Enter at one door, King Henry, Exeter, Bedford,
Warwick, ⌜Westmoreland,⌝ and other Lords. At another,
Queen Isabel ⌜of France,⌝ the King ⌜of France, the
Princess Katherine and Alice,⌝ the Duke of Burgundy,
and other French.KING HENRY Peace to this meeting wherefor we are met. Unto our brother France and to our sister, Health and fair time of day.—Joy and good wishes To our most fair and princely cousin Katherine.—5 And, as a branch and member of this royalty, By whom this great assembly is contrived, We do salute you, Duke of Burgundy.— And princes French, and peers, health to you all.
KING OF FRANCE Right joyous are we to behold your face,10 Most worthy brother England. Fairly met.— So are you, princes English, every one.QUEEN OF FRANCE So happy be the issue, brother Ireland, Of this good day and of this gracious meeting, As we are now glad to behold your eyes—15 Your eyes which hitherto have borne in them Against the French that met them in their bent The fatal balls of murdering basilisks. The venom of such looks, we fairly hope, Have lost their quality, and that this day20 Shall change all griefs and quarrels into love.KING HENRY To cry “Amen” to that, thus we appear.QUEEN OF FRANCE You English princes all, I do salute you.BURGUNDY My duty to you both, on equal love, Great kings of France and England. That I have25 labored With all my wits, my pains, and strong endeavors To bring your most imperial Majesties Unto this bar and royal interview, Your Mightiness on both parts best can witness.30 Since, then, my office hath so far prevailed That face to face and royal eye to eye You have congreeted, let it not disgrace me If I demand before this royal view What rub or what impediment there is35 Why that the naked, poor, and mangled peace, Dear nurse of arts, plenties, and joyful births, Should not in this best garden of the world, Our fertile France, put up her lovely visage? Alas, she hath from France too long been chased,
40 And all her husbandry doth lie on heaps, Corrupting in its own fertility. Her vine, the merry cheerer of the heart, Unprunèd, dies. Her hedges, even-pleached, Like prisoners wildly overgrown with hair,45 Put forth disordered twigs. Her fallow leas The darnel, hemlock, and rank fumitory Doth root upon, while that the coulter rusts That should deracinate such savagery. The even mead, that erst brought sweetly forth50 The freckled cowslip, burnet, and green clover, Wanting the scythe, withal uncorrected, rank, Conceives by idleness, and nothing teems But hateful docks, rough thistles, kecksies, burrs, Losing both beauty and utility.55 And all our vineyards, fallows, meads, and hedges, Defective in their natures, grow to wildness. Even so our houses and ourselves and children Have lost, or do not learn for want of time, The sciences that should become our country,60 But grow like savages, as soldiers will That nothing do but meditate on blood, To swearing and stern looks, diffused attire, And everything that seems unnatural. Which to reduce into our former favor65 You are assembled, and my speech entreats That I may know the let why gentle peace Should not expel these inconveniences And bless us with her former qualities.KING HENRY If, Duke of Burgundy, you would the peace,70 Whose want gives growth to th’ imperfections Which you have cited, you must buy that peace With full accord to all our just demands, Whose tenors and particular effects You have, enscheduled briefly, in your hands.
BURGUNDY 75 The King hath heard them, to the which as yet There is no answer made.KING HENRY Well then, the peace which you before so urged Lies in his answer.KING OF FRANCE I have but with a ⌜cursitory⌝ eye80 O’erglanced the articles. Pleaseth your Grace To appoint some of your council presently To sit with us once more with better heed To resurvey them, we will suddenly Pass our accept and peremptory answer.KING HENRY 85 Brother, we shall.—Go, uncle Exeter, And brother Clarence, and you, brother Gloucester, Warwick, and Huntington, go with the King, And take with you free power to ratify, Augment, or alter, as your wisdoms best90 Shall see advantageable for our dignity, Anything in or out of our demands, And we’ll consign thereto.—Will you, fair sister, Go with the princes or stay here with us?QUEEN OF FRANCE Our gracious brother, I will go with them.95 Haply a woman’s voice may do some good When articles too nicely urged be stood on.KING HENRY Yet leave our cousin Katherine here with us. She is our capital demand, comprised Within the forerank of our articles.QUEEN OF FRANCE 100 She hath good leave.All but Katherine, and the King ⌜of England,
and Alice⌝ exit.KING HENRY Fair Katherine, and most fair,
Will you vouchsafe to teach a soldier terms Such as will enter at a lady’s ear And plead his love-suit to her gentle heart?KATHERINE 105Your Majesty shall mock at me. I cannot speak your England.KING HENRY O fair Katherine, if you will love me soundly with your French heart, I will be glad to hear you confess it brokenly with your English110 tongue. Do you like me, Kate?KATHERINE Pardonnez-moi, I cannot tell wat is “like me.”KING HENRY An angel is like you, Kate, and you are like an angel.KATHERINE, ⌜to Alice⌝ 115Que dit-il? Que je suis semblable à
les anges?ALICE Oui, vraiment, sauf votre Grâce, ainsi dit-il.KING HENRY I said so, dear Katherine, and I must not blush to affirm it.KATHERINE 120Ô bon Dieu, les langues des hommes sont
pleines de tromperies.KING HENRY, ⌜to Alice⌝ What says she, fair one? That the tongues of men are full of deceits?ALICE Oui, dat de tongues of de mans is be full of125 deceits; dat is de Princess.KING HENRY The Princess is the better Englishwoman.— I’ faith, Kate, my wooing is fit for thy understanding. I am glad thou canst speak no better English, for if thou couldst, thou wouldst130 find me such a plain king that thou wouldst think I had sold my farm to buy my crown. I know no ways to mince it in love, but directly to say “I love you.” Then if you urge me farther than to say “Do you, in faith?” I wear out my suit. Give me your answer, i’135 faith, do; and so clap hands and a bargain. How say you, lady?KATHERINE Sauf votre honneur, me understand well.
KING HENRY Marry, if you would put me to verses or to dance for your sake, Kate, why you undid me.140 For the one, I have neither words nor measure; and for the other, I have no strength in measure, yet a reasonable measure in strength. If I could win a lady at leapfrog or by vaulting into my saddle with my armor on my back, under the correction of145 bragging be it spoken, I should quickly leap into a wife. Or if I might buffet for my love, or bound my horse for her favors, I could lay on like a butcher and sit like a jackanapes, never off. But, before God, Kate, I cannot look greenly nor gasp out my eloquence,150 nor I have no cunning in protestation, only downright oaths, which I never use till urged, nor never break for urging. If thou canst love a fellow of this temper, Kate, whose face is not worth sun-burning, that never looks in his glass for love of155 anything he sees there, let thine eye be thy cook. I speak to thee plain soldier. If thou canst love me for this, take me. If not, to say to thee that I shall die is true, but for thy love, by the Lord, no. Yet I love thee too. And while thou liv’st, dear Kate, take a fellow of160 plain and uncoined constancy, for he perforce must do thee right because he hath not the gift to woo in other places. For these fellows of infinite tongue, that can rhyme themselves into ladies’ favors, they do always reason themselves out again. What? A165 speaker is but a prater, a rhyme is but a ballad, a good leg will fall, a straight back will stoop, a black beard will turn white, a curled pate will grow bald, a fair face will wither, a full eye will wax hollow, but a good heart, Kate, is the sun and the moon, or170 rather the sun and not the moon, for it shines bright and never changes but keeps his course truly. If thou would have such a one, take me. And take me, take a soldier. Take a soldier, take a king. And what
say’st thou then to my love? Speak, my fair, and175 fairly, I pray thee.KATHERINE Is it possible dat I sould love de enemy of France?KING HENRY No, it is not possible you should love the enemy of France, Kate. But, in loving me, you180 should love the friend of France, for I love France so well that I will not part with a village of it. I will have it all mine. And, Kate, when France is mine and I am yours, then yours is France and you are mine.KATHERINE 185I cannot tell wat is dat.KING HENRY No, Kate? I will tell thee in French, which I am sure will hang upon my tongue like a new-married wife about her husband’s neck, hardly to be shook off. Je quand sur le possession de
190 France, et quand vous avez le possession de moi—let me see, what then? Saint Denis be my speed!—donc
vôtre est France, et vous êtes mienne. It is as easy for me, Kate, to conquer the kingdom as to speak so much more French. I shall never move thee in195 French, unless it be to laugh at me.KATHERINE Sauf votre honneur, le français que vous
parlez, il est meilleur que l’anglais lequel je parle.KING HENRY No, faith, is ’t not, Kate, but thy speaking of my tongue, and I thine, most truly-falsely must200 needs be granted to be much at one. But, Kate, dost thou understand thus much English? Canst thou love me?KATHERINE I cannot tell.KING HENRY Can any of your neighbors tell, Kate? I’ll205 ask them. Come, I know thou lovest me; and at night, when you come into your closet, you’ll question this gentlewoman about me, and, I know, Kate, you will, to her, dispraise those parts in me that you love with your heart. But, good Kate, mock me
210 mercifully, the rather, gentle princess, because I love thee cruelly. If ever thou beest mine, Kate, as I have a saving faith within me tells me thou shalt, I get thee with scambling, and thou must therefore needs prove a good soldier-breeder. Shall not thou215 and I, between Saint Denis and Saint George, compound a boy, half French, half English, that shall go to Constantinople and take the Turk by the beard? Shall we not? What say’st thou, my fair flower de luce?KATHERINE 220I do not know dat.KING HENRY No, ’tis hereafter to know, but now to promise. Do but now promise, Kate, you will endeavor for your French part of such a boy; and for my English moiety, take the word of a king and225 a bachelor. How answer you, la plus belle Katherine
du monde, mon très cher et divin déesse?KATHERINE Your Majesté ’ave fausse French enough to deceive de most sage demoiselle dat is en France.KING HENRY Now fie upon my false French. By mine230 honor, in true English, I love thee, Kate. By which honor I dare not swear thou lovest me, yet my blood begins to flatter me that thou dost, notwithstanding the poor and untempering effect of my visage. Now beshrew my father’s ambition! He was thinking of235 civil wars when he got me; therefore was I created with a stubborn outside, with an aspect of iron, that when I come to woo ladies, I fright them. But, in faith, Kate, the elder I wax, the better I shall appear. My comfort is that old age, that ill layer-up of240 beauty, can do no more spoil upon my face. Thou hast me, if thou hast me, at the worst, and thou shalt wear me, if thou wear me, better and better. And therefore tell me, most fair Katherine, will you have me? Put off your maiden blushes, avouch the245 thoughts of your heart with the looks of an empress,
take me by the hand, and say “Harry of England, I am thine,” which word thou shalt no sooner bless mine ear withal, but I will tell thee aloud “England is thine, Ireland is thine, France is thine, and Henry250 Plantagenet is thine,” who, though I speak it before his face, if he be not fellow with the best king, thou shalt find the best king of good fellows. Come, your answer in broken music, for thy voice is music, and thy English broken. Therefore, queen of all, Katherine,255 break thy mind to me in broken English. Wilt thou have me?KATHERINE Dat is as it shall please de roi mon père.KING HENRY Nay, it will please him well, Kate; it shall please him, Kate.KATHERINE 260Den it sall also content me.KING HENRY Upon that I kiss your hand, and I call you my queen.KATHERINE Laissez, mon seigneur, laissez, laissez! Ma
foi, je ne veux point que vous abaissiez votre grandeur,
265 en baisant la main d’ une—Notre Seigneur!—
indigne serviteur. Excusez-moi, je vous supplie, mon
très puissant seigneur.KING HENRY Then I will kiss your lips, Kate.KATHERINE Les dames et demoiselles, pour être baisées
270 devant leurs noces, il n’est pas la coutume de France.KING HENRY Madam my interpreter, what says she?ALICE Dat it is not be de fashion pour les ladies of France—I cannot tell wat is baiser en Anglish.KING HENRY To kiss.ALICE 275Your Majesté entendre bettre que moi.KING HENRY It is not a fashion for the maids in France to kiss before they are married, would she say?ALICE Oui, vraiment.KING HENRY O Kate, nice customs curtsy to great280 kings. Dear Kate, you and I cannot be confined within the weak list of a country’s fashion. We are
the makers of manners, Kate, and the liberty that follows our places stops the mouth of all find-faults, as I will do yours for upholding the nice fashion of285 your country in denying me a kiss. Therefore, patiently and yielding. ⌜He kisses her.⌝ You have witchcraft in your lips, Kate. There is more eloquence in a sugar touch of them than in the tongues of the French council, and they should sooner290 persuade Harry of England than a general petition of monarchs.Enter the French power, ⌜the French King and Queen
and Burgundy,⌝ and the English Lords ⌜Westmoreland
and Exeter.⌝ Here comes your father.BURGUNDY God save your Majesty. My royal cousin, teach you our princess English?KING HENRY 295I would have her learn, my fair cousin, how perfectly I love her, and that is good English.BURGUNDY Is she not apt?KING HENRY Our tongue is rough, coz, and my condition is not smooth, so that, having neither the voice300 nor the heart of flattery about me, I cannot so conjure up the spirit of love in her that he will appear in his true likeness.BURGUNDY Pardon the frankness of my mirth if I answer you for that. If you would conjure in her,305 you must make a circle; if conjure up Love in her in his true likeness, he must appear naked and blind. Can you blame her, then, being a maid yet rosed over with the virgin crimson of modesty, if she deny the appearance of a naked blind boy in her naked310 seeing self? It were, my lord, a hard condition for a maid to consign to.KING HENRY Yet they do wink and yield, as love is blind and enforces.
