ABSTRACT
Boundaries between the real, the fictional and the ideal merge when we compare the careers and staged representations of the military-heroic leaders involved in the siege of Rouen. There is a suggestion that Fluellen, a devotee of the ancient arts of war in Henry V was modelled on the real-life Sir Roger Williams.190 A veteran of Leicester's campaigns in the Netherlands, Essex's boon companion and partner in flight from court to Portuguese battlefront, documenter of the Portuguese expedition and admirer of Parma's discipline, Williams was also involved in Henri IV's Protestant campaigns against the Catholic Leaguers until Henri's conversion in 1593.191 In his Briefe Discourse he champions the right of the professional soldier of lowly birth to have pathways of promotion open to him. For this reason he comes to mind as a more likely model for Shakespeare's Williams than Fluellen. Both the real and the fictional Williams set exacting standards for a monarch's responsibilities in the undertaking and conduct of wars. The real Williams valued good training, expertise and experience in the field above noble status and his system of hierarchies reflects this. Those at the helm should be 'expert and tried soldiers of action, of long continuance'; youthful princes, nobles and 'Gentleman of good qualitie' are merely gilt on the gingerbread of an army - they only 'grace' it for 'courtesie'. Its real strength derives from its professionals - men trained up, not born, to command. Commanders like Essex and Northumberland could find endorsement for their generalship of the horse 'or command [of] a Cornet' only if their value as figureheads is underpinned by the discipline and control
instilled and maintained by 'expert and knowne' men. Noble and royal commanders may by example grow into their leadership, 'for without doubt, none can command so well, as those which have been commanded'.192
