Lords, I protest, my soul is full of woe, That blood should sprinkle me, to make me grow: I'll make a voyage to the Holy Land, To wash this blood off from my guilty hand- [Exeunt. * Immediately. SCENE I.-London. A Room in the Palace. Enter KING HENRY, WESTMORELAND, SIR WALter Blunt, and others. K. Hen. So shaken as we are, so wan with care, * Strands of the sea. No more the thirsty Erinnys* of this soil Shall daub her lips with her own children's blood; (Whose soldier now, under whose blessed cross Whose arms were moulded in their mothers' womb Which, fourteen hundred years ago, were nail'd For our advantage, on the bitter cross. But this our purpose is a twelvemonth old, Therefore we meet not now:-Then let me hear West. My liege, this haste was hot in question, K. Hen. It seems then, that the tidings of this broil Brake off our business for the Holy Land. West. This, match'd with other, did, my gracious lord'; For more uneven and unwelcome news Came from the north, and thus it did import. On Holy-rood day, the gallant Hotspur there, At Holmedon met, *The fury of discord. + Army. + Expedition. Outlines. Where they did spend a sad and bloody hour; And shape of likelihood, the news was told; K. Hen. Here is a dear and true-industrious friend, Betwixt that Holmedon and this seat of ours; Ten thousand bold Scots, two-and-twenty knights, To beaten Douglas; and the earls of Athol, And is not this an honourable spoil? A gallant prize? ha, cousin, is it not? It is a conquest for a prince to boast of. K. Hen. Yea, there thou mak'st me sad, and mak'st me sin In envy that my lord Northumberland Should be the father of so blest a son: A son, who is the theme of honour's tongue; Of my young Harry. O, that it could be proved, To his own use he keeps; and sends me word, West. This is his uncle's teaching, this is Worcester, Which makes him prune‡ himself, and bristle up K. Hen. But I have sent for him to answer this; Our holy purpose to Jerusalem. Cousin, on Wednesday next our council we For more is to be said, and to be done, SCENE II.-The same. [Exeunt. Another Room in the Palace. Enter HENRY Prince of Wales, and FALSTAFF. Fal. Now, Hal, what time of day is it, lad? P. Hen. Thou art so fat-witted, with drinking of old sack, and unbuttoning thee after supper, and sleeping upon benches after noon, that thou hast forgotten to demand that truly which thou wouldst truly know. What the devil hast thou to do with the time of the day? unless hours were cups of sack, and minutes capons, and clocks the tongues of bawds, and dials of signs of leaping-houses, and the blessed sun himself a fair hot wench in flame-colour'd taffata; I see no reason why thou shouldst be so superfluous to demand the time of the day. Fal. Indeed, you come near me, now, Hal: for we, that take purses, go by the moon and seven stars; and not by Phoebus,--he, that wandering knight so fair. And, I pray thee, sweet wag, when thou art king,-as, God save thy grace (majesty, I should say; for grace thou wilt have none), P. Hen. What, none? Fal. No, by my troth; not so much as will serve to be prologue to an egg and butter. P. Hen. Well, how then? come, roundly, roundly. Fal. Marry, then, sweet wag, when thou art king, let not us, that are squires of the night's body, be called thieves of the day's beauty; let us be-Diana's foresters, gentlemen of the shade, minions of the moon: And let men say, we be men of good government: being governed as the sea is, by our noble and chaste mistress, the moon, under whose countenance we-steal. P. Hen. Thou say'st well; and it holds well too: for the fortune of us, that are the moon's men, doth ebb and flow like the sea; being governed as the sea is, by the moon. As, for proof, now: A purse of gold most resolutely snatched on Monday night, and most dissolutely spent on Tuesday morning; got with swearing-lay by !* and spent with crying-bring int now, in as low an ebb as the foot of the ladder: and, by-and-by, in as high a flow as the ridge of the gallows. Fal. By the Lord, thou say'st true, lad. And is not my hostess of the tavern a most sweet wench? P. Hen. As the honey of Hybla, my old lad of the castle. And is not a buff jerkin a most sweet robe of durance P Fal. How now, how now, mad wag? what, in thy quips, and thy quiddities? what a plague have I to do with a buff jerkin? P. Hen. Why, what a pox have I to do with my hostess of the tavern? Fal. Well, thou hast called her to a reckoning many a time and oft. P. Hen. Did I ever call for thee to pay thy part? * Stand. I. e. more wine. + The dress of sheriff's officers. VOL. II. 2 D |