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| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 05:16:44 -0700 |
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diff --git a/1244-h/1244-h.htm b/1244-h/1244-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f6de7f6 --- /dev/null +++ b/1244-h/1244-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,4714 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII" /> +<title>Love for Love, by William Congreve</title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + P { margin-top: .75em; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + P.gutsumm { margin-left: 5%;} + P.poetry {margin-left: 3%; } + .GutSmall { font-size: 0.7em; } + H1, H2 { + text-align: center; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + } + H3, H4, H5 { + text-align: center; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; + } + BODY{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + table { border-collapse: collapse; } +table {margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto;} + td { vertical-align: top; border: 1px solid black;} + td p { margin: 0.2em; } + .blkquot {margin-left: 4em; margin-right: 4em;} /* block indent */ + + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + + .pagenum {position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: small; + text-align: right; + font-weight: normal; + color: gray; + } + img { border: none; } + img.dc { float: left; width: 50px; height: 50px; } + p.gutindent { margin-left: 2em; } + div.gapspace { height: 0.8em; } + div.gapline { height: 0.8em; width: 100%; border-top: 1px solid;} + div.gapmediumline { height: 0.3em; width: 40%; margin-left:30%; + border-top: 1px solid; } + div.gapmediumdoubleline { height: 0.3em; width: 40%; margin-left:30%; + border-top: 1px solid; border-bottom: 1px solid;} + div.gapshortdoubleline { height: 0.3em; width: 20%; + margin-left: 40%; border-top: 1px solid; + border-bottom: 1px solid; } + div.gapdoubleline { height: 0.3em; width: 50%; + margin-left: 25%; border-top: 1px solid; + border-bottom: 1px solid;} + div.gapshortline { height: 0.3em; width: 20%; margin-left:40%; + border-top: 1px solid; } + .citation {vertical-align: super; + font-size: .8em; + text-decoration: none;} + img.floatleft { float: left; + margin-right: 1em; + margin-top: 0.5em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; } + img.floatright { float: right; + margin-left: 1em; margin-top: 0.5em; + margin-bottom: 0.5em; } + img.clearcenter {display: block; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0.5em; + margin-bottom: 0.5em} + --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> +</head> +<body> +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Love for Love, by William Congreve + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most +other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of +the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have +to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. + + + + +Title: Love for Love + A Comedy + + +Author: William Congreve + + + +Release Date: January 27, 2015 [eBook #1244] +[This file was first posted on March 10, 1998] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LOVE FOR LOVE*** +</pre> +<p>Transcribed from the 1895 Methuen and Co. edition (<i>Comedies +of William Congreve</i>, <i>Volume</i> 2) by David Price, email +ccx074@pglaf.org</p> +<h1>LOVE FOR LOVE<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">A COMEDY</span></h1> +<blockquote><p><i>Nudus agris</i>, <i>nudus nummis +paternis</i>,<br /> +<i>Insanire parat certa ratione modoque</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">—<span +class="smcap">Hor</span>.</p> +</blockquote> +<h2><span class="GutSmall">TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE</span><br /> +CHARLES, EARL OF DORSET AND MIDDLESEX,<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">LORD CHAMBERLAIN OF HIS MAJESTY’S +HOUSEHOLD,</span><br /> +<span class="GutSmall">AND KNIGHT OF THE MOST NOBLE ORDER OF THE +GARTER, ETC.</span></h2> +<p><span class="smcap">My Lord</span>,—A young poet is +liable to the same vanity and indiscretion with a young lover; +and the great man who smiles upon one, and the fine woman who +looks kindly upon t’other, are both of ’em in danger +of having the favour published with the first opportunity.