Shakespeare's Kings

by John Julius Norwich

  For one to one is fair equality. -

  Enter a Herald from King John

  What tidings, messenger? be plain, and brief.

  HER. The King of France, my soveriegn 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 [y]our British earth.

  What is the answer to his proffer'd mercy?

  PR. ED. 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 the king,

  (IV, iv) 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.

  HER. I go. [Exit]

  Enter another

  PR. ED. What news with thee?

  HER. 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 has sworn that thou shalt die.

  PR. ED. Back with the beast unto the beast that sent him;

  Tell him, I cannot sit a coward's horse.

  Bid him to-day 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 carping boy, and get thee gone.

  [Exit Herald]

  Enter another

  HER. Edward of Wales, Philip, the second son

  To the most mighty Christian King of France,

  Seeing thy body's living date expir'd,

  All full of charity and Christian love,

  Commends this book, full 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.

  PR. ED. Herald of Philip, greet thy lord from me;

  All good, that he can send, I can receive:

  But think'st thou not the unadvised boy

  Hath wrong'd himself in thus far tend'ring 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 sin's 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;

  (IV, iv) So tell the courtly wanton, and be gone.

  HER. I go.

  [Exit]

  PR. ED. 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 bruis'd and bit with many broils,

  And strategems forepast 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.

  AUD. TO die is all as common as to live;

  The one in choice, 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 fear, 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.

  PR. ED. 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 if fears! and how disgrac'd

  The 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.

  (IV, v)

  SCENE V

  The Same. The French Camp. Enter King John and Charles.

  K. JOHN. A sudden darkness hath defac'd the sky,

  The winds are crept into their caves for fear,

  The leaves move not, the world is hush'd 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?

  CHAR. 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.

  K. JOHN. But now the pompous sun, in all his pride,

  Look'd 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!

  CHAR. Here comes my brother Philip.

  K. JOHN. All dismayed: -

  Enter Philip

  What fearful words are those thy looks presage?

  PHIL. A flight, a flight!

  K. JOHN. Coward, what flight? thou liest, there needs no flight.

  PHIL. A flight!

  K. JOHN. Awake thy craven powers, and tell on

  The substance of that very fear indeed,

  Which is so ghastly printed on thy face:

  What is the matter?

  PHIL. A flight of ugly ravens

  Do croak and hover o'er our soldiers' heads,

  And keep in triangles and corner'd squares

  Right as our forces are emBattled;

  With their approach there came this sudden fog

  Which now hath hid the airy floor of heaven

  And made at noon a night unnatural

  (IV, v) Upon the quaking and dismayed world:

  In brief, our soldiers have let fall their arms

  And stand like metamorphos'd images,

  Bloodless and pale, one gazing on another.

  K. JOHN. Ay, now I call to mind the prophecy;

  But I must give no entrance to a fear.

 
-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 carcases

  Of those poor English that are mark'd 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 despatch

  This little business of a silly fraud.

  Exit Philip

  Another noise. Salisbury brought in by a French Captain

  CAP. 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 encompass'd prince;

  Dispose of him as please your majesty.

  K. JOHN. Go, and the next bough, soldier, that thou seest,

  Disgrace it with his body presently:

  For I do hold a tree in France too good

  To be the gallows of an English thief.

  SAL. My Lord of Normandy, I have your pass

  And warrant for my safety through this land.

  CHAR. Villiers procur'd it for thee, did he not?

  SAL. He did.

  CHAR. And it is current, thou shalt freely pass.

  K. JOHN. Ay, freely to the gallows to be hang'd,

  Without denial or impediment: -

  Away with him.

  CHAR. 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,

  (IV, v) Character'd with this princely hand of mind;

  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.

  K. JOHN. 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.

  CHAR. 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 controll'd,

  To say, I may not give my things away?

  Upon my soul, had Edward Prince of Wales

  Engag'd 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.

