Before Bourdeaux. | |
| |
Enter TALBOT, with his Forces. | |
| Tal. Go to the gates of Bourdeaux, trumpeter; | |
| Summon their general unto the wall. | 4 |
| |
Trumpet sounds a parley. Enter, on the Walls, the General of the French Forces, and Others. | |
| English John Talbot, captains, calls you forth, | |
| Servant in arms to Harry King of England; | |
| And thus he would: Open your city gates, | 8 |
| Be humble to us, call my sov’reign yours, | |
| And do him homage as obedient subjects, | |
| And I’ll withdraw me and my bloody power; | |
| But, if you frown upon this proffer’d peace, | 12 |
| You tempt the fury of my three attendants, | |
| Lean famine, quartering steel, and climbing fire; | |
| Who in a moment even with the earth | |
| Shall lay your stately and air-braving towers, | 16 |
| If you forsake the offer of their love. | |
| Gen. Thou ominous and fearful owl of death, | |
| Our nation’s terror and their bloody scourge! | |
| The period of thy tyranny approacheth. | 20 |
| On us thou canst not enter but by death; | |
| For, I protest, we are well fortified, | |
| And strong enough to issue out and fight: | |
| If thou retire, the Dauphin, well appointed, | 24 |
| Stands with the snares of war to tangle thee: | |
| On either hand thee there are squadrons pitch’d, | |
| To wall thee from the liberty of flight; | |
| And no way canst thou turn thee for redress | 28 |
| But death doth front thee with apparent spoil, | |
| And pale destruction meets thee in the face. | |
| Ten thousand French have ta’en the sacrament, | |
| To rive their dangerous artillery | 32 |
| Upon no Christian soul but English Talbot. | |
| Lo! there thoustand’st, a breathing valiant man, | |
| Of an invincible unconquer’d spirit: | |
| This is the latest glory of thy praise, | 36 |
| That I, thy enemy, ’due thee withal; | |
| For ere the glass, that now begins to run, | |
| Finish the process of his sandy hour, | |
| These eyes, that see thee now well coloured, | 40 |
| Shall see thee wither’d, bloody, pale, and dead. [Drum afar off. | |
| Hark! hark! the Dauphin’s drum, a warning bell, | |
| Sings heavy music to thy timorous soul; | |
| And mine shall ring thy dire departure out. [Exeunt General, &c., from the Walls. | 44 |
| Tal. He fables not; I hear the enemy: | |
| Out, some light horsemen, and peruse their wings. | |
| O! negligent and heedless discipline; | |
| How are we park’d and bounded in a pale, | 48 |
| A little herd of England’s timorous deer, | |
| Maz’d with a yelping kennel of French curs! | |
| If we be English deer, be then, in blood; | |
| Not rascal-like, to fall down with a pinch, | 52 |
| But rather moody-mad and desperate stags, | |
| Turn on the bloody hounds with heads of steel, | |
| And make the cowards stand aloof at bay: | |
| Sell every man his life as dear as mine, | 56 |
| And they shall find dear deer of us, my friends. | |
| God and Saint George, Talbot and England’s right, | |
| Prosper our colours in this dangerous fight! [Exeunt. | |
