Henry VI Part 1

EXETER: We mourn in black: why mourn we not in blood?
[…] 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?

BISHOP OF WINCHESTER: He was a king bless’d 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 pray’d,
His thread of life had not so soon decay’d:
None do you like but an effeminate prince,
Whom, like a school-boy, you may over-awe.

MESSENGER: All the whole army stood agazed on him:
His soldiers spying his undaunted spirit
A Talbot! a Talbot! cried out amain
And rush’d into the bowels of the battle.
Here had the conquest fully been seal’d up,
If Sir John Fastolf had not play’d the coward:
He, being in the vaward, placed behind
With purpose to relieve and follow them,
Cowardly fled, not having struck one stroke.
Hence grew the general wreck and massacre;
Enclosed 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 betray’d.

CHARLES: Then come, o’ God’s name; I fear no woman.

JOAN LA PUCELLE: And while I live, I’ll ne’er fly from a man.

Here they fight, and JOAN LA PUCELLE overcomes

CHARLES: Stay, stay thy hands! thou art an Amazon
And fightest with the sword of Deborah.

JOAN LA PUCELLE: Christ’s mother helps me, else I were too weak.

CHARLES: Whoe’er helps thee, ‘tis thou that must help me:
Impatiently I burn with thy desire;
My heart and hands thou hast at once subdued.
Excellent Pucelle, if thy name be so,
Let me thy servant and not sovereign be:
‘Tis the French Dauphin sueth to thee thus.

JOAN LA PUCELLE: I must not yield to any rites of love,
For my profession’s sacred from above:
When I have chased all thy foes from hence,
Then will I think upon a recompense.

CHARLES: Meantime look gracious on thy prostrate thrall.

BEDFORD: Coward of France! how much he wrongs his fame,
Despairing of his own arm’s fortitude,
To join with witches and the help of hell!

BURGUNDY: Traitors have never other company.
But what’s that Pucelle whom they term so pure?

TALBOT: A maid, they say.

BEDFORD: A maid! and be so martial!

BURGUNDY: Pray God she prove not masculine ere long,
If underneath the standard of the French
She carry armour as she hath begun.

TALBOT: Well, let them practise and converse with spirits:
God is our fortress, in whose conquering name
Let us resolve to scale their flinty bulwarks.

TALBOT: No, no, I am but shadow of myself:
You are deceived, my substance is not here;
For what you see is but the smallest part
And least proportion of humanity:
I tell you, madam, were the whole frame here,
It is of such a spacious lofty pitch,
Your roof were not sufficient to contain’t.

COUNTESS OF AUVERGNE: This is a riddling merchant for the nonce;
He will be here, and yet he is not here:
How can these contrarieties agree?

TALBOT: That will I show you presently.

Winds his horn. Drums strike up: a peal of ordnance. Enter soldiers

How say you, madam? are you now persuaded
That Talbot is but shadow of himself?
These are his substance, sinews, arms and strength,
With which he yoketh your rebellious necks,
Razeth your cities and subverts your towns
And in a moment makes them desolate.

LAWYER: Unless my study and my books be false,
The argument you held was wrong in you […] in sign whereof I pluck a white rose too.

RICHARD PLANTAGENET: Now, Somerset, where is your argument?

SOMERSET: Here in my scabbard, meditating that
Shall dye your white rose in a bloody red.

RICHARD PLANTAGENET: Meantime your cheeks do counterfeit our roses;
For pale they look with fear, as witnessing
The truth on our side.

SOMERSET: No, Plantagenet,
‘Tis not for fear but anger that thy cheeks
Blush for pure shame to counterfeit our roses,
And yet thy tongue will not confess thy error.

RICHARD PLANTAGENET: Hath not thy rose a canker, Somerset?

SOMERSET: Hath not thy rose a thorn, Plantagenet?

WARWICK: And here I prophesy: this brawl to-day,
Grown to this faction in the Temple-garden,
Shall send between the red rose and the white
A thousand souls to death and deadly night.

KING HENRY VI: Uncles of Gloucester and of Winchester,
The special watchmen of our English weal,
I would prevail, if prayers might prevail,
To join your hearts in love and amity.
O, what a scandal is it to our crown,
That two such noble peers as ye should jar!
Believe me, lords, my tender years can tell
Civil dissension is a viperous worm
That gnaws the bowels of the commonwealth.

