The best known of Shakespeare’s allusions to England are no doubt those splendid outbursts of patriotism which occur in King John, and Richard II, and Henry V.  And of these the dying speech of John of Gaunt, in Richard II, is the deepest in feeling.  It is a lament upon the decay of England, ‘this dear, dear land’.  Since we began to be a nation we have always lamented our decay.  I am afraid that the Germans, whose self-esteem takes another form, were deceived by this.  To the right English temper all bragging is a thing of evil omen.  That temper is well expressed, where perhaps you would least expect to find it, in the speech of King Henry V to the French herald: 

                           To say the sooth,—­
  Though ’tis no wisdom to confess so much
  Unto an enemy of craft and vantage,—­
  My people are with sickness much enfeebled,
  My numbers lessened, and those few I have
  Almost no better than so many French;
  Who, when they were in health, I tell thee, herald,
  I thought upon one pair of English legs
  Did march three Frenchmen.  Yet, forgive me, God,
  That I do brag thus!  This your air of France
  Hath blown that vice in me; I must repent. 
  Go therefore, tell thy master here I am: 
  My ransom is this frail and worthless trunk;
  My army but a weak and sickly guard;
  Yet, God before, tell him we will come on,
  Though France himself and such another neighbour
  Stand in our way.  There’s for thy labour, Montjoy. 
  Go bid thy master well advise himself: 
  If we may pass, we will; if we be hindered,
  We shall your tawny ground with your red blood
  Discolour; and so, Montjoy, fare you well. 
  The sum of all our answer is but this: 
  We would not seek a battle as we are;
  Nor, as we are, we say we will not shun it;
  So tell your master.

That speech might have been written for the war which we are waging to-day against a less honourable enemy.  But, indeed, Shakespeare is full of prophecy.  Here is his description of the volunteers who flocked to the colours in the early days of the war: 

  Rash inconsiderate fiery voluntaries,
  With ladies’ faces and fierce dragons’ spleens,
  Have sold their fortunes at their native homes,
  Bearing their birthrights proudly on their backs,
  To make a hazard of new fortunes here. 
  In brief, a braver choice of dauntless spirits
  Than now the English bottoms have waft o’er
  Did never float upon the swelling tide.

And here is his sermon on national unity, preached by the Bishop of
Carlisle: 

  O, if you rear this house against this house,
  It will the woefullest division prove
  That ever fell upon this cursed earth. 
  Prevent it, resist it, let it not be so,
  Lest child, child’s children, cry against you ‘Woe!’

The patriotism of the women is described by the Bastard in King John: