EDWARD III

Speaker	Line
BY WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE AND	OTHERS
FIRST	heard of in the Stationers’ Register for I December 1595, The Reign of King Edward the Third was published anonymously in the following year, with the statement that it had been ‘sundry times played about the City of London’. As was usual, there are no act and scene divisions; we divide it only into scenes. It could have been written at any time between the Armada of 1588 and 1595. Like other plays of this period, including Shakespeare’s I Henry VI, Richard II, and King John, it is composed entirely in verse, much of it formal and rhetorical in style. Shakespeare seems at least to have known the play, since a historical error placing King David of Scotland among Edward’s prisoners at Calais (10.40-56, 18.63.1) occurs also in Henry V (1.2.160-2). The play’s omission from the First Folio is good presumptive evidence against Shakespeare’s sole authorship. It was, however, attributed to him in a totally unreliable catalogue of 1656; better worth taking seriously is the attribution to Shakespeare by Edward Capell, expressed in 1760. Since then various scholars have proposed that Shakespeare wrote at least the scenes involving the Countess of Salisbury (Scene 2, Scene 3). When the Oxford edition first appeared, its editors remarked that ‘if we had attempted a thorough reinvestigation of candidates for inclusion in the early dramatic canon, it would have begun with Edward III’ (Textual Companion, p. 137). Since then intensive application of stylometric and other tests of authorship, along with an increased willingness to acknowledge that Shakespeare collaborated with other writers, especially early and late in his career, has strengthened the case for including it among the collected works. We believe, however, that Shakespeare was responsible only for Scene 2 (from the entrance of Edward III) and Scene 3, and for Scene 12 (which includes a Hamlet-like meditation on the inevitability of death), and possibly Scene 13, and that one or more other authors wrote the rest of the play. The play’s treatment of history, deriving principally from Lord Berners’s translation (1535) of Froissart’s Chronicles, is loose. As with Henry V, the opening episode shows the English king seeking reassurance about his claims to the throne of France. Lorraine’s subsequent demand that Edward swear allegiance to the French king meets with derision. Attention turns to England’s relations with Scotland, where King David, France’s ally, has besieged the castle of Roxburgh, imprisoning the Countess of Salisbury. Edward instructs his son Edward (Ned) the Black Prince to raise troops against France; Edward himself will march against the Scots. At Roxburgh the King rescues and attempts to seduce the Countess, who is also desired by King David and Sir William Douglas. In the principal scenes ascribed to Shakespeare, the enraptured King expresses his passion in attractively lyrical verse recalling that of The Two Gentlemen of Verona. He attempts to persuade the Earl of Warwick, the Countess’s father, to further his suit, but the Countess, virtuous (and married), repudiates his adulterous desires, threatening to kill herself if he persists. Penitent, he reverts to the French conflict. This, presented in episodes of ambitious rhetoric rather than of violent action, reaches its first climax in young Edward’s conquest over the King of Bohemia, for which his father knights him. Edward’s queen, Philippa, who with her followers has overcome the Scots, joins him, and persuades him to show mercy to the burghers of the besieged town of Calais. Young Edward, believed dead, is revealed as the conqueror of the French, and the play ends with a jingoistic English triumph. It has had a few modern productions, including one by the Royal Shakespeare Company in
THE PERSONS OF THE	PLAY The English
QUEEN	PHILIPPA, his wife Edward, PRINCE OF WALES, their eldest son The EARL OF SALISBURY The COUNTESS OF SALISBURY, his wife The EARL OF WARWICK, the Countess’s father Sir William de MONTAGUE, Salisbury’s nephew The EARL OF DERBY Sir James AUDLEY Henry, Lord PERCY John COPLAND, an esquire, later knighted LODOWICK, King Edward’s secretary Two SQUIRES A HERALD to King Edward from the Prince of Wales Four heralds who bear the Prince of Wales’s armour Soldiers Allied with the English Robert, COMTE D’ARTOIS and Earl of Richmond Jean, COMTE DE MONTFORT, later Duc de Bretagne
GOBIN	de Grace, a French Prisoner The French Jean II de Valois, KING OF FRANCE Prince Charles, Jean’s eldest son, Duc de Normandie, the DAUPHIN
PRINCE	PHILIPPE, Jean’s younger son The DUC DE LORRAINE VILLIERS, a prisoner sent as an envoy by the Earl of Salisbury to the Dauphin The CAPTAIN OF CALAIS Another FRENCH CAPTAIN A MARINER Three HERALDS to the Prince of Wales from the King of France, the Dauphin and Prince Philippe Six POOR MEN, residents of Calais Six SUPPLICANTS, wealthy merchants and citizens of Calais Five other FRENCHMEN A FRENCIIWOMAN with two children Soldiers Allied with the French The KING OF BOHEMIA A POLISH CAPTAIN Polish and Muscovite soldiers David II, KING OF SCOTLAND Sir William DOUGLAS Two Scottish MESSENGERS The Reign of King Edward the Third Sc. 1
(didascalia)	Enter King Edward, the Earl of Derby, the Earl of Warwick, Edward Prince of Wales, Lord Audley and the Comte d’Artois
KING EDWARD	Robert of Artois, banished though thou be From France thy native country, yet with us Thou shalt retain as great a seigniory: For we create thee Earl of Richmond here. And now go forwards with our pedigree: Who next succeeded King Philippe of Beau?
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Three sons of his, which all successively Did sit upon their father’s regal throne, Yet died and left no issue of their loins.
KING EDWARD	But was my mother sister unto those?
COMTE D’ARTOIS	She was, my lord, and only Isabel Was all the daughters that this Philippe had, Whom afterward your father took to wife. And from the fragrant garden of her womb Your gracious self, the flower of Europe’s hope, Derived is inheritor to France. But note the rancour of rebellious minds: When thus the lineage of Beau was out The French obscured your mother’s privilege And, though she were the next of blood, proclaimed Jean of the house of Valois now their king. The reason was, they say, the realm of France Replete with princes of great parentage Ought not admit a governor to rule Except he be descended of the male. And that’s the special ground of their contempt Wherewith they study to exclude your grace.
KING EDWARD	But they shall find that forged ground of theirs To be but dusty heaps of brittle sand.
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Perhaps it will be thought a heinous thing That I, a Frenchman, should discover this. But heaven I call to record of my vows: It is not hate nor any private wrong, But love unto my country and the right Provokes my tongue thus lavish in report. You are the lineal watchman of our peace, And Jean of Valois indirectly climbs. What then should subjects but embrace their king? Ah, wherein may our duty more be seen Than striving to rebate a tyrant’s pride And place thee, the true shepherd of our commonwealth?
KING EDWARD	This counsel, Artois, like to fruitful showers, Hath added growth unto my dignity, And by the fiery vigour of thy words Hot courage is engendered in my breast, Which heretofore was raked in ignorance But now doth mount with golden wings of fame And will approve fair Isabel’s descent, Able to yoke their stubborn necks with steel That spurn against my sovereignty in France.
(didascalia)	Sound a horn
KING EDWARD	A messenger. Lord Audley, know from whence.
(didascalia)	Enter a messenger, the Duc de Lorraine
AUDLEY	The Duke of Lorraine, having crossed the seas, Entreats he may have conference with your highness.
KING EDWARD	Admit him, lords, that we may hear the news. (To Lorraine) Say, Duke of Lorraine, wherefore art thou come? 55
DUC DE LORRAINE	The most renowned prince, King Jean of France, Doth greet thee, Edward, and by me commands That, forsomuch as by his liberal gift The Guienne dukedom is entailed to thee, Thou do him lowly homage for the same. And for that purpose, here I summon thee Repair to France within these forty days That there, according as the custom is, Thou mayst be sworn true liegeman to our king; Or else thy title in that province dies And he himself will repossess the place.
KING EDWARD	See how occasion laughs me in the face! No sooner minded to prepare for France But straight I am invited—nay, with threats, Upon a penalty, enjoined to come! ‘Twere but a childish part to say him nay. Lorraine, return this answer to thy lord: I mean to visit him as he requests. But how? Not servilely disposed to bend, But like a conqueror to make him bow. His lame unpolished shifts are come to light, And truth hath pulled the vizard from his face That set a gloss upon his arrogance. Dare he command a fealty in me? Tell him the crown that he usurps is mine, And where he sets his foot he ought to kneel. ’Tis not a petty dukedom that I claim But all the whole dominions of the realm Which if, with grudging, he refuse to yield I’ll take away those borrowed plumes of his, And send him naked to the wilderness.
DUC DE LORRAINE	Then, Edward, here, in spite of all thy lords, I do pronounce defiance to thy face.
PRINCE OF WALES	Defiance, Frenchman? We rebound it back Even to the bottom of thy master’s throat! And, be it spoke with reverence of the King, My gracious father, and these other lords, I hold thy message but as scurrilous, And him that sent thee like the lazy drone Crept up by stealth unto the eagle’s nest, From whence we’ll shake him with so rough a storm As others shall be warned by his harm.
EARL OF WARWICK	(to Lorraine) Bid him leave off the lion’s case he wears Lest, meeting with the lion in the field, He chance to tear him piecemeal for his pride.
COMTE D’ARTOIS	(to Lorraine) The soundest counsel I can give his grace Is to surrender ere he be constrained. A voluntary mischief hath less scorn Than when reproach with violence is borne.
DUC DE LORRAINE	Regenerate traitor, viper to the place Where thou wast fostered in thine infancy! Bear’st thou a part in this conspiracy?
(didascalia)	Lorraine draws his sword
(didascalia)	KING EDWARD drawing his sword
DUC DE LORRAINE	Lorraine, behold the sharpness of this steel: Fervent desire that sits against my heart Is far more thorny-pricking than this blade That, with the nightingale, I shall be scarred As oft as I dispose myself to rest Until my colours be displayed in France. This is thy final answer. So be gone.
DUC DE LORRAINE	It is not that, nor any English brave, Afflicts me so, as doth his poisoned view: That is most false, should most of all be true. Exit
KING EDWARD	Now, lords, our fleeting barque is under sail, Our gage is thrown, and war is soon begun, But not so quickly brought unto an end.
(didascalia)	Enter Sir William Montague
KING EDWARD	But wherefore comes Sir William Montague? (To Montague) How stands the league between the Scot and us?
MONTAGUE	Cracked and dissevered, my renowned lord. The treacherous King no sooner was informed Of your withdrawing of your army back But straight, forgetting of his former oath, He made invasion on the bordering towns. Berwick is won, Newcastle spoiled and lost, And now the tyrant hath begirt with siege The Castle of Roxburgh, where, enclosed, The Countess Salisbury is like to perish.
KING EDWARD	(to Warwick) That is thy daughter, Warwick, is it not? Whose husband hath in Bretagne served so long About the planting of Lord Montfort there?
EARL OF WARWICK	It is, my lord.
KING EDWARD	Ignoble David, hast thou none to grieve But seely ladies with thy threat’ning arms? But I will make you shrink your snaily horns. (To Audley) First, therefore, Audley, this shall be thy charge: Go levy footmen for our wars in France. (To the Prince of Wales) And, Ned, take muster of our men-at-arms. In every shire elect a several band. Let them be soldiers of a lusty spirit, Such as dread nothing but dishonour’s blot. Be wary therefore, since we do commence A famous war, and with so mighty a nation. (To Derby) Derby, be thou ambassador for us Unto our father-in-law, the Earl of Hainault. Make him acquainted with our enterprise, And likewise will him, with our own allies That are in Flanders, to solicit, too, The Emperor of Almagne in our name. Myself, whilst you are jointly thus employed, Will, with these forces that I have at hand, March and once more repulse the traitorous Scot. But sirs, be resolute. We shall have wars On every side. (To the Prince of Wales) And, Ned, thou must begin Now to forget thy study and thy books, And ure thy shoulders to an armour’s weight.
PRINCE OF WALES	As cheerful sounding to my youthful spleen This tumult is of war’s increasing broils, As at the coronation of a king The joyful clamours of the people are When ‘Ave Caesar’ they pronounce aloud.
(didascalia)	Within this school of honour I shall learn
PRINCE OF WALES	Either to sacrifice my foes to death, Or, in a rightful quarrel, spend my breath. Then cheerfully forward, each a several way. In great affairs ’tis naught to use delay. Exeunt Sc. 2
(didascalia)	Enter the Countess of Salisbury, above
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Alas, how much in vain my poor eyes gaze For succour that my sovereign should send. Ah, cousin Montague, I fear thou wants The lively spirit sharply to solicit With vehement suit the King in my behalf. Thou dost not tell him what a grief it is To be the scornful captive to a Scot, Either to be wooed with broad untuned oaths, Or forced by rough insulting barbarism. Thou dost not tell him, if he here prevail, How much they will deride us in the North, And in their vile, uncivil, skipping jigs Bray forth their conquest and our overthrow Even in the barren, bleak and fruitless air—
(didascalia)	Enter below David King of Scotland and Sir William Douglas with soldiers, meeting the Due de Lorraine
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	(Aside) I must withdraw. The everlasting foe Comes to the wall. I’ll closely step aside And list their babble, blunt and full of pride. The Countess withdraws
KING OF SCOTLAND	My lord of Lorraine, to our brother of France Commend us as the man in Christendom That we most reverence and entirely love. Touching your embassage, return and say That we with England will not enter parley, Nor never make fair weather, or take truce, But burn their neighbour towns, and so persist With eager roads beyond their city York; And never shall our bonny riders rest, Nor rusting canker have the time to eat Their light-borne snaffle, nor their nimble spur, Nor lay aside their jacks of gimmaled mail, Nor hang their staves of grained Scottish ash In peaceful wise upon their city walls, Nor from their buttoned tawny leathern belts Dismiss their biting whinyards, till your King Cry out, ‘Enough! Spare England now for pity!’ Farewell, and tell him that you leave us here, Before this castle; say you came from us Even when we had that yielded to our hands.
DUC DE LORRAINE	Take I my leave, and fairly will return Your acceptable greeting to my King. Exit
KING OF SCOTLAND	(to Douglas) Now, Douglas, to our former task again For the division of this certain spoil.
DOUGLAS	My liege, I crave the lady, and no more.
KING OF SCOTLAND	Nay, soft ye, sir; first I must make my choice, And first I do bespeak her for myself.
DOUGLAS	Why then, my liege, let me enjoy her jewels.
KING OF SCOTLAND	Those are her own, still liable to her; And who inherits her hath those with all.
(didascalia)	Enter a Scottish messenger in haste
MESSENGER	My liege, as we were pricking on the hills To fetch in booty, marching hitherward We might descry a mighty host of men. The sun, reflecting on the armour, showed A field of plate; a wood of picks advanced. Bethink your highness speedily herein: An easy march within four hours will bring The hindmost rank unto this place, my liege.
KING OF SCOTLAND	Dislodge! Dislodge! It is the King of England!
(didascalia)	DOUGLAS to the Messenger
KING OF SCOTLAND	Jemmy, my man, saddle my bonny black.
KING OF SCOTLAND	Mean’st thou to fight, Douglas? We are too weak.
DOUGLAS	I know it well, my liege, and therefore fly.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	(coming forward above) My lords of Scotland, will ye stay and drink?
KING OF SCOTLAND	She mocks us, Douglas. I cannot endure it.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Say, good my lord, which is he must have the lady, And which her jewels? I am sure, my lords, Ye will not hence till you have shared the spoils.
KING OF SCOTLAND	She heard the messenger and heard our talk, And now that comfort makes her scorn at us.
(didascalia)	Enter another Scottish messenger
SECOND MESSENGER	Arm, my good lord! O we are all surprised! After the French ambassador, my liege, And tell him that you dare not ride to York.
(didascalia)	COUNTESS OF SALISBURY (to the King of Scotland)
SECOND MESSENGER	Excuse it that your bonny horse is lame.
(didascalia)	KING OF SCOTLAND aside
SECOND MESSENGER	She heard that too! Intolerable grief! (To the Countess) Woman, farewell, although I do not stay—
(didascalia)	‘Tis not for fear, and yet you run away. Exeunt Scots
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	O happy comfort, welcome to our house! The confident and boist’rous boasting Scot, That swore before my walls they would not back For all the armed power of this land, With faceless fear that ever turns his back, Turned hence against the blasting north-east wind Upon the bare report and name of arms!
(didascalia)	Enter Sir William de Montague with soldiers
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	O summer’s day! See where my cousin comes!
MONTAGUE	How fares my aunt? We are not Scots— Why do you shut your gates against your friends?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Well may I give a welcome, coz, to thee, For thou com’st well to chase my foes from hence.
MONTAGUE	The King himself is come in person hither. Dear aunt, descend, and gratulate his highness.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	How may I entertain his majesty To show my duty and his dignity?
(didascalia)	Exit from above
(didascalia)	Enter King Edward, the Earl of Warwick and the Comte d’Artois, with others, including Lodowick
KING EDWARD	What, are the stealing foxes fled and gone Before we could uncouple at their heels?
EARL OF WARWICK	They are, my liege, but with a cheerful cry Hot hounds and hardy chase them at the heels.
(didascalia)	Enter the Countess of Salisbury below
KING EDWARD	This is the Countess, Warwick, is it not?
EARL OF WARWICK	Even she, my liege, whose beauty tyrants’ fear— As a May blossom with pernicious winds— Hath sullied, withered, overcast and done.
KING EDWARD	Hath she been fairer, Warwick, than she is?
EARL OF WARWICK	My gracious King, fair is she not at all If that her self were by to stain herself As I have seen her when she was her self.
(didascalia)	KING EDWARD aside
EARL OF WARWICK	What strange enchantment lurked in those her eyes, When they excelled this excellence they have, That now her dim decline hath power to draw My subject eyes from piercing majesty To gaze on her with doting admiration?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	(kneeling before King Edward) In duty, lower than the ground I kneel, And fore my dull knees bow my feeling heart, To witness my obedience to your highness With many millions of a subject’s thanks For this your royal presence, whose approach Hath driven war and danger from my gate.
KING EDWARD	Lady, stand up. I come to bring thee peace, However thereby I have purchased war.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	(rising) No war to you, my liege. The Scots are gone And gallop home toward Scotland with their hate.
KING EDWARD	(aside) Lest yielding here I pine in shameful love— (Aloud) Come, we’ll pursue the Scots. Artois, away!
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	A little while, my gracious sovereign, stay, And let the power of a mighty king Honour our roof. My husband, in the wars, When he shall hear it, will triumph for joy. Then, dear my liege, now niggard not thy state; Being at the wall, enter our homely gate.
KING EDWARD	Pardon me, Countess, I will come no near: I dreamed tonight of treason, and I fear.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Far from this place let ugly treason lie.
KING EDWARD	(aside) No farther off than her conspiring eye, Which shoots infected poison in my heart Beyond repulse of wit or cure of art. Now in the sun alone it doth not lie With light to take light from a mortal eye; For here two day-stars that mine eyes would see More than the sun steals mine own light from me. Contemplative desire, desire to be In contemplation that may master thee. (Aloud) Warwick, Artois, to horse and let’s away!
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	What might I speak to make my sovereign stay?
KING EDWARD	(aside) What needs a tongue to such a speaking eye That more persuades than winning oratory?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Let not thy presence, like the April sun, Flatter our earth and suddenly be done. More happy do not make our outward wall Than thou wilt grace our inner house withal. Our house, my liege, is like a country swain, Whose habit rude, and manners blunt and plain, Presageth naught, yet inly beautified With bounty’s riches and fair hidden pride. For where the golden ore doth buried lie, The ground, undecked with nature’s tapestry, Seems barren, sere, unfertile, fruitless, dry; And where the upper turf of earth doth boast His pride, perfumes and parti-coloured cost, Delve there and find this issue and their pride To spring from ordure and corruptious stied. But, to make up my all-too-long compare, These ragged walls no testimony are What is within, but like a cloak doth hide From weather’s waste the under garnished pride. More gracious than my terms can, let thee be: Entreat thyself to stay a while with me.
KING EDWARD	As wise as fair—what fond fit can be heard When wisdom keeps the gate as beauty’s guard? Countess, albeit my business urgeth me It shall attend while I attend on thee. Come on, my lords, here will I host tonight.
(didascalia)	Exeunt all but Lodowick
LODOWICK	I might perceive his eye in her eye lost, His ear to drink her sweet tongue’s utterance, And changing passion, like inconstant clouds That rack upon the carriage of the winds, Increase and die in his disturbed cheeks. Lo, when she blushed, even then did he look pale, As if her cheeks by some enchanted power Attracted had the cherry blood from his. Anon, with reverent fear when she grew pale, His cheeks put on their scarlet ornaments, But no more like her oriental red Than brick to coral or live things to dead. Why did he then thus counterfeit her looks? If she did blush, ‘twas tender modest shame Being in the sacred presence of a king. If he did blush, ’twas rude immodest shame To vail his eyes amiss, being a king. If she looked pale, ‘twas seely woman’s fear To bear herself in presence of a king. If he looked pale, it was with guilty fear To dote amiss, being a mighty king. Then, Scottish wars, farewell. I fear ’twill prove A ling’ring English siege of peevish love.
(didascalia)	Enter King Edward
LODOWICK	Here comes his highness, walking all alone.
(didascalia)	Lodowick withdraws
KING EDWARD	(aside) She is grown more fairer far since I came hither, Her voice more silver every word than other, Her wit more fluent. What a strange discourse Unfolded she of David and his Scots: ‘Even thus’, quoth she, ‘he spake,’ and then spoke broad, With epithets and accents of the Scot, But somewhat better than the Scot could speak. ‘And thus,’ quoth she, and answered then herself, For who could speak like her? But she herself Breathes from the wall an angel’s note from heaven Of sweet defiance to her barbarous foes. When she would talk of peace, methinks her tongue Commanded war to prison; when of war, It wakened Caesar from his Roman grave To hear war beautified by her discourse; Wisdom is foolishness but in her tongue, Beauty a slander but in her fair face, There is no summer but in her cheerful looks, Nor frosty winter but in her disdain. I cannot blame the Scots that did besiege her, For she is all the treasure of our land, But call them cowards that they ran away, Having so rich and fair a cause to stay. (Aloud) Art thou there, Lod’wick?
(didascalia)	Lodowick comes forward
KING EDWARD	Give me ink and paper.
LODOWICK	I will, my liege.
KING EDWARD	And bid the lords hold on their play at chess, For we will walk and meditate alone.
LODOWICK	I will, my sovereign. Exit
KING EDWARD	This fellow is well read in poetry, And hath a lusty and persuasive spirit. I will acquaint him with my passion, Which he shall shadow with a veil of lawn, Through which the queen of beauty’s queen shall see Herself the ground of my infirmity.
(didascalia)	Enter Lodowick, with pen, ink and paper
KING EDWARD	Hast thou pen, ink and paper ready, Lod’wick?
LODOWICK	Ready, my liege.
KING EDWARD	Then in the summer arbour sit by me; Make it our council house or cabinet: Since green our thoughts, green be the conventicle Where we will ease us by disburd’ning them.
(didascalia)	They sit. Lodowick prepares to write
KING EDWARD	Now, Lod‘wick, invocate some golden muse To bring thee hither an enchanted pen That may for sighs set down true sighs indeed, Talking of grief, to make thee ready groan, And when thou write’st of tears, encouch the word Before and after with such sweet laments That it may raise drops in a Tartar’s eye, And make a flint-heart Scythian pitiful— For so much moving hath a poet’s pen. Then, if thou be a poet, move thou so And be enriched by thy sovereign’s love. For if the touch of sweet concordant strings Could force attendance in the ears of hell, How much more shall the strains of poets’ wit Beguile and ravish soft and human minds?
LODOWICK	To whom, my lord, shall I direct my style?
KING EDWARD	To one that stains the fair and sots the wise, Whose body is an abstract or a brief, Contains each general virtue in the world. ‘Better than beautiful’, thou must begin, Devise for fair a fairer word than ‘fair’, And every ornament that thou wouldst praise, Fly it a pitch above the soar of praise. For flattery fear thou not to be convicted, For were thy admiration ten times more, Ten times ten thousand more the worth exceeds Of that thou art to praise thy praise’s worth. Begin; I will to contemplate the while. Forget not to set down how passionate, How heart-sick and how full of languishment Her beauty makes me.
LODOWICK	Write I to a woman?
KING EDWARD	What beauty else could triumph over me, Or who but women do our love-lays greet? What think’st thou I did bid thee praise? A horse?
LODOWICK	Of what condition or estate she is ’Twere requisite that I should know, my lord.
KING EDWARD	Of such estate that hers is as a throne, And my estate the footstool where she treads. Then mayst thou judge what her condition is By the proportion of her mightiness. Write on, while I peruse her in my thoughts.
(didascalia)
KING EDWARD	Her voice to music or the nightingale. To music every summer-leaping swain Compares his sunburnt lover when she speaks, And why should I speak of the nightingale? The nightingale sings of adulterate wrong And that compare is too satirical, For sin, though sin, would not be so esteemed, But rather virtue sin, sin virtue deemed. Her hair far softer than the silkworm’s twist, Like to a flattering glass doth make more fair The yellow amber—‘like a flattering glass’ Comes in too soon: for writing of her eyes I’ll say that like a glass they catch the sun, And thence the hot reflection doth rebound Against my breast and burns my heart within. Ah, what a world of descant makes my soul Upon this voluntary ground of love! Come, Lod’wick: hast thou turned thy ink to gold? If not, write but in letters capital My mistress’ name, and it will gild thy paper. Read, Lod’wick, read! Fill thou the empty hollows of mine ears With the sweet hearing of thy poetry!
LODOWICK	I have not to a period brought her praise.
KING EDWARD	Her praise is as my Love—both infinite, Which apprehend such violent extremes That they disdain an ending period. Her beauty hath no match but my affection; Hers more than most, mine most, and more than more; Hers more to praise than tell the sea by drops— Nay more!—than drop the massy earth by sands, And sand by sand print them in memory. Then wherefore talk’st thou of a period To that which craves unended admiration? Read. Let us hear.
LODOWICK	(reading) ‘More fair and chaste than is the queen of shades’—
KING EDWARD	(staying him) That line hath two faults, gross and palpable. Compar’st thou her to the pale queen of night, Who, being set in dark, seems therefore light? What is she when the sun lifts up his head But like a fading taper, dim and dead? My love shall brave the eye of heaven at noon, And, being unmasked, outshine the golden sun!
LODOWICK	What is the other fault, my sovereign lord?
KING EDWARD	Read o’er the line again.
LODOWICK	(reading) ‘More fair and chaste’—
KING EDWARD	(staying him) I did not bid thee talk of chastity, To ransack so the treasure of her mind, For I had rather have her chased than chaste! Out with the moon line! I will none of it. And let me have her likened to the sun- Say she hath thrice more splendour than the sun, That her perfections emulates the sun, That she breeds sweets as plenteous as the sun, That she doth thaw cold winter like the sun, That she doth cheer fresh summer like the sun, That she doth dazzle gazers like the sun, And in this application to the sun Bid her be free and general as the sun, Who smiles upon the basest weed that grows As lovingly as on the fragrant rose. Let’s see what follows that same moonlight line.
LODOWICK	(reading) ‘More fair and chaste than is the queen of shades, More bold in constancy’—
KING EDWARD	(staying him) In constancy than who?
LODOWICK	(reading) ‘…than Judith was.’
KING EDWARD	O monstrous line! Put in the next a sword And I shall woo her to cut off my head! Blot, blot, good Lod’wick. Let us hear the next.
LODOWICK	There’s all that yet is done.
KING EDWARD	I thank thee then. Thou hast done little ill, But what is done is passing passing ill. No, let the captain talk of boist’rous war, The prisoner of emurèd dark constraint; The sick man best sets down the pangs of death, The man that starves the sweetness of a feast, The frozen soul the benefit of fire, And every grief his happy opposite. Love cannot sound well but in lovers’ tongues. Give me the pen and paper. I will write. Lodowick gives him the pen and paper.
(didascalia)	Enter the Countess of Salisbury
KING EDWARD	(Aside) But soft—here comes the treasurer of my spirit. (Aloud to Lodowick, showing him the paper in his hand) Lod‘wick, thou know’st not how to draw a battle! These wings, these flankers and these squadrons Argue in thee defective discipline. Thou shouldst have placed this here, this other here—
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Pardon my boldness, my thrice-gracious lords. Let my intrusion here be called my duty That comes to see my sovereign how he fares.
KING EDWARD	(to Lodowick, giving him the paper) Go, draw the same, I tell thee in what form.
LODOWICK	I go. Exit
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Sorry I am to see my liege so sad. What may thy subject do to drive from thee Thy gloomy consort, sullen melancholy?
KING EDWARD	Ah, lady, I am blunt and cannot strew The flowers of solace in a ground of shame. Since I came hither, Countess, I am wronged.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Now God forbid that any in my house Should think my sovereign wrong! Thrice-gentle King, Acquaint me with thy cause of discontent.
KING EDWARD	How near, then, shall I be to remedy?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	As near, my liege, as all my woman’s power Can pawn itself to buy thy remedy.
KING EDWARD	If thou speak’st true, then have I my redress. Engage thy power to redeem my joys, And I am joyful, Countess; else I die.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	I will, my liege.
KING EDWARD	Swear, Countess, that thou wilt.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	By heaven, I will.
KING EDWARD	Then take thyself a little way aside And tell thyself a king doth dote on thee. Say that within thy power it doth lie To make him happy, and that thou hast sworn To give him all the joy within thy power- Do this, and tell me when I shall be happy.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	All this is done, my thrice-dread sovereign. That power of love that I have power to give Thou hast, with all devout obedience. Employ me how thou wilt in proof thereof.
KING EDWARD	Thou hear’st me say that I do dote on thee.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	If on my beauty, take it if thou canst; Though little, I do prize it ten times less. If on my virtue, take it if thou canst; For virtue’s store, by giving, doth augment. Be it on what it will that I can give, And thou canst take away, inherit it.
KING EDWARD	It is thy beauty that I would enjoy.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	O, were it painted I would wipe it off And dispossess myself to give it thee! But, sovereign, it is soldered to my life: Take one, and both, for, like an humble shadow, It haunts the sunshine of my summer’s life—
KING EDWARD	But thou mayst lend it me to sport withal.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	As easy may my intellectual soul Be lent away and yet my body live As lend my body, palace to my soul, Away from her and yet retain my soul. My body is her bower, her court, her abbey; And she an angel, pure, divine, unspotted. If I should lend her house, my lord, to thee, I kill my poor soul, and my poor soul me.
KING EDWARD	Didst thou not swear to give me what I would?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	I did, my liege, so what you would I could.
KING EDWARD	I wish no more of thee than thou mayst give, Nor beg I do not, but I rather buy— That is, thy love; and for that love of thine In rich exchange I tender to thee mine.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	But that your lips were sacred, good my lord, You would profane the holy name of love. That love you offer me you cannot give, For Caesar owes that tribute to his queen. That love you beg of me I cannot give, For Sarah owes that duty to her lord. He that doth clip or counterfeit your stamp Shall die, my lord: and will your sacred self Commit high treason ‘gainst the king of heaven To stamp his image in forbidden metal, Forgetting your allegiance and your oath? In violating marriage’ sacred law You break a greater honour than yourself: To be a king is of a younger house Than to be married. Your progenitor, Sole reigning Adam o’er the universe, By God was honoured for a married man, But not by him anointed for a king. It is a penalty to break your statutes, Though not enacted with your highness’ hand; How much more to infringe the holy act Made by the mouth of God, sealed with his hand! I know my sovereign—in my husband’s love, Who now doth loyal service in his wars— Doth but so try the wife of Salisbury, Whether she will hear a wanton’s tale or no. Lest being therein guilty by my stay, From that, not from my liege, I turn away. Exit
KING EDWARD	Whether is her beauty by her words divine, Or are her words sweet chaplains to her beauty? Like as the wind doth beautify a sail And as a sail becomes the unseen wind, So do her words her beauties, beauty words. O, that I were a honey-gathering bee To bear the comb of virtue from this flower, And not a poison-sucking, envious spider To turn the juice I take to deadly venoml Religion is austere, and beauty gentle— Too strict a guardian for so fair a ward. O, that she were as is the air to me! Why, so she is: for when I would embrace her, This do I (embracing the air), and catch nothing but myself. I must enjoy her, for I cannot beat With reason and reproof fond love away.
(didascalia)	Enter the Earl of Warwick
KING EDWARD	(Aside) Here comes her father. I will work with him To bear my colours in this field of love.
EARL OF WARWICK	How is it that my sovereign is so sad? May I, with pardon, know your highness’ grief? An that my old endeavour will remove it, It shall not cumber long your majesty.
KING EDWARD	A kind and voluntary gift thou proffer’st That I was forward to have begged of thee. But, O, thou world, great nurse of flattery, Why dost thou tip men’s tongues with golden words, And peise their deeds with weight of heavy lead That fair performance cannot follow promise? O, that a man might hold the heart’s close book And choke the lavish tongue when it doth utter The breath of falsehood not charactered there!
EARL OF WARWICK	Far be it from the honour of my age That I should owe bright gold and render lead. Age is a cynic, not a flatterer. I say again that if I knew your grief, And that by me it may be lessened, My proper harm should buy your highness’ good.
KING EDWARD	These are the vulgar tenders of false men That never pay the duty of their words. Thou wilt not stick to swear what thou hast said, But when thou know’st my griefs condition This rash disgorged vomit of thy word Thou wilt eat up again, and leave me helpless.
EARL OF WARWICK	By heaven, I will not, though your majesty Did bid me run upon your sword and die!
KING EDWARD	Say that my grief is no way medicinable But by the loss and bruising of thine honour?
EARL OF WARWICK	If nothing but that loss may vantage you I would account that loss my vantage too.
KING EDWARD	Think’st that thou canst unswear thy oath again?
EARL OF WARWICK	I cannot, nor I would not if I could.
KING EDWARD	But if thou dost, what shall I say to thee?
EARL OF WARWICK	What may be said to any perjured villain That breaks the sacred warrant of an oath.
KING EDWARD	What wilt thou say to one that breaks an oath?
EARL OF WARWICK	That he hath broke his faith with God and man, And from them both stands excommunicate.
KING EDWARD	What office were it to suggest a man To break a lawful and religious vow?
EARL OF WARWICK	An office for the devil, not for man.
KING EDWARD	That devil’s office must thou do for me, Or break thy oath and cancel all the bonds Of love and duty ‘twixt thyself and me. And therefore, Warwick, if thou art thyself, The lord and master of thy word and oath, Go to thy daughter and, in my behalf, Command her, woo her, win her any ways To be my mistress and my secret love. I will not stand to hear thee make reply; Thy oath break hers, or let thy sovereign die. Exit
EARL OF WARWICK	O doting king! O detestable office! Well may I tempt myself to wrong myself, When he hath sworn me by the name of God To break a vow made by the name of God. What if I swear by this right hand of mine To cut this right hand off? The better way Were to profane the idol than confound it, But neither will I do. I’ll keep mine oath And to my daughter make a recantation Of all the virtue I have preached to her. I’ll say she must forget her husband, Salisbury— If she remember to embrace the King. I’ll say an oath may easily be broken— But not so easily pardoned, being broken. I’ll say it is true charity to love— But not true love to be so charitable. I’ll say his greatness may bear out the shame— But not his kingdom can buy out the sin. I’ll say it is my duty to persuade— But not her honesty to give consent.
(didascalia)	Enter the Countess of Salisbury
EARL OF WARWICK	(Aside) See where she comes. Was never father had Against his child an embassage so bad.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	My lord and father, I have sought for you. My mother and the peers importune you To keep in presence of his majesty, And do your best to make his highness merry.
EARL OF WARWICK	(aside) How shall I enter in this graceless errand? I must not call her child, for where’s the father That will in such a suit seduce his child? Then ‘wife of Salisbury’—shall I so begin? No, he’s my friend, and where is found the friend That will do friendship such endamagement? (To the Countess) Neither my daughter, nor my dear friend’s wife, I am not Warwick, as thou think‘st I am, But an attorney from the court of hell, That thus have housed my spirit in his form To do a message to thee from the King: ‘The mighty King of England dotes on thee: He that hath power to take away thy life Hath power to take thy honour. Then consent To pawn thine honour rather than thy life; Honour is often lost and got again, But life, once gone, hath no recovery. The sun that withers hay doth nourish grass, The King that would distain thee, will advance thee. The poets write that great Achilles’ spear Could heal the wound it made; the moral is, What mighty men misdo they can amend. The lion doth become his bloody jaws And grace his foragement by being mild When vassal fear lies trembling at his feet. The King will, in his glory, hide thy shame, And those that gaze on him, to find out thee, Will lose their eyesight looking in the sun. What can one drop of poison harm the sea Whose hugy vastures can digest the ill And make it lose his operation? The King’s great name will temper thy misdeeds, And give the bitter potion of reproach A sugared, sweet and most delicious taste. Besides, it is no harm to do the thing Which, without shame, could not be left undone.’ Thus have I, in his majesty’s behalf, Apparelled sin in virtuous sentences, And dwell upon thy answer in his suit.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Unnatural besiege! Woe me unhappy, To have escaped the danger of my foes And to be ten times worse envir‘ned by friends! Hath he no means to stain my honest blood But to corrupt the author of my blood To be his scandalous and vile solicitor? No marvel though the branch be then infected, When poison hath encompassed the root; No marvel though the leprous infant die, When the stern dame envenometh the dug. Why then, give sin a passport to offend, And youth the dangerous rein of liberty. Blot out the strict forbidding of the law, And cancel every canon that prescribes A shame for shame, or penance for offence. No, let me die if his too boist’rous will Will have it so, before I will consent To be an actor in his graceless lust.
EARL OF WARWICK	Why, now thou speak‘st as I would have thee speak! And mark how I unsay my words again: An honourable grave is more esteemed Than the polluted closet of a king. The greater man, the greater is the thing, Be it good or bad, that he shall undertake. An unreputed mote flying in the sun Presents a greater substance than it is. The freshest summer’s day doth soonest taint The loathed carrion that it seems to kiss. Deep are the blows made with a mighty axe. That sin doth ten times aggravate itself That is committed in a holy place. An evil deed done by authority Is sin and subornation. Deck an ape In tissue, and the beauty of the robe Adds but the greater scorn unto the beast. A spacious field of reasons could I urge Between his glory, daughter, and thy shame: That poison shows worst in a golden cup; Dark night seems darker by the lightning flash; Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds; And every glory that inclines to sin, The shame is treble by the opposite. So leave I with my blessing in thy bosom, Which then convert to a most heavy curse When thou convert’st from honour’s golden name To the black faction of bed-blotting shame.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	I’ll follow thee, and when my mind turns so, My body sink my soul in endless woe. Exeunt Sc. 3
(didascalia)	Enter at one door the Earl of Derby from France. At another door, enter Lord Audley with a drummer
