Page:Henry V (1918) Yale.djvu/23

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Henry the Fifth, I. ii
11

With all advantages.

Cant. They of those marches, gracious sovereign, 140
Shall be a wall sufficient to defend
Our inland from the pilfering borderers.

K. Hen. We do not mean the coursing snatchers only,
But fear the main intendment of the Scot, 144
Who hath been still a giddy neighbour to us;
For you shall read that my great-grandfather
Never went with his forces into France
But that the Scot on his unfurnish'd kingdom
Came pouring, like the tide into a breach, 149
With ample and brim fulness of his force,
Galling the gleaned land with hot assays,
Girding with grievous siege castles and towns;
That England, being empty of defence, 153
Hath shook and trembled at the ill neighbourhood.

Cant. She hath been then more fear'd than harm'd, my liege;
For hear her but exampled by herself: 156
When all her chivalry hath been in France
And she a mourning widow of her nobles,
She hath herself not only well defended,
But taken and impounded as a stray 160
The King of Scots; whom she did send to France,
To fill King Edward's fame with prisoner kings,
And make your chronicle as rich with praise
As is the ooze and bottom of the sea 164
With sunken wrack and sumless treasuries.

West. But there's a saying very old and true;

140 marches: borders
143 coursing snatchers: marauding pilferers
144 intendment: intention
145 still: always
giddy: unstable
148 unfurnish'd: undefended
151 assays: attacks
155 fear'd: frightened
160 impounded: imprisoned; cf. n.
165 wrack: wreckage