EXETER: Ay, we may march in England or in France,
Not seeing what is likely to ensue.
This late dissension grown betwixt the peers
Burns under feigned ashes of forged love
And will at last break out into a flame:
As fester’d members rot but by degree,
Till bones and flesh and sinews fall away,
So will this base and envious discord breed.
And now I fear that fatal prophecy
Which in the time of Henry named the Fifth
Was in the mouth of every sucking babe;
That Henry born at Monmouth should win all
And Henry born at Windsor lose all:
Which is so plain that Exeter doth wish
His days may finish ere that hapless time.

An alarum: excursions. Enter FASTOLF and a CAPTAIN

CAPTAIN: Whither away, Sir John Fastolfe, in such haste?

FASTOLF: Whither away! to save myself by flight:
We are like to have the overthrow again.

CAPTAIN: What! will you fly, and leave Lord Talbot?

FASTOLF: Ay,
All the Talbots in the world, to save my life!

Exit

CAPTAIN: Cowardly knight! ill fortune follow thee!

Exit

Retreat: excursions. JOAN LA PUCELLE, ALANSON, and CHARLES fly

BEDFORD: Now, quiet soul, depart when heaven please,
For I have seen our enemies’ overthrow.
What is the trust or strength of foolish man?
They that of late were daring with their scoffs
Are glad and fain by flight to save themselves.

BEDFORD dies, and is carried in by two in his chair

TALBOT: When first this order was ordain’d, my lords,
Knights of the garter were of noble birth,
Valiant and virtuous, full of haughty courage,
Such as were grown to credit by the wars;
Not fearing death, nor shrinking for distress,
But always resolute in most extremes.
He then that is not furnish’d in this sort
Doth but usurp the sacred name of knight,
Profaning this most honourable order,
And should, if I were worthy to be judge,
Be quite degraded, like a hedge-born swain
That doth presume to boast of gentle blood.

KING HENRY VI: Stain to thy countrymen, thou hear’st thy doom!
Be packing, therefore, thou that wast a knight:
Henceforth we banish thee, on pain of death.

KING HENRY VI: Good Lord, what madness rules in brainsick men,
When for so slight and frivolous a cause
Such factious emulations shall arise!
Good cousins both, of York and Somerset,
Quiet yourselves, I pray, and be at peace.

[…] And you, my lords, remember where we are,
In France, amongst a fickle wavering nation:
If they perceive dissension in our looks
And that within ourselves we disagree,
How will their grudging stomachs be provoked
To wilful disobedience, and rebel!
[…] I see no reason, if I wear this rose,

Putting on a red rose

That any one should therefore be suspicious
I more incline to Somerset than York:
Both are my kinsmen, and I love them both:
[…] Go cheerfully together and digest
Your angry choler on your enemies.

EXETER: Well didst thou, Richard, to suppress thy voice;
For, had the passions of thy heart burst out,
I fear we should have seen decipher’d there
More rancorous spite, more furious raging broils,
Than yet can be imagined or supposed.
But howsoe’er, no simple man that sees
This jarring discord of nobility,
This shouldering of each other in the court,
This factious bandying of their favourites,
But that it doth presage some ill event.
‘Tis much when sceptres are in children’s hands;
But more when envy breeds unkind division;
There comes the rain, there begins confusion.

YORK: Away! vexation almost stops my breath,
That sunder’d friends greet in the hour of death.
Lucy, farewell; no more my fortune can,
But curse the cause I cannot aid the man.
Maine, Blois, Poictiers, and Tours, are won away,
‘Long all of Somerset and his delay.

Exit, with his soldiers

LUCY: Thus, while the vulture of sedition
Feeds in the bosom of such great commanders,
Sleeping neglection doth betray to loss
The conquest of our scarce cold conqueror,
That ever living man of memory,
Henry the Fifth: whiles they each other cross,
Lives, honours, lands and all hurry to loss.

CHARLES: Had York and Somerset brought rescue in,
We should have found a bloody day of this.

BASTARD OF ORLEANCE: How the young whelp of Talbot’s, raging-wood,
Did flesh his puny sword in Frenchmen’s blood!

JOAN LA PUCELLE: Once I encounter’d him, and thus I said:
‘Thou maiden youth, be vanquish’d by a maid:’
But, with a proud majestical high scorn,
He answer’d thus: ‘Young Talbot was not born
To be the pillage of a giglot wench:’
So, rushing in the bowels of the French,
He left me proudly, as unworthy fight.

BURGUNDY: Doubtless he would have made a noble knight[.]