</p> +<p>But there may be a different motive, which will a little +distinguish the offenders. For though one should have a +vanity in ruining another’s reputation, yet the other may +only have an ambition to advance his own. And I beg leave, +my lord, that I may plead the latter, both as the cause and +excuse of this dedication.</p> +<p>Whoever is king is also the father of his country; and as +nobody can dispute your lordship’s monarchy in poetry, so +all that are concerned ought to acknowledge your universal +patronage. And it is only presuming on the privilege of a +loyal subject that I have ventured to make this, my address of +thanks, to your lordship, which at the same time includes a +prayer for your protection.</p> +<p>I am not ignorant of the common form of poetical dedications, +which are generally made up of panegyrics, where the authors +endeavour to distinguish their patrons, by the shining characters +they give them, above other men. But that, my lord, is not +my business at this time, nor is your lordship <i>now</i> to be +distinguished. I am contented with the honour I do myself +in this epistle without the vanity of attempting to add to or +explain your Lordships character.</p> +<p>I confess it is not without some struggling that I behave +myself in this case as I ought: for it is very hard to be pleased +with a subject, and yet forbear it. But I choose rather to +follow Pliny’s precept, than his example, when, in his +panegyric to the Emperor Trajan, he says:—</p> +<blockquote><p><i>Nec minus considerabo quid aures ejus pati +possint</i>, <i>quam quid virtutibus debeatur</i>.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>I hope I may be excused the pedantry of a quotation when it is +so justly applied. Here are some lines in the print (and +which your lordship read before this play was acted) that were +omitted on the stage; and particularly one whole scene in the +third act, which not only helps the design forward with less +precipitation, but also heightens the ridiculous character of +Foresight, which indeed seems to be maimed without it. But +I found myself in great danger of a long play, and was glad to +help it where I could. Though notwithstanding my care and +the kind reception it had from the town, I could heartily wish it +yet shorter: but the number of different characters represented +in it would have been too much crowded in less room.</p> +<p>This reflection on prolixity (a fault for which scarce any one +beauty will atone) warns me not to be tedious now, and detain +your lordship any longer with the trifles of, my lord, your +lordship’s most obedient and most humble servant,</p> +<p style="text-align: right">WILLIAM CONGREVE.</p> +<h2>PROLOGUE.</h2> +<p style="text-align: center">Spoken, at the opening of the new +house, by Mr. <span class="smcap">Betterton</span>.</p> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">The</span> husbandman in +vain renews his toil<br /> +To cultivate each year a hungry soil;<br /> +And fondly hopes for rich and generous fruit,<br /> +When what should feed the tree devours the root;<br /> +Th’ unladen boughs, he sees, bode certain dearth,<br /> +Unless transplanted to more kindly earth.<br /> +So the poor husbands of the stage, who found<br /> +Their labours lost upon ungrateful ground,<br /> +This last and only remedy have proved,<br /> +And hope new fruit from ancient stocks removed.<br /> +Well may they hope, when you so kindly aid,<br /> +Well plant a soil which you so rich have made.<br /> +As Nature gave the world to man’s first age,<br /> +So from your bounty, we receive this stage;<br /> +The freedom man was born to, you’ve restored,<br /> +And to our world such plenty you afford,<br /> +It seems like Eden, fruitful of its own accord.<br /> +But since in Paradise frail flesh gave way,<br /> +And when but two were made, both went astray;<br /> +Forbear your wonder, and the fault forgive,<br /> +If in our larger family we grieve<br /> +One falling Adam and one tempted Eve.<br /> +We who remain would gratefully repay<br /> +What our endeavours can, and bring this day<br /> +The first-fruit offering of a virgin play.<br /> +We hope there’s something that may please each taste,<br /> +And though of homely fare we make the feast,<br /> +Yet you will find variety at least.