Henry VI, Part I by William Shakespeare
Act 1 - Scene 1
Westminster Abbey.
Messenger : My honourable lords, health to you all!
[p]Sad tidings bring I to you
out of France,
[p]Of loss, of slaughter and discomfiture:
[p]Guienne,
Champagne, Rheims, Orleans,
[p]Paris, Guysors, Poictiers, are all
quite lost.
Messenger : No treachery; but want of men and money.
[p]Amongst the soldiers this
is muttered,
[p]That here you maintain several factions,
[p]And whilst
a field should be dispatch'd and fought,
[p]You are disputing of your
generals:
[p]One would have lingering wars with little
cost;
[p]Another would fly swift, but wanteth wings;
[p]A third
thinks, without expense at all,
[p]By guileful fair words peace may be
obtain'd.
[p]Awake, awake, English nobility!
[p]Let not sloth dim your
horrors new-begot:
[p]Cropp'd are the flower-de-luces in your
arms;
[p]Of England's coat one half is cut away.
Messenger : Lords, view these letters full of bad mischance.
[p]France is revolted
from the English quite,
[p]Except some petty towns of no
import:
[p]The Dauphin Charles is crowned king of Rheims;
[p]The
Bastard of Orleans with him is join'd;
[p]Reignier, Duke of Anjou,
doth take his part;
[p]The Duke of Alencon flieth to his side.
Messenger : My gracious lords, to add to your laments,
[p]Wherewith you now bedew
King Henry's hearse,
[p]I must inform you of a dismal fight
[p]Betwixt
the stout Lord Talbot and the French.
Messenger : O, no; wherein Lord Talbot was o'erthrown:
[p]The circumstance I'll
tell you more at large.
[p]The tenth of August last this dreadful
lord,
[p]Retiring from the siege of Orleans,
[p]Having full scarce six
thousand in his troop.
[p]By three and twenty thousand of the
French
[p]Was round encompassed and set upon.
[p]No leisure had he to
enrank his men;
[p]He wanted pikes to set before his
archers;
[p]Instead whereof sharp stakes pluck'd out of hedges
[p]They
pitched in the ground confusedly,
[p]To keep the horsemen off from
breaking in.
[p]More than three hours the fight continued;
[p]Where
valiant Talbot above human thought
[p]Enacted wonders with his sword
and lance:
[p]Hundreds he sent to hell, and none durst stand
him;
[p]Here, there, and every where, enraged he flew:
[p]The French
exclaim'd, the devil was in arms;
[p]All the whole army stood agazed
on him:
[p]His soldiers spying his undaunted spirit
[p]A Talbot! a
Talbot! cried out amain
[p]And rush'd into the bowels of the
battle.
[p]Here had the conquest fully been seal'd up,
[p]If Sir John
Fastolfe had not play'd the coward:
[p]He, being in the vaward, placed
behind
[p]With purpose to relieve and follow them,
[p]Cowardly fled,
not having struck one stroke.
[p]Hence grew the general wreck and
massacre;
[p]Enclosed were they with their enemies:
[p]A base Walloon,
to win the Dauphin's grace,
[p]Thrust Talbot with a spear into the
back,
[p]Whom all France with their chief assembled strength
[p]Durst
not presume to look once in the face.
Messenger : O no, he lives; but is took prisoner,
[p]And Lord Scales with him and
Lord Hungerford:
[p]Most of the rest slaughter'd or took likewise.
Messenger : So you had need; for Orleans is besieged;
[p]The English army is grown
weak and faint:
[p]The Earl of Salisbury craveth supply,
[p]And hardly
keeps his men from mutiny,
[p]Since they, so few, watch such a
multitude.
Next: Act 1 - Scene 2
