Nor does the dramatist imply dissent from the
French marshal's suggestion that Englishmen's great meals of beef
impair the efficiency of their intellectual armour. The point of the
reproof is not blunted by the subsequent admission of a French critic
in the same scene to the effect that, however robustious and rough in
manner Englishmen may be, they have the unmatchable courage of the
English breed of mastiffs. To credit men with the highest virtues of
which dogs are capable is a grudging compliment.
V
To sum up. The Shakespearean drama enjoins those who love their
country wisely to neglect no advantage that nature offers in the way
of resisting unjust demands upon it; to remember that her prosperity
depends on her command of the sea,--of "the silver sea, which serves
it in the office of a wall, or as a moat defensive to a house, against
the envy of less happier lands"; to hold firm in the memory "the dear
souls" who have made "her reputation through the world"; to subject at
need her faults and frailties to criticism and rebuke; and finally to
treat with disdain those in places of power, who make of no account
their responsibilities to the past as well as to the present and the
future.
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