<br /> +There’s humour, which for cheerful friends we got,<br /> +And for the thinking party there’s a plot.<br /> +We’ve something, too, to gratify ill-nature,<br /> +(If there be any here), and that is satire.<br /> +Though satire scarce dares grin, ’tis grown so mild<br /> +Or only shows its teeth, as if it smiled.<br /> +As asses thistles, poets mumble wit,<br /> +And dare not bite for fear of being bit:<br /> +They hold their pens, as swords are held by fools,<br /> +And are afraid to use their own edge-tools.<br /> +Since the Plain-Dealer’s scenes of manly rage,<br /> +Not one has dared to lash this crying age.<br /> +This time, the poet owns the bold essay,<br /> +Yet hopes there’s no ill-manners in his play;<br /> +And he declares, by me, he has designed<br /> +Affront to none, but frankly speaks his mind.<br /> +And should th’ ensuing scenes not chance to hit,<br /> +He offers but this one excuse, ’twas writ<br /> +Before your late encouragement of wit.</p> +<h2>EPILOGUE.</h2> +<p>Spoken, at the opening of the new house, by Mrs. <span +class="smcap">Bracegirdle</span>.</p> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Sure</span> Providence at +first designed this place<br /> +To be the player’s refuge in distress;<br /> +For still in every storm they all run hither,<br /> +As to a shed that shields ’em from the weather.<br /> +But thinking of this change which last befel us,<br /> +It’s like what I have heard our poets tell us:<br /> +For when behind our scenes their suits are pleading,<br /> +To help their love, sometimes they show their reading;<br /> +And, wanting ready cash to pay for hearts,<br /> +They top their learning on us, and their parts.<br /> +Once of philosophers they told us stories,<br /> +Whom, as I think, they called—Py—Pythagories,<br /> +I’m sure ’tis some such Latin name they give +’em,<br /> +And we, who know no better, must believe ’em.<br /> +Now to these men, say they, such souls were given,<br /> +That after death ne’er went to hell nor heaven,<br /> +But lived, I know not how, in beasts; and then<br /> +When many years were past, in men again.<br /> +Methinks, we players resemble such a soul,<br /> +That does from bodies, we from houses stroll.<br /> +Thus Aristotle’s soul, of old that was,<br /> +May now be damned to animate an ass,<br /> +Or in this very house, for ought we know,<br /> +Is doing painful penance in some beau;<br /> +And thus our audience, which did once resort<br /> +To shining theatres to see our sport,<br /> +Now find us tossed into a tennis-court.<br /> +These walls but t’other day were filled with noise<br /> +Of roaring gamesters and your dam’me boys;<br /> +Then bounding balls and rackets they encompast,<br /> +And now they’re filled with jests, and flights, and +bombast!<br /> +I vow, I don’t much like this transmigration,<br /> +Strolling from place to place by circulation;<br /> +Grant heaven, we don’t return to our first station!<br /> +I know not what these think, but for my part<br /> +I can’t reflect without an aching heart,<br /> +How we should end in our original, a cart.<br /> +But we can’t fear, since you’re so good to save +us,<br /> +That you have only set us up, to leave us.<br /> +Thus from the past we hope for future grace,<br /> +I beg it—<br /> +And some here know I have a begging face.<br /> +Then pray continue this your kind behaviour,<br /> +For a clear stage won’t do, without your favour.</p> +<h2>DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.</h2> +<table> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p style="text-align: center">MEN.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Sir Sampson Legend</span>, father to +Valentine and Ben,</p> +</td> +<td><p><i>Mr. Underhill</i>.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Valentine</span>, fallen under his +father’s displeasure by his expensive way of living, in +love with Angelica,</p> +</td> +<td><p><i>Mr. Betterton</i>.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Scandal</span>, his friend, a free +speaker,</p> +</td> +<td><p><i>Mr. Smith</i>.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Tattle</span>, a half-witted beau, +vain of his amours, yet valuing himself for secrecy,</p> +</td> +<td><p><i>Mr. Bowman</i>.