Shakespeare has put forth all his poetic strength in giving to Percy's speeches, and especially to his descriptions, the most graphic definiteness of detail, and a naturalness which raises into a higher sphere the racy audacity of Faulconbridge. Hotspur sets about explaining (i. 3) how it happened that he refused to hand over his prisoners to the King, and begins his defence by describing the courtier who demanded them of him:-- "When I was dry with rage and extreme toil, Breathless and faint, leaning upon my sword, Came there a certain lord, neat, trimly dress'd, Fresh as a bridegroom; and his chin, new reap'd, Show'd like a stubble-land at harvest-home. He was perfumed like a milliner." But he is not content with a general outline, or with relating what this personage said with regard to the prisoners; he gives an example even of his talk:-- "He made me mad, To see him shine so brisk, and smell so sweet, And talk so like a waiting-gentlewoman Of guns, and drums, and wounds, God save the mark! And telling me, the sovereign'st thing on earth Was parmacity for an inward bruise; And that it was great pity, so it was, That villainous saltpetre should be digg'd Out of the bowels of the harmless earth." Why this spermaceti? Why this dwelling upon so trivial and ludicrous a detail? Because it is a touch of reality and begets illusion. Precisely because we cannot at first see the reason why Percy should recall so trilling a circumstance, it seems impossible that the thing should be a mere invention. And from this insignificant word all the rest of the speech hangs as by a chain. If this be real, then all the rest is real, and Henry Percy stands before our eyes, covered with dust and blood, as on the field of Holmedon. We see the courtier at his side holding his nose as the bodies are carried past, and we hear him giving the young commander his medical advice and irritating him to the verge of frenzy.