Enter three soldiers: John Bates, Alexander Court, and Michael Williams.
Court. Brother John Bates, is not that the
morning which breaks yonder? 89
Bates. I think it be; but we have no great
cause to desire the approach of day.
Will. We see yonder the beginning of the
day, but I think we shall never see the end of
it. Who goes there?
K. Hen. A friend.
Will. Under what captain serve you? 96
K. Hen. Under Sir Thomas Erpingham.
Will. A good old commander and a most
kind gentleman: I pray you, what thinks he of
our estate? 100
K. Hen. Even as men wrecked upon a sand,
that look to be washed off the next tide.
Bates. He hath not told his thought to the
king? 104
K. Hen. No; nor it is not meet he should.
For, though I speak it to you, I think the king
is but a man, as I am: the violet smells to him
as it doth to me; the element shows to him as
it doth to me; all his senses have but human
conditions: his ceremonies laid by, in his naked-
ness he appears but a man; and though his ill
affections are higher mounted than ours, yet
when they stoop, they stoop with the like wing.
Therefore when he sees reason of fears, as we do,
his fears, out of doubt, be of the same relish as
100 estate: position
101 sand: sand-bank
108 element: sky
shows: appears
110 ceremonies: marks of office
113 stoop: term of falconry, used of the hawk descending on its prey
115 relish: flavor
