[Exit Mariner.]
Mean space, my Lords, tis best we be dispersed
To several places, least they chance to land:
First you, my Lord, with your Bohemian Troops,
Shall pitch your battailes on the lower hand;
My eldest son, the Duke of Normandy,
Together with the aide of Muscovites,
Shall climb the higher ground another way;
Here in the middle cost, betwixt you both,
Phillip, my youngest boy, and I will lodge.
So, Lors, be gone, and look unto your charge:
You stand for France, an Empire fair and large.
[Exeunt.]
Now tell me, Phillip, what is thy concept,
Touching the challenge that the English make?
PHILLIP.
I say, my Lord, claim Edward what he can,
And bring he ne’er so plain a pedigree,
Tis you are in the 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.
KING JOHN.
Well said, young Phillip! Call for bread and Wine,
That we may cheer our stomachs with repast,
To look our foes more sternly in the face.
[A Table and Provisions brought in. The battle hard a far off.]
Now is begun the heavy day at Sea:
Fight, Frenchmen, fight; be like the field of Bears,
When they defend their younglings in the Caves!
Stir, angry Nemesis, the happy helm,
That, with the sulphur battles of your rage,
The English Fleet may be dispersed and sunk.
[Shot.]
PHILLIP.
O Father, how this echoing Cannon shot,
Like sweet harmony, digests my eats!