle of 1451 in which Talbot’s death is brought forward by two years. The play ends with an uneasy peace between England and France.

THE PERSONS OF THE PLAY

The English

KING Henry VI

Duke of GLOUCESTER, Lord Protector, uncle of King Henry

Duke of BEDFORD, Regent of France

Duke of EXETER

Bishop of WINCHESTER (later Cardinal), uncle of King Henry

Duke of SOMERSET

RICHARD PLANTAGENET, later DUKE OF YORK, and Regent of France

Earl of WARWICK

Earl of SALISBURY

Earl of SUFFOLK

Lord TALBOT

JOHN Talbot

Edmund MORTIMER

Sir William GLASDALE

Sir Thomas GARGRAVE

Sir John FASTOLF

Sir William LUCY

WOODVILLE, Lieutenant of the Tower of London

MAYOR of London

VERNON

BASSET

A LAWYER

A LEGATE

Messengers, warders and keepers of the Tower of London, servingmen, officers, captains, soldiers, herald, watch

The French

CHARLES, Dauphin of France

RENÉ, Duke of Anjou, King of Naples

MARGARET, his daughter

Duke of ALENÇON

BASTARD of Orléans

Duke of BURGUNDY, uncle of King Henry

GENERAL of the French garrison at Bordeaux

COUNTESS of Auvergne

MASTER GUNNER of Orléans

A BOY, his son

JOAN la Pucelle

A SHEPHERD, father of Joan

Porter, French sergeant, French sentinels, French scout, French herald, the Governor of Paris, fiends, and soldiers

The First Part of Henry the Sixth

1.1 Dead march. Enter the funeral of King Henry the Fifth, attended on by the Duke of Bedford (Regent of France), the Duke of Gloucester (Protector), the Duke of Exeter, the Earl of Warwick, the Bishop of Winchester, and the Duke of Somerset

BEDFORD

Hung be the heavens with black! Yield, day, to night!

Comets, importing change of times and states,

Brandish your crystal tresses in the sky,

And with them scourge the bad revolting stars

That have consented unto Henry’s death—

King Henry the Fifth, too famous to live long.

England ne’er lost a king of so much worth.

GLOUCESTER

England ne‘er had a king until his time.

Virtue he had, deserving to command.

His brandished sword did blind men with his beams.

His arms spread wider than a dragon’s wings.

His sparkling eyes, replete with wrathful fire,

More dazzled and drove back his enemies

Than midday sun, fierce bent against their faces.

What should I say? His deeds exceed all speech.

He ne’er lift up his hand but conquered.

EXETER

We mourn in black; why mourn we not in blood?

Henry is dead, and never shall revive.

Upon a wooden coffin we attend,

And death’s dishonourable victory

We with our stately presence glorify,

Like captives bound to a triumphant car.

What, shall we curse the planets of mishap,

That plotted thus our glory’s overthrow?

Or shall we think the subtle-witted French

Conjurers and sorcerers, that, afraid of him,

By magic verses have contrived his end?

WINCHESTER

He was a king blest of the King of Kings.

Unto the French, the dreadful judgement day

So dreadful will not be as was his sight.

The battles of the Lord of Hosts he fought.

The Church’s prayers made him so prosperous.

GLOUCESTER

The Church? Where is it? Had not churchmen prayed,

His thread of life had not so soon decayed.

None do you like but an effeminate prince,

Whom like a schoolboy you may overawe.

WINCHESTER

Gloucester, whate’er we like, thou art Protector,

And lookest to command the Prince and realm.

Thy wife is proud: she holdeth thee in awe,

More than God or religious churchmen may.

GLOUCESTER

Name not religion, for thou lov‘st the flesh,

And ne’er throughout the year to church thou go’st,

Except it be to pray against thy foes.

BEDFORD

Cease, cease these jars, and rest your minds in peace.

Let’s to the altar. Heralds, wait on us.

⌈Exeunt Warwick, Somerset, and heralds with coffin⌉

Instead of gold, we’ll offer up our arms—

Since arms avail not, now that Henry’s dead.

Posterity, await for wretched years,

When, at their mothers’ moistened eyes, babes shall suck,

Our isle be made a marish of salt tears,

And none but women left to wail the dead.

Henry the Fifth, thy ghost I invocate:

Prosper this realm; keep it from civil broils;

Combat with adverse planets in the heavens.

A far more glorious star thy soul will make

Than Julius Caesar or bright—

Enter a Messenger

MESSENGER

My honourable lords, health to you all.

Sad tidings bring I to you out of France,

Of loss, of slaughter, and discomfiture.

Guyenne, Compiegne, Rouen, Rheims, Orléans,

Paris, Gisors, Poitiers are all quite lost.

BEDFORD

What sayst thou, man, before dead Henry’s corpse?

Speak softly, or the loss of those great towns

Will make him burst his lead and rise from death.

GLOUCESTER (to the Messenger)

Is Paris lost? Is Rouen yielded up?

If Henry were recalled to life again,

These news would cause him once more yield the ghost.

EXETER (to the Messenger)

How were they lost? What treachery was used?