BURGUNDY They are then excused, my lord, when they315 see not what they do.KING HENRY Then, good my lord, teach your cousin to consent winking.BURGUNDY I will wink on her to consent, my lord, if you will teach her to know my meaning, for maids320 well summered and warm kept are like flies at Bartholomew-tide: blind, though they have their eyes; and then they will endure handling, which before would not abide looking on.KING HENRY This moral ties me over to time and a hot325 summer. And so I shall catch the fly, your cousin, in the latter end, and she must be blind too.BURGUNDY As love is, my lord, before it loves.KING HENRY It is so. And you may, some of you, thank love for my blindness, who cannot see many a fair330 French city for one fair French maid that stands in my way.KING OF FRANCE Yes, my lord, you see them perspectively, the cities turned into a maid, for they are all girdled with maiden walls that war hath ⌜never⌝335 entered.KING HENRY Shall Kate be my wife?KING OF FRANCE So please you.KING HENRY I am content, so the maiden cities you talk of may wait on her. So the maid that stood in340 the way for my wish shall show me the way to my will.KING OF FRANCE We have consented to all terms of reason.KING HENRY Is ’t so, my lords of England?WESTMORELAND The King hath granted every article,345 His daughter first, and, in sequel, all, According to their firm proposèd natures.
EXETER Only he hath not yet subscribèd this: Where your Majesty demands that the King of France, having any occasion to write for matter of350 grant, shall name your Highness in this form and with this addition, in French: Notre très cher fils
Henri, roi d’ Angleterre, héritier de France; and thus in Latin: Praeclarissimus filius noster Henricus, rex
Angliae et hœres Franciae.KING OF FRANCE 355 Nor this I have not, brother, so denied But your request shall make me let it pass.KING HENRY I pray you, then, in love and dear alliance, Let that one article rank with the rest, And thereupon give me your daughter.KING OF FRANCE 360 Take her, fair son, and from her blood raise up Issue to me, that the contending kingdoms Of France and England, whose very shores look pale With envy of each other’s happiness, May cease their hatred, and this dear conjunction365 Plant neighborhood and Christian-like accord In their sweet bosoms, that never war advance His bleeding sword ’twixt England and fair France.LORDS Amen.KING HENRY Now welcome, Kate, and bear me witness all370 That here I kiss her as my sovereign queen.⌜He kisses her.⌝ Flourish.QUEEN OF FRANCE God, the best maker of all marriages, Combine your hearts in one, your realms in one. As man and wife, being two, are one in love, So be there ’twixt your kingdoms such a spousal375 That never may ill office or fell jealousy,
237
Henry V
ACT 5. EPILOGUE
Which troubles oft the bed of blessèd marriage, Thrust in between the paction of these kingdoms To make divorce of their incorporate league, That English may as French, French Englishmen,380 Receive each other. God speak this Amen!ALL Amen.KING HENRY Prepare we for our marriage; on which day, My Lord of Burgundy, we’ll take your oath, And all the peers’, for surety of our leagues.385 Then shall I swear to Kate, and you to me, And may our oaths well kept and prosp’rous be.Sennet. They exit.
Henry V