EARL OF DERBY	Thrice-noble Audley, well encountered here. How is it with our sovereign and his peers?
AUDLEY	‘Tis full a fortnight since I saw his highness, What time he sent me forth to muster men, Which I accordingly have done, and bring them hither, In fair array, before his majesty. What news, my lord of Derby, from the Emperor?
EARL OF DERBY	As good as we desire. The Emperor Hath yielded to his highness friendly aid, And makes our king lieutenant-general In all his lands and large dominions. Then via for the spacious bounds of France!
AUDLEY	What, doth his highness leap to hear these news?
EARL OF DERBY	I have not yet found time to open them. The King is in his closet, malcontent. For what I know not, but he gave in charge Till after dinner none should interrupt him. The Countess Salisbury and her father Warwick, Artois, and all, look underneath the brows.
AUDLEY	Undoubtedly, then, something is amiss.
(didascalia)	Sound trumpets within
EARL OF DERBY	The trumpets sound. The King is now abroad.
(didascalia)	Enter King Edward
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Here comes his highness.
EARL OF DERBY	(to the King) Befall my sovereign all my sovereign’s wish.
(didascalia)	KING EDWARD aside
EARL OF DERBY	Ah, that thou wert a witch to make it so.
EARL OF DERBY	The Emperor greeteth you—
(didascalia)	KING EDWARD aside Would it were the Countess.
EARL OF DERBY	—And hath accorded to your highness’ suit.
(didascalia)	KING EDWARD aside
EARL OF DERBY	Thou liest. She hath not, but I would she had.
AUDLEY	All love and duty to my lord the King.
(didascalia)	KING EDWARD aside
AUDLEY	Well, all but one is none. (To Audley) What news with you?
AUDLEY	I have, my liege, levied those horse and foot, According as your charge, and brought them hither.
KING EDWARD	Then let those foot trudge hence upon those horse, According to our discharge, and be gone. Derby, I’ll look upon the Countess’ mind anon.
EARL OF DERBY	The Countess’ mind, my liege?
KING EDWARD	I mean the Emperor. Leave me alone.
AUDLEY	(to Derby) What is his mind?
EARL OF DERBY	Let’s leave him to his humour.
(didascalia)	Exeunt Derby and Audley
KING EDWARD	Thus from the heart’s abundance speaks the tongue: ‘Countess’ for ‘Emperor’—and indeed why not? She is as imperator over me, and I to her Am as a kneeling vassal that observes The pleasure or displeasure of her eye.
(didascalia)	Enter Lodowick
KING EDWARD	(To Lodowick) What says the more-than-Cleopatra’s match To Caesar now?
LODOWICK	That yet, my liege, ere night She will resolve your majesty.
(didascalia)	Sound drum within
KING EDWARD	What drum is this that thunders forth this march To start the tender Cupid in my bosom? Poor sheepskin, how it brawls with him that beateth it! Go, break the thund’ring parchment-bottom out And I will teach it to conduct sweet lines Unto the bosom of a heavenly nymph; For I will use it as my writing paper, And so reduce him from a scolding drum To be the herald, and dear counsel-bearer, Betwixt a goddess and a mighty king. Go, bid the drummer learn to touch the lute, Or hang him in the braces of his drum; For now we think it an uncivil thing To trouble heaven with such harsh resounds. Away!
(didascalia)	Exit Lodowick
KING EDWARD	The quarrel that I have requires no arms But these of mine, and these shall meet my foe In a deep march of penetrable groans. My eyes shall be my arrows, and my sighs Shall serve me as the vantage of the wind To whirl away my sweet’st artillery. Ah, but alas, she wins the sun of me, For that is she herself, and thence it comes That poets term the wanton warrior blind. But love hath eyes as judgement to his steps, Till too much loved glory dazzles them—
(didascalia)	Enter Lodowick
KING EDWARD	How now?
LODOWICK	My liege, the drum that struck the lusty march Stands with Prince Edward, your thrice-valiant son.
(didascalia)	Exit
(didascalia)	Enter Edward, Prince of Wales
(didascalia)	I see the boy. Aside O, how his mother’s face,
KING EDWARD	Modelled in his, corrects my strayed desire, And rates my heart, and chides my thievish eye, Who, being rich enough in seeing her, Yet seek elsewhere; and basest theft is that Which cannot cloak itself in poverty. (To the Prince) Now, boy, what news?
PRINCE OF WALES	I have assembled, my dear lord and father, The choicest buds of all our English blood For our affairs to France, and here we come To take direction from your majesty.
KING EDWARD	(aside) Still do I see in him delineate His mother’s visage. Those his eyes are hers, Who looking wistly on me make me blush. For faults against themselves give evidence; Lust is a fire, and men, like lanterns, show Light lust within themselves, even through themselves. Away, loose silks o’er wavering vanity! Shall the large limit of fair Brittany By me be overthrown, and shall I not Master this little mansion of myself? Give me an armour of eternal steel: I go to conquer kings; and shall I not then Subdue myself and be my enemy’s friend? It must not be. (To the Prince) Come, boy! Forward! Advance! Let’s with our colours sweet the air of France.
(didascalia)	Enter Lodowick
LODOWICK	(to the King) My liege, the Countess, with a smiling cheer, Desires access unto your majesty.
KING EDWARD	(aside) Why there it goes. That very smile of hers Hath ransomed captive France and set the King, The Dauphin and the peers at liberty. (To the Prince) Go, leave me, Ned, and revel with thy friends.
(didascalia)	Exit the Prince of Wales
KING EDWARD	(Aside) Thy mother is but black, and thou, like her, Dost put it in my mind how foul she is. (To Lodowick) Go, fetch the Countess hither in thy hand—
(didascalia)	Exit Lodowick
KING EDWARD	And let her chase away these winter clouds, For she gives beauty both to heaven and earth. The sin is more to hack and hew poor men Than to embrace in an unlawful bed The register of all rarieties Since leathern Adam till this youngest hour.
(didascalia)	Enter Lodowick leading in by the hand the Countess of Salisbury
KING EDWARD	Go, Lod’wick, put thy hand into my purse— Play, spend, give, riot, waste, do what thou wilt So thou wilt hence awhile and leave me here.
(didascalia)	Exit Lodowick
KING EDWARD	(To the Countess) Now, my soul’s playfellow, art thou come To speak the more-than-heavenly word of ‘yea’ To my objection in thy beauteous love?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	My father on his blessing hath commanded—
KING EDWARD	That thou shalt yield to me.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Ay, dear my liege, your due.
KING EDWARD	And that, my dearest love, can be no less Than right for right, and render love for love.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Than wrong for wrong, and endless hate for hate. But sith I see your majesty so bent That my unwillingness, my husband’s love, Your high estate, nor no respect respected Can be my help, but that your mightiness Will overbear and awe these dear regards, I bind my discontent to thy content, And what I would not ill compel I will, Provided that yourself remove those lets That stand between your highness’ love and mine.
KING EDWARD	Name them, fair Countess, and by heaven I will.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	It is their lives that stand between our love That I would have choked up, my sovereign.
KING EDWARD	Whose lives, my lady?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	My thrice-loving liege, Your Queen and Salisbury, my wedded husband, Who, living, have that title in our love That we cannot bestow but by their death.
KING EDWARD	Their opposition is beyond our law.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	So is your desire. If the law Can hinder you to execute the one, Let it forbid you to attempt the other. I cannot think you love me as you say Unless you do make good what you have sworn.
KING EDWARD	No more. Thy husband and the Queen shall die. Fairer thou art by far than Hero was; Beardless Leander not so strong as I. He swam an easy current for his love, But I will through a Hellespont of blood To arrive at Sestos, where my Hero lies.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Nay, you’ll do more. You’ll make the river too With their heart bloods that keep our love asunder, Of which my husband and your wife are twain.
KING EDWARD	Thy beauty makes them guilty of their death, And gives in evidence that they shall die— Upon which verdict I, their judge, condemn them.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	O, perjured beauty! More corrupted judge! When to the great star chamber o‘er our heads The universal sessions calls to ’count This packing evil, we both shall tremble for it.
KING EDWARD	What says my fair love? Is she resolute?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Resolved to be dissolved, and therefore this: Keep but thy word, great King, and I am thine. Stand where thou dost—I’ll part a little from thee— She moves away from the King
(didascalia)	kneeling And see how I will yield me to thy hands.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Here, by my side, doth hang my wedding knives. She reveals two knives Take thou the one, She offers a knife to the King and with it kill thy Queen, And learn by me to find her where she lies; And with this other She turns the other knife on herself I’ll dispatch my love, Which now lies fast asleep within my heart. When they are gone, then I’ll consent to love. Stir not, lascivious King, to hinder me. My resolution is more nimbler far Than thy prevention can be in my rescue. An if thou stir, I strike. Therefore stand still, And hear the choice that I will put thee to. Either swear to leave thy most unholy suit And never henceforth to solicit me, Or else, by heaven, this sharp-pointed knife Shall stain thy earth with that which thou wouldst stain— My poor, chaste blood. Swear, Edward, swear, Or I will strike and die before thee here.
KING EDWARD	Even by that power I swear, that gives me now The power to be ashamed of myself, I never mean to part my lips again In any words that tends to such a suit. Arise, true English lady, whom our isle May better boast of than ever Roman might Of her, whose ransacked treasury hath tasked The vain endeavour of so many pens. Arise, and be my fault thy honour’s fame Which after-ages shall enrich thee with. I am awakèd from this idle dream.
(didascalia)	The Countess stands
KING EDWARD	(Calling) Warwick, my son, Derby, Artois and Audley— Brave warriors all, where are you all this while?
(didascalia)	Enter all the peers: the Earl of Warwick, the
KING EDWARD	Prince of Wales, the Earl of Derby, the Comte d’Artois and Lord Audley Warwick, I make thee Warden of the North. Thou, Prince of Wales, and Audley, straight to sea, Scour to Newhaven—some there stay for me. Myself, Artois and Derby will through Flanders To greet our friends there and to crave their aid. This night will scarce suffice me to discover My folly’s siege against a faithful lover, For ere the sun shall gild the eastern sky We’ll wake him with our martial harmony.
(didascalia)	Exeunt
KING EDWARD	Sc. 4
(didascalia)	Enter Jean King of France, his two sons (the Dauphin and Prince Philippe) and the Duc de Lorraine
KING OF FRANCE	Here, till our navy of a thousand sail Have made a breakfast to our foe by sea, Let us encamp to wait their happy speed. Lorraine, what readiness is Edward in? How hast thou heard that he provided is Of martial furniture for this exploit?
DUC DE LORRAINE	To lay aside unnecessary soothing, And not to spend the time in circumstance, ’Tis bruited for a certainty, my lord, That he’s exceeding strongly fortified. His subjects flock as willingly to war As if unto a triumph they were led.
DAUPHIN	England was wont to harbour malcontents, Bloodthirsty and seditious Catilines, Spendthrifts, and such as gape for nothing else But change and alteration of the state. And is it possible That they are now so loyal in themselves?
DUC DE LORRAINE	All but the Scot, who solemnly protests, As heretofore I have informed his grace, Never to sheathe his sword or take a truce.
KING OF FRANCE	Ah, that’s the anch’rage of some better hope. But on the other side, to think what friends King Edward hath retained in Netherland, Among those ever-bibbing epicures— Those frothy Dutchmen, puffed with double beer, That drink and swill in every place they come— Doth not a little aggravate mine ire. Besides, we hear the Emperor conjoins And stalls him in his own authority. But all the mightier that their number is The greater glory reaps the victory! Some friends have we beside domestic power— The stern Polonian and the warlike Dane, The King of Bohême, and of Sicily, Are all become confederates with us And, as I think, are marching hither apace—
(didascalia)	Sound drums within
KING OF FRANCE	But soft, I hear the music of their drums, By which I guess that their approach is near.
(didascalia)	Enter at one door the King of Bohemia with Danish soldiers and a drummer. Enter at another door a Polish captain with Muscovite and Polish soldiers and a drummer
KING OF BOHEMIA	King Jean of France, as league and neighbourhood Requires when friends are any way distressed, I come to aid thee with my country’s force.
POLISH CAPTAIN	(to the King of France) And from great Moscow, fearful to the Turk, And lofty Poland, nurse of hardy men, I bring these servitors to fight for thee, Who willingly will venture in thy cause.
KING OF FRANCE	Welcome, Bohemian king, and welcome all. This your great kindness I will not forget. Besides your plentiful rewards in crowns That from our treasury ye shall receive, There comes a harebrained nation, decked in pride, The spoil of whom will be a treble gain. And now my hope is full, my joy complete. At sea we are as puissant as the force Of Agamemnon in the haven of Troy. By land, with Xerxes we compare of strength, Whose soldiers drank up rivers in their thirst. Then, Bayard-like, blind overweening Ned, To reach at our imperial diadem Is either to be swallowed of the waves, Or hacked a-pieces when thou com’st ashore.
(didascalia)	Enter a French Mariner
MARINER	Near to the coast I have descried, my lord, As I was busy in my watchful charge, The proud armada of King Edward’s ships, Which, at the first far off when I did ken, Seemed as it were a grove of withered pines, But drawing near, their glorious bright aspect, Their streaming ensigns wrought of coloured silk, Like to a meadow full of sundry flowers, Adorns the naked bosom of the earth. Majestical the order of their course, Figuring the hornèd circle of the moon, And on the top gallant of the admiral, And likewise all the handmaids of his train, The arms of England and of France unite Are quartered equally by herald’s art. Thus titely carried with a merry gale They plough the ocean hitherward amain.
KING OF FRANCE	Dare he already crop the fleur-de-lis? I hope, the honey being gathered thence, He, with the spider, afterward approached, Shall suck forth deadly venom from the leaves. But where’s our navy? How are they prepared To wing themselves against this flight of ravens?
MARINER	They, having knowledge brought them by the scouts, Did break from anchor straight and, puffed with rage, No otherwise than were their sails with wind, Made forth as when the empty eagle flies To satisfy his hungry, griping maw.
KING OF FRANCE	(giving money) There’s for thy news. Return unto thy barque, And if thou scape the bloody stroke of war And do survive the conflict, come again, And let us hear the manner of the fight. Exit Mariner Mean space, my lords, ’tis best we be dispersed To several places, lest they chance to land. (To the King of Bohemia) First you, my lord, with your Bohemian troops, Shall pitch your battles on the lower hand.
(didascalia)	(To the Dauphin and the Polish captain)
KING OF FRANCE	My eldest son, the Duke of Normandy, Together with this aid of Muscovites, Shall climb the higher ground another way. Here in the middle coast, betwixt you both, Philippe, my youngest boy, and I will lodge. So, lords, be gone, and look unto your charge, You stand for France, an empire fair and large.
(didascalia)	Exeunt all but the King of France and Prince Philippe
KING OF FRANCE	Now tell me, Philippe, what is thy conceit Touching the challenge that the English make?
PRINCE PHILIPPE	I say, my lord, claim Edward what he can, And bring he ne‘er so plain a pedigree, ’Tis you are in possession of the crown, And that’s the surest point of all the law. But were it not, yet ere he should prevail I’ll make a conduit of my dearest blood, Or chase those straggling upstarts home again.
(didascalia)	Well said, young Philippe! To an attendant Call for bread and wine
KING OF FRANCE	That we may cheer our stomachs with repast To look our foes more sternly in the face. Bread and wine are brought forth. The battle is heard afar off. The King and Prince Philippe sup Now is begun the heavy day at sea. Fight, Frenchmen, fight! Be like the field of bears When they defend their younglings in their caves. Steer, angry Nemesis, the happy helm That with the sulphur battles of your rage The English fleet may be dispersed and sunk. A cannon shot within
PRINCE PHILIPPE	O, father, how this echoing cannon shot, Like sweet harmony, digests my cates!
KING OF FRANCE	Now, boy, thou hear‘st what thund’ring terror ’tis To buckle for a kingdom’s sovereignty. The earth, with giddy trembling when it shakes, Or when the exhalations of the air Breaks in extremity of lightning flash, Affrights not more than kings when they dispose To show the rancour of their high-swoll’n hearts.
(didascalia)	Retreat sounds within
(didascalia)	Retreat is sounded—one side hath the worse.
KING OF FRANCE	O, if it be the French, sweet fortune turn, And in thy turning, change the froward winds That, with advantage of a favouring sky, Our men may vanquish, and the other fly.
(didascalia)	Enter the French Mariner
KING OF FRANCE	My heart misgives. (To the Mariner) Say, mirror of pale death, To whom belongs the honour of this day? Relate, I pray thee, if thy breath will serve The sad discourse of this discomfiture.
MARINER	I will, my lord. My gracious sovereign, France hath ta‘en the foil, And boasting Edward triumphs with success. These iron-hearted navies, When last I was reporter to your grace, Both full of angry spleen, of hope and fear, Hasting to meet each other in the face, At last conjoined, and by their admiral Our admiral encountered many shot. By this, the other, that beheld these twain Give earnest-penny of a further wreck, Like fiery dragons took their haughty flight; And likewise meeting, from their smoky wombs Sent many grim ambassadors of death. Then ’gan the day to turn to gloomy night, And darkness did as well enclose the quick As those that were but newly reft of life. No leisure served for friends to bid farewell, And if it had, the hideous noise was such As each to other seemed deaf and dumb. Purple the sea whose channel filled as fast With streaming gore that from the maimed fell, As did her gushing moisture break into The cranny cleftures of the through-shot planks. Here flew a head dissevered from the trunk; There mangled arms and legs were tossed aloft, As when a whirlwind takes the summer dust And scatters it in middle of the air. Then might ye see the reeling vessels split And, tottering, sink into the ruthless flood Until their lofty tops were seen no more. All shifts were tried, both for defence and hurt. And now the effect of valour and of fear, Of resolution and of cowardice, We lively pictured—how the one for fame, The other by compulsion, laid about. Much did the Nonpareil, that brave ship; So did the Black Snake of Boulogne, than which A bonnier vessel never yet spread sail. But all in vain: both sun, the wind and tide Revolted all unto our foemen’s side, That we, perforce, were fain to give them way, And they are landed. Thus my tale is done. We have untimely lost, and they have won.
KING OF FRANCE	Then rests there nothing but, with present speed, To join our several forces all in one, And bid them battle ere they range too far. Come, gentle Philippe, let us hence depart; This soldier’s words have pierced thy father’s heart.
(didascalia)	Exeunt
KING OF FRANCE	Sc. 5
(didascalia)	Enter at one door two Frenchmen without baggage. Enter at another door, meeting them, other Frenchmen and a Frenchwoman with two little children, all with baggage
FRENCHMAN WITHOUT BAGGAGE	Well met, my masters. How now? What’s the news, And wherefore are ye laden thus with stuff? What, is it quarter-day, that you remove, And carry bag and baggage too?
FIRST FRENCHMAN WITH BAGGAGE	Quarter-day, ay, and quartering day I fear. Have ye not heard the news that flies abroad?
FRENCHMAN WITHOUT BAGGAGE	What news?
SECOND FRENCHMAN WITH BAGGAGE	How the French navy is destroyed at sea, And that the English army is arrived.
FRENCHMAN WITHOUT BAGGAGE	What then?
FIRST FRENCHMAN WITH BAGGAGE	‘What then,’ quoth you? Why, is’t not time to fly, When envy and destruction is so nigh?
FRENCHMAN WITHOUT BAGGAGE	Content thee, man, they are far enough from hence, And will be met, I warrant ye, to their cost, Before they break so far into the realm.
FIRST FRENCHMAN WITH BAGGAGE	Ay, so the grasshopper doth spend the time In mirthful jollity, till winter come, And then, too late, he would redeem his time, When frozen cold hath nipped his careless head. He that no sooner will provide a cloak Than when he sees it doth begin to rain May, peradventure, for his negligence, Be throughly washed when he suspects it not. We that have charge, and such a train as this, Must look in time to look for them and us, Lest, when we would, we cannot be relieved.
FRENCHMAN WITHOUT BAGGAGE	Belike you then despair of ill success, And think your country will be subjugate.
SECOND FRENCHMAN WITH BAGGAGE	We cannot tell. ’Tis good to fear the worst.
FRENCHMAN WITHOUT BAGGAGE	Yet rather fight, than like unnatural sons Forsake your loving parents in distress.
FIRST FRENCHMAN WITH BAGGAGE	Tush, they that have already taken arms Are many fearful millions in respect Of that small handful of our enemies. But ’tis a rightful quarrel must prevail: Edward is son unto our late king’s sister, Where Jean Valois is three degrees removed.
FRENCHWOMAN	Besides, there goes a prophecy abroad, Published by one that was a friar once, Whose oracles have many times proved true, And now he says the time will shortly come Whenas a lion roused in the west Shall carry hence the fleur-de-lis of France. These, I can tell ye, and such like surmises, Strike many Frenchmen cold unto the heart.
(didascalia)	Enter a Frenchman in haste
FLEEING FRENCHMAN	Fly, countrymen and citizens of France! Sweet-flow’ring peace, the root of happy life, Is quite abandoned and expulsed the land. Instead of whom, ransack-constraining war Sits like to ravens upon your houses’ tops. Slaughter and mischief walk within your streets And, unrestrained, make havoc as they pass, The form whereof, even now, myself beheld Upon this fair mountain, whence I came. For so far off as I directed mine eyes I might perceive five cities all on fire, Cornfields and vineyards burning like an oven, And, as the reeking vapour in the wind Y-turnèd but aside, I likewise might discern The poor inhabitants, escaped the flame, Fall numberless upon the soldiers’ pikes. Three ways these dreadful ministers of wrath Do tread the measures of their tragic march: Upon the right hand comes the conquering King, Upon the left his hot, unbridled son, And in the midst their nation’s glittering host. All which, though distant, yet conspire in one To leave a desolation where they come. Fly, therefore, citizens, if you be wise. Seek out some habitation further off. Here, if you stay, your wives will be abused, Your treasure shared before your weeping eyes. Shelter you yourselves, for now the storm doth rise. Away, away! Methinks I hear their drums! Ah, wretched France, I greatly fear thy fall; Thy glory shaketh like a tottering wall.
(didascalia)	Exeunt
FLEEING FRENCHMAN	Sc. 6
(didascalia)	Enter King Edward and the Earl of Derby with soldiers and Gobin de Grace
KING EDWARD	Where is the Frenchman by whose cunning guide We found the shallow of this river Somme, And had direction how to pass the sea?
GOBIN	Here, my good lord.
KING EDWARD	How art thou called? Tell me thy name.
GOBIN	Gobin de Grace, if please your excellence.
KING EDWARD	Then, Gobin, for the service thou hast done We here enlarge and give thee liberty, And for a recompense, beside this good, Thou shalt receive five hundred marks in gold. (To Derby) I know not how we should have missed our son, Whom now in heart I wish I might behold.
(didascalia)	Enter the Comte d’Artois
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Good news, my lord! The Prince is hard at hand, And with him comes Lord Audley and the rest Whom, since our landing, we could never meet.
(didascalia)	Enter Edward Prince of Wales, Lord Audley and soldiers
KING EDWARD	Welcome, fair Prince. How hast thou sped, my son, Since thy arrival on the coast of France?
PRINCE OF WALES	Successfully, I thank the gracious heavens. Some of their strongest cities we have won— As Harfleur, Lô, Crotoy and Carentan— And others wasted, leaving at our heels A wide, apparent field and beaten path For solitariness to progress in. Yet those that would submit we kindly pardoned, For who in scorn refused our proffered peace Endured the penalty of sharp revenge.
KING EDWARD	Ah, France, why shouldst thou be this obstinate Against the kind embracement of thy friends? How gently had we thought to touch thy breast And set our foot upon thy tender mould, But that in froward and disdainful pride Thou, like a skittish and untamed colt, Dost start aside and strike us with thy heels. But tell me, Ned, in all thy warlike course Hast thou not seen the usurping King of France?
PRINCE OF WALES	Yes, my good lord, and not two hours ago, With full a hundred thousand fighting men Upon the one side with the river’s bank, And on the other, both his multitudes. I feared he would have cropped our smaller power, But happily, perceiving your approach, He hath withdrawn himself to Crécy plains, Where, as it seemeth by his good array, He means to bid us battle presently.
KING EDWARD	He shall be welcome. That’s the thing we crave.
(didascalia)	Enter Jean King of France, the Dauphin, the
KING EDWARD	Duc de Lorraine, the King of Bohemia, young Prince Philippe and soldiers
KING OF FRANCE	Edward, know that Jean, the true King of France, Musing thou shouldst encroach upon his land And, in thy tyrannous proceeding, slay His faithful subjects and subvert his towns, Spits in thy face, and, in this manner following, Upbraids thee with thine arrogant intrusion. First, I condemn thee for a fugitive, A thievish pirate and a needy mate, One that hath either no abiding-place Or else, inhabiting some barren soil, Where neither herb or fruitful grain is had, Dost altogether live by pilfering. Next, insomuch thou hast infringed thy faith, Broke league and solemn covenant made with me, I hold thee for a false, pernicious wretch. And last of all, although I scorn to cope With one so much inferior to myself, Yet in respect thy thirst is all for gold, Thy labour rather to be feared than loved, To satisfy thy lust, in either part, Here am I come and with me have I brought Exceeding store of treasure, pearl and coin. Leave, therefore, now to persecute the weak, And armed ent‘ring conflict with the armed, Let it be seen, ’mongst other petty thefts, How thou canst win this pillage manfully.
KING EDWARD	If gall or wormwood have a pleasant taste, Then is thy salutation honey sweet. But as the one hath no such property, So is the other most satirical. Yet wot how I regard thy worthless taunts. If thou have uttered them to soil my fame, Or dim the reputation of my birth, Know that thy wolvish barking cannot hurt. If slyly to insinuate with the world, And with a strumpet’s artificial lime To paint thy vicious and deformed cause, Be well assured the counterfeit will fade, And in the end thy foul defects be seen. But if thou didst it to provoke me on, As who should say I were but timorous, Or, coldly negligent, did need a spur, Bethink thyself how slack I was at sea, How, since my landing, I have won no towns, Entered no further but upon the coast, And there have ever since securely slept. But if I have been otherwise employed, Imagine, Valois, whether I intend To skirmish, not for pillage, but for the crown Which thou dost wear and that I vow to have, Or one of us shall fall into his grave.
PRINCE OF WALES	Look not for cross invectives at our hands, Or railing execrations of despite. Let creeping serpents hid in hollow banks Sting with their tongues; we have remorseless swords, And they shall plead for us and our affairs. Yet thus much briefly, by my father’s leave, As all the immodest poison of thy throat Is scandalous and most notorious lies, And our pretended quarrel is truly just, So end the battle when we meet today: May either of us prosper and prevail Or, luckless cursed, receive eternal shame.
KING EDWARD	That needs no further question, and I know His conscience witnesseth it is my right. Therefore, Valois, say: wilt thou yet resign Before the sickle’s thrust into the corn, Or that enkindled fury turn to flame?
KING OF FRANCE	Edward, I know what right thou hast in France, And ere I basely will resign my crown This champaign field shall be a pool of blood, And all our prospect as a slaughterhouse.
PRINCE OF WALES	Ay, that approves thee, tyrant, what thou art. No father, king, or shepherd of thy realm, But one that tears her entrails with thy hands And, like a thirsty tiger, suck’st her blood.
AUDLEY	You peers of France, why do you follow him That is so prodigal to spend your lives?
DAUPHIN	Whom should they follow, aged impotent, But he that is their true-born sovereign?
KING EDWARD	Upbraid’st thou him because within his face Time hath engraved deep characters of age? Know that these grave scholars of experience, Like stiff-grown oaks, will stand immovable When whirlwind quickly turns up younger trees.
EARL OF DERBY	(to the King of France) Was ever any of thy father’s house King but thyself before this present time? (To the French generally) Edward’s great lineage by the mother’s side Five hundred years hath held the sceptre up. Judge then, conspirators, by this descent Which is the true-born sovereign—this, or that.
PRINCE PHILIPPE	(to the King of France) Father, range your battles. Prate no more. These English fain would spend the time in words That, night approaching, they might scape unfought.
KING OF FRANCE	Lords and my loving subjects, now’s the time That your intended force must bide the touch. Therefore, my friends, consider this in brief. He that you fight for is your natural king; He against whom you fight a foreigner. He that you fight for rules in clemency, And reigns you with a mild and gentle bit; He against whom you fight, if he prevail, Will straight enthrone himself in tyranny, Make slaves of you and with a heavy hand Curtail and curb your sweetest liberty. Then, to protect your country and your King, Let but the haughty courage of your hearts Answer the number of your able hands, And we shall quickly chase these fugitives. For what’s this Edward but a belly-god, A tender and lascivious wantonness, That th‘other day was almost dead for love? And what, I pray you, is his goodly guard? Such as, but scant them of their chines of beef, And take away their downy feather beds, And presently they are as resty-stiff As ’twere a many overridden jades. Then, Frenchmen, scorn that such should be your lords, And rather bind ye them in captive bands.
ALL THE FRENCH	Vive le roil God save King Jean of Francel
KING OF FRANCE	Now, on this plain of Crécy, spread yourselves. And, Edward, when thou dar’st, begin the fight!
(didascalia)	Exit with the French
KING EDWARD	(calling after) We presently will meet thee, Jean of France! (To the English) And, English lords, let us resolve the day Either to clear us of that scandalous crime Or be entombed in our innocence. (To the Prince of Wales) And, Ned, because this battle is the first That ever yet thou fought’st in pitched field, As ancient custom is of martialists To dub thee with the type of chivalry, In solemn manner we will give thee arms. Come, therefore, heralds; orderly bring forth A strong attirement for the Prince my son.
(didascalia)	Enter four heralds bringing in a coat armour, a helmet, a lance and a shield
KING EDWARD	Edward Plantagenet, in the name of God, As with this armour I impale thy breast So be thy noble, unrelenting heart Walled in with flint of matchless fortitude That never base affections enter there.
(didascalia)	The Prince of Wales is invested in armour
KING EDWARD	Fight and be valiant; conquer where thou com’st. (To Derby, Audley and Artois) Now follow, lords, and do him honour too.
EARL OF DERBY	Edward Plantagenet, Prince of Wales, As I do set this helmet on thy head Wherewith the chamber of thy brain is fenced, So may thy temples with Bellona’s hand Be still adorned with laurel victory.
(didascalia)	The helmet is placed on the Prince of Wales
EARL OF DERBY	Fight and be valiant; conquer where thou com’st.
AUDLEY	Edward Plantagenet, Prince of Wales, Receive this lance into thy manly hand. Use it in fashion of a brazen pen To draw forth bloody stratagems in France, And print thy valiant deeds in honour’s book.
(didascalia)	The lance is given to the Prince of Wales
AUDLEY	Fight and be valiant; vanquish where thou com’st.
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Edward Plantagenet, Prince of Wales, Hold, take this target; wear it on thy arm. And may the view thereof, like Perseus’ shield, Astonish and transform thy gazing foes To senseless images of meagre death.
(didascalia)	The shield is given to the Prince of Wales
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Fight and be valiant; conquer where thou com’st.
KING EDWARD	Now wants there naught but knighthood, which deferred We leave till thou hast won it in the field.
PRINCE OF WALES	My gracious father and ye forward peers, This honour you have done me animates And cheers my green, yet scarce-appearing, strength With comfortable, good-presaging signs, No otherwise than did old Jacob’s words Whenas he breathed his blessings on his sons. These hallowed gifts of yours, when I profane Or use them not to glory of my God To patronage the fatherless and poor, Or for the benefit of England’s peace, Be numb my joints, wax feeble both mine arms, Wither my heart that, like a sapless tree, I may remain the map of infamy.
KING EDWARD	Then thus our steeled battles shall be ranged. (To the Prince of Wales) The leading of the vanguard, Ned, is thine, To dignify whose lusty spirit the more We temper it with Audley’s gravity, That courage and experience, joined in one, Your manège may be second unto none. (To all) For the main battles I will guide myself, And Derby in the rearward march behind, That orderly disposed and set in ’ray Let us to horse, and God grant us the day!
(didascalia)	Exeunt
KING EDWARD	Sc. 7
(didascalia)	Alarum. Enter and exit a many Frenchmen flying. Chasing after them, enter and exit Edward Prince of Wales running. Then enter Jean King of France and the Due de Lorraine
KING OF FRANCE	O Lorraine, say: what mean our men to fly? Our number is far greater than our foes.
DUC DE LORRAINE	The garrison of Genoese, my lord, That came from Paris, weary with their march, Grudging to be so suddenly employed, No sooner in the forefront took their place, But straight retiring, so dismayed the rest As likewise they betook themselves to flight, In which, for haste to make a safe escape, More in the clustering throng are pressed to death Than by the enemy a thousandfold.
KING OF FRANCE	O, hapless fortune! Let us yet assay If we can counsel some of them to stay.
(didascalia)	Exeunt
KING OF FRANCE	Sc. 8
(didascalia)	Enter King Edward and Lord Audley
KING EDWARD	Lord Audley, whiles our son is in the chase, Withdraw our powers unto this little hill, And here a season let us breathe ourselves.
AUDLEY	I will, my lord. Exit
(didascalia)	Sound retreat within
KING EDWARD	Just-dooming heaven, whose secret providence To our gross judgement is inscrutable, How are we bound to praise thy wondrous works That hast, this day, given way unto the right, And made the wicked stumble at themselves?
(didascalia)	Enter the Comte d’Artois
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Rescue, King Edward! Rescue for thy son!
KING EDWARD	Rescue, Artois? What, is he prisoner, Or fell by violence beside his horse?
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Neither, my lord, but narrowly beset With turning Frenchmen, whom he did pursue, As ’tis impossible that he should scape Except your highness presently descend.
KING EDWARD	Tut, let him fight. We gave him arms today, And he is labouring for a knighthood, man!
(didascalia)	Enter the Earl of Derby
EARL OF DERBY	The Prince, my lord, the Prince! O, succour him! He’s close encompassed with a world of odds.
KING EDWARD	Then will he win a world of honour too If he by valour can redeem him thence. If not, what remedy? We have more sons Than one to comfort our declining age.
(didascalia)	Enter Lord Audley
AUDLEY	Renowned Edward, give me leave, I pray, To lead my soldiers where I may relieve Your grace’s son, in danger to be slain. The snares of French, like emmets on a bank, Muster about him whilst he, lion-like, Entangled in the net of their assaults, Franticly rends and bites the woven toil. But all in vain. He cannot free himself.
KING EDWARD	Audley, content. I will not have a man, On pain of death, sent forth to succour him. This is the day ordained by destiny To season his green courage with those grievous thoughts That, if he breaketh out, Nestor’s years on earth Will make him savour still of this exploit.
EARL OF DERBY	Ah, but he shall not live to see those days!
KING EDWARD	Why, then, his epitaph is lasting praise.
AUDLEY	Yet, good my lord, ’tis too much wilfulness To let his blood be spilt, that may be saved.
KING EDWARD	Exclaim no more, for none of you can tell Whether a borrowed aid will serve or no. Perhaps he is already slain or ta’en. And dare a falcon when she’s in her flight, And ever after she’ll be haggard-like. Let Edward be delivered by our hands And, still in danger, he’ll expect the like. But if himself himself redeem from thence, He will have vanquished, cheerful, death and fear, And ever after dread their force no more Than if they were but babes or captive slaves.
AUDLEY	O cruel father! Farewell Edward, then.
EARL OF DERBY	Farewell, sweet Prince, the hope of chivalry.
COMTE D’ARTOIS	O, would my life might ransom him from death!
(didascalia)	Trumpets sound retreat within
KING EDWARD	But soft—methinks I hear The dismal charge of trumpets’ loud retreat. All are not slain, I hope, that went with him. Some will return with tidings, good or bad.
(didascalia)	Enter Edward Prince of Wales in triumph, bearing in his hand his shivered lance. The body of the King of Bohemia is borne before, wrapped in the colours of Bohemia. The English run and embrace the Prince
AUDLEY	O, joyful sight! Victorious Edward lives!
EARL OF DERBY	Welcome, brave Prince.
KINC EDWARD	Welcome, Plantagenet. The Prince kneels and kisses his father’s hand
PRINCE OF WALES	First, having done my duty as beseemed, Lords, I regreet you all with hearty thanks. And now behold after my winter’s toil My painful voyage on the boist’rous sea Of war’s devouring gulfs and steely rocks I bring my freight unto the wished port, My summer’s hope, my travail’s sweet reward. (Pointing at Bohemia’s body) And here, with humble duty, I present This sacrifice, this first fruit of my sword, Cropped and cut down even at the gate of death: The King of Bohême, father, whom I slew, Whose thousands had entrenched me round about, And lay as thick upon my battered crest As on an anvil with their ponderous glaives. Yet marble courage still did underprop, And when my weary arms with often blows, Like the continual labouring woodman’s axe That is enjoined to fell a load of oaks, Began to falter, straight I would recover My gifts you gave me and my zealous vow, And then new courage made me fresh again That, in despite, I carved my passage forth, And put the multitude to speedy flight. Lo, thus hath Edward’s hand filled your request And done, I hope, the duty of a knight. His sword borne forth by a soldier
KING EDWARD	Ay, well thou hast deserved a knighthood, Ned, He takes the sword And therefore, with thy sword yet reeking warm With blood of those that fought to be thy bane, He knights the Prince Arise Prince Edward, trusty knight-at-arms. This day thou hast confounded me with joy And proved thyself fit heir unto a king.
PRINCE OF WALES	(rising, and then giving the King a paper) Here is a note, my gracious lord, of those That in this conflict of our foes were slain: Eleven princes of esteem, fourscore barons, A hundred and twenty knights, and thirty thousand Common soldiers—and of our men, a thousand.
KING EDWARD	Our God be praised! Now, Jean of France, I hope Thou know’st King Edward for no wantonness, No love-sick cockney, nor his soldiers jades. But which way is the fearful King escaped?
PRINCE OF WALES	Towards Poitiers, noble father, and his sons.
KING EDWARD	Ned, thou and Audley shall pursue them still. Myself and Derby will to Calais straight, And there begirt that haven town with siege. Now lies it on an upshot: therefore, strike, And wistly follow whiles the game’s on foot. Exeunt Sc. 9
(didascalia)	Enter the Comte de Montfort with a coronet in his hand and with him the Earl of Salisbury
COMTE DE MONTFORT	My lord of Salisbury, since by your aid Mine enemy Sir Charles of Blois is slain, And I again am quietly possessed In Bretagne’s dukedom, know that I resolve, For this kind furtherance of your king and you, To swear allegiance to his majesty— He offers Salisbury the coronet In sign whereof receive this coronet. Bear it unto him, and withal mine oath Never to be but Edward’s faithful friend.
EARL OF SALISBURY	(taking the coronet) I take it, Montfort. Thus I hope ere long The whole dominions of the realm of France Will be surrendered to his conquering hand.
(didascalia)	Exit Montfort
EARL OF SALISBURY	Now, if I knew but safely how to pass, I would at Calais gladly meet his grace, Whither I am by letters certified That he intends to have his host removed. It shall be so. This policy will serve. (Calling) Ho, who’s within? Bring Villiers to me.
(didascalia)	Enter Villiers
EARL OF SALISBURY	Villiers, thou know’st thou art my prisoner, And that I might for ransom, if I would, Require of thee a hundred thousand francs, Or else retain and keep thee captive still. But so it is that for a smaller charge Thou mayst be quit, an if thou wilt thyself. And this it is: procure me but a passport Of Charles, the Duke of Normandy, that I Without restraint may have recourse to Calais Through all the countries where he hath to do— Which thou mayst easily obtain, I think, By reason I have often heard thee say He and thou were students once together— And then thou shalt be set at liberty. How sayst thou? Wilt thou undertake to do it?
VILLIERS	I will, my lord. But I must speak with him.
EARL OF SALISBURY	Why, so thou shalt! Take horse and post from hence— Only before thou go’st, swear by thy faith That if thou canst not compass my desire, Thou wilt return my prisoner back again, And that shall be sufficient warrant for me.
VILLIERS	To that condition I agree, my lord, And will unfeignedly perform the same.
(didascalia)	Exit
EARL	or SALISBURY Farewell, Villiers! Thus once I mean to try a Frenchman’s faith.
(didascalia)	Exit
EARL	Sc. 10
(didascalia)	Enter King Edward and the Earl of Derby with soldiers
KING EDWARD	Since they refuse our proffered league, my lord, And will not ope their gates and let us in, We will entrench ourselves on every side, That neither victuals nor supply of men May come to succour this accursed town. Famine shall combat where our swords are stopped.