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Ben</span>, Sir Sampson’s +younger son, half home-bred and half sea-bred, designed to marry +Miss Prue,</p> +</td> +<td><p><i>Mr. Dogget</i>.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Foresight</span>, an illiterate old +fellow, peevish and positive, superstitious, and pretending to +understand astrology, palmistry, physiognomy, omens, dreams, +etc.; uncle to Angelica,</p> +</td> +<td><p><i>Mr. Sanford</i>.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Jeremy</span>, servant to +Valentine,</p> +</td> +<td><p><i>Mr. Bowen</i>.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Trapland</span>, a scrivener,</p> +</td> +<td><p><i>Mr. Triffusis</i>.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Buckram</span>, a lawyer,</p> +</td> +<td><p><i>Mr. Freeman</i>.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p style="text-align: center">WOMEN.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Angelica</span>, niece to Foresight, +of a considerable fortune in her own hands,</p> +</td> +<td><p><i>Mrs. Bracegirdle</i>.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Mrs. Foresight</span>, second wife to +Foresight,</p> +</td> +<td><p><i>Mrs. Bowman</i>.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Mrs. Frail</span>, sister to Mrs. +Foresight, a woman of the town,</p> +</td> +<td><p><i>Mrs. Barry</i>.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Miss Prue</span>, daughter to +Foresight by a former wife, a silly, awkward country girl,</p> +</td> +<td><p><i>Mrs. Ayliff</i>.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Nurse</span> to <span +class="smcap">Miss</span>,</p> +</td> +<td><p><i>Mrs. Leigh</i>.</p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Jenny</span>,</p> +</td> +<td><p><i>Mrs. Lawson</i>.</p> +</td> +</tr> +</table> +<p style="text-align: center">A <span +class="smcap">Steward</span>, <span +class="smcap">Officers</span>, <span +class="smcap">Sailors</span>, <span class="smcap">and Several +Servants</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">The Scene in London.</p> +<h2>ACT I.—SCENE I.</h2> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Valentine</span> <i>in his chamber +reading</i>. <span class="smcap">Jeremy</span> +<i>waiting</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Several books upon the +table</i>.</p> +<p>VAL. Jeremy.</p> +<p>JERE. Sir?</p> +<p>VAL. Here, take away. I’ll walk a turn and +digest what I have read.</p> +<p>JERE. You’ll grow devilish fat upon this paper +diet. [<i>Aside</i>, <i>and taking away the books</i>.]</p> +<p>VAL. And d’ye hear, go you to breakfast. +There’s a page doubled down in Epictetus, that is a feast +for an emperor.</p> +<p>JERE. Was Epictetus a real cook, or did he only write +receipts?</p> +<p>VAL. Read, read, sirrah, and refine your appetite; learn +to live upon instruction; feast your mind and mortify your flesh; +read, and take your nourishment in at your eyes; shut up your +mouth, and chew the cud of understanding. So Epictetus +advises.</p> +<p>JERE. O Lord! I have heard much of him, when I +waited upon a gentleman at Cambridge. Pray what was that +Epictetus?</p> +<p>VAL. A very rich man.—Not worth a groat.</p> +<p>JERE. Humph, and so he has made a very fine feast, where +there is nothing to be eaten?</p> +<p>VAL. Yes.</p> +<p>JERE. Sir, you’re a gentleman, and probably +understand this fine feeding: but if you please, I had rather be +at board wages. Does your Epictetus, or your Seneca here, +or any of these poor rich rogues, teach you how to pay your debts +without money? Will they shut up the mouths of your +creditors? Will Plato be bail for you? Or Diogenes, +because he understands confinement, and lived in a tub, go to +prison for you? ’Slife, sir, what do you mean, to mew +yourself up here with three or four musty books, in commendation +of starving and poverty?</p> +<p>VAL. Why, sirrah, I have no money, you know it; and +therefore resolve to rail at all that have. And in that I +but follow the examples of the wisest and wittiest men in all +ages, these poets and philosophers whom you naturally hate, for +just such another reason; because they abound in sense, and you +are a fool.