Pist. Doth Fortune play the huswife with me now?[5331]
News have I, that my Doll is dead i' the spital[5331][5332]
Of malady of France;[5331][5333]75
And there my rendezvous is quite cut off.[5331]
Old I do wax; and from my weary limbs[5331]
Honour is cudgelled. Well, bawd I'll turn,[5331][5334]
And something lean to cutpurse of quick hand.[5331]
To England will I steal, and there I'll steal:80
And patches will I get unto these cudgell'd scars,[5335]
And swear I got them in the Gallia wars.[5336] [Exit.
Scene II. France. A royal palace.
Enter, at one door, King Henry, Exeter, Bedford, Gloucester, Warwick, Westmoreland, and other Lords; at another, the French King, Queen Isabel, the Princess Katharine, Alice and other Ladies; the Duke of Burgundy, and his train.[5337]
K. Hen. Peace to this meeting, wherefore 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 Katharine;
And, as a branch and member of this royalty,5
By whom this great assembly is contrived,
We do salute you, Duke of Burgundy;[5338]
And, princes French, and peers, health to you all!
Fr. King. Right joyous are we to behold your face,
Most worthy brother England; fairly met:[5339]10
So are you, princes English, every one.
Q. Isa. So happy be the issue, brother England,[5340]
Of this good day and of this gracious meeting,
As we are now glad to behold your eyes;
Your eyes, which hitherto have borne in them[5341]15
Against the French, that met them in their bent,[5341]
The fatal balls of murdering basilisks:
The venom of such looks, we fairly hope,
Have lost their quality, and that this day[5342]
Shall change all griefs and quarrels into love.20
K. Hen. To cry amen to that, thus we appear.
Q. Isa. You English princes all, I do salute you.
Bur. My duty to you both, on equal love,
Great Kings of France and England! That I have labour'd,[5343]
With all my wits, my pains and strong endeavours,25
To bring your most imperial majesties
Unto this bar and royal interview,
Your mightiness on both parts best can witness.[5344]
Since then my office hath so far prevail'd
That, face to face and royal eye to eye,30
You have congreeted, let it not disgrace me,
If I demand, before this royal view,
What rub or what impediment there is,
Why that the naked, poor and mangled Peace,
Dear nurse of arts, plenties and joyful births,35
Should not in this best garden of the world
Our fertile France, put up her lovely visage?[5345]
Alas, she hath from France too long been chased,
And all her husbandry doth lie on heaps,
Corrupting in its own fertility.[5346]40
Her vine, the merry cheerer of the heart,
Unpruned dies; her hedges even-pleach'd,[5347]
Like prisoners wildly overgrown with hair,
Put forth disorder'd twigs; her fallow leas
The darnel, hemlock and rank fumitory[5348]45
Doth root upon, while that the coulter rusts[5349]
That should deracinate such savagery;
The even mead, that erst brought sweetly forth
The freckled cowslip, burnet and green clover,
Wanting the scythe, all uncorrected, rank,[5350]50
Conceives by idleness and nothing teems
But hateful docks, rough thistles, kecksies, burs,[5351]
Losing both beauty and utility.
And as our vineyards, fallows, meads and hedges,[5352][5353]
Defective in their natures, grow to wildness,[5353][5354]55
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;
But grow like savages,—as soldiers will[5355]
That nothing do but meditate on blood,—60
To swearing and stern looks, diffused attire[5356]
And every thing that seems unnatural,
Which to reduce into our former favour
You are assembled: and my speech entreats
That I may know the let, why gentle Peace65
Should not expel these inconveniences
And bless us with her former qualities.
K. Hen. If, Duke of Burgundy, you would the peace,[5357]
Whose want gives growth to the imperfections
Which you have cited, you must buy that peace70
With full accord to all our just demands;
Whose tenours and particular effects[5358]
You have enscheduled briefly in your hands.