  K. JOHN. Dwell'st thou on precedents?

  Then be it so. -Say, Englishman, of what degree thou art.

  SAL. An earl in England though a prisoner here;

  And those that know me call me Salisbury.

  K. JOHN. Then, Salisbury, say whither thou art bound.

  SAL. TO Calice, where my liege, King Edward, is.

  K. JOHN. To Calice, Salisbury? then to

  Calice pack; And bid the 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,

  (IV, v) Hoop'd with a band of iron round about.

  After which sight to Calice spur amain,

  And say, the prince was smother'd and not slain:

  And tell the king, this is not all his ill,

  For I will greet him ere he thinks I will.

  Away, begone; the smoke but of our shot

  Will choke our foes, though bullets hit them not.

  [Exeunt]

  SCENE VI

  The Same. A Part of the Field of Battle. Alarum.

  Enter Prince Edward and Artois. ART.

  HOW fares your grace? are you not shot, my lord?

  PR. ED. No, dear Artois; but chok'd with dust and smoke

  And stepp'd aside for breath and fresher air.

  ART. Breathe then, and to't 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 want.

  PR. ED. 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 out-scold our adversaries?

  Up, up, Artois! the ground itself is arm'd

  [With] fire-containing flint; command our bows

  To hurl away their pretty-colour'd yew,

  And to't with stones: away, Artois, away;

  My soul doth prophesy we win the day.

  Exeunt

  Alarum. Enter King John

  K. JOHN. Our multitudes are in themselves confounded,

  Dismayed and distraught; swift-starting fear

  Hath buzz'd 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.

  (IV, vi) Enter Charles

  CHAR. 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 nought but death,

  Cowardly works confusion on itself.

  Enter Philip

  PHIL. Pluck out your eyes and see not this day's shame!

  An arm hath beat an army; one poor David

  Hath with a stone foil'd twenty stout Goliaths:

  Some twenty naked starvelings with small flints

  Have driven back a puissant host of men,

  Array'd and fenc'd in all accomplements.

  K. JOHN. Mordieu, they quoit at us and kill us up;

  No less than forty thousand wicked elders

  Have forty lean slaves this day ston'd to death.

  CHAR. 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.

  K. JOHN. What, is there no hope left?

  PHIL. No hope, but death, to bury up our shame.

  K. JOHN. Make up once more with me; the twentieth part

  Of those that live are men enough to quail

  The feeble handful on the adverse part.<
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  CHAR. Then charge again: if Heaven be not oppos'd,

  We cannot lose the day.

  K. JOHN. On, away.

  [Exeunt]

  Enter Audley, wounded, and rescued by two squires

  FIRST ESQ. How fares my lord?

  AUD. Even as a man may do,

  That dines at such a bloody feast as this.

  SECOND ESQ. I hope, my lord, that is no mortal scar.

  AUD. 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.

  (IV, vii)

  SCENE VII

  The Same. The English Camp. Enter Prince

  Edward, King John, Charles, and all, with ensigns spread.

  PR. ED. Now, John in France, and lately John of France,

  Thy bloody ensigns are my captive colours;

  And you, high-vaunting Charles of Normandy,

  That once to-day sent me a horse to fly,

  Are now the subjects of my clemency.

  Fie, lords! is't 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?

  K. JOHN. Thy fortune, not thy force, hath conquer'd us.

  PR. ED. An argument that Heaven aids the right. -

  [Enter Artois, with Philip] See, see,

  Artois doth bring with him along

  The late good-counsel-giver to my soul! –

  Welcome, Artois, and welcome,

  Philip, 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, -

  Sound trumpets. Enter Audley

  But, say, what grim discouragement comes here!

  Alas, what thousand armed men of France

  Have writ that note of death in Audley's face?

  -Speak, thou that woo'st death with thy careless smile

  And look'st so merrily upon thy grave

  As if thou wert enamour'd on thine end,

  What hungry sword hath so bereav'd thy face