</p> +<p>JERE. Ay, sir, I am a fool, I know it: and yet, heaven +help me, I’m poor enough to be a wit. But I was +always a fool when I told you what your expenses would bring you +to; your coaches and your liveries; your treats and your balls; +your being in love with a lady that did not care a farthing for +you in your prosperity; and keeping company with wits that cared +for nothing but your prosperity; and now, when you are poor, hate +you as much as they do one another.</p> +<p>VAL. Well, and now I am poor I have an opportunity to be +revenged on them all. I’ll pursue Angelica with more +love than ever, and appear more notoriously her admirer in this +restraint, than when I openly rivalled the rich fops that made +court to her. So shall my poverty be a mortification to her +pride, and, perhaps, make her compassionate the love which has +principally reduced me to this lowness of fortune. And for +the wits, I’m sure I am in a condition to be even with +them.</p> +<p>JERE. Nay, your condition is pretty even with theirs, +that’s the truth on’t.</p> +<p>VAL. I’ll take some of their trade out of their +hands.</p> +<p>JERE. Now heaven of mercy continue the tax upon +paper. You don’t mean to write?</p> +<p>VAL. Yes, I do. I’ll write a play.</p> +<p>JERE. Hem! Sir, if you please to give me a small +certificate of three lines—only to certify those whom it +may concern, that the bearer hereof, Jeremy Fetch by name, has +for the space of seven years truly and faithfully served +Valentine Legend, Esq., and that he is not now turned away for +any misdemeanour, but does voluntarily dismiss his master from +any future authority over him—</p> +<p>VAL. No, sirrah; you shall live with me still.</p> +<p>JERE. Sir, it’s impossible. I may die with +you, starve with you, or be damned with your works. But to +live, even three days, the life of a play, I no more expect it +than to be canonised for a muse after my decease.</p> +<p>VAL. You are witty, you rogue. I shall want your +help. I’ll have you learn to make couplets to tag the +ends of acts. D’ye hear? Get the maids to +Crambo in an evening, and learn the knack of rhyming: you may +arrive at the height of a song sent by an unknown hand, or a +chocolate-house lampoon.</p> +<p>JERE. But, sir, is this the way to recover your +father’s favour? Why, Sir Sampson will be +irreconcilable. If your younger brother should come from +sea, he’d never look upon you again. You’re +undone, sir; you’re ruined; you won’t have a friend +left in the world if you turn poet. Ah, pox confound that +Will’s coffee-house: it has ruined more young men than the +Royal Oak lottery. Nothing thrives that belongs +to’t. The man of the house would have been an +alderman by this time, with half the trade, if he had set up in +the city. For my part, I never sit at the door that I +don’t get double the stomach that I do at a horse +race. The air upon Banstead-Downs is nothing to it for a +whetter; yet I never see it, but the spirit of famine appears to +me, sometimes like a decayed porter, worn out with pimping, and +carrying <i>billet doux</i> and songs: not like other porters, +for hire, but for the jests’ sake. Now like a thin +chairman, melted down to half his proportion, with carrying a +poet upon tick, to visit some great fortune; and his fare to be +paid him like the wages of sin, either at the day of marriage, or +the day of death.</p> +<p>VAL. Very well, sir; can you proceed?</p> +<p>JERE. Sometimes like a bilked bookseller, with a meagre +terrified countenance, that looks as if he had written for +himself, or were resolved to turn author, and bring the rest of +his brethren into the same condition. And lastly, in the +form of a worn-out punk, with verses in her hand, which her +vanity had preferred to settlements, without a whole tatter to +her tail, but as ragged as one of the muses; or as if she were +carrying her linen to the paper-mill, to be converted into folio +books of warning to all young maids, not to prefer poetry to good +sense, or lying in the arms of a needy wit, before the embraces +of a wealthy fool.</p> +<h3>SCENE II.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>, <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>SCAN. What, Jeremy holding forth?</p> +<p>VAL. The rogue has (with all the wit he could muster up) +been declaiming against wit.