(didascalia)	Enter six poor Frenchmen
EARL OF DERBY	The promised aid that made them stand aloof Is now retired and gone another way. It will repent them of their stubborn will. But what are these poor, ragged slaves, my lord?
KING EDWARD	Ask what they are. It seems they come from Calais.
EARL OF DERBY	(to the poor Frenchmen) You wretched patterns of despair and woe— What are you? Living men, or gliding ghosts Crept from your graves to walk upon the earth?
POOR MAN	No ghosts, my lord, but men that breathe a life Far worse than is the quiet sleep of death. We are distressed poor inhabitants That long have been diseased, sick and lame. And now, because we are not fit to serve, The Captain of the town hath thrust us forth That so expense of victuals may be saved.
KING EDWARD	A charitable deed, no doubt, and worthy praise! But how do you imagine, then, to speed? We are your enemies: in such a case We can no less but put ye to the sword, Since, when we proffered truce, it was refused.
POOR MAN	An if your grace no otherwise vouchsafe, As welcome death is unto us as life.
KING EDWARD	Poor seely men, much wronged, and more distressed! Go, Derby, go, and see they be relieved. Command that victuals be appointed them, And give to every one five crowns apiece.
(didascalia)	Exeunt the Earl of Derby and the six poor Frenchmen
KING EDWARD	The lion scorns to touch the yielding prey, And Edward’s sword must fresh itself in such As wilful stubbornness hath made perverse.
(didascalia)	Enter Lord Percy
KING EDWARD	Lord Percy, welcome. What’s the news in England?
PERCY	The Queen, my lord, commends her to your grace, And from her highness and the lord vicegerent I bring this happy tidings of success: David of Scotland, lately up in arms, Thinking belike he soonest should prevail— Your highness being absent from the realm— Is by the fruitful service of your peers And painful travail of the Queen herself— That, big with child, was every day in arms— Vanquished, subdued and taken prisoner.
KING EDWARD	Thanks, Percy, for thy news, with all my heart! What was he took him prisoner in the field?
PERCY	A squire, my lord. John Copland is his name, Who, since entreated by her majesty, Denies to make surrender of his prize To any but unto your grace alone— Whereat the Queen is grievously displeased.
KING EDWARD	Well then, we’ll have a pursuivant dispatched To summon Copland hither out of hand, And with him he shall bring his prisoner-king.
PERCY	The Queen, my lord, herself by this at sea, And purposeth, as soon as wind will serve, To land at Calais, and to visit you.
KING EDWARD	She shall be welcome, and to wait her coming I’ll pitch my tent near to the sandy shore.
(didascalia)	Enter a Captain of Calais
CAPTAIN OF CALAIS	The burgesses of Calais, mighty king, Have, by a council, willingly decreed To yield the town and castle to your hands Upon condition it will please your grace To grant them benefit of life and goods.
KING EDWARD	They will so? Then, belike, they may command, Dispose, elect and govern as they list! No, sirrah. Tell them, since they did refuse Our princely clemency at first proclaimed, They shall not have it now, although they would. I will accept of naught but fire and sword— Except within these two days, six of them, That are the wealthiest merchants in the town, Come naked all but for their linen shirts, With each a halter hanged about his neck, And, prostrate, yield themselves upon their knees To be afflicted, hanged or what I please. And so you may inform their masterships.
(didascalia)	Exeunt all but the Captain
CAPTAIN OF CALAIS	Why, this it is to trust a broken staff. Had we not been persuaded Jean, our king, Would, with his army, have relieved the town, We had not stood upon defiance so. But now ’tis past that no man can recall, 84 And better some do go to wreck than all.
(didascalia)	Exit
CAPTAIN OF CALAIS	Sc. 11
(didascalia)	Enter the Dauphin and Villiers with a paper
DAUPHIN	I wonder, Villiers, thou shouldst importune me For one that is our deadly enemy.
VILLIERS	Not for his sake, my gracious lord, so much Am I become an earnest advocate As that, thereby, my ransom will be quit.
DAUPHIN	Thy ransom, man? Why need’st thou talk of that? Art thou not free? And are not all occasions That happen for advantage of our foes To be accepted of and stood upon?
VILLIERS	No, good my lord, except the same be just. For profit must with honour be commixed, Or else our actions are but scandalous. But, letting pass these intricate objections, Will’t please your highness to subscribe or no?
DAUPHIN	Villiers, I will not nor I cannot do it. Salisbury shall not have his will so much To claim a passport how it pleaseth him.
VILLIERS	Why then, I know the extremity, my lord. I must return to prison, whence I came.
DAUPHIN	Return? I hope thou wilt not! What bird that hath escaped the fowler’s gin Will not beware how she’s ensnared again? Or what is he so senseless and secure That, having hardly passed a dangerous gulf, Will put himself in peril there again?
VILLIERS	Ah, but it is mine oath, my gracious lord, Which I in conscience may not violate— Or else a kingdom should not draw me hence.
DAUPHIN	Thine oath? Why, that doth bind thee to abide. Hast thou not sworn obedience to thy Prince?
VILLIERS	In all things that uprightly he commands. But either to persuade or threaten me Not to perform the covenant of my word Is lawless, and I need not to obey.
DAUPHIN	Why, is it lawful for a man to kill, And not to break a promise with his foe?
VILLIERS	To kill, my lord, when war is once proclaimed, So that our quarrel be for wrongs received, No doubt is lawfully permitted us. But in an oath, we must be well advised How we do swear, and when we once have sworn, Not to infringe it, though we die therefor. Therefore, my lord, as willing I return As if I were to fly to paradise. He begins to leave
DAUPHIN	Stay, my Villiers. Thine honourable mind Deserves to be eternally admired. Thy suit shall be no longer thus deferred. Give me the paper. I’ll subscribe to it. Villiers gives him the paper, which the Dauphin signs And wheretofore I loved thee as Villiers, Hereafter I’ll embrace thee as myself. Stay, and be still in favour with thy lord.
VILLIERS	(receiving back the paper) I humbly thank your grace. I must dispatch And send this passport first unto the Earl, And then I will attend your highness’ pleasure.
DAUPHIN	Do so, Villiers. And Charles, when he hath need, Be such his soldiers, howsoever he speed.
(didascalia)	Exit Villiers
(didascalia)	Enter ean King of France
KING OF FRANCE	Come, Charles, and arm thee. Edward is entrapped. The Prince of Wales is fall’n into our hands, And we have compassed him. He cannot scape.
DAUPHIN	But will your highness fight today?
KING OF FRANCE	What else, my son? He’s scarce eight thousand strong, And we are threescore thousand at the least.
DAUPHIN	I have a prophecy, my gracious lord, Wherein is written what success is like To happen us in this outrageous war. It was delivered me at Crécy’s field By one that is an aged hermit there: ‘When feathered fowl shall make thine army tremble, And flintstones rise and break the battle ’ray, Then think on him that doth not now dissemble, For that shall be the hapless dreadful day, Yet in the end thy foot thou shalt advance As far in England as thy foe in France.’
KING OF FRANCE	By this it seems we shall be fortunate. For, as it is impossible that stones Should ever rise and break the battle ’ray, Or airy fowl make men in arms to quake, So is it like we shall not be subdued. Or, say this might be true: yet in the end, Since he doth promise we shall drive him hence And scourge their country as they have done ours, By this revenge that loss will seem the less. But all are frivolous fancies, toys and dreams. Once we are sure we have ensnared the son, Catch we the father after how we can.
(didascalia)	Exeunt
KING OF FRANCE	Sc. 12
(didascalia)	Enter Edward Prince of Wales, Lord Audley and others
PRINCE OF WALES	Audley, the arms of death embrace us round And comfort have we none, save that to die We pay sour earnest for a sweeter life. At Crécy field our clouds of warlike smoke Choked up those French mouths and dissevered them, But now their multitudes of millions hide, Masking, as ’twere, the beauteous burning sun, Leaving no hope to us but sullen dark And eyeless terror of all-ending night.
AUDLEY	This sudden, mighty and expedient head That they have made, fair Prince, is wonderful. Before us, in the valley, lies the King, Vantaged with all that heaven and earth can yield, His party stronger battled than our whole. His son, the braving Duke of Normandy, Hath trimmed the mountain on our right hand up In shining plate, that now the aspiring hill Shows like a silver quarry, or an orb, Aloft the which the banners, bannerets And new-replenished pennants cuff the air And beat the winds that, for their gaudiness, Struggles to kiss them. On our left hand lies Philippe, the younger issue of the King, Coating the other hill in such array That all his gilded upright pikes do seem Straight trees of gold; the pendant ensigns, leaves, And their device of antique heraldry, Quartered in colours seeming sundry fruits, Makes it the orchard of the Hesperides. Behind us too the hill doth rear his height, For, like a half-moon opening but one way, It rounds us in. There, at our backs, are lodged The fatal crossbows, and the battle there Is governed by the rough Châtillion. Then thus it stands: the valley for our flight The King binds in, the hills on either hand Are proudly royalizèd by his sons, And on the hill behind stands certain death In pay and service with Châtillion.
PRINCE OF WALES	Death’s name is much more mighty than his deeds. Thy parcelling this power hath made it more Than all the world! Call it but a power. As many sands as these, my hands, can hold Are but my handful of so many sands, Eas‘ly ta’en up and quickly thrown away. But if I stand to count them, sand by sand, The number would confound my memory, And make a thousand millions of a task Which, briefly, is no more in deed than one. These quarters, squadrons and these regiments Before, behind us, and on either hand, Are but a power. When we name a man, His hand, his foot, his head hath several strengths, And, being all but one self-instanced strength, Why, all this many, Audley, is but one, And we can call it all but one man’s strength. He that hath far to go tells it by miles; If he should tell the steps it kills his heart. The drops are infinite that make a flood, And yet, thou know’st, we call it but a rain. There is but one France, and one king of France: That France hath no more kings, and that same king Hath but the puissant legion of one king. And we have one. Then apprehend no odds, For one to one is fair equality.
(didascalia)	Enter
PRINCE OF WALES	a Herald from Jean King of France What tidings, messenger? Be plain and brief.
HERALD	The King of France, my sovereign lord and master, Greets by me his foe, the Prince of Wales. If thou call forth a hundred men of name— Of lords, knights, squires and English gentlemen— And with thyself and those, kneel at his feet, He straight will fold his bloody colours up And ransom shall redeem lives forfeited. If not, this day shall drink more English blood Than e’er was buried in our British earth. What is thy answer to his proffered mercy?
PRINCE OF WALES	This heaven that covers France contains the mercy That draws from me submissive orisons. That such base breath should vanish from my lips To urge the plea of mercy to a man, The Lord forbid. Return and tell thy King: My tongue is made of steel, and it shall beg My mercy on his coward burgonet. Tell him my colours are as red as his, My men as bold, our English arms as strong. Return him my defiance in his face.
HERALD	I go.
(didascalia)	Exit
(didascalia)	Enter a Herald from the Dauphin (Prince Charles of Normandy)
PRINCE OF WALES	What news with thee?
SECOND HERALD	The Duke of Normandy, my lord and master, Pitying thy youth is so engirt with peril, By me hath sent a nimble-jointed jennet, As swift as ever yet thou didst bestride, And therewithal he counsels thee to fly, Else death himself hath sworn that thou shalt die.
PRINCE OF WALES	Back with the beast unto the beast that sent him! Tell him I cannot sit a coward’s horse. Bid him today bestride the jade himself, For I will stain my horse quite o‘er with blood And double-gild my spurs, but I will catch him. So tell the cap’ring boy, and get thee gone.
SECOND HERALD	I go.
(didascalia)	Exit
(didascalia)	Enter a Herald from Prince Philippe, carrying a book
THIRD HERALD	Edward of Wales, Philippe, the second son To the most mighty Christian King of France, Seeing thy body’s living date expired, All full of charity and Christian love He offers the book to the Prince Commends this book full fairly fraught with prayers To thy fair hand, and for thy hour of life Entreats thee that thou meditate therein, And arm thy soul for her long journey towards. Thus have I done his bidding and return.
PRINCE OF WALES	Herald of Philippe, greet thy lord from me. All good that he can send I can receive. But think’st thou not the unadvised boy Hath wronged himself in thus far tendering me? Haply he cannot pray without the book; I think him no divine extemporal. Then render back this commonplace of prayer To do himself good in adversity. Besides, he knows not my sins’ quality, And therefore knows no prayers for my avail. Ere night his prayer may be to pray to God To put it in my heart to hear his prayer. So tell the courtly wanton, and be gone.
THIRD HERALD	I go. Exit
PRINCE OF WALES	How confident their strength and number makes them! Now, Audley, sound those silver wings of thine, And let those milk-white messengers of time Show thy time’s learning in this dangerous time. Thyself art bruised and bit with many broils, And stratagems fore-past with iron pens Are texted in thine honourable face. Thou art a married man in this distress, But danger woos me as a blushing maid. Teach me an answer to this perilous time.
AUDLEY	To die is all as common as to live. The one enchased the other holds in chase. For from the instant we begin to live, We do pursue and hunt the time to die. First bud we, then we blow, and after seed, Then presently we fall, and as a shade Follows the body, so we follow death. If then we hunt for death why do we fear it? If we fear it, why do we follow it? If we do follow it, how can we shun it? If we do fear, with fear we do but aid The thing we fear to seize on us the sooner. If we fear not, then no resolved proffer Can overthrow the limit of our fate. For whether ripe or rotten, drop we shall, As we do draw the lottery of our doom.
PRINCE OF WALES	Ah, good old man! A thousand thousand armours These words of thine have buckled on my back. Ah, what an idiot hast thou made of life To seek the thing it fears, and how disgraced Th‘imperial victory of murd’ring death, Since all the lives his conquering arrows strike Seek him, and he not them, to shame his glory. I will not give a penny for a life, Nor half a halfpenny to shun grim death, Since for to live is but to seek to die, And dying but beginning of new life. Let come the hour when he that rules it will. To live or die I hold indifferent still.
(didascalia)	Exeunt
PRINCE OF WALES	Sc. 13
(didascalia)	Enter Jean King of France and the Dauphin
KING OF FRANCE	A sudden darkness hath defaced the sky, The winds are crept into their caves for fear, The leaves move not, the world is hushed and still, The birds cease singing and the wand’ring brooks Murmur no wonted greeting to their shores. Silence attends some wonder and expecteth That heaven should pronounce some prophecy. Where or from whom proceeds this silence, Charles?
DAUPHIN	Our men with open mouths and staring eyes Look on each other as they did attend Each other’s words, and yet no creature speaks. A tongue-tied fear hath made a midnight hour, And speeches sleep through all the waking regions.
KING OF FRANCE	But now the pompous sun in all his pride Looked through his golden coach upon the world, And, on a sudden, hath he hid himself, That now the under earth is as a grave, Dark, deadly, silent and uncomfortable. A clamour of ravens Hark, what a deadly outcry do I hear!
(didascalia)	Enter Prince Philippe
DAUPHIN	Here comes my brother Philippe—
KING OF FRANCE	All dismayed. (To Philippe) What fearful words are those thy looks presage?
PRINCE PHILIPPE	A flight, a flight—
KING OF FRANCE	Coward, what flight? Thou liest. There needs no flight.
PRINCE PHILIPPE	A flight—
KING OF FRANCE	Awake thy craven powers, and tell on The substance of that very fear in deed Which is so ghastly printed in thy face. What is the matter?
PRINCE PHILIPPE	A flight of ugly ravens Do croak and hover o’er our soldiers’ heads, And keep in triangles and cornered squares, Right as our forces are embattelèd. With their approach there came this sudden fog Which now hath hid the airy floor of heaven, And made at noon a night unnatural Upon the quaking and dismayed world. In brief, our soldiers have let fall their arms, And stand like metamorphosed images, Bloodless and pale, one gazing on another.
(didascalia)	KING OF FRANCE aside
PRINCE PHILIPPE	Ay, now I call to mind the prophecy— But I must give no utterance to a fear. (To Philippe) Return, and hearten up these yielding souls! Tell them the ravens, seeing them in arms— So many fair against a famished few— Come but to dine upon their handiwork, And prey upon the carrion that they kill. For when we see a horse laid down to die— Although not dead—the ravenous birds Sit watching the departure of his life. Even so these ravens, for the carcasses Of those poor English that are marked to die, Hover about, and if they cry to us ’Tis but for meat that we must kill for them. Away, and comfort up my soldiers, And sound the trumpets and at once dispatch This little business of a silly fraud. Exit Prince Philippe Another noise. Enter the Earl of Salisbury brought in by a French Captain
FRENCH CAPTAIN	Behold, my liege, this knight and forty more, Of whom the better part are slain and fled, With all endeavour sought to break our ranks And make their way to the encompassed Prince. Dispose of him as please your majesty.
KING OF FRANCE	Go, and the next bough, soldier, that thou seest, Disgrace it with his body presently, Fore I do hold a tree in France too good To be the gallows of an English thief.
EARL OF SALISBURY	(to the Dauphin) My lord of Normandy, I have your pass And warrant for my safety through this land.
DAUPHIN	Villiers procured it for thee, did he not?
EARL OF SALISBURY	He did.
DAUPHIN	And it is current. Thou shalt freely pass.
KING OF FRANCE	Ay, freely to the gallows to be hanged Without denial or impediment! Away with him.
DAUPHIN	I hope your highness will not so disgrace me, And dash the virtue of my seal at arms. He hath my never-broken name to show, Charàctered with this princely hand of mine. And rather let me leave to be a prince Than break the stable verdict of a prince. I do beseech you, let him pass in quiet.
KING OF FRANCE	Thou and thy word lie both in my command. What canst thou promise that I cannot break? Which of these twain is greater infamy— To disobey thy father or thyself? Thy word, nor no man’s, may exceed his power, Nor that same man doth never break his word That keeps it to the utmost of his power. The breach of faith dwells in the soul’s consent, Which, if thyself without consent do break, Thou art not charged with the breach of faith. Go, hang him; for thy licence lies in me, And my constraint stands the excuse for thee.
DAUPHIN	What, am I not a soldier in my word? Then arms, adieu, and let them fight that list. Shall I not give my girdle from my waist But with a guardian I shall be controlled To say I may not give my things away? Upon my soul, had Edward Prince of Wales Engaged his word, writ down his noble hand, For all your knights to pass his father’s land, The royal King, to grace his warlike son, Would not alone safe conduct give to them, But with all bounty feasted them and theirs.
KING OF FRANCE	Dwell’st thou on precedents? Then be it so. (To Salisbury) Say, Englishman, of what degree thou art.
EARL OF SALISBURY	An earl in England, though a prisoner here. And those that know me, call me Salisbury.
KING OF FRANCE	Then, Salisbury, say whither thou art bound.
EARL OF SALISBURY	To Calais, where my liege, King Edward, is.
KING OF FRANCE	To Calais, Salisbury? Then to Calais pack, And bid thy King prepare a noble grave To put his princely son, black Edward, in. And as thou travell’st westward from this place, Some two leagues hence there is a lofty hill, Whose top seems topless, for the embracing sky Doth hide his high head in her azure bosom, Upon whose tall top, when thy foot attains, Look back upon the humble vale beneath— Humble of late, but now made proud with arms— And thence behold the wretched Prince of Wales Hooped with a band of iron round about. After which sight, to Calais spur amain, And say the Prince was smothered and not slain. And tell thy King, this is not all his ill, For I will greet him ere he thinks I will. Away, be gone. The smoke but of our shot Will choke our foes, though bullets hit them not.
(didascalia)	Exeunt
KING OF FRANCE	Sc. 14
(didascalia)	Alarum. Enter Edward Prince of Wales and the Comte d’Artois
COMTE D’ARTOIS	How fares your grace? Are you not shot, my lord?
PRINCE OF WALES	No, dear Artois, but choked with dust and smoke, And stepped aside for breath and fresher air.
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Breathe then, and to it again!The amazed French Are quite distract with gazing on the crows, And, were our quivers full of shafts again, Your grace should see a glorious day of this. O, for more arrows, Lord—that’s our one want!
PRINCE OF WALES	Courage, Artois! A fig for feathered shafts When feathered fowls do bandy on our side! What need we fight and sweat and keep a coil When railing crows outscold our adversaries? Up, up, Artois! The ground itself is armed With fire-containing flint. Command our bows To hurl away their parti-coloured yew, And to it with stones! Away, Artois, away! My soul doth prophesy we win the day.
(didascalia)	Exeunt
PRINCE OF WALES	Sc. 15
(didascalia)	Alarum. Enter Jean King of France
KING OF FRANCE	Our multitudes are in themselves confounded, Dismayed and distraught. Swift-starting fear Hath buzzed a cold dismay through all our army, And every petty disadvantage prompts The fear-possessed abject soul to fly. Myself, whose spirit is steel to their dull lead, What with recalling of the prophecy, And that our native stones from English arms Rebel against us, find myself attainted With strong surprise of weak and yielding fear.
(didascalia)	Enter the Dauphin
DAUPHIN	Fly, father, fly! The French do kill the French: Some that would stand let drive at some that fly; Our drums strike nothing but discouragement; Our trumpets sound dishonour and retire; The spirit of fear, that feareth naught but death, Cowardly works confusion on itself.
(didascalia)	Enter Prince Philippe
PRINCE PHILIPPE	Pluck out your eyes and see not this day’s shame! An arm hath beat an army. One poor David Hath, with a stone, foiled twenty stout Goliaths. Some twenty naked starvelings with small flints Hath driven back a puissant host of men Arrayed and fenced in all accomplements.
KING OF FRANCE	Mort dieu! They quoit at us and kill us up! No less than forty thousand wicked elders Have forty lean slaves this day stoned to death.
DAUPHIN	O, that I were some other countryman! This day hath set derision on the French, And all the world will blurt and scorn at us.
KING OF FRANCE	What, is there no hope left?
PRINCE PHILIPPE	No hope but death, to bury up our shame.
KING OF FRANCE	Make up once more with me: the twenti’th part Of those that live are men enough to quail The feeble handful on the adverse part.
DAUPHIN	Then charge again! If heaven be not opposed We cannot lose the day.
KING	or FRANCE On, on, away!
(didascalia)	Exeunt
KING	Sc. 16 Enter Lord Audley wounded and rescued by two Squires
SQUIRE	How fares my lord?
AUDLEY	Even as a man may do That dines at such a bloody feast as this.
SQUIRE	I hope, my lord, that is no mortal scar.
AUDLEY	No matter if it be. The count is cast, And, in the worst, ends but a mortal man. Good friends, convey me to the princely Edward, That, in the crimson bravery of my blood, I may become him with saluting him. I’ll smile and tell him that this open scar Doth end the harvest of his Audley’s war. Exeunt Sc. 17
(didascalia)	Enter Edward Prince of Wales with his prisoners: jean King of France and the Dauphin, and all with ensigns spread. Retreat sounded
PRINCE OF WALES	(to the King and then the Dauphin) Now, Jean in France, and lately Jean of France, Thy bloody ensigns are my captive colours— And you, high-vaunting Charles of Normandy, That once today sent me a horse to fly, Are now the subjects of my clemency. 5 Fie, lords, is it not a shame that English boys, Whose early days are yet not worth a beard, Should in the bosom of your kingdom, thus, One against twenty, beat you up together?
KING OF FRANCE	Thy fortune, not thy force, hath conquered us.
PRINCE OF WALES	An argument that heaven aids the right.
(didascalia)	Enter the Comte d’Artois with Prince Philippe
PRINCE OF WALES	See, see—Artois doth bring with him along The late good counsel-giver to my soul. Welcome, Artois, and welcome Philippe too! Who now, of you or I, have need to pray? Now is the proverb verified in you— ‘Too bright a morning breeds a louring day’.
(didascalia)	Sound trumpets. Enter Lord Audley supported by the two Squires
PRINCE OF WALES	But say, what grim discouragement comes here? Alas, what thousand armèd men of France Have writ that note of death in Audley’s face? (To Audley) Speak thou, that woo‘st death with thy careless smile, And look’st so merrily upon thy grave As if thou wert enamoured on thine end. What hungry sword hath so bereaved thy face And lopped a true friend from my loving soul?
AUDLEY	O, Prince, thy sweet bemoaning speech to me Is as a mournful knell to one dead sick.
PRINCE OF WALES	(embracing him) Dear Audley, if my tongue ring out thy end My arms shall be thy grave. What may I do To win thy life or to revenge thy death? If thou wilt drink the blood of captive kings, Or that it were restorative, command A health of king’s blood, and I’ll drink to thee. If honour may dispense for thee with death, The never-dying honour of this day Share wholly, Audley, to thyself, and live.
AUDLEY	Victorious Prince—that thou art so, behold A Caesar’s fame in kings’ captivity— If I could hold dim death but at a bay Till I did see my liege, thy royal father, My soul should yield this castle of my flesh, This mangled tribute, with all willingness, To darkness, consummation, dust and worms.
PRINCE OF WALES	Cheerly, bold man. Thy soul is all too proud To yield her city for one little breach.
(didascalia)
PRINCE OF WALES	Should be divorced from her earthly spouse By the soft temper of a Frenchman’s sword. Lo, to repair thy life I give to thee Three thousand marks a year in English land.
AUDLEY	I take thy gift to pay the debts I owe. These two poor squires redeemed me from the French With lusty and dear hazard of their lives. What thou hast given me, I give to them, And as thou lov’st me, Prince, lay thy consent To this bequeath in my last testament.
PRINCE OF WALES	Renowned Audley, live, and have from me This gift twice doubled to these squires and thee. But live or die, what thou hast given away To these and theirs shall lasting freedom stay. (To the Squires) Come, gentlemen, I’ll see my friend bestowed
(didascalia)	Within an easy litter. Then we’ll march
PRINCE OF WALES	Proudly toward Calais with triumphant pace, Unto my royal father, and there bring The tribute of my wars: fair France his king.
(didascalia)	Exeunt
PRINCE OF WALES	Sc. 18
(didascalia)	Enter fat one door, as Supplicants, six citizens of Calais in their shirts, barefoot, with halters about their necks. Enter fat another door King Edward speaking with Queen Philippa. Enter with them the Earl of Derby and soldiers
KING EDWARD	No more, Queen Philip—pacify yourself. Copland, except he can excuse his fault, Shall find displeasure written in our looks. And now, unto this proud, resisting town. Soldiers, assault! I will no longer stay To be deluded by their false delays. Put all to sword, and make the spoil your own.
(didascalia)	ALL SIX SUPPLICANTS coming forward
KING EDWARD	Mercy, King Edward! Mercy, gracious lord!
KING EDWARD	Contemptuous villains, call ye now for truce? Mine ears are stopped against your bootless cries.
(didascalia)	Sound drums alarum, draw threat’ning swords!
FIRST SUPPLICANT	Ah, noble prince, take pity on this town, And hear us, mighty King. We claim the promise that your highness made— The two days’ respite is not yet expired, And we are come with willingness to bear What torturing death or punishment you please, So that the trembling multitude be saved.
KING EDWARD	My promise—well, I do confess as much. But I require the chiefest citizens And men of most account that should submit. You, peradventure, are but servile grooms, Or some felonious robbers on the sea, Whom, apprehended, law would execute, Albeit severity lay dead in us. No, no—ye cannot overreach us thus.
SECOND SUPPLICANT	The sun, dread lord, that in the western fall Beholds us now low-brought through misery, Did, in the orient purple of the morn, Salute our coming forth when we were known
(didascalia)
SECOND SUPPLICANT	Or may our portion be with damned fiends.
KING EDWARD	If it be so, then let our covenant stand. We take possession of the town in peace, But for yourselves, look you for no remorse. But, as imperial justice hath decreed, Your bodies shall be dragged about these walls, And, after, feel the stroke of quartering steel. This is your doom. (To the soldiers) Go, soldiers, see it done.
QUEEN PHILIPPA	A Ah, be more mild unto these yielding men! It is a glorious thing to stablish peace, And kings approach the nearest unto God By giving life and safety unto men. As thou intendest to be king of France, So let her people live to call thee king. For what the sword cuts down, or fire hath spoiled, Is held in reputation none of ours.
KING EDWARD	Although experience teach us this is true— That peaceful quietness brings most delight When most of all abuses are controlled— Yet, insomuch it shall be known that we As well can master our affections As conquer other by the dint of sword, Philip, prevail: we yield to thy request— These men shall live to boast of clemency, And, tyranny, strike terror to thyself.
SECOND SUPPLICANT	Long live your highness! Happy be your reign!
KING EDWARD	(to the six Supplicants) Go, get you hencel Return unto the town. And if this kindness hath deserved your love, Learn then to reverence Edward as your king.
(didascalia)	Exeunt the six Supplicants
KING EDWARD	Now might we hear of our affairs abroad, We would till gloomy winter were o’erspent Dispose our men in garrison a while.
(didascalia)	Enter Copland, with David King of Scotland as his prisoner
KING EDWARD	But who comes here?
EARL OF DERBY	Copland, my lord, and David King of Scots.
KING EDWARD	Is this the proud, presumptuous squire of the north That would not yield his prisoner to my Queen?
COPLAND	I am, my liege, a northern squire indeed, But neither proud nor insolent, I trust.
KING EDWARD	What moved thee, then, to be so obstinate To contradict our royal Queen’s desire?
COPLAND	No wilful disobedience, mighty lord, But my desert, and public law at arms. I took the King, myself, in single fight, And, like a soldier, would be loath to lose The least pre-eminence that I had won. And Copland, straight upon your highness’ charge, Is come to France, and with a lowly mind Doth vail the bonnet of his victory. Receive, dread lord, the custom of my freight, The wealthy tribute of my labouring hands, Which should long since have been surrendered up, Had but your gracious self been there in place.
QUEEN PHILIPPA	But, Copland, thou didst scorn the King’s command, Neglecting our commission in his name.
COPLAND	His name I reverence, but his person more. His name shall keep me in allegiance still, But to his person I will bend my knee.
KING EDWARD	(to the Queen) I pray thee, Philip, let displeasure pass. This man doth please me, and I like his words. For what is he that will attempt great deeds And lose the glory that ensues, the fame? All rivers have recourse unto the sea, And Copland’s faith, relation to his king. (To Copland) Kneel therefore down. He knights him Now rise, King Edward’s knight. And to maintain thy state, I freely give 96 Five hundred marks a year to thee and thine.
(didascalia)	Enter the Earl of Salisbury, with a coronet
KING EDWARD	Welcome, Lord Salisbury! What news from Bretagne?
EARL OF SALISBURY	This, mighty King: the country we have won, And Charles de Montfort, regent of that place, Presents your highness with this coronet, Protesting true allegiance to your grace.
KING EDWARD	We thank thee for thy service, valiant Earl. Challenge our favour, for we owe it thee.
EARL OF SALISBURY	But now, my lord, as this is joyful news, So must my voice be tragical again, And I must sing of doleful accidents.
KING EDWARD	What, have our men the overthrow at Poitiers, Or is our son beset with too much odds?
EARL OF SALISBURY	He was, my lord, and as my worthless self, With forty other serviceable knights, Under safe conduct of the Dauphin’s seal, Did travel that way, finding him distressed, A troop of lances met us on the way, Surprised and brought us prisoners to the King, Who, proud of this and eager of revenge, Commanded straight to cut off all our heads. And surely we had died but that the Duke, More full of honour than his angry sire, Procured our quick deliverance from thence. But ere we went, ‘Salute your King,’ quoth he, ‘Bid him provide a funeral for his son. Today our sword shall cut his thread of life And, sooner than he thinks, we’ll be with him To quittance those displeasures he hath done.’ This said, we passed, not daring to reply. Our hearts were dead, our looks diffused and wan. Wand‘ring, at last we climbed unto a hill From whence, although our grief were much before, Yet now to see the occasion with our eyes Did thrice so much increase our heaviness. For there, my lord, O there we did descry Down in a valley how both armies lay. The French had cast their trenches like a ring, And every barricado’s open front Was thick embossed with brazen ordinance. Here stood a battle of ten thousand horse, There twice as many pikes in quadrant wise, Here crossbows and there deadly wounding darts, And in the midst, like to a slender point
(didascalia)	Within the compass of the horizon,
EARL OF SALISBURY	As ’twere a rising bubble in the sea, A hazel wand amidst a wood of pines, Or as a bear fast-chained unto a stake, Stood famous Edward, still expecting when Those dogs of France would fasten on his flesh. Anon, the death-procuring knell begins. Off go the cannons that, with trembling noise, Did shake the very mountain where they stood. Then sound the trumpets’ clangour in the air. The battles join, and when we could no more Discern the difference ‘twixt the friend and foe, So intricate the dark confusion was, Away we turned our wat’ry eyes with sighs As black as powder fuming into smoke. And thus, I fear, unhappy have I told The most untimely tale of Edward’s fall.
QUEEN PHILIPPA	Ah, me! Is this my welcome into France? Is this the comfort that I looked to have When I should meet with my beloved son? Sweet Ned, I would thy mother, in the sea, Had been prevented of this mortal grief.
KING EDWARD	Content thee, Philip. ’Tis not tears will serve To call him back if he be taken hence. Comfort thyself as I do, gentle Queen, With hope of sharp, unheard-of, dire revenge! He bids me to provide his funeral! And so I will, but all the peers in France Shall mourners be, and weep out bloody tears Until their empty veins be dry and sere. The pillars of his hearse shall be their bones; The mould that covers him, their city ashes; His knell, the groaning cries of dying men; And, in the stead of tapers on his tomb, An hundred-fifty towers shall burning blaze While we bewail our valiant son’s decease!
(didascalia)	Flourish within. Enter a Herald
HERALD	Rejoice, my lord! Ascend the imperial throne! The mighty and redoubted Prince of Wales, Great servitor to bloody Mars in arms, The Frenchman’s terror and his country’s fame, Triumphant rideth like a Roman peer, And, lowly, at his stirrup, comes afoot King Jean of France together with his son In captive bonds, whose diadem he brings To crown thee with, and to proclaim thee king.
KING EDWARD	Away with mourning, Philip! Wipe thine eyes!
(didascalia)	Sound trumpets! Welcome in Plantagenet!
(didascalia)	Enter Edward Prince of Wales with Jean King of France and Prince Philippe as his prisoners. Also enter Lord Audley in a litter borne by the two Squires and the Comte d’Artois
KING EDWARD	As things long lost when they are found again, So doth my son rejoice his father’s heart, For whom, even now, my soul was much perplexed.
QUEEN PHILIPPA	Be this a token to express my joy— She kisses the Prince of Wales For inward passions will not let me speak.
PRINCE OF WALES	(to King Edward) My gracious father, here receive thy gift, This wreath of conquest and reward of war, Got with as mickle peril of our lives As e’er was thing of price before this day. Install your highness in your proper right, And herewithal I render to your hands These prisoners, chief occasion of our strife.
KING EDWARD	(to the King of France) So, Jean of France, I see you keep your word! You promised to be sooner with ourself Than we did think for, and ’tis so indeed. But had you done at first as now you do, How many civil towns had stood untouched That now are turned to ragged heaps of stones? How many people’s lives mightst thou have saved That are untimely sunk into their graves?
KING OF FRANCE	Edward, recount not things irrevocable. Tell me what ransom thou requir’st to have.
KING EDWARD	Thy ransom, Jean, hereafter shall be known. But first to England thou must cross the seas To see what entertainment it affords. Howe’er it falls, it cannot be so bad As ours hath been since we arrived in France.
KING OF FRANCE	Accursed man! Of this I was foretold, But did misconstrue what the prophet told.
PRINCE OF WALES	(to King Edward) Now, father, this petition Edward makes To thee, whose grace hath been his strongest shield: That as thy pleasure chose me for the man To be the instrument to show thy power, So thou wilt grant that many princes more, Bred and brought up within that little isle, May still be famous for like victories. And for my part, the bloody scars I bear, The weary nights that I have watched in field, 5 The dangerous conflicts I have often had, The fearful menaces were proffered me, The heat and cold, and what else might displease, I wish were now redoubled twentyfold, So that hereafter ages, when they read The painful traffic of my tender youth, Might thereby be inflamed with such resolve As not the territories of France alone, But likewise Spain, Turkey and what countries else That justly would provoke fair England’s ire, Might at thy presence tremble and retire.
KING EDWARD	Here, English lords, we do proclaim a rest, An intercession of our painful arms. Sheathe up your swords, refresh your weary limbs, Peruse your spoils, and after we have breathed A day or two within this haven town, God willing, then for England we’ll be shipped, Where in a happy hour I trust we shall Arrive: three kings, two princes, and a queen.
(didascalia)	Exeunt
ADDITIONAL PASSAGE	In Q, the following lines, which are probably a misplaced addition, occur at the end of 8.108, between ‘foot’ and ‘Exeunt’, and fall between what may have been stints by two different authors. They may have been intended to go after either 8.93 or 8.98.
KING EDWARD	What picture’s this?
PRINCE OF WALES	A pelican, my lord, Wounding her bosom with her crooked beak That so her nest of young ones might be fed With drops of blood that issue from her heart. The motto, ‘Sic et vos’—‘and so should you’.
ON	the night of 28 December 1594, the Christmas revels at Gray’s Inn—one of London’s law schools—became so uproarious that one performance planned for the occasion had to be abandoned. Eventually ‘it was thought good not to offer anything of account saving dancing and revelling with gentlewomen; and after such sports a comedy of errors (like to Plautus his Menaechmus) was played by the players. So that night was begun, and continued to the end, in nothing but confusion and errors; whereupon it was ever afterwards called “The Night of Errors”.’ This sounds like a reference to Shakespeare’s play, first printed in the 1623 Folio, which is certainly based in large part on the Roman dramatist Plautus’ comedy Menaechmi. As Shakespeare’s shortest play, it would have been especially suited to late-night performance. Exceptional in having no cues for music, it may have been written for the occasion, or at least have been new in 1594. The comedy in Menaechmi derives from the embarrassment experienced by a man in search of his long-lost twin brother when various people intimately acquainted with that twin—including his wife, his mistress, and his father—mistake the one for the other. Shakespeare greatly increases the possibilities of comic confusion by giving the brothers (both called Antipholus) servants (both called Dromio) who themselves are long-separated twins. An added episode in which Antipholus of Ephesus’ wife, Adriana, bars him from his own house in which she is entertaining his brother is based on another play by Plautus, Amphitruo. Shakespeare sets the comic action within a more serious framework, opening with a scene in which the twin masters’ old father, Egeon, who has arrived at Ephesus in search of them, is shown under imminent sentence of death unless he finds someone to redeem him. This strand of the plot, as well as the surprising revelation that brings about the resolution of the action, is based on the story of Apollonius of Tyre which Shakespeare was to use again, many years later, in Pericles. The Comedy of Errors is a kind of diploma piece, as if Shakespeare were displaying his ability to outshine both his classical progenitors and their English imitators. Along with The Tempest, it is his most classically constructed play: all the action takes place within a few hours and in a single place. Moreover, it seems to make use of the conventionalized arcade setting of academic drama, with three ‘houses’—the Phoenix, the Porcupine, and the Priory—represented by doors and signs on stage. The working out of the complexities inherent in the basic situation represents a considerable intellectual feat. But the comedy is humanized by the interweaving of romantic elements, such as Egeon’s initial plight, the love between the visiting Antipholus and his twin brother’s wife’s sister, Luciana, and the entirely serious portrayal of Egeon’s suffering when his own son fails to recognize him at the moment of his greatest need. From time to time the comic tension is relaxed by the presence of discursive set pieces, none more memorable than Dromio of Syracuse’s description of Nell, the kitchen wench who is ‘spherical, like a globe’.
THE PERSONS OF THE	PLAY Solinus, DUKE of Ephesus EGEON, a merchant of Syracuse, father of the Antipholus twins ADRIANA, wife of Antipholus of Ephesus LUCIANA, her sister NELL, Adriana’s kitchen-maid ANGELO, a goldsmith BALTHASAR, a merchant A COURTESAN Doctor PINCH, a schoolmaster and exorcist
MERCHANT OF	EPHESUS, a friend of Antipholus of Syracuse
SECOND	MERCHANT, Angelo’s creditor EMILIA, an abbess at Ephesus Jailer, messenger, headsman, officers, and other attendants

