Edward III, William Shakespeare [novels to read for beginners txt] 📗

will, my lord.
My gracious sovereign, France hath ta’en the foil,
And boasting Edward triumphs with success.
These iron-hearted navies,
When last I was reporter to your grace,
Both full of angry spleen, of hope and fear,
Hasting to meet each other in the face,
At last conjoin’d, and by their admiral
Our admiral encounter’d many shot.
By this, the other, that beheld these twain
Give earnest-penny of a further wrack,
Like fiery dragons took their haughty flight;
And, likewise meeting, from their smoky wombs
Sent many grim ambassadors of death.
Then gan the day to turn to gloomy night;
And darkness did as well enclose the quick
As those that were but newly reft of life.
No leisure serv’d for friends to bid farewell;
And, if it had, the hideous noise was such,
As each to other seemed deaf and dumb.
Purple the sea; whose channel fill’d as fast
With streaming gore that from the maimed fell
As did her gushing moisture break into
The crannied cleftures of the through-shot planks.
Here flew a head, dissever’d from the trunk;
There mangled arms and legs were toss’d aloft,
As when a whirlwind takes the summer dust
And scatters it in middle of the air.
Then might ye see the reeling vessels split
And tottering sink into the ruthless flood
Until their lofty tops were seen no more.
All shifts were tried both for defence and hurt.
And now the effect of valour and of fear,
Of resolution and of cowardice,
We lively pictur’d; how the one for fame,
The other by compulsion laid about.
Much did the Nonpareille, that brave ship;
So did the Black-Snake of Bullen, than which
A bonnier vessel never yet spread sail:
But all in vain; both sun, the wind and tide
Revolted all unto our foemen’s side,
That we perforce were fain to give them way,
And they are landed: thus my tale is done;
We have untimely lost, and they have won. King John

Then rests there nothing, but with present speed
To join our several forces all in one,
And bid them battle ere they range too far.⁠—
Come, gentle Philip, let us hence depart;
This soldier’s words have pierc’d thy father’s heart. Exeunt.

Scene II

Picardy. Fields near Cressy.

Enter a Frenchman, meeting certain others, a Woman and two Children, laden with household-stuff, as removing. First Frenchman

Well met, my masters: how now? what’s the news?
And wherefore are ye laden thus with stuff?
What, is it quarter-day, that you remove
And carry bag and baggage too?

Second Frenchman

Quarter-day? aye, and quartering day, I fear:
Have ye not heard the news that flies abroad?

First Frenchman What news? Third Frenchman

How the French navy is destroy’d at sea
And that the English army is arriv’d.

First Frenchman What then? Second Frenchman

What then, quoth you? why, is’t not time to fly,
When envy and destruction is so nigh?

First Frenchman

Content thee, man; they are far enough from hence;
And will be met, I warrant ye, to their cost,
Before they break so far into the realm.

Second Frenchman

Ay, so the grasshopper doth spend the time
In mirthful jollity, till winter come;
And then too late he would redeem his time
When frozen cold hath nipp’d his careless head.
He, that no sooner will provide a cloak
Than when he sees it doth begin to rain,
May, peradventure, for his negligence,
Be throughly wash’d when he suspects it not.
We that have charge and such a train as this
Must look in time to look for them and us,
Lest, when we would, we cannot be reliev’d.

First Frenchman

Belike, you then despair of all success
And think your country will be subjugate.

Third Frenchman We cannot tell; ’tis good to fear the worst. First Frenchman

Yet rather fight, than like unnatural sons
Forsake your loving parents in distress.

Second Frenchman

Tush, they that have already taken arms
Are many fearful millions in respect
Of that small handful of our enemies.
But ’tis a rightful quarrel must prevail;
Edward is son unto our late king’s sister,
When John Valois is three degrees remov’d.

Woman

Besides, there goes a prophecy abroad,
Publish’d by one that was a friar once
Whose oracles have many times prov’d true;
And now he says, “The time will shortly come,
When as a lion, roused in the west,
Shall carry hence the flower-de-luce of France”:
These, I can tell ye, and such-like surmises
Strike many Frenchmen cold unto the heart.

Enter another Frenchman, hastily. Fourth Frenchman

Fly, countrymen and citizens of France!
Sweet-flow’ring peace, the root of happy life,
Is quite abandon’d and expuls’d the land:
Instead of whom, ransack-constraining war
Sits like to ravens upon your houses’ tops;
Slaughter and mischief walk within your streets,
And, unrestrain’d, make havoc as they pass:
The form whereof even now myself beheld,
Upon this fair mountain, whence I came.
For so far off as I directed mine eyes,
I might perceive five cities all on fire,
Corn-fields and vineyards, burning like an oven;
And, as the reaking vapour in the wind
Turn’d but aside, I likewise might discern
The poor inhabitants, escap’d the flame,
Fall numberless upon the soldiers’ pikes.
Three ways these dreadful ministers of wrath
Do tread the measures of their tragic march.
Upon the right hand comes the conquering king,
Upon the left his hot unbridled son,
And in the midst our nation’s glittering host;
All which, though distant, yet conspire in one
To leave a desolation where they come.
Fly, therefore, citizens, if you be wise,
Seek out some habitation further off.
Here is you stay, your wives will be abus’d,
Your treasure shar’d before your weeping eyes.
Shelter yourselves, for now the storm doth rise.
Away, away! methinks, I hear their drums.
Ah, wretched France, I greatly fear thy fall;
Thy glory shaketh like a tottering wall. Exeunt.

Scene III

The Same.

Drums. Enter King Edward, marching; Derby, etc., and Forces, and Gobin de Grey. King Edward

Where is the Frenchman, by whose cunning guide
We found the shallow of this river Somme,
And had direction how to pass the sea?

Gobin Here, my good lord. King Edward How art thou called? tell me thy name. Gobin Gobin de Grey, if please your excellence. King Edward

Then, Gobin, for the service thou hast done,
We here enlarge and give thee liberty;
And, for a3 recompense, beside this good,
Thou shalt receive five hundred marks in gold.⁠—
I know not how, we should have met our son;
Whom now in heart I wish I might behold.

Enter