“O fair Katharine, if you will love me soundly with your French heart, I will be glad to hear you confess it brokenly with your English tongue. Do you like me, Kate?”
Kate. Pardonnez moi; I cannot tell vat is—like me.
King. [Explosively and deliciously.] An angel is like you, Kate; and you are like an angel: faith, I’m glad thou can’st speak no better English: for if thou could’st thou would’st find me such a plain King, that thou would’st think I had sold my farm to buy my crown. If you would put me to verses, or to dance for your sake, Kate, why you undid me. I speak plain soldier. If thou can’st 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 whil’st thou livest, Kate, take a fellow of a plain uncoined constancy: a straight-back will stoop; but a good heart, Kate, is the sun and the moon; or rather the sun and not the moon, for it shines bright and never changes. If thou would’st have such a one, take me!
Kate. Is it possible dat I should love de enemy of France?
King. No, it’s not possible, Kate: but in loving me you would 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. But, Kate, dost thou understand thus much English—Can’st thou love me?
Kate. I cannot tell.
King. Can any of your neighbors tell, Kate?
Kate. I do not know dat.
King. By mine 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. Wilt thou have me Kate?
Kate. That is as it shall please le roy mon Père.