Before Orleans.
 Enter a French SERGEANT with two SENTINELS, on the walls.

Sergeant	Sirs, take your places and be vigilant.
	If any noise or soldier you perceive
	Near to the walls, by some apparent sign
	Let us have knowledge at the court of guard.

1st Sentinel	Sergeant, you shall.
													[Exit SERGEANT.
							Thus are poor servitors,
	When others sleep upon their quiet beds,
	Constrained to watch in darkness, rain, and cold.

    Enter TALBOT, BEDFORD, BURGUNDY, and FORCES, with scaling-ladders;
                    their drums beating a dead march.

Talbot	Lord Regent, and redoubted Burgundy,
	By whose approach the regions of Artois,
	Walloon, and Picardy, are friends to us,
	This happy night the Frenchmen are secure,
	Having all day caroused and banqueted:
	Embrace we then this opportunity,
	As fitting best to quittance their deceit,
	Contrived by art and baleful sorcery.

Bedford	Coward of France! How much he wrongs his fame,
	Despairing of his own arm's fortitude,
	To join with witches and the help of hell!

Burgundy	Traitors have never other company.
	But what's that Pucelle whom they term so pure?

Talbot	A maid, they say.

Bedford						A maid! - and be so martial?

Burgundy	Pray God she prove not masculine ere long,
	If underneath the standard of the French
	She carry armour as she hath begun.

Talbot	Well, let them practise and converse with spirits;
	God is our fortress, in whose conquering name
	Let us resolve to scale their flinty bulwarks.

Bedford	Ascend, brave Talbot; we will follow thee.

Talbot	Not all together! Better far, I guess,
	That we do make our entrance several ways,
	That if it chance the one of us do fall,
	The other yet may rise against their force.

Bedford	Agreed. I'll to yon corner.

Burgundy									And I to this.

Talbot	And here will Talbot mount, or make his grave.
	Now, Salisbury, for thee, and for the right
	Of English Henry, shall this night appear
	How much in duty I am bound to both.
								  [The ENGLISH scale the walls and
									  cry "Saint George! A Talbot!"

1st Sentinel	Arm, arm! The enemy doth make assault.

                    The ENGLISH exeunt into the town.
       The FRENCH leap over the walls in their shirts, and exeunt.
         Enter, several ways, the BASTARD, ALENON, and REIGNIER,
                       half ready and half unready.

Alenon	How now, my lords! What, all unready so?

Bastard	Unready? Ay, and glad we 'scaped so well.

Reignier	'Twas time, I trow, to wake and leave our beds,
	Hearing alarums at our chamber-doors.

Alenon	Of all exploits since first I followed arms,
	Ne'er heard I of a warlike enterprise
	More venturous or desperate than this.

Bastard	I think this Talbot be a fiend of hell.

Reignier	If not of hell, the heavens sure favour him.

Alenon	Here cometh Charles: I marvel how he sped.

                    Enter CHARLES and JOAN LA PUCELLE.

Bastard	Tut, holy Joan was his defensive guard.

Charles	Is this thy cunning, thou deceitful dame?
	Didst thou at first, to flatter us withal,
	Make us partakers of a little gain,
	That now our loss might be ten times so much?

La Pucelle	Wherefore is Charles impatient with his friend?
	At all times will you have my power alike?
	Sleeping or waking must I still prevail,
	Or will you blame and lay the fault on me?
	Improvident soldiers! Had your watch been good
	This sudden mischief never could have fallen.

Charles	Duke of Alenon, this was your default,
	That, being captain of the watch tonight,
	Did look no better to that weighty charge.

Alenon	Had all your quarters been as safely kept
	As that whereof I had the government,
	We had not been thus shamefully surprised.

Bastard	Mine was secure.

Reignier						And so was mine, my lord.

Charles	And for myself, most part of all this night,
	Within her quarter and mine own precinct
	I was employed in passing to and fro,
	About relieving of the sentinels.
	Then how or which way should they first break in?

La Pucelle	Question, my lords, no further of the case,
	How or which way: 'tis sure they found some place
	But weakly guarded, where the breach was made.
	And now there rests no other shift but this:
	To gather our soldiers, scattered and dispersed,
	And lay new platforms to endamage them.

      Alarum. Enter an English SOLDIER crying "A Talbot, A Talbot!"
              The FRENCH fly, leaving their clothes behind.

Soldier	I'll be so bold to take what they have left.
	The cry of 'Talbot' serves me for a sword;
	For I have loaden me with many spoils,
	Using no other weapon but his name.
													[Exit.
