Act 4, Scene 2

Before Bordeaux.

[Enter Talbot, with trump and drum.]
Lord Talbot
1782 Go to the gates of Bordeaux, trumpeter:
1783 Summon their general unto the wall.
[Trumpet sounds. Enter General and others, aloft.]
Lord Talbot
1784 English John Talbot, Captains, calls you forth,
1785 Servant in arms to Harry King of England;
1786 And thus he would: Open your city-gates,
1787 Be humble to us; call my sovereign yours,
1788 And do him homage as obedient subjects;
1789 And I 'll withdraw me and my bloody power:
1790 But, if you frown upon this proffer'd peace,
1791 You tempt the fury of my three attendants,
1792 Lean famine, quartering steel, and climbing fire;
1793 Who in a moment even with the earth
1794 Shall lay your stately and air-braving towers,
1795 If you forsake the offer of their love.
French General
1796 Thou ominous and fearful owl of death,
1797 Our nation's terror and their bloody scourge!
1798 The period of thy tyranny approacheth.
1799 On us thou canst not enter but by death;
1800 For, I protest, we are well fortified
1801 And strong enough to issue out and fight:
1802 If thou retire, the Dauphin, well appointed,
1803 Stands with the snares of war to tangle thee:
1804 On either hand thee there are squadrons pitch'd
1805 To wall thee from the liberty of flight;
1806 And no way canst thou turn thee for redress,
1807 But death doth front thee with apparent spoil,
1808 And pale destruction meets thee in the face.
1809 Ten thousand French have ta'en the sacrament
1810 To rive their dangerous artillery
1811 Upon no Christian soul but English Talbot.
1812 Lo, there thou stand'st, a breathing valiant man,
1813 Of an invincible unconquer'd spirit!
1814 This is the latest glory of thy praise
1815 That I, thy enemy, due thee withal;
1816 For ere the glass, that now begins to run,
1817 Finish the process of his sandy hour,
1818 These eyes, that see thee now well colored,
1819 Shall see thee wither'd, bloody, pale, and dead.
[Drum afar off.]
French General
1820 Hark! hark! the Dauphin's drum, a warning bell,
1821 Sings heavy music to thy timorous soul;
1822 And mine shall ring thy dire departure out.
[Exeunt General, etc.]
Lord Talbot
1823 He fables not; I hear the enemy:
1824 Out, some light horsemen, and peruse their wings.
1825 O, negligent and heedless discipline!
1826 How are we park'd and bounded in a pale,
1827 A little herd of England's timorous deer,
1828 Mazed with a yelping kennel of French curs!
1829 If we be English deer, be then in blood;
1830 Not rascal-like, to fall down with a pinch,
1831 But rather, moody-mad and desperate stags,
1832 Turn on the bloody hounds with heads of steel
1833 And make the cowards stand aloof at bay:
1834 Sell every man his life as dear as mine,
1835 And they shall find dear deer of us, my friends.
1836 God and Saint George, Talbot and England's right,
1837 Prosper our colors in this dangerous fight!
[Exeunt.]

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Notes

TLN 1791rhetorical device
“fury of my three attendants, Lean famine, quartering steel”
Talbot personifies the three horrors of a siege — starvation, the sword, and fire — as his 'attendants,' turning abstract consequences into menacing companions he commands. The device is personification combined with a tricolon (a list of three), a standard tool of classical rhetoric meant to hammer the threat home.
TLN 1796cultural context
“Thou ominous and fearful owl of death”
The French General calls Talbot an 'owl of death.' In Elizabethan belief the owl's screech at night was a portent of death — its cry was thought to precede or announce a killing. Calling Talbot an owl is the General's backhanded acknowledgment of the terror he brings: every English approach has meant death for France.
TLN 1809historical topical
“Ten thousand French have ta'en the sacrament To rive their dangerous artillery”
To 'take the sacrament' on an oath was to swear before God on the consecrated bread and wine of the Eucharist — the holiest, most binding pledge a Christian could make. The French General says ten thousand soldiers have sworn this oath dedicating their guns exclusively to killing Talbot, which explains why the siege scene becomes so personal: Talbot himself is the declared target of a mass religious vow.
historical John Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury
TLN 1816archaic vocab
“ere the glass, that now begins to run, Finish the process of his sandy hour”
The General predicts that Talbot will be dead before a single hourglass runs out. 'The glass' is an hourglass, and 'his sandy hour' is the span of time measured by its sand. The image presses the point cruelly: the surrounded English army's destruction is not a matter of days but of minutes — one hourglass-turn.
TLN 1826rhetorical device
“park'd and bounded in a pale, A little herd of England's timorous deer”
Talbot extends a hunting metaphor across ten lines to rally his surrounded men. 'Park'd' means penned inside a deer-park; 'pale' is the fence enclosing it; 'rascal' is a technical hunting term for a lean, inferior deer unfit to be hunted — Talbot urges his men not to be like 'rascals' that collapse at a mere pinch, but like full-blooded stags who turn on the hounds. The final line pays the pun off: 'dear deer of us' plays on dear (costly, beloved) and deer (the animal).
TLN 1836historical topical
“God and Saint George, Talbot and England's right”
Saint George was England's patron saint, and 'Saint George for England!' was the standard English battle cry. Coupling his name with God's was the highest invocation an English soldier could make before fighting. Talbot places his own name and 'England's right' — the legitimacy of the English claim to France — in the same breath, presenting the coming battle as both a holy cause and a personal matter of honor.
historical The Order of the Garterhistorical John Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury