William Shakespeare: The Life of King Henry V

ACT FOURTH. 1. SCENE I. The English camp at Agincourt. (continued)

WILLIAMS.
'Tis certain, every man that dies ill, the ill upon his own head,
the King is not to answer for it.

BATES.
I do not desire he should answer for me; and yet I determine to
fight lustily for him.

KING HENRY.
I myself heard the King say he would not be ransom'd.

WILLIAMS.
Ay, he said so, to make us fight cheerfully; but when our
throats are cut, he may be ransom'd, and we ne'er the wiser.

KING HENRY.
If I live to see it, I will never trust his word after.

WILLIAMS.
You pay him then. That's a perilous shot out of an elder-gun,
that a poor and a private displeasure can do against a monarch!
You may as well go about to turn the sun to ice with fanning in
his face with a peacock's feather. You'll never trust his word
after! Come, 'tis a foolish saying.

KING HENRY.
Your reproof is something too round. I should be angry with
you, if the time were convenient.

WILLIAMS.
Let it be a quarrel between us if you live.

KING HENRY.
I embrace it.

WILLIAMS.
How shall I know thee again?

KING HENRY.
Give me any gage of thine, and I will wear it in my bonnet;
then, if ever thou dar'st acknowledge it, I will make it my
quarrel.

WILLIAMS.
Here's my glove; give me another of thine.

KING HENRY.
There.

WILLIAMS.
This will I also wear in my cap. If ever thou come to me
and say, after to-morrow, "This is my glove," by this hand I
will take thee a box on the ear.

KING HENRY.
If ever I live to see it, I will challenge it.