Page:Henry V (1918) Yale.djvu/121

Henry the Fifth, V. ii

Great Kings of France and England! That I have labour'd

With all my wits, my pains, and strong endeavours,

To bring your most imperial majesties

Unto this bar and royal interview,

Your mightiness on both parts best can witness.

Since then my office hath so far prevail'd

That face to face, and royal eye to eye,

You have congreeted, let it not disgrace me

If I demand before this royal view,

What rub or what impediment there is,

Why that the naked, poor, and mangled Peace,

Dear nurse of arts, plenties, and joyful births,

Should not in this best garden of the world,

Our fertile France, put up her lovely visage?

Alas! she hath from France too long been chas'd,

And all her husbandry doth lie on heaps,

Corrupting in it own fertility.

Her vine, the merry cheerer of the heart,

Unpruned dies; her hedges even-pleach'd,

Like prisoners wildly overgrown with hair,

Put forth disorder'd twigs; her fallow leas

The darnel, hemlock and rank fumitory

Doth root upon, while that the coulter rusts

That should deracinate such savagery;

The even mead, that erst brought sweetly forth

The freckled cowslip, burnet, and green clover,

Wanting the scythe, all uncorrected, rank,

Conceives by idleness, and nothing teems

But hateful docks, rough thistles, kecksies, burs,

 27 bar: barrier; place of meeting

31 congreeted: exchanged greetings

32 view: presence

40 it: its

42 even-pleach'd: evenly interwoven

44 leas: arable land

45 darnel: a weed injurious to crops

fumitory: a weed with a bitter taste

46 coulter: ploughshare

47 deracinate: uproot

52 kecksies: dry stalks 