| ACT V | PROLOGUE | |
| | Enter Chorus | |
| Chorus | Vouchsafe to those that have not read the story, | |
| | That I may prompt them: and of such as have, | |
| | I humbly pray them to admit the excuse | |
| | Of time, of numbers and due course of things, | 5 |
| | Which cannot in their huge and proper life | |
| | Be here presented. Now we bear the king | |
| | Toward Calais: grant him there; there seen, | |
| | Heave him away upon your winged thoughts | |
| | Athwart the sea. Behold, the English beach | 10 |
| | Pales in the flood with men, with wives and boys, | |
| | Whose shouts and claps out-voice the deep mouth'd sea, | |
| | Which like a mighty whiffler 'fore the king | |
| | Seems to prepare his way: so let him land, | |
| | And solemnly see him set on to London. | 15 |
| | So swift a pace hath thought that even now | |
| | You may imagine him upon Blackheath; | |
| | Where that his lords desire him to have borne | |
| | His bruised helmet and his bended sword | |
| | Before him through the city: he forbids it, | 20 |
| | Being free from vainness and self-glorious pride; | |
| | Giving full trophy, signal and ostent | |
| | Quite from himself to God. But now behold, | |
| | In the quick forge and working-house of thought, | |
| | How London doth pour out her citizens! | 25 |
| | The mayor and all his brethren in best sort, | |
| | Like to the senators of the antique Rome, | |
| | With the plebeians swarming at their heels, | |
| | Go forth and fetch their conquering Caesar in: | |
| | As, by a lower but loving likelihood, | 30 |
| | Were now the general of our gracious empress, | |
| | As in good time he may, from Ireland coming, | |
| | Bringing rebellion broached on his sword, | |
| | How many would the peaceful city quit, | |
| | To welcome him! much more, and much more cause, | 35 |
| | Did they this Harry. Now in London place him; | |
| | As yet the lamentation of the French | |
| | Invites the King of England's stay at home; | |
| | The emperor's coming in behalf of France, | |
| | To order peace between them; and omit | 40 |
| | All the occurrences, whatever chanced, | |
| | Till Harry's back-return again to France: | |
| | There must we bring him; and myself have play'd | |
| | The interim, by remembering you 'tis past. | |
| | Then brook abridgment, and your eyes advance, | 45 |
| | After your thoughts, straight back again to France. | |
| | Exit | |
| ACT V SCENE I | France. The English camp. | |
| | Enter FLUELLEN and GOWER | |
| GOWER | Nay, that's right; but why wear you your leek today? | |
| | Saint Davy's day is past. | |
| FLUELLEN | There is occasions and causes why and wherefore in | 50 |
| | all things: I will tell you, asse my friend, | |
| | Captain Gower: the rascally, scald, beggarly, | |
| | lousy, pragging knave, Pistol, which you and | |
| | yourself and all the world know to be no petter | |
| | than a fellow, look you now, of no merits, he is | 55 |
| |
come to me and prings me pread and salt yesterday, | |
| | look you, and bid me eat my leek: it was in place | |
| | where I could not breed no contention with him; but | |
| | I will be so bold as to wear it in my cap till I see | |
| | him once again, and then I will tell him a little | 60 |
| | piece of my desires. | |
| | Enter PISTOL | |
| GOWER | Why, here he comes, swelling like a turkey-cock. | |
| FLUELLEN | 'Tis no matter for his swellings nor his | |
| | turkey-cocks. God pless you, Aunchient Pistol! you | |
| | scurvy, lousy knave, God pless you! | 65 |
| PISTOL | Ha! art thou bedlam? dost thou thirst, base Trojan, | |
| | To have me fold up Parca's fatal web? | |
| | Hence! I am qualmish at the smell of leek. | |
| FLUELLEN | I peseech you heartily, scurvy, lousy knave, at my | |
| | desires, and my requests, and my petitions, to eat, | 70 |
| | look you, this leek: because, look you, you do not | |
| | love it, nor your affections and your appetites and | |
| | your digestions doo's not agree with it, I would | |
| | desire you to eat it. | |