</p> +<p>SCAN. Ay? Why, then, I’m afraid Jeremy has +wit: for wherever it is, it’s always contriving its own +ruin.</p> +<p>JERE. Why, so I have been telling my master, sir: Mr. +Scandal, for heaven’s sake, sir, try if you can dissuade +him from turning poet.</p> +<p>SCAN. Poet! He shall turn soldier first, and +rather depend upon the outside of his head than the lining. +Why, what the devil, has not your poverty made you enemies +enough? Must you needs shew your wit to get more?</p> +<p>JERE. Ay, more indeed: for who cares for anybody that +has more wit than himself?</p> +<p>SCAN. Jeremy speaks like an oracle. Don’t +you see how worthless great men and dull rich rogues avoid a +witty man of small fortune? Why, he looks like a writ of +enquiry into their titles and estates, and seems commissioned by +heaven to seize hte better half.</p> +<p>VAL. Therefore I would rail in my writings, and be +revenged.</p> +<p>SCAN. Rail? At whom? The whole world? +Impotent and vain! Who would die a martyr to sense in a +country where the religion is folly? You may stand at bay +for a while; but when the full cry is against you, you +shan’t have fair play for your life. If you +can’t be fairly run down by the hounds, you will be +treacherously shot by the huntsmen. No, turn pimp, +flatterer, quack, lawyer, parson, be chaplain to an atheist, or +stallion to an old woman, anything but poet. A modern poet +is worse, more servile, timorous, and fawning, than any I have +named: without you could retrieve the ancient honours of the +name, recall the stage of Athens, and be allowed the force of +open honest satire.</p> +<p>VAL. You are as inveterate against our poets as if your +character had been lately exposed upon the stage. Nay, I am +not violently bent upon the trade. [<i>One +knocks</i>.] Jeremy, see who’s there. [<span +class="smcap">Jer</span>. <i>goes to the door</i>.] But +tell me what you would have me do? What do the world say of +me, and my forced confinement?</p> +<p>SCAN. The world behaves itself as it uses to do on such +occasions; some pity you, and condemn your father; others excuse +him, and blame you; only the ladies are merciful, and wish you +well, since love and pleasurable expense have been your greatest +faults.</p> +<p>VAL. How now?</p> +<p>JERE. Nothing new, sir; I have despatched some half a +dozen duns with as much dexterity as a hungry judge does causes +at dinner-time.</p> +<p>VAL. What answer have you given ’em?</p> +<p>SCAN. Patience, I suppose, the old receipt.</p> +<p>JERE. No, faith, sir; I have put ’em off so long +with patience and forbearance, and other fair words, that I was +forced now to tell ’em in plain downright +English—</p> +<p>VAL. What?</p> +<p>JERE. That they should be paid.</p> +<p>VAL. When?</p> +<p>JERE. To-morrow.</p> +<p>VAL. And how the devil do you mean to keep your +word?</p> +<p>JERE. Keep it? Not at all; it has been so very +much stretched that I reckon it will break of course by +to-morrow, and nobody be surprised at the matter. +[<i>Knocking</i>.] Again! Sir, if you don’t +like my negotiation, will you be pleased to answer these +yourself?</p> +<p>VAL. See who they are.</p> +<h3>SCENE III.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>.</p> +<p>VAL. By this, Scandal, you may see what it is to be +great; secretaries of state, presidents of the council, and +generals of an army lead just such a life as I do; have just such +crowds of visitants in a morning, all soliciting of past +promises; which are but a civiller sort of duns, that lay claim +to voluntary debts.</p> +<p>SCAN. And you, like a true great man, having engaged +their attendance, and promised more than ever you intended to +perform, are more perplexed to find evasions than you would be to +invent the honest means of keeping your word, and gratifying your +creditors.</p> +<p>VAL. Scandal, learn to spare your friends, and do not +provoke your enemies; this liberty of your tongue will one day +bring a confinement on your body, my friend.</p> +<h3>SCENE IV.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>, <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>JERE. O sir, there’s Trapland the scrivener, with +two suspicious fellows like lawful pads, that would knock a man +down with pocket-tipstaves. And there’s your +father’s steward, and the nurse with one of your children +from Twitnam.