Act 1, Scene 4

Orleans.

[Enter, on the walls, a Master Gunner and his Boy.]
Master Gunner of Orleans
428 Sirrah, thou know'st how Orleans is besieged,
429 And how the English have the suburbs won.
Gunner's Boy
430 Father, I know; and oft have shot at them,
431 Howe'er unfortunate I miss'd my aim.
Master Gunner of Orleans
432 But now thou shalt not. Be thou ruled by me:
433 Chief master-gunner am I of this town;
434 Something I must do to procure me grace.
435 The prince's espials have informed me
436 How the English, in the suburbs close intrench'd,
437 Wont through a secret grate of iron bars
438 In yonder tower to overpeer the city,
439 And thence discover how with most advantage
440 They may vex us with shot or with assault.
441 To intercept this inconvenience,
442 A piece of ordnance 'gainst it I have placed;
443 And even these three days have I watch'd,
444 If I could see them.
445 Now do thou watch, for I can stay no longer.
446 If thou spy'st any, run and bring me word;
447 And thou shalt find me at the governor's.
[Exit.]
Gunner's Boy
448 Father, I warrant you; take you no care;
449 I'll never trouble you, if I may spy them.
[Exit.]
[Enter, on the turrets, the Lords Salisbury and Talbot, Sir William Glansdale, Sir Thomas Gargrave, and others.]
Earl of Salisbury
450 Talbot, my life, my joy, again return'd!
451 How wert thou handled being prisoner?
452 Or by what means got'st thou to be releas'd?
453 Discourse, I prithee, on this turret's top.
Lord Talbot
454 The Duke of Bedford had a prisoner
455 Call'd the brave Lord Ponton de Santrailles;
456 For him was I exchanged and ransomed.
457 But with a baser man of arms by far
458 Once in contempt they would have barter'd me:
459 Which I disdaining scorn'd, and craved death
460 Rather than I would be so vile-esteem'd.
461 In fine, redeem'd I was as I desired.
462 But, O! the treacherous Fastolfe wounds my heart,
463 Whom with my bare fists I would execute,
464 If I now had him brought into my power.
Earl of Salisbury
465 Yet tell'st thou not how thou wert entertain'd.
Lord Talbot
466 With scoffs and scorns and contumelious taunts.
467 In open market-place produced they me,
468 To be a public spectacle to all:
469 Here, said they, is the terror of the French,
470 The scarecrow that affrights our children so.
471 Then broke I from the officers that led me,
472 And with my nails digg'd stones out of the ground
473 To hurl at the beholders of my shame;
474 My grisly countenance made others fly;
475 None durst come near for fear of sudden death.
476 In iron walls they deem'd me not secure;
477 So great fear of my name 'mongst them was spread
478 That they supposed I could rend bars of steel,
479 And spurn in pieces posts of adamant:
480 Wherefore a guard of chosen shot I had,
481 That walk'd about me every minute while;
482 And if I did but stir out of my bed,
483 Ready they were to shoot me to the heart.
[Enter the Boy with a linstock.]
Earl of Salisbury
484 I grieve to hear what torments you endured,
485 But we will be revenged sufficiently.
486 Now it is supper-time in Orleans:
487 Here, through this grate, I count each one,
488 And view the Frenchmen how they fortify:
489 Let us look in; the sight will much delight thee.
490 Sir Thomas Gargrave and Sir William Glansdale,
491 Let me have your express opinions
492 Where is best place to make our battery next.
Sir Thomas Gargrave
493 I think, at the north gate; for there stand lords.
Sir William Glansdale
494 And I, here, at the bulwark of the bridge.
Lord Talbot
495 For aught I see, this city must be famish'd,
496 Or with light skirmishes enfeebled.
[Here they shoot. Salisbury and Gargrave fall.]
Earl of Salisbury
497 O Lord, have mercy on us, wretched sinners!
Sir Thomas Gargrave
498 O Lord, have mercy on me, woful man!
Lord Talbot
499 What chance is this that suddenly hath cross'd us?
500 Speak, Salisbury: at least, if thou canst speak:
501 How farest thou, mirror of all martial men?
502 One of thy eyes and thy cheek's side struck off!
503 Accursed tower! accursed fatal hand
504 That hath contrived this woful tragedy!
505 In thirteen battles Salisbury o'ercame;
506 Henry the Fifth he first train'd to the wars;
507 Whilst any trump did sound, or drum struck up,
508 His sword did ne'er leave striking in the field.
509 Yet liv'st thou, Salisbury? though thy speech doth fail,
510 One eye thou hast, to look to heaven for grace:
511 The sun with one eye vieweth all the world.
512 Heaven, be thou gracious to none alive,
513 If Salisbury wants mercy at thy hands!
514 Bear hence his body; I will help to bury it,
515 Sir Thomas Gargrave, hast thou any life?
516 Speak unto Talbot; nay, look up to him.
517 Salisbury, cheer thy spirit with this comfort,
518 Thou shalt not die whiles—
519 He beckons with his hand and smiles on me,
520 As who should say 'When I am dead and gone,
521 Remember to avenge me on the French.'
522 Plantagenet, I will; and like thee, Nero,
523 Play on the lute, beholding the towns burn;
524 Wretched shall France be only in thy name.
[Here an alarum, and it thunders and lightens.]
Lord Talbot
525 What stir is this? what tumult's in the heavens?
526 Whence cometh this alarum and the noise?
[Enter a Messenger.]
Messenger
527 My lord, my lord, the French have gather'd head:
528 The Dauphin, with one Joan la Pucelle join'd,
529 A holy prophetess new risen up,
530 Is come with a great power to raise the siege.
[Here SALISBURY lifteth himself up and groans.]
Lord Talbot
531 Hear, hear how dying Salisbury doth groan!
532 It irks his heart he cannot be revenged.
533 Frenchmen, I 'll be a Salisbury to you:
534 Pucelle or puzzel, dolphin or dogfish,
535 Your hearts I 'll stamp out with my horse's heels,
536 And make a quagmire of your mingled brains.
537 Convey me Salisbury into his tent,
538 And then we 'll try what these dastard Frenchmen dare.
[Alarum. Exeunt.]

