#ASonnetADay – 91. “Some glory in their birth, some in their skill…”

4 Comments

1. Semper Gumby says:

   16 November 2020 at 11:12 AM

   Thank you Fr. Z, this sonnet refreshingly returns to the Good, the True, and the Beautiful.

   Though, here at Chuck Norris Hall we also enjoy our crenellated battlements, chapel, huge glass windows to survey the realm, and a library filled floor to ceiling with books on falconry.
2. Fr. John Zuhlsdorf says:

   16 November 2020 at 1:36 PM

   From Henry V:
   ACT IV SCENE VII. The French camp, near Agincourt:
   Enter the Constable of France, the LORD RAMBURES, ORLEANS, DAUPHIN, with others
   Constable
   Tut! I have the best armour of the world. Would it were day!
   ORLEANS
   You have an excellent armour; but let my horse have his due.
   Constable
   It is the best horse of Europe.
   ORLEANS
   Will it never be morning?
   DAUPHIN
   My lord of Orleans, and my lord high constable, you
   talk of horse and armour?
   ORLEANS
   You are as well provided of both as any prince in the world.
   DAUPHIN
   What a long night is this! I will not change my
   horse with any that treads but on four pasterns.
   Ca, ha! he bounds from the earth, as if his
   entrails were hairs; le cheval volant, the Pegasus,
   chez les narines de feu! When I bestride him, I
   soar, I am a hawk: he trots the air; the earth
   sings when he touches it; the basest horn of his
   hoof is more musical than the pipe of Hermes.
   ORLEANS
   He’s of the colour of the nutmeg.
   DAUPHIN
   And of the heat of the ginger. It is a beast for
   Perseus: he is pure air and fire; and the dull
   elements of earth and water never appear in him, but
   only in Patient stillness while his rider mounts
   him: he is indeed a horse; and all other jades you
   may call beasts.
   Constable
   Indeed, my lord, it is a most absolute and excellent horse.
   DAUPHIN
   It is the prince of palfreys; his neigh is like the
   bidding of a monarch and his countenance enforces homage.
   ORLEANS
   No more, cousin.
   DAUPHIN
   Nay, the man hath no wit that cannot, from the
   rising of the lark to the lodging of the lamb, vary
   deserved praise on my palfrey: it is a theme as
   fluent as the sea: turn the sands into eloquent
   tongues, and my horse is argument for them all:
   ’tis a subject for a sovereign to reason on, and for
   a sovereign’s sovereign to ride on; and for the
   world, familiar to us and unknown to lay apart
   their particular functions and wonder at him. I
   once writ a sonnet in his praise and began thus:
   ‘Wonder of nature,’–
   ORLEANS
   I have heard a sonnet begin so to one’s mistress.
   DAUPHIN
   Then did they imitate that which I composed to my
   courser, for my horse is my mistress.
   ORLEANS
   Your mistress bears well.
   DAUPHIN
   Me well; which is the prescript praise and
   perfection of a good and particular mistress.
   Constable
   Nay, for methought yesterday your mistress shrewdly
   shook your back.
   DAUPHIN
   So perhaps did yours.
   Constable
   Mine was not bridled.
   DAUPHIN
   O then belike she was old and gentle; and you rode,
   like a kern of Ireland, your French hose off, and in
   your straight strossers.
   Constable
   You have good judgment in horsemanship.
   DAUPHIN
   Be warned by me, then: they that ride so and ride
   not warily, fall into foul bogs. I had rather have
   my horse to my mistress.
   Constable
   I had as lief have my mistress a jade.
   DAUPHIN
   I tell thee, constable, my mistress wears his own hair.
   Constable
   I could make as true a boast as that, if I had a sow
   to my mistress.
   DAUPHIN
   ‘Le chien est retourne a son propre vomissement, et
   la truie lavee au bourbier;’ thou makest use of any thing.
   Constable
   Yet do I not use my horse for my mistress, or any
   such proverb so little kin to the purpose.
   RAMBURES
   My lord constable, the armour that I saw in your tent
   to-night, are those stars or suns upon it?
   Constable
   Stars, my lord.
   DAUPHIN
   Some of them will fall to-morrow, I hope.
   Constable
   And yet my sky shall not want.
   DAUPHIN
   That may be, for you bear a many superfluously, and
   ’twere more honour some were away.
   Constable
   Even as your horse bears your praises; who would
   trot as well, were some of your brags dismounted.
   DAUPHIN
   Would I were able to load him with his desert! Will
   it never be day? I will trot to-morrow a mile, and
   my way shall be paved with English faces.
   Constable
   I will not say so, for fear I should be faced out of
   my way: but I would it were morning; for I would
   fain be about the ears of the English.
   RAMBURES
   Who will go to hazard with me for twenty prisoners?
   Constable
   You must first go yourself to hazard, ere you have them.
   DAUPHIN
   ‘Tis midnight; I’ll go arm myself.
   Exit
3. Semper Gumby says:

   17 November 2020 at 2:07 PM

   CONSTABLE. Then shall we find to-morrow they have only stomachs
   to eat, and none to fight. Now is it time to arm. Come, shall we
   about it?

   ORLEANS. It is now two o’clock; but let me see- by ten
   We shall have each a hundred Englishmen.

   End Act III, Scene 7.

   Act IV Prologue

   Chorus:

   Proud of their numbers and secure in soul,
   The confident and over-lusty French

   …

   The poor condemned English,
   Like sacrifices, by their watchful fires
   Sit patiently and inly ruminate
   The morning’s danger; and their gesture sad
   Investing lank-lean cheeks and war-worn coats
   Presenteth them unto the gazing moon
   So many horrid ghosts. O, now, who will behold
   The royal captain of this ruin’d band
   Walking from watch to watch, from tent to tent,
   Let him cry ‘Praise and glory on his head!’
   For forth he goes and visits all his host;
   Bids them good morrow with a modest smile,
   And calls them brothers, friends, and countrymen.
   Upon his royal face there is no note
   How dread an army hath enrounded him.
4. Fr. John Zuhlsdorf says:

   17 November 2020 at 2:10 PM

   […]

   With cheerful semblance and sweet majesty;
   That every wretch, pining and pale before,
   Beholding him, plucks comfort from his looks:
   A largess universal like the sun
   His liberal eye doth give to every one,
   Thawing cold fear, that mean and gentle all,
   Behold, as may unworthiness define,
   A little touch of Harry in the night.

   […]

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