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Enter King Edward, the Earl of Derby, the Earl of Warwick, Edward Prince of Wales, Lord Audley and the Comte d’Artois
KING EDWARD	Robert of Artois, banished though thou be From France thy native country, yet with us Thou shalt retain as great a seigniory: For we create thee Earl of Richmond here. And now go forwards with our pedigree: Who next succeeded King Philippe of Beau?
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Three sons of his, which all successively Did sit upon their father’s regal throne, Yet died and left no issue of their loins.
KING EDWARD	But was my mother sister unto those?
COMTE D’ARTOIS	She was, my lord, and only Isabel Was all the daughters that this Philippe had, Whom afterward your father took to wife. And from the fragrant garden of her womb Your gracious self, the flower of Europe’s hope, Derived is inheritor to France. But note the rancour of rebellious minds: When thus the lineage of Beau was out The French obscured your mother’s privilege And, though she were the next of blood, proclaimed Jean of the house of Valois now their king. The reason was, they say, the realm of France Replete with princes of great parentage Ought not admit a governor to rule Except he be descended of the male. And that’s the special ground of their contempt Wherewith they study to exclude your grace.
KING EDWARD	But they shall find that forged ground of theirs To be but dusty heaps of brittle sand.
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Perhaps it will be thought a heinous thing That I, a Frenchman, should discover this. But heaven I call to record of my vows: It is not hate nor any private wrong, But love unto my country and the right Provokes my tongue thus lavish in report. You are the lineal watchman of our peace, And Jean of Valois indirectly climbs. What then should subjects but embrace their king? Ah, wherein may our duty more be seen Than striving to rebate a tyrant’s pride And place thee, the true shepherd of our commonwealth?
KING EDWARD	This counsel, Artois, like to fruitful showers, Hath added growth unto my dignity, And by the fiery vigour of thy words Hot courage is engendered in my breast, Which heretofore was raked in ignorance But now doth mount with golden wings of fame And will approve fair Isabel’s descent, Able to yoke their stubborn necks with steel That spurn against my sovereignty in France.
(didascalia)	Sound a horn
KING EDWARD	A messenger. Lord Audley, know from whence.
(didascalia)	Enter a messenger, the Duc de Lorraine
AUDLEY	The Duke of Lorraine, having crossed the seas, Entreats he may have conference with your highness.
KING EDWARD	Admit him, lords, that we may hear the news. (To Lorraine) Say, Duke of Lorraine, wherefore art thou come? 55
DUC DE LORRAINE	The most renowned prince, King Jean of France, Doth greet thee, Edward, and by me commands That, forsomuch as by his liberal gift The Guienne dukedom is entailed to thee, Thou do him lowly homage for the same. And for that purpose, here I summon thee Repair to France within these forty days That there, according as the custom is, Thou mayst be sworn true liegeman to our king; Or else thy title in that province dies And he himself will repossess the place.
KING EDWARD	See how occasion laughs me in the face! No sooner minded to prepare for France But straight I am invited—nay, with threats, Upon a penalty, enjoined to come! ‘Twere but a childish part to say him nay. Lorraine, return this answer to thy lord: I mean to visit him as he requests. But how? Not servilely disposed to bend, But like a conqueror to make him bow. His lame unpolished shifts are come to light, And truth hath pulled the vizard from his face That set a gloss upon his arrogance. Dare he command a fealty in me? Tell him the crown that he usurps is mine, And where he sets his foot he ought to kneel. ’Tis not a petty dukedom that I claim But all the whole dominions of the realm Which if, with grudging, he refuse to yield I’ll take away those borrowed plumes of his, And send him naked to the wilderness.
DUC DE LORRAINE	Then, Edward, here, in spite of all thy lords, I do pronounce defiance to thy face.
PRINCE OF WALES	Defiance, Frenchman? We rebound it back Even to the bottom of thy master’s throat! And, be it spoke with reverence of the King, My gracious father, and these other lords, I hold thy message but as scurrilous, And him that sent thee like the lazy drone Crept up by stealth unto the eagle’s nest, From whence we’ll shake him with so rough a storm As others shall be warned by his harm.
EARL OF WARWICK	(to Lorraine) Bid him leave off the lion’s case he wears Lest, meeting with the lion in the field, He chance to tear him piecemeal for his pride.
COMTE D’ARTOIS	(to Lorraine) The soundest counsel I can give his grace Is to surrender ere he be constrained. A voluntary mischief hath less scorn Than when reproach with violence is borne.
DUC DE LORRAINE	Regenerate traitor, viper to the place Where thou wast fostered in thine infancy! Bear’st thou a part in this conspiracy?
(didascalia)	Lorraine draws his sword
(didascalia)	KING EDWARD drawing his sword
DUC DE LORRAINE	Lorraine, behold the sharpness of this steel: Fervent desire that sits against my heart Is far more thorny-pricking than this blade That, with the nightingale, I shall be scarred As oft as I dispose myself to rest Until my colours be displayed in France. This is thy final answer. So be gone.
DUC DE LORRAINE	It is not that, nor any English brave, Afflicts me so, as doth his poisoned view: That is most false, should most of all be true. Exit
KING EDWARD	Now, lords, our fleeting barque is under sail, Our gage is thrown, and war is soon begun, But not so quickly brought unto an end.
(didascalia)	Enter Sir William Montague
KING EDWARD	But wherefore comes Sir William Montague? (To Montague) How stands the league between the Scot and us?
MONTAGUE	Cracked and dissevered, my renowned lord. The treacherous King no sooner was informed Of your withdrawing of your army back But straight, forgetting of his former oath, He made invasion on the bordering towns. Berwick is won, Newcastle spoiled and lost, And now the tyrant hath begirt with siege The Castle of Roxburgh, where, enclosed, The Countess Salisbury is like to perish.
KING EDWARD	(to Warwick) That is thy daughter, Warwick, is it not? Whose husband hath in Bretagne served so long About the planting of Lord Montfort there?
EARL OF WARWICK	It is, my lord.
KING EDWARD	Ignoble David, hast thou none to grieve But seely ladies with thy threat’ning arms? But I will make you shrink your snaily horns. (To Audley) First, therefore, Audley, this shall be thy charge: Go levy footmen for our wars in France. (To the Prince of Wales) And, Ned, take muster of our men-at-arms. In every shire elect a several band. Let them be soldiers of a lusty spirit, Such as dread nothing but dishonour’s blot. Be wary therefore, since we do commence A famous war, and with so mighty a nation. (To Derby) Derby, be thou ambassador for us Unto our father-in-law, the Earl of Hainault. Make him acquainted with our enterprise, And likewise will him, with our own allies That are in Flanders, to solicit, too, The Emperor of Almagne in our name. Myself, whilst you are jointly thus employed, Will, with these forces that I have at hand, March and once more repulse the traitorous Scot. But sirs, be resolute. We shall have wars On every side. (To the Prince of Wales) And, Ned, thou must begin Now to forget thy study and thy books, And ure thy shoulders to an armour’s weight.
PRINCE OF WALES	As cheerful sounding to my youthful spleen This tumult is of war’s increasing broils, As at the coronation of a king The joyful clamours of the people are When ‘Ave Caesar’ they pronounce aloud.
(didascalia)	Within this school of honour I shall learn
PRINCE OF WALES	Either to sacrifice my foes to death, Or, in a rightful quarrel, spend my breath. Then cheerfully forward, each a several way. In great affairs ’tis naught to use delay. Exeunt