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Notes

TLN 435archaic vocab
“The prince's espials have informed me”
'Espials' means spies or scouts — agents sent ahead to watch the enemy and report back. The Master Gunner has learned the English reconnaissance habit from French agents working for 'the prince' (the Dauphin).
TLN 437archaic vocab
“Wont through a secret grate of iron bars”
'Wont' here is an adjective meaning 'accustomed to': the English are in the habit of passing through a hidden iron-barred window in the tower to spy down on the city. The Master Gunner has aimed a cannon at that opening.
TLN 442archaic vocab
“A piece of ordnance 'gainst it I have placed”
A 'piece of ordnance' is a cannon. 'Ordnance' (sometimes spelled 'ordinance' in period texts) was the general term for artillery — large guns mounted on carriages. The Master Gunner has trained a cannon directly at the grated window.
historical The Siege of Orleans
TLN 454historical topical
“The Duke of Bedford had a prisoner Call'd the brave Lord Ponton de Santrailles; For him was I exchanged and ransomed.”
Capturing and ransoming prisoners of war was a normal and profitable business in fifteenth-century warfare. A captured nobleman was worth his weight in money: his captors negotiated a cash payment or a prisoner-swap before releasing him. Here Talbot was freed through an exchange — the English returned the French lord Ponton de Santrailles in return for Talbot. Jean Poton de Xaintrailles was a real French captain, companion to Joan of Arc.
historical John Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury
TLN 467historical topical
“In open market-place produced they me, To be a public spectacle to all”
Talbot describes being paraded through a market square so crowds could mock him. Public humiliation of captive enemies was a deliberate act of psychological warfare in medieval practice: displaying the 'terror of the French' as a helpless prisoner was meant to break French morale and break Talbot's. The crowd jeers that he is merely 'the scarecrow that affrights our children.'
historical John Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury
TLN 478archaic vocab
“rend bars of steel, And spurn in pieces posts of adamant”
'Adamant' was the hardest substance imaginable — a legendary material (the word covers both the hardest stone and, later, the hardest metal) thought to be unbreakable by any force. To say the French feared Talbot could shatter posts of adamant is to say his strength was believed to be superhuman. 'Spurn' means kick or strike with the foot.
TLN 480archaic vocab
“a guard of chosen shot I had”
'Shot' here is a collective noun for soldiers armed with firearms or crossbows — marksmen. A 'guard of chosen shot' means a handpicked unit of sharpshooters posted around Talbot's cell, ready to shoot him the instant he stirred.
TLN 501rhetorical device
“mirror of all martial men”
Talbot calls the wounded Salisbury 'mirror of all martial men' — meaning the perfect model or embodiment of a soldier, a man others should look to as a reflection of what a warrior ought to be. 'Mirror' in this sense meant an exemplary standard, not a looking-glass.
historical John Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury
TLN 505historical topical
“In thirteen battles Salisbury o'ercame; Henry the Fifth he first train'd to the wars”
Talbot's eulogy credits Salisbury with thirteen military victories and with being the first to bring Henry V into active warfare — an honor that frames Salisbury as the link between the great conquering king and the current, faltering campaign. The historical Thomas Montagu, 4th Earl of Salisbury, was one of England's foremost commanders under Henry V and in the early French wars of Henry VI.
historical The Siege of Orleans
TLN 522classical allusion
“like thee, Nero, Play on the lute, beholding the towns burn”
Talbot vows to watch French towns burn while playing music — invoking the Roman emperor Nero, who was notorious for supposedly playing his lyre and singing while Rome burned in the great fire of 64 CE. Talbot turns a symbol of monstrous indifference into a promise of cold revenge: he will be as remorseless as Nero, but his fire will consume France.
classical Nero, the emperor who killed his mother
TLN 534wordplay
“Pucelle or puzzel, dolphin or dogfish”
Talbot fires off a contemptuous pun on each French name. 'Pucelle' (the Maid, Joan's title) sounds like 'puzzel,' a vulgar Elizabethan word for a slut or drab. 'Dolphin' (the English spelling of 'Dauphin,' heir to the French throne) is punned down to 'dogfish' — a small, scavenging shark, the least impressive of fish. Both insults deny any dignity to France's champions.
historical Joan la Pucelle (Joan of Arc)