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And bid it pass?

Ver. All furnish'd, all in arms;

All plum'd like estridges that with the wind

Bated like eagles having lately bath'd;

Glittering in golden coats like images;

As full of spirit as the month of May

And gorgeous as the sun at midsummer;

Wanton as youthful goats, wild as young bulls.

I saw young Harry with his beaver on

His cushes on his thighs, gallantly arm'd,

Rise from the ground like feathered Mercury,

And vaulted with such ease into his seat

As if an angel dropp'd down from the clouds

To turn and wind a fiery Pegasus

And witch the world with noble horsemanship.

Hot. No more, no more! Worse than the sun in March,

This praise doth nourish agues. Let them come.

They come like sacrifices in their trim,

And to the fire-ey'd maid of smoky war

All hot and bleeding Will we offer them.

The mailed Mars Shall on his altar sit

Up to the ears in blood. I am on fire

To hear this rich reprisal is so nigh,

And yet not ours. Come, let me taste my horse,

Who is to bear me like a thunderbolt

Against the bosom of the Prince of Wales.

Harry to Harry shall, hot horse to horse,

Meet, and ne'er part till one drop down a corse.

that Glendower were come!

Ver. There is more news.

I learn'd in Worcester, as I rode along,

He cannot draw his power this fourteen days.

Doug. That's the worst tidings that I hear of yet.

Wor. Ay, by my faith, that bears a frosty sound.

Hot. What may the King's whole battle reach unto?

Ver. To thirty thousand.

Hot. Forty let it be.

My father and Glendower being both away,

The powers of us may serve so great a day.

Come, let us take a muster speedily.

Doomsday is near. Die all, die merrily.

Doug. Talk not of dying. I am out of fear

Of death or death's hand for this one half-year.

Exeunt.

Scene II. A public road near Coventry.

Enter Falstaff and Bardolph.

Fal. Bardolph, get thee before to Coventry; fill me a bottle of

sack. Our soldiers shall march through. We'll to Sutton

Co'fil'

to-night.

Bard. Will you give me money, Captain?

Fal. Lay out, lay out.

Bald. This bottle makes an angel.

Fal. An if it do, take it for thy labour; an if it make twenty,

take them all; I'll answer the coinage. Bid my lieutenant Peto

meet me at town's end.

Bard. I Will, Captain. Farewell. Exit.

Fal. If I be not ashamed of my soldiers, I am a sous'd gurnet.

I

have misused the King's press damnably. I have got in exchange of

a hundred and fifty soldiers, three hundred and odd pounds. I

press me none but good householders, yeomen's sons; inquire me

out contracted bachelors, such as had been ask'd twice on the

banes- such a commodity of warm slaves as had as lieve hear the

devil as a drum; such as fear the report of a caliver worse than

a struck fowl or a hurt wild duck. I press'd me none but such

toasts-and-butter, with hearts in their bellies no bigger than

pins' heads, and they have bought out their services; and now my

whole charge consists of ancients, corporals, lieutenants,

gentlemen of companies- slaves as ragged as Lazarus in the

painted cloth, where the glutton's dogs licked his sores; and

such as indeed were never soldiers, but discarded unjust

serving-men, younger sons to Younger brothers, revolted tapsters,

and ostlers trade-fall'n; the cankers of a calm world and a long

peace; ten times more dishonourable ragged than an old fac'd

ancient; and such have I to fill up the rooms of them that have

bought out their services that you would think that I had a

hundred and fifty tattered Prodigals lately come from

swine-keeping, from eating draff and husks. A mad fellow met me

on the way, and told me I had unloaded all the gibbets and

press'd the dead bodies. No eye hath seen such scarecrows.

I'll

not march through Coventry with them, that's flat. Nay, and the

villains march wide betwixt the legs, as if they had gyves on;

for indeed I had the most of them out of prison. There's but a

shirt and a half in all my company; and the half-shirt is two

napkins tack'd together and thrown over the