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Enter the Countess of Salisbury, above
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Alas, how much in vain my poor eyes gaze For succour that my sovereign should send. Ah, cousin Montague, I fear thou wants The lively spirit sharply to solicit With vehement suit the King in my behalf. Thou dost not tell him what a grief it is To be the scornful captive to a Scot, Either to be wooed with broad untuned oaths, Or forced by rough insulting barbarism. Thou dost not tell him, if he here prevail, How much they will deride us in the North, And in their vile, uncivil, skipping jigs Bray forth their conquest and our overthrow Even in the barren, bleak and fruitless air—
(didascalia)	Enter below David King of Scotland and Sir William Douglas with soldiers, meeting the Due de Lorraine
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	(Aside) I must withdraw. The everlasting foe Comes to the wall. I’ll closely step aside And list their babble, blunt and full of pride. The Countess withdraws
KING OF SCOTLAND	My lord of Lorraine, to our brother of France Commend us as the man in Christendom That we most reverence and entirely love. Touching your embassage, return and say That we with England will not enter parley, Nor never make fair weather, or take truce, But burn their neighbour towns, and so persist With eager roads beyond their city York; And never shall our bonny riders rest, Nor rusting canker have the time to eat Their light-borne snaffle, nor their nimble spur, Nor lay aside their jacks of gimmaled mail, Nor hang their staves of grained Scottish ash In peaceful wise upon their city walls, Nor from their buttoned tawny leathern belts Dismiss their biting whinyards, till your King Cry out, ‘Enough! Spare England now for pity!’ Farewell, and tell him that you leave us here, Before this castle; say you came from us Even when we had that yielded to our hands.
DUC DE LORRAINE	Take I my leave, and fairly will return Your acceptable greeting to my King. Exit
KING OF SCOTLAND	(to Douglas) Now, Douglas, to our former task again For the division of this certain spoil.
DOUGLAS	My liege, I crave the lady, and no more.
KING OF SCOTLAND	Nay, soft ye, sir; first I must make my choice, And first I do bespeak her for myself.
DOUGLAS	Why then, my liege, let me enjoy her jewels.
KING OF SCOTLAND	Those are her own, still liable to her; And who inherits her hath those with all.
(didascalia)	Enter a Scottish messenger in haste
MESSENGER	My liege, as we were pricking on the hills To fetch in booty, marching hitherward We might descry a mighty host of men. The sun, reflecting on the armour, showed A field of plate; a wood of picks advanced. Bethink your highness speedily herein: An easy march within four hours will bring The hindmost rank unto this place, my liege.
KING OF SCOTLAND	Dislodge! Dislodge! It is the King of England!
(didascalia)	DOUGLAS to the Messenger
KING OF SCOTLAND	Jemmy, my man, saddle my bonny black.
KING OF SCOTLAND	Mean’st thou to fight, Douglas? We are too weak.
DOUGLAS	I know it well, my liege, and therefore fly.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	(coming forward above) My lords of Scotland, will ye stay and drink?
KING OF SCOTLAND	She mocks us, Douglas. I cannot endure it.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Say, good my lord, which is he must have the lady, And which her jewels? I am sure, my lords, Ye will not hence till you have shared the spoils.
KING OF SCOTLAND	She heard the messenger and heard our talk, And now that comfort makes her scorn at us.
(didascalia)	Enter another Scottish messenger
SECOND MESSENGER	Arm, my good lord! O we are all surprised! After the French ambassador, my liege, And tell him that you dare not ride to York.
(didascalia)	COUNTESS OF SALISBURY (to the King of Scotland)
SECOND MESSENGER	Excuse it that your bonny horse is lame.
(didascalia)	KING OF SCOTLAND aside
SECOND MESSENGER	She heard that too! Intolerable grief! (To the Countess) Woman, farewell, although I do not stay—
(didascalia)	‘Tis not for fear, and yet you run away. Exeunt Scots
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	O happy comfort, welcome to our house! The confident and boist’rous boasting Scot, That swore before my walls they would not back For all the armed power of this land, With faceless fear that ever turns his back, Turned hence against the blasting north-east wind Upon the bare report and name of arms!
(didascalia)	Enter Sir William de Montague with soldiers
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	O summer’s day! See where my cousin comes!
MONTAGUE	How fares my aunt? We are not Scots— Why do you shut your gates against your friends?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Well may I give a welcome, coz, to thee, For thou com’st well to chase my foes from hence.
MONTAGUE	The King himself is come in person hither. Dear aunt, descend, and gratulate his highness.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	How may I entertain his majesty To show my duty and his dignity?
(didascalia)	Exit from above
(didascalia)	Enter King Edward, the Earl of Warwick and the Comte d’Artois, with others, including Lodowick
KING EDWARD	What, are the stealing foxes fled and gone Before we could uncouple at their heels?
EARL OF WARWICK	They are, my liege, but with a cheerful cry Hot hounds and hardy chase them at the heels.
(didascalia)	Enter the Countess of Salisbury below
KING EDWARD	This is the Countess, Warwick, is it not?
EARL OF WARWICK	Even she, my liege, whose beauty tyrants’ fear— As a May blossom with pernicious winds— Hath sullied, withered, overcast and done.
KING EDWARD	Hath she been fairer, Warwick, than she is?
EARL OF WARWICK	My gracious King, fair is she not at all If that her self were by to stain herself As I have seen her when she was her self.
(didascalia)	KING EDWARD aside
EARL OF WARWICK	What strange enchantment lurked in those her eyes, When they excelled this excellence they have, That now her dim decline hath power to draw My subject eyes from piercing majesty To gaze on her with doting admiration?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	(kneeling before King Edward) In duty, lower than the ground I kneel, And fore my dull knees bow my feeling heart, To witness my obedience to your highness With many millions of a subject’s thanks For this your royal presence, whose approach Hath driven war and danger from my gate.
KING EDWARD	Lady, stand up. I come to bring thee peace, However thereby I have purchased war.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	(rising) No war to you, my liege. The Scots are gone And gallop home toward Scotland with their hate.
KING EDWARD	(aside) Lest yielding here I pine in shameful love— (Aloud) Come, we’ll pursue the Scots. Artois, away!
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	A little while, my gracious sovereign, stay, And let the power of a mighty king Honour our roof. My husband, in the wars, When he shall hear it, will triumph for joy. Then, dear my liege, now niggard not thy state; Being at the wall, enter our homely gate.
KING EDWARD	Pardon me, Countess, I will come no near: I dreamed tonight of treason, and I fear.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Far from this place let ugly treason lie.
KING EDWARD	(aside) No farther off than her conspiring eye, Which shoots infected poison in my heart Beyond repulse of wit or cure of art. Now in the sun alone it doth not lie With light to take light from a mortal eye; For here two day-stars that mine eyes would see More than the sun steals mine own light from me. Contemplative desire, desire to be In contemplation that may master thee. (Aloud) Warwick, Artois, to horse and let’s away!
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	What might I speak to make my sovereign stay?
KING EDWARD	(aside) What needs a tongue to such a speaking eye That more persuades than winning oratory?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Let not thy presence, like the April sun, Flatter our earth and suddenly be done. More happy do not make our outward wall Than thou wilt grace our inner house withal. Our house, my liege, is like a country swain, Whose habit rude, and manners blunt and plain, Presageth naught, yet inly beautified With bounty’s riches and fair hidden pride. For where the golden ore doth buried lie, The ground, undecked with nature’s tapestry, Seems barren, sere, unfertile, fruitless, dry; And where the upper turf of earth doth boast His pride, perfumes and parti-coloured cost, Delve there and find this issue and their pride To spring from ordure and corruptious stied. But, to make up my all-too-long compare, These ragged walls no testimony are What is within, but like a cloak doth hide From weather’s waste the under garnished pride. More gracious than my terms can, let thee be: Entreat thyself to stay a while with me.
KING EDWARD	As wise as fair—what fond fit can be heard When wisdom keeps the gate as beauty’s guard? Countess, albeit my business urgeth me It shall attend while I attend on thee. Come on, my lords, here will I host tonight.
(didascalia)	Exeunt all but Lodowick
LODOWICK	I might perceive his eye in her eye lost, His ear to drink her sweet tongue’s utterance, And changing passion, like inconstant clouds That rack upon the carriage of the winds, Increase and die in his disturbed cheeks. Lo, when she blushed, even then did he look pale, As if her cheeks by some enchanted power Attracted had the cherry blood from his. Anon, with reverent fear when she grew pale, His cheeks put on their scarlet ornaments, But no more like her oriental red Than brick to coral or live things to dead. Why did he then thus counterfeit her looks? If she did blush, ‘twas tender modest shame Being in the sacred presence of a king. If he did blush, ’twas rude immodest shame To vail his eyes amiss, being a king. If she looked pale, ‘twas seely woman’s fear To bear herself in presence of a king. If he looked pale, it was with guilty fear To dote amiss, being a mighty king. Then, Scottish wars, farewell. I fear ’twill prove A ling’ring English siege of peevish love.
(didascalia)	Enter King Edward
LODOWICK	Here comes his highness, walking all alone.
(didascalia)	Lodowick withdraws
KING EDWARD	(aside) She is grown more fairer far since I came hither, Her voice more silver every word than other, Her wit more fluent. What a strange discourse Unfolded she of David and his Scots: ‘Even thus’, quoth she, ‘he spake,’ and then spoke broad, With epithets and accents of the Scot, But somewhat better than the Scot could speak. ‘And thus,’ quoth she, and answered then herself, For who could speak like her? But she herself Breathes from the wall an angel’s note from heaven Of sweet defiance to her barbarous foes. When she would talk of peace, methinks her tongue Commanded war to prison; when of war, It wakened Caesar from his Roman grave To hear war beautified by her discourse; Wisdom is foolishness but in her tongue, Beauty a slander but in her fair face, There is no summer but in her cheerful looks, Nor frosty winter but in her disdain. I cannot blame the Scots that did besiege her, For she is all the treasure of our land, But call them cowards that they ran away, Having so rich and fair a cause to stay. (Aloud) Art thou there, Lod’wick?
(didascalia)	Lodowick comes forward
KING EDWARD	Give me ink and paper.
LODOWICK	I will, my liege.
KING EDWARD	And bid the lords hold on their play at chess, For we will walk and meditate alone.
LODOWICK	I will, my sovereign. Exit
KING EDWARD	This fellow is well read in poetry, And hath a lusty and persuasive spirit. I will acquaint him with my passion, Which he shall shadow with a veil of lawn, Through which the queen of beauty’s queen shall see Herself the ground of my infirmity.
(didascalia)	Enter Lodowick, with pen, ink and paper
KING EDWARD	Hast thou pen, ink and paper ready, Lod’wick?
LODOWICK	Ready, my liege.
KING EDWARD	Then in the summer arbour sit by me; Make it our council house or cabinet: Since green our thoughts, green be the conventicle Where we will ease us by disburd’ning them.
(didascalia)	They sit. Lodowick prepares to write
KING EDWARD	Now, Lod‘wick, invocate some golden muse To bring thee hither an enchanted pen That may for sighs set down true sighs indeed, Talking of grief, to make thee ready groan, And when thou write’st of tears, encouch the word Before and after with such sweet laments That it may raise drops in a Tartar’s eye, And make a flint-heart Scythian pitiful— For so much moving hath a poet’s pen. Then, if thou be a poet, move thou so And be enriched by thy sovereign’s love. For if the touch of sweet concordant strings Could force attendance in the ears of hell, How much more shall the strains of poets’ wit Beguile and ravish soft and human minds?
LODOWICK	To whom, my lord, shall I direct my style?
KING EDWARD	To one that stains the fair and sots the wise, Whose body is an abstract or a brief, Contains each general virtue in the world. ‘Better than beautiful’, thou must begin, Devise for fair a fairer word than ‘fair’, And every ornament that thou wouldst praise, Fly it a pitch above the soar of praise. For flattery fear thou not to be convicted, For were thy admiration ten times more, Ten times ten thousand more the worth exceeds Of that thou art to praise thy praise’s worth. Begin; I will to contemplate the while. Forget not to set down how passionate, How heart-sick and how full of languishment Her beauty makes me.
LODOWICK	Write I to a woman?
KING EDWARD	What beauty else could triumph over me, Or who but women do our love-lays greet? What think’st thou I did bid thee praise? A horse?
LODOWICK	Of what condition or estate she is ’Twere requisite that I should know, my lord.
KING EDWARD	Of such estate that hers is as a throne, And my estate the footstool where she treads. Then mayst thou judge what her condition is By the proportion of her mightiness. Write on, while I peruse her in my thoughts.
(didascalia)
KING EDWARD	Her voice to music or the nightingale. To music every summer-leaping swain Compares his sunburnt lover when she speaks, And why should I speak of the nightingale? The nightingale sings of adulterate wrong And that compare is too satirical, For sin, though sin, would not be so esteemed, But rather virtue sin, sin virtue deemed. Her hair far softer than the silkworm’s twist, Like to a flattering glass doth make more fair The yellow amber—‘like a flattering glass’ Comes in too soon: for writing of her eyes I’ll say that like a glass they catch the sun, And thence the hot reflection doth rebound Against my breast and burns my heart within. Ah, what a world of descant makes my soul Upon this voluntary ground of love! Come, Lod’wick: hast thou turned thy ink to gold? If not, write but in letters capital My mistress’ name, and it will gild thy paper. Read, Lod’wick, read! Fill thou the empty hollows of mine ears With the sweet hearing of thy poetry!
LODOWICK	I have not to a period brought her praise.
KING EDWARD	Her praise is as my Love—both infinite, Which apprehend such violent extremes That they disdain an ending period. Her beauty hath no match but my affection; Hers more than most, mine most, and more than more; Hers more to praise than tell the sea by drops— Nay more!—than drop the massy earth by sands, And sand by sand print them in memory. Then wherefore talk’st thou of a period To that which craves unended admiration? Read. Let us hear.
LODOWICK	(reading) ‘More fair and chaste than is the queen of shades’—
KING EDWARD	(staying him) That line hath two faults, gross and palpable. Compar’st thou her to the pale queen of night, Who, being set in dark, seems therefore light? What is she when the sun lifts up his head But like a fading taper, dim and dead? My love shall brave the eye of heaven at noon, And, being unmasked, outshine the golden sun!
LODOWICK	What is the other fault, my sovereign lord?
KING EDWARD	Read o’er the line again.
LODOWICK	(reading) ‘More fair and chaste’—
KING EDWARD	(staying him) I did not bid thee talk of chastity, To ransack so the treasure of her mind, For I had rather have her chased than chaste! Out with the moon line! I will none of it. And let me have her likened to the sun- Say she hath thrice more splendour than the sun, That her perfections emulates the sun, That she breeds sweets as plenteous as the sun, That she doth thaw cold winter like the sun, That she doth cheer fresh summer like the sun, That she doth dazzle gazers like the sun, And in this application to the sun Bid her be free and general as the sun, Who smiles upon the basest weed that grows As lovingly as on the fragrant rose. Let’s see what follows that same moonlight line.
LODOWICK	(reading) ‘More fair and chaste than is the queen of shades, More bold in constancy’—
KING EDWARD	(staying him) In constancy than who?
LODOWICK	(reading) ‘…than Judith was.’
KING EDWARD	O monstrous line! Put in the next a sword And I shall woo her to cut off my head! Blot, blot, good Lod’wick. Let us hear the next.
LODOWICK	There’s all that yet is done.
KING EDWARD	I thank thee then. Thou hast done little ill, But what is done is passing passing ill. No, let the captain talk of boist’rous war, The prisoner of emurèd dark constraint; The sick man best sets down the pangs of death, The man that starves the sweetness of a feast, The frozen soul the benefit of fire, And every grief his happy opposite. Love cannot sound well but in lovers’ tongues. Give me the pen and paper. I will write. Lodowick gives him the pen and paper.
(didascalia)	Enter the Countess of Salisbury
KING EDWARD	(Aside) But soft—here comes the treasurer of my spirit. (Aloud to Lodowick, showing him the paper in his hand) Lod‘wick, thou know’st not how to draw a battle! These wings, these flankers and these squadrons Argue in thee defective discipline. Thou shouldst have placed this here, this other here—
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Pardon my boldness, my thrice-gracious lords. Let my intrusion here be called my duty That comes to see my sovereign how he fares.
KING EDWARD	(to Lodowick, giving him the paper) Go, draw the same, I tell thee in what form.
LODOWICK	I go. Exit
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Sorry I am to see my liege so sad. What may thy subject do to drive from thee Thy gloomy consort, sullen melancholy?
KING EDWARD	Ah, lady, I am blunt and cannot strew The flowers of solace in a ground of shame. Since I came hither, Countess, I am wronged.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Now God forbid that any in my house Should think my sovereign wrong! Thrice-gentle King, Acquaint me with thy cause of discontent.
KING EDWARD	How near, then, shall I be to remedy?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	As near, my liege, as all my woman’s power Can pawn itself to buy thy remedy.
KING EDWARD	If thou speak’st true, then have I my redress. Engage thy power to redeem my joys, And I am joyful, Countess; else I die.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	I will, my liege.
KING EDWARD	Swear, Countess, that thou wilt.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	By heaven, I will.
KING EDWARD	Then take thyself a little way aside And tell thyself a king doth dote on thee. Say that within thy power it doth lie To make him happy, and that thou hast sworn To give him all the joy within thy power- Do this, and tell me when I shall be happy.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	All this is done, my thrice-dread sovereign. That power of love that I have power to give Thou hast, with all devout obedience. Employ me how thou wilt in proof thereof.
KING EDWARD	Thou hear’st me say that I do dote on thee.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	If on my beauty, take it if thou canst; Though little, I do prize it ten times less. If on my virtue, take it if thou canst; For virtue’s store, by giving, doth augment. Be it on what it will that I can give, And thou canst take away, inherit it.
KING EDWARD	It is thy beauty that I would enjoy.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	O, were it painted I would wipe it off And dispossess myself to give it thee! But, sovereign, it is soldered to my life: Take one, and both, for, like an humble shadow, It haunts the sunshine of my summer’s life—
KING EDWARD	But thou mayst lend it me to sport withal.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	As easy may my intellectual soul Be lent away and yet my body live As lend my body, palace to my soul, Away from her and yet retain my soul. My body is her bower, her court, her abbey; And she an angel, pure, divine, unspotted. If I should lend her house, my lord, to thee, I kill my poor soul, and my poor soul me.
KING EDWARD	Didst thou not swear to give me what I would?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	I did, my liege, so what you would I could.
KING EDWARD	I wish no more of thee than thou mayst give, Nor beg I do not, but I rather buy— That is, thy love; and for that love of thine In rich exchange I tender to thee mine.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	But that your lips were sacred, good my lord, You would profane the holy name of love. That love you offer me you cannot give, For Caesar owes that tribute to his queen. That love you beg of me I cannot give, For Sarah owes that duty to her lord. He that doth clip or counterfeit your stamp Shall die, my lord: and will your sacred self Commit high treason ‘gainst the king of heaven To stamp his image in forbidden metal, Forgetting your allegiance and your oath? In violating marriage’ sacred law You break a greater honour than yourself: To be a king is of a younger house Than to be married. Your progenitor, Sole reigning Adam o’er the universe, By God was honoured for a married man, But not by him anointed for a king. It is a penalty to break your statutes, Though not enacted with your highness’ hand; How much more to infringe the holy act Made by the mouth of God, sealed with his hand! I know my sovereign—in my husband’s love, Who now doth loyal service in his wars— Doth but so try the wife of Salisbury, Whether she will hear a wanton’s tale or no. Lest being therein guilty by my stay, From that, not from my liege, I turn away. Exit
KING EDWARD	Whether is her beauty by her words divine, Or are her words sweet chaplains to her beauty? Like as the wind doth beautify a sail And as a sail becomes the unseen wind, So do her words her beauties, beauty words. O, that I were a honey-gathering bee To bear the comb of virtue from this flower, And not a poison-sucking, envious spider To turn the juice I take to deadly venoml Religion is austere, and beauty gentle— Too strict a guardian for so fair a ward. O, that she were as is the air to me! Why, so she is: for when I would embrace her, This do I (embracing the air), and catch nothing but myself. I must enjoy her, for I cannot beat With reason and reproof fond love away.
(didascalia)	Enter the Earl of Warwick
KING EDWARD	(Aside) Here comes her father. I will work with him To bear my colours in this field of love.
EARL OF WARWICK	How is it that my sovereign is so sad? May I, with pardon, know your highness’ grief? An that my old endeavour will remove it, It shall not cumber long your majesty.
KING EDWARD	A kind and voluntary gift thou proffer’st That I was forward to have begged of thee. But, O, thou world, great nurse of flattery, Why dost thou tip men’s tongues with golden words, And peise their deeds with weight of heavy lead That fair performance cannot follow promise? O, that a man might hold the heart’s close book And choke the lavish tongue when it doth utter The breath of falsehood not charactered there!
EARL OF WARWICK	Far be it from the honour of my age That I should owe bright gold and render lead. Age is a cynic, not a flatterer. I say again that if I knew your grief, And that by me it may be lessened, My proper harm should buy your highness’ good.
KING EDWARD	These are the vulgar tenders of false men That never pay the duty of their words. Thou wilt not stick to swear what thou hast said, But when thou know’st my griefs condition This rash disgorged vomit of thy word Thou wilt eat up again, and leave me helpless.
EARL OF WARWICK	By heaven, I will not, though your majesty Did bid me run upon your sword and die!
KING EDWARD	Say that my grief is no way medicinable But by the loss and bruising of thine honour?
EARL OF WARWICK	If nothing but that loss may vantage you I would account that loss my vantage too.
KING EDWARD	Think’st that thou canst unswear thy oath again?
EARL OF WARWICK	I cannot, nor I would not if I could.
KING EDWARD	But if thou dost, what shall I say to thee?
EARL OF WARWICK	What may be said to any perjured villain That breaks the sacred warrant of an oath.
KING EDWARD	What wilt thou say to one that breaks an oath?
EARL OF WARWICK	That he hath broke his faith with God and man, And from them both stands excommunicate.
KING EDWARD	What office were it to suggest a man To break a lawful and religious vow?
EARL OF WARWICK	An office for the devil, not for man.
KING EDWARD	That devil’s office must thou do for me, Or break thy oath and cancel all the bonds Of love and duty ‘twixt thyself and me. And therefore, Warwick, if thou art thyself, The lord and master of thy word and oath, Go to thy daughter and, in my behalf, Command her, woo her, win her any ways To be my mistress and my secret love. I will not stand to hear thee make reply; Thy oath break hers, or let thy sovereign die. Exit
EARL OF WARWICK	O doting king! O detestable office! Well may I tempt myself to wrong myself, When he hath sworn me by the name of God To break a vow made by the name of God. What if I swear by this right hand of mine To cut this right hand off? The better way Were to profane the idol than confound it, But neither will I do. I’ll keep mine oath And to my daughter make a recantation Of all the virtue I have preached to her. I’ll say she must forget her husband, Salisbury— If she remember to embrace the King. I’ll say an oath may easily be broken— But not so easily pardoned, being broken. I’ll say it is true charity to love— But not true love to be so charitable. I’ll say his greatness may bear out the shame— But not his kingdom can buy out the sin. I’ll say it is my duty to persuade— But not her honesty to give consent.
(didascalia)	Enter the Countess of Salisbury
EARL OF WARWICK	(Aside) See where she comes. Was never father had Against his child an embassage so bad.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	My lord and father, I have sought for you. My mother and the peers importune you To keep in presence of his majesty, And do your best to make his highness merry.
EARL OF WARWICK	(aside) How shall I enter in this graceless errand? I must not call her child, for where’s the father That will in such a suit seduce his child? Then ‘wife of Salisbury’—shall I so begin? No, he’s my friend, and where is found the friend That will do friendship such endamagement? (To the Countess) Neither my daughter, nor my dear friend’s wife, I am not Warwick, as thou think‘st I am, But an attorney from the court of hell, That thus have housed my spirit in his form To do a message to thee from the King: ‘The mighty King of England dotes on thee: He that hath power to take away thy life Hath power to take thy honour. Then consent To pawn thine honour rather than thy life; Honour is often lost and got again, But life, once gone, hath no recovery. The sun that withers hay doth nourish grass, The King that would distain thee, will advance thee. The poets write that great Achilles’ spear Could heal the wound it made; the moral is, What mighty men misdo they can amend. The lion doth become his bloody jaws And grace his foragement by being mild When vassal fear lies trembling at his feet. The King will, in his glory, hide thy shame, And those that gaze on him, to find out thee, Will lose their eyesight looking in the sun. What can one drop of poison harm the sea Whose hugy vastures can digest the ill And make it lose his operation? The King’s great name will temper thy misdeeds, And give the bitter potion of reproach A sugared, sweet and most delicious taste. Besides, it is no harm to do the thing Which, without shame, could not be left undone.’ Thus have I, in his majesty’s behalf, Apparelled sin in virtuous sentences, And dwell upon thy answer in his suit.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Unnatural besiege! Woe me unhappy, To have escaped the danger of my foes And to be ten times worse envir‘ned by friends! Hath he no means to stain my honest blood But to corrupt the author of my blood To be his scandalous and vile solicitor? No marvel though the branch be then infected, When poison hath encompassed the root; No marvel though the leprous infant die, When the stern dame envenometh the dug. Why then, give sin a passport to offend, And youth the dangerous rein of liberty. Blot out the strict forbidding of the law, And cancel every canon that prescribes A shame for shame, or penance for offence. No, let me die if his too boist’rous will Will have it so, before I will consent To be an actor in his graceless lust.
EARL OF WARWICK	Why, now thou speak‘st as I would have thee speak! And mark how I unsay my words again: An honourable grave is more esteemed Than the polluted closet of a king. The greater man, the greater is the thing, Be it good or bad, that he shall undertake. An unreputed mote flying in the sun Presents a greater substance than it is. The freshest summer’s day doth soonest taint The loathed carrion that it seems to kiss. Deep are the blows made with a mighty axe. That sin doth ten times aggravate itself That is committed in a holy place. An evil deed done by authority Is sin and subornation. Deck an ape In tissue, and the beauty of the robe Adds but the greater scorn unto the beast. A spacious field of reasons could I urge Between his glory, daughter, and thy shame: That poison shows worst in a golden cup; Dark night seems darker by the lightning flash; Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds; And every glory that inclines to sin, The shame is treble by the opposite. So leave I with my blessing in thy bosom, Which then convert to a most heavy curse When thou convert’st from honour’s golden name To the black faction of bed-blotting shame.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	I’ll follow thee, and when my mind turns so, My body sink my soul in endless woe. Exeunt

