25th October

It's the 25^th of October today.

What's so special about today?

This is what Shakespeare said in this speech by King Henry V before the Battle of Agincourt:

This day is called the Feast of Crispian.

He that outlives this day and comes safe home

Will stand a-tiptoe when this day is named

And rouse him at the name of Crispian.

He that shall see this day and live t' old age

Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours

And say, "Tomorrow is Saint Crispian."

Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars

And say, "These wounds I had on Crispin's day."

Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,

But he'll remember, with advantages

What feats he did that day. Then shall our names,

Familiar in his mouth as household words —

Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter,

Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester —

Be in their flowing cups freshly remembered.

This story shall the good man teach his son,

And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by

From this day to the ending of the world,

But we in it shall be remembered,

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers.

For he today that sheds his blood with me

Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,

This day shall gentle his condition.

And gentlemen in England now abed

Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,

And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks

That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's Day.

Laurence Olivier, later Sir Laurence and then Lord Olivier,

in the 1944 film version of Shakespeare's Henry V

It's a little known fact (well, at least I didn't know till I wrote this!) that the Charge of the Light Brigade during the Battle of Balaclava in the Crimean War also took place on St Crispin's Day.