Page 1641 - Shakespeare - Vol. 2

And you shall find his vanities forespent
Were but the outside of the Roman Brutus,
Covering discretion with a coat of folly;
As gardeners do with ordure hide those roots

That shall first spring and be most delicate. [40]

DAUPHIN
Well, ’tis not so, my Lord High Constable;
But though we think it so, it is no matter:
In cases of defence ’tis best to weigh

The enemy more mighty than he seems:
So the proportions of defence are fill’d; [45]
Which of a weak and niggardly projection
Doth, like a miser, spoil his coat with scanting
A little cloth.

FRENCH KING
Think we King Harry strong;
And, princes, look you strongly arm to meet him.
The kindred of him hath been flesh’d upon us, [50]
And he is bred out of that bloody strain

That haunted us in our familiar paths;
Witness our too much memorable shame
When Cressy battle fatally was struck,
And all our princes captiv’d by the hand [55]

Of that black name, Edward, Black Prince of Wales;
Whiles that his mountain sire, on mountain standing,
Up in the air, crown’d with the golden sun,
Saw his heroical seed, and smil’d to see him,

Mangle the work of nature, and deface [60]
The patterns that by God and by French fathers
Had twenty years been made. This is a stem
Of that victorious stock; and let us fear

The native mightiness and fate of him.

Enter a Messenger.

MESSANGER