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Enter at one door the Earl of Derby from France. At another door, enter Lord Audley with a drummer
EARL OF DERBY	Thrice-noble Audley, well encountered here. How is it with our sovereign and his peers?
AUDLEY	‘Tis full a fortnight since I saw his highness, What time he sent me forth to muster men, Which I accordingly have done, and bring them hither, In fair array, before his majesty. What news, my lord of Derby, from the Emperor?
EARL OF DERBY	As good as we desire. The Emperor Hath yielded to his highness friendly aid, And makes our king lieutenant-general In all his lands and large dominions. Then via for the spacious bounds of France!
AUDLEY	What, doth his highness leap to hear these news?
EARL OF DERBY	I have not yet found time to open them. The King is in his closet, malcontent. For what I know not, but he gave in charge Till after dinner none should interrupt him. The Countess Salisbury and her father Warwick, Artois, and all, look underneath the brows.
AUDLEY	Undoubtedly, then, something is amiss.
(didascalia)	Sound trumpets within
EARL OF DERBY	The trumpets sound. The King is now abroad.
(didascalia)	Enter King Edward
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Here comes his highness.
EARL OF DERBY	(to the King) Befall my sovereign all my sovereign’s wish.
(didascalia)	KING EDWARD aside
EARL OF DERBY	Ah, that thou wert a witch to make it so.
EARL OF DERBY	The Emperor greeteth you—
(didascalia)	KING EDWARD aside Would it were the Countess.
EARL OF DERBY	—And hath accorded to your highness’ suit.
(didascalia)	KING EDWARD aside
EARL OF DERBY	Thou liest. She hath not, but I would she had.
AUDLEY	All love and duty to my lord the King.
(didascalia)	KING EDWARD aside
AUDLEY	Well, all but one is none. (To Audley) What news with you?
AUDLEY	I have, my liege, levied those horse and foot, According as your charge, and brought them hither.
KING EDWARD	Then let those foot trudge hence upon those horse, According to our discharge, and be gone. Derby, I’ll look upon the Countess’ mind anon.
EARL OF DERBY	The Countess’ mind, my liege?
KING EDWARD	I mean the Emperor. Leave me alone.
AUDLEY	(to Derby) What is his mind?
EARL OF DERBY	Let’s leave him to his humour.
(didascalia)	Exeunt Derby and Audley
KING EDWARD	Thus from the heart’s abundance speaks the tongue: ‘Countess’ for ‘Emperor’—and indeed why not? She is as imperator over me, and I to her Am as a kneeling vassal that observes The pleasure or displeasure of her eye.
(didascalia)	Enter Lodowick
KING EDWARD	(To Lodowick) What says the more-than-Cleopatra’s match To Caesar now?
LODOWICK	That yet, my liege, ere night She will resolve your majesty.
(didascalia)	Sound drum within
KING EDWARD	What drum is this that thunders forth this march To start the tender Cupid in my bosom? Poor sheepskin, how it brawls with him that beateth it! Go, break the thund’ring parchment-bottom out And I will teach it to conduct sweet lines Unto the bosom of a heavenly nymph; For I will use it as my writing paper, And so reduce him from a scolding drum To be the herald, and dear counsel-bearer, Betwixt a goddess and a mighty king. Go, bid the drummer learn to touch the lute, Or hang him in the braces of his drum; For now we think it an uncivil thing To trouble heaven with such harsh resounds. Away!
(didascalia)	Exit Lodowick
KING EDWARD	The quarrel that I have requires no arms But these of mine, and these shall meet my foe In a deep march of penetrable groans. My eyes shall be my arrows, and my sighs Shall serve me as the vantage of the wind To whirl away my sweet’st artillery. Ah, but alas, she wins the sun of me, For that is she herself, and thence it comes That poets term the wanton warrior blind. But love hath eyes as judgement to his steps, Till too much loved glory dazzles them—
(didascalia)	Enter Lodowick
KING EDWARD	How now?
LODOWICK	My liege, the drum that struck the lusty march Stands with Prince Edward, your thrice-valiant son.
(didascalia)	Exit
(didascalia)	Enter Edward, Prince of Wales
(didascalia)	I see the boy. Aside O, how his mother’s face,
KING EDWARD	Modelled in his, corrects my strayed desire, And rates my heart, and chides my thievish eye, Who, being rich enough in seeing her, Yet seek elsewhere; and basest theft is that Which cannot cloak itself in poverty. (To the Prince) Now, boy, what news?
PRINCE OF WALES	I have assembled, my dear lord and father, The choicest buds of all our English blood For our affairs to France, and here we come To take direction from your majesty.
KING EDWARD	(aside) Still do I see in him delineate His mother’s visage. Those his eyes are hers, Who looking wistly on me make me blush. For faults against themselves give evidence; Lust is a fire, and men, like lanterns, show Light lust within themselves, even through themselves. Away, loose silks o’er wavering vanity! Shall the large limit of fair Brittany By me be overthrown, and shall I not Master this little mansion of myself? Give me an armour of eternal steel: I go to conquer kings; and shall I not then Subdue myself and be my enemy’s friend? It must not be. (To the Prince) Come, boy! Forward! Advance! Let’s with our colours sweet the air of France.
(didascalia)	Enter Lodowick
LODOWICK	(to the King) My liege, the Countess, with a smiling cheer, Desires access unto your majesty.
KING EDWARD	(aside) Why there it goes. That very smile of hers Hath ransomed captive France and set the King, The Dauphin and the peers at liberty. (To the Prince) Go, leave me, Ned, and revel with thy friends.
(didascalia)	Exit the Prince of Wales
KING EDWARD	(Aside) Thy mother is but black, and thou, like her, Dost put it in my mind how foul she is. (To Lodowick) Go, fetch the Countess hither in thy hand—
(didascalia)	Exit Lodowick
KING EDWARD	And let her chase away these winter clouds, For she gives beauty both to heaven and earth. The sin is more to hack and hew poor men Than to embrace in an unlawful bed The register of all rarieties Since leathern Adam till this youngest hour.
(didascalia)	Enter Lodowick leading in by the hand the Countess of Salisbury
KING EDWARD	Go, Lod’wick, put thy hand into my purse— Play, spend, give, riot, waste, do what thou wilt So thou wilt hence awhile and leave me here.
(didascalia)	Exit Lodowick
KING EDWARD	(To the Countess) Now, my soul’s playfellow, art thou come To speak the more-than-heavenly word of ‘yea’ To my objection in thy beauteous love?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	My father on his blessing hath commanded—
KING EDWARD	That thou shalt yield to me.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Ay, dear my liege, your due.
KING EDWARD	And that, my dearest love, can be no less Than right for right, and render love for love.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Than wrong for wrong, and endless hate for hate. But sith I see your majesty so bent That my unwillingness, my husband’s love, Your high estate, nor no respect respected Can be my help, but that your mightiness Will overbear and awe these dear regards, I bind my discontent to thy content, And what I would not ill compel I will, Provided that yourself remove those lets That stand between your highness’ love and mine.
KING EDWARD	Name them, fair Countess, and by heaven I will.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	It is their lives that stand between our love That I would have choked up, my sovereign.
KING EDWARD	Whose lives, my lady?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	My thrice-loving liege, Your Queen and Salisbury, my wedded husband, Who, living, have that title in our love That we cannot bestow but by their death.
KING EDWARD	Their opposition is beyond our law.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	So is your desire. If the law Can hinder you to execute the one, Let it forbid you to attempt the other. I cannot think you love me as you say Unless you do make good what you have sworn.
KING EDWARD	No more. Thy husband and the Queen shall die. Fairer thou art by far than Hero was; Beardless Leander not so strong as I. He swam an easy current for his love, But I will through a Hellespont of blood To arrive at Sestos, where my Hero lies.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Nay, you’ll do more. You’ll make the river too With their heart bloods that keep our love asunder, Of which my husband and your wife are twain.
KING EDWARD	Thy beauty makes them guilty of their death, And gives in evidence that they shall die— Upon which verdict I, their judge, condemn them.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	O, perjured beauty! More corrupted judge! When to the great star chamber o‘er our heads The universal sessions calls to ’count This packing evil, we both shall tremble for it.
KING EDWARD	What says my fair love? Is she resolute?
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Resolved to be dissolved, and therefore this: Keep but thy word, great King, and I am thine. Stand where thou dost—I’ll part a little from thee— She moves away from the King
(didascalia)	kneeling And see how I will yield me to thy hands.
COUNTESS OF SALISBURY	Here, by my side, doth hang my wedding knives. She reveals two knives Take thou the one, She offers a knife to the King and with it kill thy Queen, And learn by me to find her where she lies; And with this other She turns the other knife on herself I’ll dispatch my love, Which now lies fast asleep within my heart. When they are gone, then I’ll consent to love. Stir not, lascivious King, to hinder me. My resolution is more nimbler far Than thy prevention can be in my rescue. An if thou stir, I strike. Therefore stand still, And hear the choice that I will put thee to. Either swear to leave thy most unholy suit And never henceforth to solicit me, Or else, by heaven, this sharp-pointed knife Shall stain thy earth with that which thou wouldst stain— My poor, chaste blood. Swear, Edward, swear, Or I will strike and die before thee here.
KING EDWARD	Even by that power I swear, that gives me now The power to be ashamed of myself, I never mean to part my lips again In any words that tends to such a suit. Arise, true English lady, whom our isle May better boast of than ever Roman might Of her, whose ransacked treasury hath tasked The vain endeavour of so many pens. Arise, and be my fault thy honour’s fame Which after-ages shall enrich thee with. I am awakèd from this idle dream.
(didascalia)	The Countess stands
KING EDWARD	(Calling) Warwick, my son, Derby, Artois and Audley— Brave warriors all, where are you all this while?
(didascalia)	Enter all the peers: the Earl of Warwick, the
KING EDWARD	Prince of Wales, the Earl of Derby, the Comte d’Artois and Lord Audley Warwick, I make thee Warden of the North. Thou, Prince of Wales, and Audley, straight to sea, Scour to Newhaven—some there stay for me. Myself, Artois and Derby will through Flanders To greet our friends there and to crave their aid. This night will scarce suffice me to discover My folly’s siege against a faithful lover, For ere the sun shall gild the eastern sky We’ll wake him with our martial harmony.
(didascalia)	Exeunt

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Enter Jean King of France, his two sons (the Dauphin and Prince Philippe) and the Duc de Lorraine
KING OF FRANCE	Here, till our navy of a thousand sail Have made a breakfast to our foe by sea, Let us encamp to wait their happy speed. Lorraine, what readiness is Edward in? How hast thou heard that he provided is Of martial furniture for this exploit?
DUC DE LORRAINE	To lay aside unnecessary soothing, And not to spend the time in circumstance, ’Tis bruited for a certainty, my lord, That he’s exceeding strongly fortified. His subjects flock as willingly to war As if unto a triumph they were led.
DAUPHIN	England was wont to harbour malcontents, Bloodthirsty and seditious Catilines, Spendthrifts, and such as gape for nothing else But change and alteration of the state. And is it possible That they are now so loyal in themselves?
DUC DE LORRAINE	All but the Scot, who solemnly protests, As heretofore I have informed his grace, Never to sheathe his sword or take a truce.
KING OF FRANCE	Ah, that’s the anch’rage of some better hope. But on the other side, to think what friends King Edward hath retained in Netherland, Among those ever-bibbing epicures— Those frothy Dutchmen, puffed with double beer, That drink and swill in every place they come— Doth not a little aggravate mine ire. Besides, we hear the Emperor conjoins And stalls him in his own authority. But all the mightier that their number is The greater glory reaps the victory! Some friends have we beside domestic power— The stern Polonian and the warlike Dane, The King of Bohême, and of Sicily, Are all become confederates with us And, as I think, are marching hither apace—
(didascalia)	Sound drums within
KING OF FRANCE	But soft, I hear the music of their drums, By which I guess that their approach is near.
(didascalia)	Enter at one door the King of Bohemia with Danish soldiers and a drummer. Enter at another door a Polish captain with Muscovite and Polish soldiers and a drummer
KING OF BOHEMIA	King Jean of France, as league and neighbourhood Requires when friends are any way distressed, I come to aid thee with my country’s force.
POLISH CAPTAIN	(to the King of France) And from great Moscow, fearful to the Turk, And lofty Poland, nurse of hardy men, I bring these servitors to fight for thee, Who willingly will venture in thy cause.
KING OF FRANCE	Welcome, Bohemian king, and welcome all. This your great kindness I will not forget. Besides your plentiful rewards in crowns That from our treasury ye shall receive, There comes a harebrained nation, decked in pride, The spoil of whom will be a treble gain. And now my hope is full, my joy complete. At sea we are as puissant as the force Of Agamemnon in the haven of Troy. By land, with Xerxes we compare of strength, Whose soldiers drank up rivers in their thirst. Then, Bayard-like, blind overweening Ned, To reach at our imperial diadem Is either to be swallowed of the waves, Or hacked a-pieces when thou com’st ashore.
(didascalia)	Enter a French Mariner
MARINER	Near to the coast I have descried, my lord, As I was busy in my watchful charge, The proud armada of King Edward’s ships, Which, at the first far off when I did ken, Seemed as it were a grove of withered pines, But drawing near, their glorious bright aspect, Their streaming ensigns wrought of coloured silk, Like to a meadow full of sundry flowers, Adorns the naked bosom of the earth. Majestical the order of their course, Figuring the hornèd circle of the moon, And on the top gallant of the admiral, And likewise all the handmaids of his train, The arms of England and of France unite Are quartered equally by herald’s art. Thus titely carried with a merry gale They plough the ocean hitherward amain.
KING OF FRANCE	Dare he already crop the fleur-de-lis? I hope, the honey being gathered thence, He, with the spider, afterward approached, Shall suck forth deadly venom from the leaves. But where’s our navy? How are they prepared To wing themselves against this flight of ravens?
MARINER	They, having knowledge brought them by the scouts, Did break from anchor straight and, puffed with rage, No otherwise than were their sails with wind, Made forth as when the empty eagle flies To satisfy his hungry, griping maw.
KING OF FRANCE	(giving money) There’s for thy news. Return unto thy barque, And if thou scape the bloody stroke of war And do survive the conflict, come again, And let us hear the manner of the fight. Exit Mariner Mean space, my lords, ’tis best we be dispersed To several places, lest they chance to land. (To the King of Bohemia) First you, my lord, with your Bohemian troops, Shall pitch your battles on the lower hand.
(didascalia)	(To the Dauphin and the Polish captain)
KING OF FRANCE	My eldest son, the Duke of Normandy, Together with this aid of Muscovites, Shall climb the higher ground another way. Here in the middle coast, betwixt you both, Philippe, my youngest boy, and I will lodge. So, lords, be gone, and look unto your charge, You stand for France, an empire fair and large.
(didascalia)	Exeunt all but the King of France and Prince Philippe
KING OF FRANCE	Now tell me, Philippe, what is thy conceit Touching the challenge that the English make?
PRINCE PHILIPPE	I say, my lord, claim Edward what he can, And bring he ne‘er so plain a pedigree, ’Tis you are in possession of the crown, And that’s the surest point of all the law. But were it not, yet ere he should prevail I’ll make a conduit of my dearest blood, Or chase those straggling upstarts home again.
(didascalia)	Well said, young Philippe! To an attendant Call for bread and wine
KING OF FRANCE	That we may cheer our stomachs with repast To look our foes more sternly in the face. Bread and wine are brought forth. The battle is heard afar off. The King and Prince Philippe sup Now is begun the heavy day at sea. Fight, Frenchmen, fight! Be like the field of bears When they defend their younglings in their caves. Steer, angry Nemesis, the happy helm That with the sulphur battles of your rage The English fleet may be dispersed and sunk. A cannon shot within
PRINCE PHILIPPE	O, father, how this echoing cannon shot, Like sweet harmony, digests my cates!
KING OF FRANCE	Now, boy, thou hear‘st what thund’ring terror ’tis To buckle for a kingdom’s sovereignty. The earth, with giddy trembling when it shakes, Or when the exhalations of the air Breaks in extremity of lightning flash, Affrights not more than kings when they dispose To show the rancour of their high-swoll’n hearts.
(didascalia)	Retreat sounds within
(didascalia)	Retreat is sounded—one side hath the worse.
KING OF FRANCE	O, if it be the French, sweet fortune turn, And in thy turning, change the froward winds That, with advantage of a favouring sky, Our men may vanquish, and the other fly.
(didascalia)	Enter the French Mariner
KING OF FRANCE	My heart misgives. (To the Mariner) Say, mirror of pale death, To whom belongs the honour of this day? Relate, I pray thee, if thy breath will serve The sad discourse of this discomfiture.
MARINER	I will, my lord. My gracious sovereign, France hath ta‘en the foil, And boasting Edward triumphs with success. These iron-hearted navies, When last I was reporter to your grace, Both full of angry spleen, of hope and fear, Hasting to meet each other in the face, At last conjoined, and by their admiral Our admiral encountered many shot. By this, the other, that beheld these twain Give earnest-penny of a further wreck, Like fiery dragons took their haughty flight; And likewise meeting, from their smoky wombs Sent many grim ambassadors of death. Then ’gan the day to turn to gloomy night, And darkness did as well enclose the quick As those that were but newly reft of life. No leisure served for friends to bid farewell, And if it had, the hideous noise was such As each to other seemed deaf and dumb. Purple the sea whose channel filled as fast With streaming gore that from the maimed fell, As did her gushing moisture break into The cranny cleftures of the through-shot planks. Here flew a head dissevered from the trunk; There mangled arms and legs were tossed aloft, As when a whirlwind takes the summer dust And scatters it in middle of the air. Then might ye see the reeling vessels split And, tottering, sink into the ruthless flood Until their lofty tops were seen no more. All shifts were tried, both for defence and hurt. And now the effect of valour and of fear, Of resolution and of cowardice, We lively pictured—how the one for fame, The other by compulsion, laid about. Much did the Nonpareil, that brave ship; So did the Black Snake of Boulogne, than which A bonnier vessel never yet spread sail. But all in vain: both sun, the wind and tide Revolted all unto our foemen’s side, That we, perforce, were fain to give them way, And they are landed. Thus my tale is done. We have untimely lost, and they have won.
KING OF FRANCE	Then rests there nothing but, with present speed, To join our several forces all in one, And bid them battle ere they range too far. Come, gentle Philippe, let us hence depart; This soldier’s words have pierced thy father’s heart.
(didascalia)	Exeunt

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Enter at one door two Frenchmen without baggage. Enter at another door, meeting them, other Frenchmen and a Frenchwoman with two little children, all with baggage
FRENCHMAN WITHOUT BAGGAGE	Well met, my masters. How now? What’s the news, And wherefore are ye laden thus with stuff? What, is it quarter-day, that you remove, And carry bag and baggage too?
FIRST FRENCHMAN WITH BAGGAGE	Quarter-day, ay, and quartering day I fear. Have ye not heard the news that flies abroad?
FRENCHMAN WITHOUT BAGGAGE	What news?
SECOND FRENCHMAN WITH BAGGAGE	How the French navy is destroyed at sea, And that the English army is arrived.
FRENCHMAN WITHOUT BAGGAGE	What then?
FIRST FRENCHMAN WITH BAGGAGE	‘What then,’ quoth you? Why, is’t not time to fly, When envy and destruction is so nigh?
FRENCHMAN WITHOUT BAGGAGE	Content thee, man, they are far enough from hence, And will be met, I warrant ye, to their cost, Before they break so far into the realm.
FIRST FRENCHMAN WITH BAGGAGE	Ay, so the grasshopper doth spend the time In mirthful jollity, till winter come, And then, too late, he would redeem his time, When frozen cold hath nipped his careless head. He that no sooner will provide a cloak Than when he sees it doth begin to rain May, peradventure, for his negligence, Be throughly washed when he suspects it not. We that have charge, and such a train as this, Must look in time to look for them and us, Lest, when we would, we cannot be relieved.
FRENCHMAN WITHOUT BAGGAGE	Belike you then despair of ill success, And think your country will be subjugate.
SECOND FRENCHMAN WITH BAGGAGE	We cannot tell. ’Tis good to fear the worst.
FRENCHMAN WITHOUT BAGGAGE	Yet rather fight, than like unnatural sons Forsake your loving parents in distress.
FIRST FRENCHMAN WITH BAGGAGE	Tush, they that have already taken arms Are many fearful millions in respect Of that small handful of our enemies. But ’tis a rightful quarrel must prevail: Edward is son unto our late king’s sister, Where Jean Valois is three degrees removed.
FRENCHWOMAN	Besides, there goes a prophecy abroad, Published by one that was a friar once, Whose oracles have many times proved true, And now he says the time will shortly come Whenas a lion roused in the west Shall carry hence the fleur-de-lis of France. These, I can tell ye, and such like surmises, Strike many Frenchmen cold unto the heart.
(didascalia)	Enter a Frenchman in haste
FLEEING FRENCHMAN	Fly, countrymen and citizens of France! Sweet-flow’ring peace, the root of happy life, Is quite abandoned and expulsed the land. Instead of whom, ransack-constraining war Sits like to ravens upon your houses’ tops. Slaughter and mischief walk within your streets And, unrestrained, make havoc as they pass, The form whereof, even now, myself beheld Upon this fair mountain, whence I came. For so far off as I directed mine eyes I might perceive five cities all on fire, Cornfields and vineyards burning like an oven, And, as the reeking vapour in the wind Y-turnèd but aside, I likewise might discern The poor inhabitants, escaped the flame, Fall numberless upon the soldiers’ pikes. Three ways these dreadful ministers of wrath Do tread the measures of their tragic march: Upon the right hand comes the conquering King, Upon the left his hot, unbridled son, And in the midst their nation’s glittering host. All which, though distant, yet conspire in one To leave a desolation where they come. Fly, therefore, citizens, if you be wise. Seek out some habitation further off. Here, if you stay, your wives will be abused, Your treasure shared before your weeping eyes. Shelter you yourselves, for now the storm doth rise. Away, away! Methinks I hear their drums! Ah, wretched France, I greatly fear thy fall; Thy glory shaketh like a tottering wall.
(didascalia)	Exeunt

