HENRY V A monologue from the play by William Shakespeare BERGUNDY: My duty to you both, on equal love, Great Kings of France and England! That I have labored With all my wits, my pains, and strong endeavors 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 prevailed 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 chased, And all her husbandry doth lie in heaps, Corrupting in it own fertility. Her vine, the merry cheerer of the heart, Unprunèd dies; her hedge even-pleached, Like prisoners wildly overgrown with hair, Put forth disordered 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, burrs, Losing both beauty and utility. And all our vineyards, fallows, meads, and hedges, Defective in their natures, grow to wildness. Even so our houses and ourselves and children Have lost, or do not learn for want of time, The sciences that should become our country; But grow like savages, as soldiers will, That nothing do but meditate on blood, To swearing and stern looks, diffused attire, And everything that seems unnatural. Which to reduce into our former favor You are assembled; and my speech entreats That I may know the let why gentle Peace Should not expel these inconveniences And bless us with her former qualities. Purchase this play! MORE MONOLOGUES BY WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

RELATED LINKS: Biographical aspects of the Sonnets - Examines the worth of Shakespeare's sonnets in piecing together clues as to the nature of his romantic life. Doubtful Plays of Shakespeare - Analysis of evidence supporting the claim of Shakespearean authorship of several questionable Elizabethan plays. Greene's Jealousy of Shakespeare - As early as 1592, Shakespeare's dramatic work had excited the envy and indignation of his contemporaries, including the accomplished scholar and dramatist, Robert Greene. His Family and Education - Available biographical details of Shakespeare's early life. His Marriage and Relations with his Wife - Known facts of Shakespeare's relationship with Anne Hathaway. Shakespeare Index - An index of articles on to the Elizabethan dramatist. The Shakespeare-Bacon Theory - Analysis of the theory that the plays of William Shakespeare were not written by the man whose biography we are familiar with, but rather under pseudonym by Lord Chancellor Francis Bacon. Shakespeare Monologues - More monologues by William Shakespeare. Shakespeare's Coined Words - A study of words coined by Shakespeare which either have been, or deserve to be, adopted into common usage. Shakespeare: Sonnets - An index of poems by William Shakespeare. William Shakespeare - A biography. William Shakespeare - A biography. Purchase books by William Shakespeare Search eBay! or Abebooks for more books by William Shakespeare. Find more articles on SHAKESPEARE:

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