The king falls sick immediately after his victory at Shrewsbury, and is afflicted by spectres of Conscience and Death. He commands
'some that attending were
To fetch the crowne and set it in his sight;
On which with fixed eye and heauie cheere
Casting a looke, O God, sayeth he, what right
I had to thee my soule doth now conceiue,—
Thee which with blood I got, with horror leave.'
Horror so overwhelms the king that he swoons—
'When loe his Sonne comes in and takes away
The fatall crowne from thence and out he goes
As if unwilling longer time to lose.'
The king revives, summons the prince, and says:
'O sonne, what needes thee make such speed
Vnto that care where feare exceedes thy right,
And when his sinne whom thou shalt now succeed
Shall still upbraide thy inheritance of might?
And if thou canst liue, and liue great, from woe,
Without this carefull trauaille, let it goe.'
The prince replies:
'What wrong hath not continuance quite outworne?
Yeeres make that right which neuer was so borne.'
The king dies praying that virtuous deeds and the holy wars of his son may atone for his own sins.
The Famous Victories of Henry V
In this crude play Prince Hal is twice committed to prison, once by the Lord Mayor for rioting in the streets after a merry evening at the tavern in Eastcheap, and once by the Lord Chief Justice for giving him 'a box on the ear' upon his refusal to pardon one of the prince's companions who has been convicted of highway robbery.