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Enter King Edward and the Earl of Derby with soldiers and Gobin de Grace
KING EDWARD	Where is the Frenchman by whose cunning guide We found the shallow of this river Somme, And had direction how to pass the sea?
GOBIN	Here, my good lord.
KING EDWARD	How art thou called? Tell me thy name.
GOBIN	Gobin de Grace, if please your excellence.
KING EDWARD	Then, Gobin, for the service thou hast done We here enlarge and give thee liberty, And for a recompense, beside this good, Thou shalt receive five hundred marks in gold. (To Derby) I know not how we should have missed our son, Whom now in heart I wish I might behold.
(didascalia)	Enter the Comte d’Artois
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Good news, my lord! The Prince is hard at hand, And with him comes Lord Audley and the rest Whom, since our landing, we could never meet.
(didascalia)	Enter Edward Prince of Wales, Lord Audley and soldiers
KING EDWARD	Welcome, fair Prince. How hast thou sped, my son, Since thy arrival on the coast of France?
PRINCE OF WALES	Successfully, I thank the gracious heavens. Some of their strongest cities we have won— As Harfleur, Lô, Crotoy and Carentan— And others wasted, leaving at our heels A wide, apparent field and beaten path For solitariness to progress in. Yet those that would submit we kindly pardoned, For who in scorn refused our proffered peace Endured the penalty of sharp revenge.
KING EDWARD	Ah, France, why shouldst thou be this obstinate Against the kind embracement of thy friends? How gently had we thought to touch thy breast And set our foot upon thy tender mould, But that in froward and disdainful pride Thou, like a skittish and untamed colt, Dost start aside and strike us with thy heels. But tell me, Ned, in all thy warlike course Hast thou not seen the usurping King of France?
PRINCE OF WALES	Yes, my good lord, and not two hours ago, With full a hundred thousand fighting men Upon the one side with the river’s bank, And on the other, both his multitudes. I feared he would have cropped our smaller power, But happily, perceiving your approach, He hath withdrawn himself to Crécy plains, Where, as it seemeth by his good array, He means to bid us battle presently.
KING EDWARD	He shall be welcome. That’s the thing we crave.
(didascalia)	Enter Jean King of France, the Dauphin, the
KING EDWARD	Duc de Lorraine, the King of Bohemia, young Prince Philippe and soldiers
KING OF FRANCE	Edward, know that Jean, the true King of France, Musing thou shouldst encroach upon his land And, in thy tyrannous proceeding, slay His faithful subjects and subvert his towns, Spits in thy face, and, in this manner following, Upbraids thee with thine arrogant intrusion. First, I condemn thee for a fugitive, A thievish pirate and a needy mate, One that hath either no abiding-place Or else, inhabiting some barren soil, Where neither herb or fruitful grain is had, Dost altogether live by pilfering. Next, insomuch thou hast infringed thy faith, Broke league and solemn covenant made with me, I hold thee for a false, pernicious wretch. And last of all, although I scorn to cope With one so much inferior to myself, Yet in respect thy thirst is all for gold, Thy labour rather to be feared than loved, To satisfy thy lust, in either part, Here am I come and with me have I brought Exceeding store of treasure, pearl and coin. Leave, therefore, now to persecute the weak, And armed ent‘ring conflict with the armed, Let it be seen, ’mongst other petty thefts, How thou canst win this pillage manfully.
KING EDWARD	If gall or wormwood have a pleasant taste, Then is thy salutation honey sweet. But as the one hath no such property, So is the other most satirical. Yet wot how I regard thy worthless taunts. If thou have uttered them to soil my fame, Or dim the reputation of my birth, Know that thy wolvish barking cannot hurt. If slyly to insinuate with the world, And with a strumpet’s artificial lime To paint thy vicious and deformed cause, Be well assured the counterfeit will fade, And in the end thy foul defects be seen. But if thou didst it to provoke me on, As who should say I were but timorous, Or, coldly negligent, did need a spur, Bethink thyself how slack I was at sea, How, since my landing, I have won no towns, Entered no further but upon the coast, And there have ever since securely slept. But if I have been otherwise employed, Imagine, Valois, whether I intend To skirmish, not for pillage, but for the crown Which thou dost wear and that I vow to have, Or one of us shall fall into his grave.
PRINCE OF WALES	Look not for cross invectives at our hands, Or railing execrations of despite. Let creeping serpents hid in hollow banks Sting with their tongues; we have remorseless swords, And they shall plead for us and our affairs. Yet thus much briefly, by my father’s leave, As all the immodest poison of thy throat Is scandalous and most notorious lies, And our pretended quarrel is truly just, So end the battle when we meet today: May either of us prosper and prevail Or, luckless cursed, receive eternal shame.
KING EDWARD	That needs no further question, and I know His conscience witnesseth it is my right. Therefore, Valois, say: wilt thou yet resign Before the sickle’s thrust into the corn, Or that enkindled fury turn to flame?
KING OF FRANCE	Edward, I know what right thou hast in France, And ere I basely will resign my crown This champaign field shall be a pool of blood, And all our prospect as a slaughterhouse.
PRINCE OF WALES	Ay, that approves thee, tyrant, what thou art. No father, king, or shepherd of thy realm, But one that tears her entrails with thy hands And, like a thirsty tiger, suck’st her blood.
AUDLEY	You peers of France, why do you follow him That is so prodigal to spend your lives?
DAUPHIN	Whom should they follow, aged impotent, But he that is their true-born sovereign?
KING EDWARD	Upbraid’st thou him because within his face Time hath engraved deep characters of age? Know that these grave scholars of experience, Like stiff-grown oaks, will stand immovable When whirlwind quickly turns up younger trees.
EARL OF DERBY	(to the King of France) Was ever any of thy father’s house King but thyself before this present time? (To the French generally) Edward’s great lineage by the mother’s side Five hundred years hath held the sceptre up. Judge then, conspirators, by this descent Which is the true-born sovereign—this, or that.
PRINCE PHILIPPE	(to the King of France) Father, range your battles. Prate no more. These English fain would spend the time in words That, night approaching, they might scape unfought.
KING OF FRANCE	Lords and my loving subjects, now’s the time That your intended force must bide the touch. Therefore, my friends, consider this in brief. He that you fight for is your natural king; He against whom you fight a foreigner. He that you fight for rules in clemency, And reigns you with a mild and gentle bit; He against whom you fight, if he prevail, Will straight enthrone himself in tyranny, Make slaves of you and with a heavy hand Curtail and curb your sweetest liberty. Then, to protect your country and your King, Let but the haughty courage of your hearts Answer the number of your able hands, And we shall quickly chase these fugitives. For what’s this Edward but a belly-god, A tender and lascivious wantonness, That th‘other day was almost dead for love? And what, I pray you, is his goodly guard? Such as, but scant them of their chines of beef, And take away their downy feather beds, And presently they are as resty-stiff As ’twere a many overridden jades. Then, Frenchmen, scorn that such should be your lords, And rather bind ye them in captive bands.
ALL THE FRENCH	Vive le roil God save King Jean of Francel
KING OF FRANCE	Now, on this plain of Crécy, spread yourselves. And, Edward, when thou dar’st, begin the fight!
(didascalia)	Exit with the French
KING EDWARD	(calling after) We presently will meet thee, Jean of France! (To the English) And, English lords, let us resolve the day Either to clear us of that scandalous crime Or be entombed in our innocence. (To the Prince of Wales) And, Ned, because this battle is the first That ever yet thou fought’st in pitched field, As ancient custom is of martialists To dub thee with the type of chivalry, In solemn manner we will give thee arms. Come, therefore, heralds; orderly bring forth A strong attirement for the Prince my son.
(didascalia)	Enter four heralds bringing in a coat armour, a helmet, a lance and a shield
KING EDWARD	Edward Plantagenet, in the name of God, As with this armour I impale thy breast So be thy noble, unrelenting heart Walled in with flint of matchless fortitude That never base affections enter there.
(didascalia)	The Prince of Wales is invested in armour
KING EDWARD	Fight and be valiant; conquer where thou com’st. (To Derby, Audley and Artois) Now follow, lords, and do him honour too.
EARL OF DERBY	Edward Plantagenet, Prince of Wales, As I do set this helmet on thy head Wherewith the chamber of thy brain is fenced, So may thy temples with Bellona’s hand Be still adorned with laurel victory.
(didascalia)	The helmet is placed on the Prince of Wales
EARL OF DERBY	Fight and be valiant; conquer where thou com’st.
AUDLEY	Edward Plantagenet, Prince of Wales, Receive this lance into thy manly hand. Use it in fashion of a brazen pen To draw forth bloody stratagems in France, And print thy valiant deeds in honour’s book.
(didascalia)	The lance is given to the Prince of Wales
AUDLEY	Fight and be valiant; vanquish where thou com’st.
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Edward Plantagenet, Prince of Wales, Hold, take this target; wear it on thy arm. And may the view thereof, like Perseus’ shield, Astonish and transform thy gazing foes To senseless images of meagre death.
(didascalia)	The shield is given to the Prince of Wales
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Fight and be valiant; conquer where thou com’st.
KING EDWARD	Now wants there naught but knighthood, which deferred We leave till thou hast won it in the field.
PRINCE OF WALES	My gracious father and ye forward peers, This honour you have done me animates And cheers my green, yet scarce-appearing, strength With comfortable, good-presaging signs, No otherwise than did old Jacob’s words Whenas he breathed his blessings on his sons. These hallowed gifts of yours, when I profane Or use them not to glory of my God To patronage the fatherless and poor, Or for the benefit of England’s peace, Be numb my joints, wax feeble both mine arms, Wither my heart that, like a sapless tree, I may remain the map of infamy.
KING EDWARD	Then thus our steeled battles shall be ranged. (To the Prince of Wales) The leading of the vanguard, Ned, is thine, To dignify whose lusty spirit the more We temper it with Audley’s gravity, That courage and experience, joined in one, Your manège may be second unto none. (To all) For the main battles I will guide myself, And Derby in the rearward march behind, That orderly disposed and set in ’ray Let us to horse, and God grant us the day!
(didascalia)	Exeunt

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Alarum. Enter and exit a many Frenchmen flying. Chasing after them, enter and exit Edward Prince of Wales running. Then enter Jean King of France and the Due de Lorraine
KING OF FRANCE	O Lorraine, say: what mean our men to fly? Our number is far greater than our foes.
DUC DE LORRAINE	The garrison of Genoese, my lord, That came from Paris, weary with their march, Grudging to be so suddenly employed, No sooner in the forefront took their place, But straight retiring, so dismayed the rest As likewise they betook themselves to flight, In which, for haste to make a safe escape, More in the clustering throng are pressed to death Than by the enemy a thousandfold.
KING OF FRANCE	O, hapless fortune! Let us yet assay If we can counsel some of them to stay.
(didascalia)	Exeunt

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Enter King Edward and Lord Audley
KING EDWARD	Lord Audley, whiles our son is in the chase, Withdraw our powers unto this little hill, And here a season let us breathe ourselves.
AUDLEY	I will, my lord. Exit
(didascalia)	Sound retreat within
KING EDWARD	Just-dooming heaven, whose secret providence To our gross judgement is inscrutable, How are we bound to praise thy wondrous works That hast, this day, given way unto the right, And made the wicked stumble at themselves?
(didascalia)	Enter the Comte d’Artois
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Rescue, King Edward! Rescue for thy son!
KING EDWARD	Rescue, Artois? What, is he prisoner, Or fell by violence beside his horse?
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Neither, my lord, but narrowly beset With turning Frenchmen, whom he did pursue, As ’tis impossible that he should scape Except your highness presently descend.
KING EDWARD	Tut, let him fight. We gave him arms today, And he is labouring for a knighthood, man!
(didascalia)	Enter the Earl of Derby
EARL OF DERBY	The Prince, my lord, the Prince! O, succour him! He’s close encompassed with a world of odds.
KING EDWARD	Then will he win a world of honour too If he by valour can redeem him thence. If not, what remedy? We have more sons Than one to comfort our declining age.
(didascalia)	Enter Lord Audley
AUDLEY	Renowned Edward, give me leave, I pray, To lead my soldiers where I may relieve Your grace’s son, in danger to be slain. The snares of French, like emmets on a bank, Muster about him whilst he, lion-like, Entangled in the net of their assaults, Franticly rends and bites the woven toil. But all in vain. He cannot free himself.
KING EDWARD	Audley, content. I will not have a man, On pain of death, sent forth to succour him. This is the day ordained by destiny To season his green courage with those grievous thoughts That, if he breaketh out, Nestor’s years on earth Will make him savour still of this exploit.
EARL OF DERBY	Ah, but he shall not live to see those days!
KING EDWARD	Why, then, his epitaph is lasting praise.
AUDLEY	Yet, good my lord, ’tis too much wilfulness To let his blood be spilt, that may be saved.
KING EDWARD	Exclaim no more, for none of you can tell Whether a borrowed aid will serve or no. Perhaps he is already slain or ta’en. And dare a falcon when she’s in her flight, And ever after she’ll be haggard-like. Let Edward be delivered by our hands And, still in danger, he’ll expect the like. But if himself himself redeem from thence, He will have vanquished, cheerful, death and fear, And ever after dread their force no more Than if they were but babes or captive slaves.
AUDLEY	O cruel father! Farewell Edward, then.
EARL OF DERBY	Farewell, sweet Prince, the hope of chivalry.
COMTE D’ARTOIS	O, would my life might ransom him from death!
(didascalia)	Trumpets sound retreat within
KING EDWARD	But soft—methinks I hear The dismal charge of trumpets’ loud retreat. All are not slain, I hope, that went with him. Some will return with tidings, good or bad.
(didascalia)	Enter Edward Prince of Wales in triumph, bearing in his hand his shivered lance. The body of the King of Bohemia is borne before, wrapped in the colours of Bohemia. The English run and embrace the Prince
AUDLEY	O, joyful sight! Victorious Edward lives!
EARL OF DERBY	Welcome, brave Prince.
KINC EDWARD	Welcome, Plantagenet. The Prince kneels and kisses his father’s hand
PRINCE OF WALES	First, having done my duty as beseemed, Lords, I regreet you all with hearty thanks. And now behold after my winter’s toil My painful voyage on the boist’rous sea Of war’s devouring gulfs and steely rocks I bring my freight unto the wished port, My summer’s hope, my travail’s sweet reward. (Pointing at Bohemia’s body) And here, with humble duty, I present This sacrifice, this first fruit of my sword, Cropped and cut down even at the gate of death: The King of Bohême, father, whom I slew, Whose thousands had entrenched me round about, And lay as thick upon my battered crest As on an anvil with their ponderous glaives. Yet marble courage still did underprop, And when my weary arms with often blows, Like the continual labouring woodman’s axe That is enjoined to fell a load of oaks, Began to falter, straight I would recover My gifts you gave me and my zealous vow, And then new courage made me fresh again That, in despite, I carved my passage forth, And put the multitude to speedy flight. Lo, thus hath Edward’s hand filled your request And done, I hope, the duty of a knight. His sword borne forth by a soldier
KING EDWARD	Ay, well thou hast deserved a knighthood, Ned, He takes the sword And therefore, with thy sword yet reeking warm With blood of those that fought to be thy bane, He knights the Prince Arise Prince Edward, trusty knight-at-arms. This day thou hast confounded me with joy And proved thyself fit heir unto a king.
PRINCE OF WALES	(rising, and then giving the King a paper) Here is a note, my gracious lord, of those That in this conflict of our foes were slain: Eleven princes of esteem, fourscore barons, A hundred and twenty knights, and thirty thousand Common soldiers—and of our men, a thousand.
KING EDWARD	Our God be praised! Now, Jean of France, I hope Thou know’st King Edward for no wantonness, No love-sick cockney, nor his soldiers jades. But which way is the fearful King escaped?
PRINCE OF WALES	Towards Poitiers, noble father, and his sons.
KING EDWARD	Ned, thou and Audley shall pursue them still. Myself and Derby will to Calais straight, And there begirt that haven town with siege. Now lies it on an upshot: therefore, strike, And wistly follow whiles the game’s on foot. Exeunt

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Enter the Comte de Montfort with a coronet in his hand and with him the Earl of Salisbury
COMTE DE MONTFORT	My lord of Salisbury, since by your aid Mine enemy Sir Charles of Blois is slain, And I again am quietly possessed In Bretagne’s dukedom, know that I resolve, For this kind furtherance of your king and you, To swear allegiance to his majesty— He offers Salisbury the coronet In sign whereof receive this coronet. Bear it unto him, and withal mine oath Never to be but Edward’s faithful friend.
EARL OF SALISBURY	(taking the coronet) I take it, Montfort. Thus I hope ere long The whole dominions of the realm of France Will be surrendered to his conquering hand.
(didascalia)	Exit Montfort
EARL OF SALISBURY	Now, if I knew but safely how to pass, I would at Calais gladly meet his grace, Whither I am by letters certified That he intends to have his host removed. It shall be so. This policy will serve. (Calling) Ho, who’s within? Bring Villiers to me.
(didascalia)	Enter Villiers
EARL OF SALISBURY	Villiers, thou know’st thou art my prisoner, And that I might for ransom, if I would, Require of thee a hundred thousand francs, Or else retain and keep thee captive still. But so it is that for a smaller charge Thou mayst be quit, an if thou wilt thyself. And this it is: procure me but a passport Of Charles, the Duke of Normandy, that I Without restraint may have recourse to Calais Through all the countries where he hath to do— Which thou mayst easily obtain, I think, By reason I have often heard thee say He and thou were students once together— And then thou shalt be set at liberty. How sayst thou? Wilt thou undertake to do it?
VILLIERS	I will, my lord. But I must speak with him.
EARL OF SALISBURY	Why, so thou shalt! Take horse and post from hence— Only before thou go’st, swear by thy faith That if thou canst not compass my desire, Thou wilt return my prisoner back again, And that shall be sufficient warrant for me.
VILLIERS	To that condition I agree, my lord, And will unfeignedly perform the same.
(didascalia)	Exit
EARL	or SALISBURY Farewell, Villiers! Thus once I mean to try a Frenchman’s faith.
(didascalia)	Exit

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Enter King Edward and the Earl of Derby with soldiers
KING EDWARD	Since they refuse our proffered league, my lord, And will not ope their gates and let us in, We will entrench ourselves on every side, That neither victuals nor supply of men May come to succour this accursed town. Famine shall combat where our swords are stopped.
(didascalia)	Enter six poor Frenchmen
EARL OF DERBY	The promised aid that made them stand aloof Is now retired and gone another way. It will repent them of their stubborn will. But what are these poor, ragged slaves, my lord?
KING EDWARD	Ask what they are. It seems they come from Calais.
EARL OF DERBY	(to the poor Frenchmen) You wretched patterns of despair and woe— What are you? Living men, or gliding ghosts Crept from your graves to walk upon the earth?
POOR MAN	No ghosts, my lord, but men that breathe a life Far worse than is the quiet sleep of death. We are distressed poor inhabitants That long have been diseased, sick and lame. And now, because we are not fit to serve, The Captain of the town hath thrust us forth That so expense of victuals may be saved.
KING EDWARD	A charitable deed, no doubt, and worthy praise! But how do you imagine, then, to speed? We are your enemies: in such a case We can no less but put ye to the sword, Since, when we proffered truce, it was refused.
POOR MAN	An if your grace no otherwise vouchsafe, As welcome death is unto us as life.
KING EDWARD	Poor seely men, much wronged, and more distressed! Go, Derby, go, and see they be relieved. Command that victuals be appointed them, And give to every one five crowns apiece.
(didascalia)	Exeunt the Earl of Derby and the six poor Frenchmen
KING EDWARD	The lion scorns to touch the yielding prey, And Edward’s sword must fresh itself in such As wilful stubbornness hath made perverse.
(didascalia)	Enter Lord Percy
KING EDWARD	Lord Percy, welcome. What’s the news in England?
PERCY	The Queen, my lord, commends her to your grace, And from her highness and the lord vicegerent I bring this happy tidings of success: David of Scotland, lately up in arms, Thinking belike he soonest should prevail— Your highness being absent from the realm— Is by the fruitful service of your peers And painful travail of the Queen herself— That, big with child, was every day in arms— Vanquished, subdued and taken prisoner.
KING EDWARD	Thanks, Percy, for thy news, with all my heart! What was he took him prisoner in the field?
PERCY	A squire, my lord. John Copland is his name, Who, since entreated by her majesty, Denies to make surrender of his prize To any but unto your grace alone— Whereat the Queen is grievously displeased.
KING EDWARD	Well then, we’ll have a pursuivant dispatched To summon Copland hither out of hand, And with him he shall bring his prisoner-king.
PERCY	The Queen, my lord, herself by this at sea, And purposeth, as soon as wind will serve, To land at Calais, and to visit you.
KING EDWARD	She shall be welcome, and to wait her coming I’ll pitch my tent near to the sandy shore.
(didascalia)	Enter a Captain of Calais
CAPTAIN OF CALAIS	The burgesses of Calais, mighty king, Have, by a council, willingly decreed To yield the town and castle to your hands Upon condition it will please your grace To grant them benefit of life and goods.
KING EDWARD	They will so? Then, belike, they may command, Dispose, elect and govern as they list! No, sirrah. Tell them, since they did refuse Our princely clemency at first proclaimed, They shall not have it now, although they would. I will accept of naught but fire and sword— Except within these two days, six of them, That are the wealthiest merchants in the town, Come naked all but for their linen shirts, With each a halter hanged about his neck, And, prostrate, yield themselves upon their knees To be afflicted, hanged or what I please. And so you may inform their masterships.
(didascalia)	Exeunt all but the Captain
CAPTAIN OF CALAIS	Why, this it is to trust a broken staff. Had we not been persuaded Jean, our king, Would, with his army, have relieved the town, We had not stood upon defiance so. But now ’tis past that no man can recall, 84 And better some do go to wreck than all.
(didascalia)	Exit

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Enter the Dauphin and Villiers with a paper
DAUPHIN	I wonder, Villiers, thou shouldst importune me For one that is our deadly enemy.
VILLIERS	Not for his sake, my gracious lord, so much Am I become an earnest advocate As that, thereby, my ransom will be quit.
DAUPHIN	Thy ransom, man? Why need’st thou talk of that? Art thou not free? And are not all occasions That happen for advantage of our foes To be accepted of and stood upon?
VILLIERS	No, good my lord, except the same be just. For profit must with honour be commixed, Or else our actions are but scandalous. But, letting pass these intricate objections, Will’t please your highness to subscribe or no?
DAUPHIN	Villiers, I will not nor I cannot do it. Salisbury shall not have his will so much To claim a passport how it pleaseth him.
VILLIERS	Why then, I know the extremity, my lord. I must return to prison, whence I came.
DAUPHIN	Return? I hope thou wilt not! What bird that hath escaped the fowler’s gin Will not beware how she’s ensnared again? Or what is he so senseless and secure That, having hardly passed a dangerous gulf, Will put himself in peril there again?
VILLIERS	Ah, but it is mine oath, my gracious lord, Which I in conscience may not violate— Or else a kingdom should not draw me hence.
DAUPHIN	Thine oath? Why, that doth bind thee to abide. Hast thou not sworn obedience to thy Prince?
VILLIERS	In all things that uprightly he commands. But either to persuade or threaten me Not to perform the covenant of my word Is lawless, and I need not to obey.
DAUPHIN	Why, is it lawful for a man to kill, And not to break a promise with his foe?
VILLIERS	To kill, my lord, when war is once proclaimed, So that our quarrel be for wrongs received, No doubt is lawfully permitted us. But in an oath, we must be well advised How we do swear, and when we once have sworn, Not to infringe it, though we die therefor. Therefore, my lord, as willing I return As if I were to fly to paradise. He begins to leave
DAUPHIN	Stay, my Villiers. Thine honourable mind Deserves to be eternally admired. Thy suit shall be no longer thus deferred. Give me the paper. I’ll subscribe to it. Villiers gives him the paper, which the Dauphin signs And wheretofore I loved thee as Villiers, Hereafter I’ll embrace thee as myself. Stay, and be still in favour with thy lord.
VILLIERS	(receiving back the paper) I humbly thank your grace. I must dispatch And send this passport first unto the Earl, And then I will attend your highness’ pleasure.
DAUPHIN	Do so, Villiers. And Charles, when he hath need, Be such his soldiers, howsoever he speed.
(didascalia)	Exit Villiers
(didascalia)	Enter ean King of France
KING OF FRANCE	Come, Charles, and arm thee. Edward is entrapped. The Prince of Wales is fall’n into our hands, And we have compassed him. He cannot scape.
DAUPHIN	But will your highness fight today?
KING OF FRANCE	What else, my son? He’s scarce eight thousand strong, And we are threescore thousand at the least.
DAUPHIN	I have a prophecy, my gracious lord, Wherein is written what success is like To happen us in this outrageous war. It was delivered me at Crécy’s field By one that is an aged hermit there: ‘When feathered fowl shall make thine army tremble, And flintstones rise and break the battle ’ray, Then think on him that doth not now dissemble, For that shall be the hapless dreadful day, Yet in the end thy foot thou shalt advance As far in England as thy foe in France.’
KING OF FRANCE	By this it seems we shall be fortunate. For, as it is impossible that stones Should ever rise and break the battle ’ray, Or airy fowl make men in arms to quake, So is it like we shall not be subdued. Or, say this might be true: yet in the end, Since he doth promise we shall drive him hence And scourge their country as they have done ours, By this revenge that loss will seem the less. But all are frivolous fancies, toys and dreams. Once we are sure we have ensnared the son, Catch we the father after how we can.
(didascalia)	Exeunt

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Enter Edward Prince of Wales, Lord Audley and others
PRINCE OF WALES	Audley, the arms of death embrace us round And comfort have we none, save that to die We pay sour earnest for a sweeter life. At Crécy field our clouds of warlike smoke Choked up those French mouths and dissevered them, But now their multitudes of millions hide, Masking, as ’twere, the beauteous burning sun, Leaving no hope to us but sullen dark And eyeless terror of all-ending night.
AUDLEY	This sudden, mighty and expedient head That they have made, fair Prince, is wonderful. Before us, in the valley, lies the King, Vantaged with all that heaven and earth can yield, His party stronger battled than our whole. His son, the braving Duke of Normandy, Hath trimmed the mountain on our right hand up In shining plate, that now the aspiring hill Shows like a silver quarry, or an orb, Aloft the which the banners, bannerets And new-replenished pennants cuff the air And beat the winds that, for their gaudiness, Struggles to kiss them. On our left hand lies Philippe, the younger issue of the King, Coating the other hill in such array That all his gilded upright pikes do seem Straight trees of gold; the pendant ensigns, leaves, And their device of antique heraldry, Quartered in colours seeming sundry fruits, Makes it the orchard of the Hesperides. Behind us too the hill doth rear his height, For, like a half-moon opening but one way, It rounds us in. There, at our backs, are lodged The fatal crossbows, and the battle there Is governed by the rough Châtillion. Then thus it stands: the valley for our flight The King binds in, the hills on either hand Are proudly royalizèd by his sons, And on the hill behind stands certain death In pay and service with Châtillion.
PRINCE OF WALES	Death’s name is much more mighty than his deeds. Thy parcelling this power hath made it more Than all the world! Call it but a power. As many sands as these, my hands, can hold Are but my handful of so many sands, Eas‘ly ta’en up and quickly thrown away. But if I stand to count them, sand by sand, The number would confound my memory, And make a thousand millions of a task Which, briefly, is no more in deed than one. These quarters, squadrons and these regiments Before, behind us, and on either hand, Are but a power. When we name a man, His hand, his foot, his head hath several strengths, And, being all but one self-instanced strength, Why, all this many, Audley, is but one, And we can call it all but one man’s strength. He that hath far to go tells it by miles; If he should tell the steps it kills his heart. The drops are infinite that make a flood, And yet, thou know’st, we call it but a rain. There is but one France, and one king of France: That France hath no more kings, and that same king Hath but the puissant legion of one king. And we have one. Then apprehend no odds, For one to one is fair equality.
(didascalia)	Enter
PRINCE OF WALES	a Herald from Jean King of France What tidings, messenger? Be plain and brief.
HERALD	The King of France, my sovereign lord and master, Greets by me his foe, the Prince of Wales. If thou call forth a hundred men of name— Of lords, knights, squires and English gentlemen— And with thyself and those, kneel at his feet, He straight will fold his bloody colours up And ransom shall redeem lives forfeited. If not, this day shall drink more English blood Than e’er was buried in our British earth. What is thy answer to his proffered mercy?
PRINCE OF WALES	This heaven that covers France contains the mercy That draws from me submissive orisons. That such base breath should vanish from my lips To urge the plea of mercy to a man, The Lord forbid. Return and tell thy King: My tongue is made of steel, and it shall beg My mercy on his coward burgonet. Tell him my colours are as red as his, My men as bold, our English arms as strong. Return him my defiance in his face.
HERALD	I go.
(didascalia)	Exit
(didascalia)	Enter a Herald from the Dauphin (Prince Charles of Normandy)
PRINCE OF WALES	What news with thee?
SECOND HERALD	The Duke of Normandy, my lord and master, Pitying thy youth is so engirt with peril, By me hath sent a nimble-jointed jennet, As swift as ever yet thou didst bestride, And therewithal he counsels thee to fly, Else death himself hath sworn that thou shalt die.
PRINCE OF WALES	Back with the beast unto the beast that sent him! Tell him I cannot sit a coward’s horse. Bid him today bestride the jade himself, For I will stain my horse quite o‘er with blood And double-gild my spurs, but I will catch him. So tell the cap’ring boy, and get thee gone.
SECOND HERALD	I go.
(didascalia)	Exit
(didascalia)	Enter a Herald from Prince Philippe, carrying a book
THIRD HERALD	Edward of Wales, Philippe, the second son To the most mighty Christian King of France, Seeing thy body’s living date expired, All full of charity and Christian love He offers the book to the Prince Commends this book full fairly fraught with prayers To thy fair hand, and for thy hour of life Entreats thee that thou meditate therein, And arm thy soul for her long journey towards. Thus have I done his bidding and return.
PRINCE OF WALES	Herald of Philippe, greet thy lord from me. All good that he can send I can receive. But think’st thou not the unadvised boy Hath wronged himself in thus far tendering me? Haply he cannot pray without the book; I think him no divine extemporal. Then render back this commonplace of prayer To do himself good in adversity. Besides, he knows not my sins’ quality, And therefore knows no prayers for my avail. Ere night his prayer may be to pray to God To put it in my heart to hear his prayer. So tell the courtly wanton, and be gone.
THIRD HERALD	I go. Exit
PRINCE OF WALES	How confident their strength and number makes them! Now, Audley, sound those silver wings of thine, And let those milk-white messengers of time Show thy time’s learning in this dangerous time. Thyself art bruised and bit with many broils, And stratagems fore-past with iron pens Are texted in thine honourable face. Thou art a married man in this distress, But danger woos me as a blushing maid. Teach me an answer to this perilous time.
AUDLEY	To die is all as common as to live. The one enchased the other holds in chase. For from the instant we begin to live, We do pursue and hunt the time to die. First bud we, then we blow, and after seed, Then presently we fall, and as a shade Follows the body, so we follow death. If then we hunt for death why do we fear it? If we fear it, why do we follow it? If we do follow it, how can we shun it? If we do fear, with fear we do but aid The thing we fear to seize on us the sooner. If we fear not, then no resolved proffer Can overthrow the limit of our fate. For whether ripe or rotten, drop we shall, As we do draw the lottery of our doom.
PRINCE OF WALES	Ah, good old man! A thousand thousand armours These words of thine have buckled on my back. Ah, what an idiot hast thou made of life To seek the thing it fears, and how disgraced Th‘imperial victory of murd’ring death, Since all the lives his conquering arrows strike Seek him, and he not them, to shame his glory. I will not give a penny for a life, Nor half a halfpenny to shun grim death, Since for to live is but to seek to die, And dying but beginning of new life. Let come the hour when he that rules it will. To live or die I hold indifferent still.
(didascalia)	Exeunt

