Bertie's Paraphrases of Famous Scenes from Shakespeare: Henry V, Act 4, Scene 3 (The Saint Crispin's Day Speech)

This scene takes place just before the Battle of Agincourt, at which a depleted English army, led by King Henry the Fifth, defeated a greatly superior force of French. Most of the English were on foot, and many of the French were armored knights on horseback. The English won largely because of their secret weapon, the longbow, which was powerful enough to penetrate armour at some distance. The battle was fought on 25th October (Saint Crispin's Day) 1415.

[Setting: the English camp.]

[Enter Gloster, Bedford, Exeter, Salisbury, Westmoreland, and
many soldiers.]

GLOSTER: Where is the king?

BEDFORD: The king has ridden to view their army himself.

WESTMORELAND: They have fully sixty thousand fighting men.

EXETER: That's five to one; besides, they are all fresh.

SALISBURY: May God's arm strike with us! - it's fearsome odds.
: May God be with you, nobles all.
: I'll go to my charger.
[Embracing them]: If we meet no more till we meet in Heaven,
then, joyfully, - my noble Lord of Bedford, - my
dear Lord Gloster, - and my good Lord Exeter, - and
all my loving kinsman, - warriors all, adieu!

BEDFORD: Farewell, good Salisbury; and may good luck go with
you!

EXETER: Farewell, loving lord.
: Fight valiantly today: - and yet I do you wrong in
reminding you of it, for you are made of the firm faith
of valour.

[Exit Salisbury.]

BEDFORD: He is as full of valour as of comradeship: - princely
in both.

[Enter Henry behind them.]

WESTMORELAND: Oh! - I wish that we now had here just one in
ten thousand of those men in England that do no
work today.
[Note: many men in England would be doing no work because of the St.Crispin's Day holiday]

HENRY: Who's he that wishes so?
: My cousin Westmoreland?
: No, my fair cousin: - if we are marked to die, we are
enough loss for our country to suffer; and if to live,
the fewer men the greater share of honour.
: God's will! - please, do not wish for one man more.
: By Jove! - I am not greedy for gold; nor do I care who
feeds at my expense; it does not worry me if men wear
my garments: such outer things do not dwell in my
desires; but, if it is a sin to covet honour, I am the
most offending soul alive.
: No, truly, my cousin, do not wish one man from England.
: God's peace! - I would not want to lose so great an
honour as one man more, I think, would share with me,
- not for the best hope I have.
: Oh! - do not wish for one more; rather, proclaim it,
Westmoreland, throughout my army, that he who has no
stomach for this fight, let him depart, his passport
shall be made, and coins for passage put into his purse.
: We would not want to die in that man's company who
fears to die with us in fellowship.
: This day is called the Feast of Crispian: - he that
outlives this day and comes home safe will stand on
tip-toe when this day is named, and rouse himself at
hearing the name of Crispian.
: He that shall live this day, and see old age, will
yearly feast [= throw a party for] his neighbours on its
eve, and say "Tomorrow is Saint Crispian!" - then he will
roll up his sleeve and show his scars, and say, "I got these
wounds on Crispin's Day!"
: Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot if he'll not
remember with clarity what feats he did that day.
: Then our names, familiar in his mouth as household words,
- Harry the king, Bedford and Exeter, Warwick and Talbot,
Salisbury and Gloster, - shall be freshly remembered in
their overflowing cups.
: The good man shall teach this story to his son, and
Crispin Crispian shall never go by, from this day to the
ending of the world, and we not be remembered in it.
: We few; we happy few; we band of brothers.
: For he that sheds his blood today with me shall be my
brother; be he ever so humble, this day shall make noble
his condition.
: And gentlemen in England now in bed shall think themselves
accursed they were not here, and consider their manhoods
worthless while anyone speaks that fought with us upon
Saint Crispin's Day.

[Re-enter Salisbury.]

SALISBURY: My sovereign lord, present yourself quickly.
: The French are splendidly assembled in their
battalions, and will charge on us with all speed.

HENRY: All things are ready if our minds are.

WESTMORELAND: Perish the man whose mind is backward now!

HENRY: You do not wish more help from England, cousin?

WESTMORELAND: God's will! - my lord, I wish you and I alone,
without more help, could fight this royal battle!

HENRY: Why, now you have unwished five thousand men, which I
like better than to wish us one more.
: You know your places.
: God be with you all!

[Enter Montjoy, the official French messenger]

MONTJOY: Once more I come, to know from you, king Harry, if you
will now negotiate for your ransom, before your very
certain overthrow: - for, certainly, you are so near
the gulf that you must necessarily be swallowed.
: Besides, the Constable, in mercy, desires you to
remind your followers of repentance, so that their
souls may make a peaceful and a sweet retreat off
of these fields, where (poor wretches!) their bodies
must lie and fester.
[Note: by 'the Constable' he means the Constable of France, who was the highest French military officer]

HENRY: Who has sent you now?

MONTJOY: The constable of France.

HENRY: Please, carry my former answer back.
: Tell them to defeat me and then sell my bones.
: Good God! - why should they mock poor fellows this way?
: The man who once sold the lion's skin while the beast
lived was killed in hunting him.
: Many of our bodies shall no doubt find native [= English]
graves, upon which, I trust, report of this day's work
shall live in brass; and those who leave their valiant
bones in France, dying like men, even if buried on your
dunghills, they shall be famed; for there the sun shall
greet them, and raise their reeking honours up to heaven,
leaving their earthly parts to choke your atmosphere, the
smell of which shall breed a plague in France.
: So take note of abounding valour in our English, who,
being dead, break out into a second course of mischief,
like the infected graze of a bullet, killing with
renewed deadliness.
: Let me speak proudly.
: Tell the Constable we are only workaday warriors; our
gay clothing and our gilt [= gold trim] are all dirtied
from rainy marching in the arduous field; there is not a
feather in our army (good indication, I hope, that we
will not fly [= flee]), and time has worn us down to
slovenliness.
: But, I swear by the mass, our hearts are in trim; and
my poor soldiers tell me, before night they'll be in
fresher robes, or they will pluck the gay new coats over
the French soldiers' heads, and turn them out of uniform.
: If they do this (as, if God pleases, they shall) my ransom
then will easily be calculated.
: Messenger, save your effort.
: Come no more for ransom, gentle messenger: - they shall
have none, I swear, except these my joints; which, if
they have them as I will leave them to 'em, shall yield
them little, tell the Constable.

MONTJOY: I shall, King Harry.
: And so fare you well.
: You never shall hear Montjoy any more.

[Exit Montjoy.]

HENRY [jokingly]: I fear you'll once more come again for ransom.

[Enter the Duke of York.]

YORK: My lord, most humbly on my knee I beg for the leadership
of the vanguard.

HENRY: Take it, brave York.
: Now, soldiers, march away.
: And how you please, God, manage the day!

[Exit all]

[End of scene]