MESSENGER

No treachery, but want of men and money.

Amongst the soldiers this is mutterèd:

That here you maintain several factions,

And whilst a field should be dispatched and fought,

You are disputing of your generals.

One would have ling’ring wars, with little cost;

Another would fly swift, but wanteth wings;

A third thinks, without expense at all,

By guileful fair words peace may be obtained.

Awake, awake, English nobility!

Let not sloth dim your honours new-begot.

Cropped are the flower-de-luces in your arms;

Of England’s coat, one half is cut away. ⌈Exit⌉

EXETER

Were our tears wanting to this funeral,

These tidings would call forth her flowing tides.

BEDFORD

Me they concern; Regent I am of France.

Give me my steeled coat. I’ll fight for France.

Away with these disgraceful wailing robes!

⌈He removes his mourning robe

Wounds will I lend the French, instead of eyes,

To weep their intermissive miseries.

Enter to them another Messenger with letters

SECOND MESSENGER

Lords, view these letters, full of bad mischance.

France is revolted from the English quite,

Except some petty towns of no import.

The Dauphin Charles is crowned king in Rheims;

The Bastard of Orléans with him is joined;

René, Duke of Anjou, doth take his part;

The Duke of Alençon flyeth to his side. Exit

EXETER

The Dauphin crowned King? All fly to him?

O whither shall we fly from this reproach?

GLOUCESTER

We will not fly, but to our enemies’ throats.

Bedford, if thou be slack, I’ll fight it out.

BEDFORD

Gloucester, why doubt’st thou of my forwardness?

An army have I mustered in my thoughts,

Wherewith already France is overrun.

Enter another Messenger

THIRD MESSENGER

My gracious lords, to add to your laments,

Wherewith you now bedew King Henry’s hearse,

I must inform you of a dismal fight

Betwixt the stout Lord Talbot and the French.

WINCHESTER

What, wherein Talbot overcame—is’t so?

THIRD MESSENGER

O no, wherein Lord Talbot was o’erthrown.

The circumstance I’ll tell you more at large.

The tenth of August last, this dreadful lord,

Retiring from the siege of Orléans,

Having full scarce six thousand in his troop,

By three-and-twenty thousand of the French

Was round encompassed and set upon.

No leisure had he to enrank his men.

He wanted pikes to set before his archers—

Instead whereof, sharp stakes plucked out of hedges

They pitched in the ground confusedly,

To keep the horsemen off from breaking in.

More than three hours the fight continued,

Where valiant Talbot above human thought

Enacted wonders with his sword and lance.

Hundreds he sent to hell, and none durst stand him;

Here, there, and everywhere, enraged he slew.

The French exclaimed the devil was in arms:

All the whole army stood agazed on him.

His soldiers, spying his undaunted spirit,

‘A Talbot! A Talbot!’ cried out amain,

And rushed into the bowels of the battle.

Here had the conquest fully been sealed up,

If Sir John Fastolf had not played the coward.

He, being in the vanguard placed behind,

With purpose to relieve and follow them,

Cowardly fled, not having struck one stroke.

Hence grew the general wrack and massacre.

Enclosèd were they with their enemies.

A base Walloon, to win the Dauphin’s grace,

Thrust Talbot with a spear into the back—

Whom all France, with their chief assembled strength,

Durst not presume to look once in the face.

BEDFORD

Is Talbot slain then? I will slay myself,

For living idly here in pomp and ease

Whilst such a worthy leader, wanting aid,

Unto his dastard foemen is betrayed.

THIRD MESSENGER

O no, he lives, but is took prisoner,

And Lord Scales with him, and Lord Hungerford;

Most of the rest slaughtered, or took likewise.

BEDFORD

His ransom there is none but I shall pay.

I’ll hale the Dauphin headlong from his throne;

His crown shall be the ransom of my friend.

Four of their lords I’ll change for one of ours.

Farewell, my masters; to my task will I.

Bonfires in France forthwith I am to make,

To keep our great Saint George’s feast withal.

Ten thousand soldiers with me I will take,

Whose bloody deeds shall make all Europe quake.

THIRD MESSENGER

So you had need. Fore Orléans, besieged,

The English army is grown weak and faint.

The Earl of Salisbury craveth supply,

And hardly keeps his men from mutiny,

Since they, so few, watch such a multitude.

⌈Exit⌉

EXETER

Remember, lords, your oaths to Henry sworn:

Either to quell the Dauphin utterly,

Or bring him in obedience to your yoke.

BEDFORD

I do remember it, and here take my leave

To go about my preparation. Exit

GLOUCESTER

I’ll to the Tower with all the haste I can,

To view th’artillery and munition,

And then I will proclaim young Henry king. Exit

EXETER

To Eltham will I, where the young King is,

Being ordained his special governor,

And for his safety there I’ll best devise. Exit

WINCHESTER

Each hath his place and function to attend;

I am left out; for me, nothing remains.

But long I will not be Jack-out-of-office.

The King from Eltham I intend to steal,

And sit at chiefest stern of public weal. Exit