| ACT III | PROLOGUE | |
| | Enter Chorus | |
| Chorus | Thus with imagined wing our swift scene flies | |
| | In motion of no less celerity | |
| | Than that of thought. Suppose that you have seen | |
| | The well-appointed king at Hampton pier | 5 |
| | Embark his royalty; and his brave fleet | |
| | With silken streamers the young Phoebus fanning: | |
| | Play with your fancies, and in them behold | |
| | Upon the hempen tackle ship-boys climbing; | |
| | Hear the shrill whistle which doth order give | 10 |
| | To sounds confused; behold the threaden sails, | |
| | Borne with the invisible and creeping wind, | |
| | Draw the huge bottoms through the furrow'd sea, | |
| | Breasting the lofty surge: O, do but think | |
| | You stand upon the ravage and behold | 15 |
| | A city on the inconstant billows dancing; | |
| | For so appears this fleet majestical, | |
| | Holding due course to Harfleur. Follow, follow: | |
| | Grapple your minds to sternage of this navy, | |
| | And leave your England, as dead midnight still, | 20 |
| | Guarded with grandsires, babies and old women, | |
| | Either past or not arrived to pith and puissance; | |
| | For who is he, whose chin is but enrich'd | |
| | With one appearing hair, that will not follow | |
| | These cull'd and choice-drawn cavaliers to France? | 25 |
| | Work, work your thoughts, and therein see a siege; | |
| | Behold the ordnance on their carriages, | |
| | With fatal mouths gaping on girded Harfleur. | |
| | Suppose the ambassador from the French comes back; | |
| | Tells Harry that the king doth offer him | 30 |
| | Katharine his daughter, and with her, to dowry, | |
| | Some petty and unprofitable dukedoms. | |
| | The offer likes not: and the nimble gunner | |
| | With linstock now the devilish cannon touches, | |
| | Alarum, and chambers go off. | |
| | And down goes all before them. Still be kind, | 35 |
| | And eke out our performance with your mind. | |
| | Exit. | |
| ACT III SCENE I | France. Before Harfleur. | |
| | Alarum. Enter KING HENRY, EXETER, BEDFORD, GLOUCESTER, and Soldiers, with scaling-ladders. | |
| KING HENRY V | Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more; | |
| | Or close the wall up with our English dead. | |
| | In peace there's nothing so becomes a man | 40 |
| | As modest stillness and humility: | |
| | But when the blast of war blows in our ears, | |
| | Then imitate the action of the tiger; | |
| | Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood, | |
| | Disguise fair nature with hard-favour'd rage; | 45 |
| | Then lend the eye a terrible aspect; | |
| | Let pry through the portage of the head | |
| | Like the brass cannon; let the brow o'erwhelm it | |
| | As fearfully as doth a galled rock | |
| | O'erhang and jutty his confounded base, | 50 |
| | Swill'd with the wild and wasteful ocean. | |
| | Now set the teeth and stretch the nostril wide, | |
| | Hold hard the breath and bend up every spirit | |
| | To his full height. On, on, you noblest English. | |
| | Whose blood is fet from fathers of war-proof! | 55 |
| | Fathers that, like so many Alexanders, | |
| | Have in these parts from morn till even fought | |
| | And sheathed their swords for lack of argument: | |
| | Dishonour not your mothers; now attest | |
| | That those whom you call'd fathers did beget you. | 60 |
| | Be copy now to men of grosser blood, | |
| | And teach them how to war. And you, good yeoman, | |
| | Whose limbs were made in England, show us here | |
| | The mettle of your pasture; let us swear | |
| | That you are worth your breeding; which I doubt not; | 65 |
| | For there is none of you so mean and base, | |
| | That hath not noble lustre in your eyes. | |
| | I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips, | |
| | Straining upon the start. The game's afoot: | |
| | Follow your spirit, and upon this charge | 70 |
| | Cry 'God for Harry, England, and Saint George!' | |
| | Exeunt. Alarum, and chambers go off. | |