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Enter Jean King of France and the Dauphin
KING OF FRANCE	A sudden darkness hath defaced the sky, The winds are crept into their caves for fear, The leaves move not, the world is hushed and still, The birds cease singing and the wand’ring brooks Murmur no wonted greeting to their shores. Silence attends some wonder and expecteth That heaven should pronounce some prophecy. Where or from whom proceeds this silence, Charles?
DAUPHIN	Our men with open mouths and staring eyes Look on each other as they did attend Each other’s words, and yet no creature speaks. A tongue-tied fear hath made a midnight hour, And speeches sleep through all the waking regions.
KING OF FRANCE	But now the pompous sun in all his pride Looked through his golden coach upon the world, And, on a sudden, hath he hid himself, That now the under earth is as a grave, Dark, deadly, silent and uncomfortable. A clamour of ravens Hark, what a deadly outcry do I hear!
(didascalia)	Enter Prince Philippe
DAUPHIN	Here comes my brother Philippe—
KING OF FRANCE	All dismayed. (To Philippe) What fearful words are those thy looks presage?
PRINCE PHILIPPE	A flight, a flight—
KING OF FRANCE	Coward, what flight? Thou liest. There needs no flight.
PRINCE PHILIPPE	A flight—
KING OF FRANCE	Awake thy craven powers, and tell on The substance of that very fear in deed Which is so ghastly printed in thy face. What is the matter?
PRINCE PHILIPPE	A flight of ugly ravens Do croak and hover o’er our soldiers’ heads, And keep in triangles and cornered squares, Right as our forces are embattelèd. With their approach there came this sudden fog Which now hath hid the airy floor of heaven, And made at noon a night unnatural Upon the quaking and dismayed world. In brief, our soldiers have let fall their arms, And stand like metamorphosed images, Bloodless and pale, one gazing on another.
(didascalia)	KING OF FRANCE aside
PRINCE PHILIPPE	Ay, now I call to mind the prophecy— But I must give no utterance to a fear. (To Philippe) Return, and hearten up these yielding souls! Tell them the ravens, seeing them in arms— So many fair against a famished few— Come but to dine upon their handiwork, And prey upon the carrion that they kill. For when we see a horse laid down to die— Although not dead—the ravenous birds Sit watching the departure of his life. Even so these ravens, for the carcasses Of those poor English that are marked to die, Hover about, and if they cry to us ’Tis but for meat that we must kill for them. Away, and comfort up my soldiers, And sound the trumpets and at once dispatch This little business of a silly fraud. Exit Prince Philippe Another noise. Enter the Earl of Salisbury brought in by a French Captain
FRENCH CAPTAIN	Behold, my liege, this knight and forty more, Of whom the better part are slain and fled, With all endeavour sought to break our ranks And make their way to the encompassed Prince. Dispose of him as please your majesty.
KING OF FRANCE	Go, and the next bough, soldier, that thou seest, Disgrace it with his body presently, Fore I do hold a tree in France too good To be the gallows of an English thief.
EARL OF SALISBURY	(to the Dauphin) My lord of Normandy, I have your pass And warrant for my safety through this land.
DAUPHIN	Villiers procured it for thee, did he not?
EARL OF SALISBURY	He did.
DAUPHIN	And it is current. Thou shalt freely pass.
KING OF FRANCE	Ay, freely to the gallows to be hanged Without denial or impediment! Away with him.
DAUPHIN	I hope your highness will not so disgrace me, And dash the virtue of my seal at arms. He hath my never-broken name to show, Charàctered with this princely hand of mine. And rather let me leave to be a prince Than break the stable verdict of a prince. I do beseech you, let him pass in quiet.
KING OF FRANCE	Thou and thy word lie both in my command. What canst thou promise that I cannot break? Which of these twain is greater infamy— To disobey thy father or thyself? Thy word, nor no man’s, may exceed his power, Nor that same man doth never break his word That keeps it to the utmost of his power. The breach of faith dwells in the soul’s consent, Which, if thyself without consent do break, Thou art not charged with the breach of faith. Go, hang him; for thy licence lies in me, And my constraint stands the excuse for thee.
DAUPHIN	What, am I not a soldier in my word? Then arms, adieu, and let them fight that list. Shall I not give my girdle from my waist But with a guardian I shall be controlled To say I may not give my things away? Upon my soul, had Edward Prince of Wales Engaged his word, writ down his noble hand, For all your knights to pass his father’s land, The royal King, to grace his warlike son, Would not alone safe conduct give to them, But with all bounty feasted them and theirs.
KING OF FRANCE	Dwell’st thou on precedents? Then be it so. (To Salisbury) Say, Englishman, of what degree thou art.
EARL OF SALISBURY	An earl in England, though a prisoner here. And those that know me, call me Salisbury.
KING OF FRANCE	Then, Salisbury, say whither thou art bound.
EARL OF SALISBURY	To Calais, where my liege, King Edward, is.
KING OF FRANCE	To Calais, Salisbury? Then to Calais pack, And bid thy King prepare a noble grave To put his princely son, black Edward, in. And as thou travell’st westward from this place, Some two leagues hence there is a lofty hill, Whose top seems topless, for the embracing sky Doth hide his high head in her azure bosom, Upon whose tall top, when thy foot attains, Look back upon the humble vale beneath— Humble of late, but now made proud with arms— And thence behold the wretched Prince of Wales Hooped with a band of iron round about. After which sight, to Calais spur amain, And say the Prince was smothered and not slain. And tell thy King, this is not all his ill, For I will greet him ere he thinks I will. Away, be gone. The smoke but of our shot Will choke our foes, though bullets hit them not.
(didascalia)	Exeunt

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Alarum. Enter Edward Prince of Wales and the Comte d’Artois
COMTE D’ARTOIS	How fares your grace? Are you not shot, my lord?
PRINCE OF WALES	No, dear Artois, but choked with dust and smoke, And stepped aside for breath and fresher air.
COMTE D’ARTOIS	Breathe then, and to it again!The amazed French Are quite distract with gazing on the crows, And, were our quivers full of shafts again, Your grace should see a glorious day of this. O, for more arrows, Lord—that’s our one want!
PRINCE OF WALES	Courage, Artois! A fig for feathered shafts When feathered fowls do bandy on our side! What need we fight and sweat and keep a coil When railing crows outscold our adversaries? Up, up, Artois! The ground itself is armed With fire-containing flint. Command our bows To hurl away their parti-coloured yew, And to it with stones! Away, Artois, away! My soul doth prophesy we win the day.
(didascalia)	Exeunt

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Alarum. Enter Jean King of France
KING OF FRANCE	Our multitudes are in themselves confounded, Dismayed and distraught. Swift-starting fear Hath buzzed a cold dismay through all our army, And every petty disadvantage prompts The fear-possessed abject soul to fly. Myself, whose spirit is steel to their dull lead, What with recalling of the prophecy, And that our native stones from English arms Rebel against us, find myself attainted With strong surprise of weak and yielding fear.
(didascalia)	Enter the Dauphin
DAUPHIN	Fly, father, fly! The French do kill the French: Some that would stand let drive at some that fly; Our drums strike nothing but discouragement; Our trumpets sound dishonour and retire; The spirit of fear, that feareth naught but death, Cowardly works confusion on itself.
(didascalia)	Enter Prince Philippe
PRINCE PHILIPPE	Pluck out your eyes and see not this day’s shame! An arm hath beat an army. One poor David Hath, with a stone, foiled twenty stout Goliaths. Some twenty naked starvelings with small flints Hath driven back a puissant host of men Arrayed and fenced in all accomplements.
KING OF FRANCE	Mort dieu! They quoit at us and kill us up! No less than forty thousand wicked elders Have forty lean slaves this day stoned to death.
DAUPHIN	O, that I were some other countryman! This day hath set derision on the French, And all the world will blurt and scorn at us.
KING OF FRANCE	What, is there no hope left?
PRINCE PHILIPPE	No hope but death, to bury up our shame.
KING OF FRANCE	Make up once more with me: the twenti’th part Of those that live are men enough to quail The feeble handful on the adverse part.
DAUPHIN	Then charge again! If heaven be not opposed We cannot lose the day.
KING	or FRANCE On, on, away!
(didascalia)	Exeunt

Speaker	Line
SQUIRE	How fares my lord?
AUDLEY	Even as a man may do That dines at such a bloody feast as this.
SQUIRE	I hope, my lord, that is no mortal scar.
AUDLEY	No matter if it be. The count is cast, And, in the worst, ends but a mortal man. Good friends, convey me to the princely Edward, That, in the crimson bravery of my blood, I may become him with saluting him. I’ll smile and tell him that this open scar Doth end the harvest of his Audley’s war. Exeunt

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Enter Edward Prince of Wales with his prisoners: jean King of France and the Dauphin, and all with ensigns spread. Retreat sounded
PRINCE OF WALES	(to the King and then the Dauphin) Now, Jean in France, and lately Jean of France, Thy bloody ensigns are my captive colours— And you, high-vaunting Charles of Normandy, That once today sent me a horse to fly, Are now the subjects of my clemency. 5 Fie, lords, is it not a shame that English boys, Whose early days are yet not worth a beard, Should in the bosom of your kingdom, thus, One against twenty, beat you up together?
KING OF FRANCE	Thy fortune, not thy force, hath conquered us.
PRINCE OF WALES	An argument that heaven aids the right.
(didascalia)	Enter the Comte d’Artois with Prince Philippe
PRINCE OF WALES	See, see—Artois doth bring with him along The late good counsel-giver to my soul. Welcome, Artois, and welcome Philippe too! Who now, of you or I, have need to pray? Now is the proverb verified in you— ‘Too bright a morning breeds a louring day’.
(didascalia)	Sound trumpets. Enter Lord Audley supported by the two Squires
PRINCE OF WALES	But say, what grim discouragement comes here? Alas, what thousand armèd men of France Have writ that note of death in Audley’s face? (To Audley) Speak thou, that woo‘st death with thy careless smile, And look’st so merrily upon thy grave As if thou wert enamoured on thine end. What hungry sword hath so bereaved thy face And lopped a true friend from my loving soul?
AUDLEY	O, Prince, thy sweet bemoaning speech to me Is as a mournful knell to one dead sick.
PRINCE OF WALES	(embracing him) Dear Audley, if my tongue ring out thy end My arms shall be thy grave. What may I do To win thy life or to revenge thy death? If thou wilt drink the blood of captive kings, Or that it were restorative, command A health of king’s blood, and I’ll drink to thee. If honour may dispense for thee with death, The never-dying honour of this day Share wholly, Audley, to thyself, and live.
AUDLEY	Victorious Prince—that thou art so, behold A Caesar’s fame in kings’ captivity— If I could hold dim death but at a bay Till I did see my liege, thy royal father, My soul should yield this castle of my flesh, This mangled tribute, with all willingness, To darkness, consummation, dust and worms.
PRINCE OF WALES	Cheerly, bold man. Thy soul is all too proud To yield her city for one little breach.
(didascalia)
PRINCE OF WALES	Should be divorced from her earthly spouse By the soft temper of a Frenchman’s sword. Lo, to repair thy life I give to thee Three thousand marks a year in English land.
AUDLEY	I take thy gift to pay the debts I owe. These two poor squires redeemed me from the French With lusty and dear hazard of their lives. What thou hast given me, I give to them, And as thou lov’st me, Prince, lay thy consent To this bequeath in my last testament.
PRINCE OF WALES	Renowned Audley, live, and have from me This gift twice doubled to these squires and thee. But live or die, what thou hast given away To these and theirs shall lasting freedom stay. (To the Squires) Come, gentlemen, I’ll see my friend bestowed
(didascalia)	Within an easy litter. Then we’ll march
PRINCE OF WALES	Proudly toward Calais with triumphant pace, Unto my royal father, and there bring The tribute of my wars: fair France his king.
(didascalia)	Exeunt

Speaker	Line
(didascalia)	Enter fat one door, as Supplicants, six citizens of Calais in their shirts, barefoot, with halters about their necks. Enter fat another door King Edward speaking with Queen Philippa. Enter with them the Earl of Derby and soldiers
KING EDWARD	No more, Queen Philip—pacify yourself. Copland, except he can excuse his fault, Shall find displeasure written in our looks. And now, unto this proud, resisting town. Soldiers, assault! I will no longer stay To be deluded by their false delays. Put all to sword, and make the spoil your own.
(didascalia)	ALL SIX SUPPLICANTS coming forward
KING EDWARD	Mercy, King Edward! Mercy, gracious lord!
KING EDWARD	Contemptuous villains, call ye now for truce? Mine ears are stopped against your bootless cries.
(didascalia)	Sound drums alarum, draw threat’ning swords!
FIRST SUPPLICANT	Ah, noble prince, take pity on this town, And hear us, mighty King. We claim the promise that your highness made— The two days’ respite is not yet expired, And we are come with willingness to bear What torturing death or punishment you please, So that the trembling multitude be saved.
KING EDWARD	My promise—well, I do confess as much. But I require the chiefest citizens And men of most account that should submit. You, peradventure, are but servile grooms, Or some felonious robbers on the sea, Whom, apprehended, law would execute, Albeit severity lay dead in us. No, no—ye cannot overreach us thus.
SECOND SUPPLICANT	The sun, dread lord, that in the western fall Beholds us now low-brought through misery, Did, in the orient purple of the morn, Salute our coming forth when we were known
(didascalia)
SECOND SUPPLICANT	Or may our portion be with damned fiends.
KING EDWARD	If it be so, then let our covenant stand. We take possession of the town in peace, But for yourselves, look you for no remorse. But, as imperial justice hath decreed, Your bodies shall be dragged about these walls, And, after, feel the stroke of quartering steel. This is your doom. (To the soldiers) Go, soldiers, see it done.
QUEEN PHILIPPA	A Ah, be more mild unto these yielding men! It is a glorious thing to stablish peace, And kings approach the nearest unto God By giving life and safety unto men. As thou intendest to be king of France, So let her people live to call thee king. For what the sword cuts down, or fire hath spoiled, Is held in reputation none of ours.
KING EDWARD	Although experience teach us this is true— That peaceful quietness brings most delight When most of all abuses are controlled— Yet, insomuch it shall be known that we As well can master our affections As conquer other by the dint of sword, Philip, prevail: we yield to thy request— These men shall live to boast of clemency, And, tyranny, strike terror to thyself.
SECOND SUPPLICANT	Long live your highness! Happy be your reign!
KING EDWARD	(to the six Supplicants) Go, get you hencel Return unto the town. And if this kindness hath deserved your love, Learn then to reverence Edward as your king.
(didascalia)	Exeunt the six Supplicants
KING EDWARD	Now might we hear of our affairs abroad, We would till gloomy winter were o’erspent Dispose our men in garrison a while.
(didascalia)	Enter Copland, with David King of Scotland as his prisoner
KING EDWARD	But who comes here?
EARL OF DERBY	Copland, my lord, and David King of Scots.
KING EDWARD	Is this the proud, presumptuous squire of the north That would not yield his prisoner to my Queen?
COPLAND	I am, my liege, a northern squire indeed, But neither proud nor insolent, I trust.
KING EDWARD	What moved thee, then, to be so obstinate To contradict our royal Queen’s desire?
COPLAND	No wilful disobedience, mighty lord, But my desert, and public law at arms. I took the King, myself, in single fight, And, like a soldier, would be loath to lose The least pre-eminence that I had won. And Copland, straight upon your highness’ charge, Is come to France, and with a lowly mind Doth vail the bonnet of his victory. Receive, dread lord, the custom of my freight, The wealthy tribute of my labouring hands, Which should long since have been surrendered up, Had but your gracious self been there in place.
QUEEN PHILIPPA	But, Copland, thou didst scorn the King’s command, Neglecting our commission in his name.
COPLAND	His name I reverence, but his person more. His name shall keep me in allegiance still, But to his person I will bend my knee.
KING EDWARD	(to the Queen) I pray thee, Philip, let displeasure pass. This man doth please me, and I like his words. For what is he that will attempt great deeds And lose the glory that ensues, the fame? All rivers have recourse unto the sea, And Copland’s faith, relation to his king. (To Copland) Kneel therefore down. He knights him Now rise, King Edward’s knight. And to maintain thy state, I freely give 96 Five hundred marks a year to thee and thine.
(didascalia)	Enter the Earl of Salisbury, with a coronet
KING EDWARD	Welcome, Lord Salisbury! What news from Bretagne?
EARL OF SALISBURY	This, mighty King: the country we have won, And Charles de Montfort, regent of that place, Presents your highness with this coronet, Protesting true allegiance to your grace.
KING EDWARD	We thank thee for thy service, valiant Earl. Challenge our favour, for we owe it thee.
EARL OF SALISBURY	But now, my lord, as this is joyful news, So must my voice be tragical again, And I must sing of doleful accidents.
KING EDWARD	What, have our men the overthrow at Poitiers, Or is our son beset with too much odds?
EARL OF SALISBURY	He was, my lord, and as my worthless self, With forty other serviceable knights, Under safe conduct of the Dauphin’s seal, Did travel that way, finding him distressed, A troop of lances met us on the way, Surprised and brought us prisoners to the King, Who, proud of this and eager of revenge, Commanded straight to cut off all our heads. And surely we had died but that the Duke, More full of honour than his angry sire, Procured our quick deliverance from thence. But ere we went, ‘Salute your King,’ quoth he, ‘Bid him provide a funeral for his son. Today our sword shall cut his thread of life And, sooner than he thinks, we’ll be with him To quittance those displeasures he hath done.’ This said, we passed, not daring to reply. Our hearts were dead, our looks diffused and wan. Wand‘ring, at last we climbed unto a hill From whence, although our grief were much before, Yet now to see the occasion with our eyes Did thrice so much increase our heaviness. For there, my lord, O there we did descry Down in a valley how both armies lay. The French had cast their trenches like a ring, And every barricado’s open front Was thick embossed with brazen ordinance. Here stood a battle of ten thousand horse, There twice as many pikes in quadrant wise, Here crossbows and there deadly wounding darts, And in the midst, like to a slender point
(didascalia)	Within the compass of the horizon,
EARL OF SALISBURY	As ’twere a rising bubble in the sea, A hazel wand amidst a wood of pines, Or as a bear fast-chained unto a stake, Stood famous Edward, still expecting when Those dogs of France would fasten on his flesh. Anon, the death-procuring knell begins. Off go the cannons that, with trembling noise, Did shake the very mountain where they stood. Then sound the trumpets’ clangour in the air. The battles join, and when we could no more Discern the difference ‘twixt the friend and foe, So intricate the dark confusion was, Away we turned our wat’ry eyes with sighs As black as powder fuming into smoke. And thus, I fear, unhappy have I told The most untimely tale of Edward’s fall.
QUEEN PHILIPPA	Ah, me! Is this my welcome into France? Is this the comfort that I looked to have When I should meet with my beloved son? Sweet Ned, I would thy mother, in the sea, Had been prevented of this mortal grief.
KING EDWARD	Content thee, Philip. ’Tis not tears will serve To call him back if he be taken hence. Comfort thyself as I do, gentle Queen, With hope of sharp, unheard-of, dire revenge! He bids me to provide his funeral! And so I will, but all the peers in France Shall mourners be, and weep out bloody tears Until their empty veins be dry and sere. The pillars of his hearse shall be their bones; The mould that covers him, their city ashes; His knell, the groaning cries of dying men; And, in the stead of tapers on his tomb, An hundred-fifty towers shall burning blaze While we bewail our valiant son’s decease!
(didascalia)	Flourish within. Enter a Herald
HERALD	Rejoice, my lord! Ascend the imperial throne! The mighty and redoubted Prince of Wales, Great servitor to bloody Mars in arms, The Frenchman’s terror and his country’s fame, Triumphant rideth like a Roman peer, And, lowly, at his stirrup, comes afoot King Jean of France together with his son In captive bonds, whose diadem he brings To crown thee with, and to proclaim thee king.
KING EDWARD	Away with mourning, Philip! Wipe thine eyes!
(didascalia)	Sound trumpets! Welcome in Plantagenet!
(didascalia)	Enter Edward Prince of Wales with Jean King of France and Prince Philippe as his prisoners. Also enter Lord Audley in a litter borne by the two Squires and the Comte d’Artois
KING EDWARD	As things long lost when they are found again, So doth my son rejoice his father’s heart, For whom, even now, my soul was much perplexed.
QUEEN PHILIPPA	Be this a token to express my joy— She kisses the Prince of Wales For inward passions will not let me speak.
PRINCE OF WALES	(to King Edward) My gracious father, here receive thy gift, This wreath of conquest and reward of war, Got with as mickle peril of our lives As e’er was thing of price before this day. Install your highness in your proper right, And herewithal I render to your hands These prisoners, chief occasion of our strife.
KING EDWARD	(to the King of France) So, Jean of France, I see you keep your word! You promised to be sooner with ourself Than we did think for, and ’tis so indeed. But had you done at first as now you do, How many civil towns had stood untouched That now are turned to ragged heaps of stones? How many people’s lives mightst thou have saved That are untimely sunk into their graves?
KING OF FRANCE	Edward, recount not things irrevocable. Tell me what ransom thou requir’st to have.
KING EDWARD	Thy ransom, Jean, hereafter shall be known. But first to England thou must cross the seas To see what entertainment it affords. Howe’er it falls, it cannot be so bad As ours hath been since we arrived in France.
KING OF FRANCE	Accursed man! Of this I was foretold, But did misconstrue what the prophet told.
PRINCE OF WALES	(to King Edward) Now, father, this petition Edward makes To thee, whose grace hath been his strongest shield: That as thy pleasure chose me for the man To be the instrument to show thy power, So thou wilt grant that many princes more, Bred and brought up within that little isle, May still be famous for like victories. And for my part, the bloody scars I bear, The weary nights that I have watched in field, 5 The dangerous conflicts I have often had, The fearful menaces were proffered me, The heat and cold, and what else might displease, I wish were now redoubled twentyfold, So that hereafter ages, when they read The painful traffic of my tender youth, Might thereby be inflamed with such resolve As not the territories of France alone, But likewise Spain, Turkey and what countries else That justly would provoke fair England’s ire, Might at thy presence tremble and retire.
KING EDWARD	Here, English lords, we do proclaim a rest, An intercession of our painful arms. Sheathe up your swords, refresh your weary limbs, Peruse your spoils, and after we have breathed A day or two within this haven town, God willing, then for England we’ll be shipped, Where in a happy hour I trust we shall Arrive: three kings, two princes, and a queen.
(didascalia)	Exeunt
ADDITIONAL PASSAGE	In Q, the following lines, which are probably a misplaced addition, occur at the end of 8.108, between ‘foot’ and ‘Exeunt’, and fall between what may have been stints by two different authors. They may have been intended to go after either 8.93 or 8.98.
KING EDWARD	What picture’s this?
PRINCE OF WALES	A pelican, my lord, Wounding her bosom with her crooked beak That so her nest of young ones might be fed With drops of blood that issue from her heart. The motto, ‘Sic et vos’—‘and so should you’.
ON	the night of 28 December 1594, the Christmas revels at Gray’s Inn—one of London’s law schools—became so uproarious that one performance planned for the occasion had to be abandoned. Eventually ‘it was thought good not to offer anything of account saving dancing and revelling with gentlewomen; and after such sports a comedy of errors (like to Plautus his Menaechmus) was played by the players. So that night was begun, and continued to the end, in nothing but confusion and errors; whereupon it was ever afterwards called “The Night of Errors”.’ This sounds like a reference to Shakespeare’s play, first printed in the 1623 Folio, which is certainly based in large part on the Roman dramatist Plautus’ comedy Menaechmi. As Shakespeare’s shortest play, it would have been especially suited to late-night performance. Exceptional in having no cues for music, it may have been written for the occasion, or at least have been new in 1594. The comedy in Menaechmi derives from the embarrassment experienced by a man in search of his long-lost twin brother when various people intimately acquainted with that twin—including his wife, his mistress, and his father—mistake the one for the other. Shakespeare greatly increases the possibilities of comic confusion by giving the brothers (both called Antipholus) servants (both called Dromio) who themselves are long-separated twins. An added episode in which Antipholus of Ephesus’ wife, Adriana, bars him from his own house in which she is entertaining his brother is based on another play by Plautus, Amphitruo. Shakespeare sets the comic action within a more serious framework, opening with a scene in which the twin masters’ old father, Egeon, who has arrived at Ephesus in search of them, is shown under imminent sentence of death unless he finds someone to redeem him. This strand of the plot, as well as the surprising revelation that brings about the resolution of the action, is based on the story of Apollonius of Tyre which Shakespeare was to use again, many years later, in Pericles. The Comedy of Errors is a kind of diploma piece, as if Shakespeare were displaying his ability to outshine both his classical progenitors and their English imitators. Along with The Tempest, it is his most classically constructed play: all the action takes place within a few hours and in a single place. Moreover, it seems to make use of the conventionalized arcade setting of academic drama, with three ‘houses’—the Phoenix, the Porcupine, and the Priory—represented by doors and signs on stage. The working out of the complexities inherent in the basic situation represents a considerable intellectual feat. But the comedy is humanized by the interweaving of romantic elements, such as Egeon’s initial plight, the love between the visiting Antipholus and his twin brother’s wife’s sister, Luciana, and the entirely serious portrayal of Egeon’s suffering when his own son fails to recognize him at the moment of his greatest need. From time to time the comic tension is relaxed by the presence of discursive set pieces, none more memorable than Dromio of Syracuse’s description of Nell, the kitchen wench who is ‘spherical, like a globe’.
THE PERSONS OF THE	PLAY Solinus, DUKE of Ephesus EGEON, a merchant of Syracuse, father of the Antipholus twins ADRIANA, wife of Antipholus of Ephesus LUCIANA, her sister NELL, Adriana’s kitchen-maid ANGELO, a goldsmith BALTHASAR, a merchant A COURTESAN Doctor PINCH, a schoolmaster and exorcist
MERCHANT OF	EPHESUS, a friend of Antipholus of Syracuse
SECOND	MERCHANT, Angelo’s creditor EMILIA, an abbess at Ephesus Jailer, messenger, headsman, officers, and other attendants