| PISTOL | Not for Cadwallader and all his goats. | 75 |
| FLUELLEN | There is one goat for you. | |
| | Strikes him | |
| | Will you be so good, scauld knave, as eat it? | |
| PISTOL | Base Trojan, thou shalt die. | |
| FLUELLEN | You say very true, scauld knave, when God's will is: | |
| | I will desire you to live in the mean time, and eat | 80 |
| | your victuals: come, there is sauce for it. | |
| | Strikes him. | |
| | You called me yesterday mountain-squire; but I will | |
| | make you to-day a squire of low degree. I pray you, | |
| | fall to: if you can mock a leek, you can eat a leek. | |
| GOWER | Enough, captain: you have astonished him. | 85 |
| FLUELLEN | I say, I will make him eat some part of my leek, or | |
| | I will peat his pate four days. Bite, I pray you; it | |
| | is good for your green wound and your ploody coxcomb. | |
| PISTOL | Must I bite? | |
| FLUELLEN | Yes, certainly, and out of doubt and out of question | 90 |
| | too, and ambiguities. | |
| PISTOL | By this leek, I will most horribly revenge: I eat | |
| | and eat, I swear-- | |
| FLUELLEN | Eat, I pray you: will you have some more sauce to | |
| | your leek? there is not enough leek to swear by. | 95 |
| PISTOL | Quiet thy cudgel; thou dost see I eat. | |
| FLUELLEN | Much good do you, scauld knave, heartily. Nay, pray | |
| | you, throw none away; the skin is good for your | |
| | broken coxcomb. When you take occasions to see leeks | |
| | hereafter, I pray you, mock at 'em; that is all. | 100 |
| PISTOL | Good. | |
| FLUELLEN | Ay, leeks is good: hold you, there is a groat to | |
| | heal your pate. | |
| PISTOL | Me a groat! | |
| FLUELLEN | Yes, verily and in truth, you shall take it; or I | 105 |
| | have another leek in my pocket, which you shall eat. | |
| PISTOL | I take thy groat in earnest of revenge. | |
| FLUELLEN | If I owe you any thing, I will pay you in cudgels: | |
| | you shall be a woodmonger, and buy nothing of me but | |
| | cudgels. God b' wi' you, and keep you, and heal your pate. | 110 |
| | Exit. | |
| PISTOL | All hell shall stir for this. | |
| GOWER | Go, go; you are a counterfeit cowardly knave. Will | |
| | you mock at an ancient tradition, begun upon an | |
| | honourable respect, and worn as a memorable trophy of | |
| | predeceased valour and dare not avouch in your deeds | 115 |
| | any of your words? I have seen you gleeking and | |
| | galling at this gentleman twice or thrice. You | |
| | thought, because he could not speak English in the | |
| | native garb, he could not therefore handle an | |
| | English cudgel: you find it otherwise; and | 120 |
| | henceforth let a Welsh correction teach you a good | |
| | English condition. Fare ye well. | |
| | Exit. | |
| PISTOL | Doth Fortune play the huswife with me now? | |
| | News have I, that my Nell is dead i' the spital | |
| | Of malady of France; | 125 |
| | And there my rendezvous is quite cut off. | |
| | Old I do wax; and from my weary limbs | |
| | Honour is cudgelled. Well, bawd I'll turn, | |
| | And something lean to cutpurse of quick hand. | |
| | To England will I steal, and there I'll steal: | 130 |
| | And patches will I get unto these cudgell'd scars, | |
| | And swear I got them in the Gallia wars. | |
| | Exit. | |
| EPILOGUE | Enter Chorus | |
| Chorus | Thus far, with rough and all-unable pen, | |
| | Our bending author hath pursued the story, | |
| | In little room confining mighty men, | 135 |
| | Mangling by starts the full course of their glory. | |
| | Small time, but in that small most greatly lived | |
| | This star of England: Fortune made his sword; | |
| | By which the world's best garden be achieved, | |
| | And of it left his son imperial lord. | 140 |
| | Henry the Sixth, in infant bands crown'd King | |
| | Of France and England, did this king succeed; | |
| | Whose state so many had the managing, | |
| | That they lost France and made his England bleed: | |
| | Which oft our stage hath shown; and, for their sake, | 145 |
| | In your fair minds let this acceptance take. | |
| | Exit | |