</p> +<p>VAL. Pox on her, could she find no other time to fling +my sins in my face? Here, give her this, [<i>gives +money</i>] and bid her trouble me no more; a thoughtless +two-handed whore, she knows my condition well enough, and might +have overlaid the child a fortnight ago, if she had had any +forecast in her.</p> +<p>SCAN. What, is it bouncing Margery, with my godson?</p> +<p>JERE. Yes, sir.</p> +<p>SCAN. My blessing to the boy, with this token [<i>gives +money</i>] of my love. And d’ye hear, bid Margery put +more flocks in her bed, shift twice a week, and not work so hard, +that she may not smell so vigorously. I shall take the air +shortly.</p> +<p>VAL. Scandal, don’t spoil my boy’s +milk. Bid Trapland come in. If I can give that +Cerberus a sop, I shall be at rest for one day.</p> +<h3>SCENE V.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>, <span +class="smcap">Trapland</span>, <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>VAL. Oh, Mr. Trapland! My old friend! +Welcome. Jeremy, a chair quickly: a bottle of sack and a +toast—fly—a chair first.</p> +<p>TRAP. A good morning to you, Mr. Valentine, and to you, +Mr. Scandal.</p> +<p>SCAN. The morning’s a very good morning, if you +don’t spoil it.</p> +<p>VAL. Come, sit you down, you know his way.</p> +<p>TRAP. [<i>sits</i>.] There is a debt, Mr. +Valentine, of £1500 of pretty long standing—</p> +<p>VAL. I cannot talk about business with a thirsty +palate. Sirrah, the sack.</p> +<p>TRAP. And I desire to know what course you have taken +for the payment?</p> +<p>VAL. Faith and troth, I am heartily glad to see +you. My service to you. Fill, fill to honest Mr. +Trapland—fuller.</p> +<p>TRAP. Hold, sweetheart: this is not to our +business. My service to you, Mr. Scandal. +[<i>Drinks</i>.] I have forborne as long—</p> +<p>VAL. T’other glass, and then we’ll +talk. Fill, Jeremy.</p> +<p>TRAP. No more, in truth. I have forborne, I +say—</p> +<p>VAL. Sirrah, fill when I bid you. And how does +your handsome daughter? Come, a good husband to her. +[<i>Drinks</i>.]</p> +<p>TRAP. Thank you. I have been out of this +money—</p> +<p>VAL. Drink first. Scandal, why do you not +drink? [<i>They drink</i>.]</p> +<p>TRAP. And, in short, I can be put off no longer.</p> +<p>VAL. I was much obliged to you for your supply. It +did me signal service in my necessity. But you delight in +doing good. Scandal, drink to me, my friend +Trapland’s health. An honester man lives not, nor one +more ready to serve his friend in distress: though I say it to +his face. Come, fill each man his glass.</p> +<p>SCAN. What, I know Trapland has been a whoremaster, and +loves a wench still. You never knew a whoremaster that was +not an honest fellow.</p> +<p>TRAP. Fie, Mr. Scandal, you never knew—</p> +<p>SCAN. What don’t I know? I know the buxom +black widow in the Poultry. £800 a year jointure, and +£20,000 in money. Aha! old Trap.</p> +<p>VAL. Say you so, i’faith? Come, we’ll +remember the widow. I know whereabouts you are; come, to +the widow—</p> +<p>TRAP. No more, indeed.</p> +<p>VAL. What, the widow’s health; give it +him—off with it. [<i>They drink</i>.] A lovely +girl, i’faith, black sparkling eyes, soft pouting ruby +lips! Better sealing there than a bond for a million, +ha?</p> +<p>TRAP. No, no, there’s no such thing; we’d +better mind our business. You’re a wag.</p> +<p>VAL. No, faith, we’ll mind the widow’s +business: fill again. Pretty round heaving breasts, a +Barbary shape, and a jut with her bum would stir an anchoret: and +the prettiest foot! Oh, if a man could but fasten his eyes +to her feet as they steal in and out, and play at bo-peep under +her petticoats, ah! Mr. Trapland?</p> +<p>TRAP. Verily, give me a glass. You’re a +wag,—and here’s to the widow. +[<i>Drinks</i>.]</p> +<p>SCAN. He begins to chuckle; ply him close, or +he’ll relapse into a dun.</p> +<h3>SCENE VI.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Officer</span>.</p> +<p>OFF. By your leave, gentlemen: Mr. Trapland, if we must +do our office, tell us. We have half a dozen gentlemen to +arrest in Pall Mall and Covent Garden; and if we don’t make +haste the chairmen will be abroad, and block up the +chocolate-houses, and then our labour’s lost.</p> +<p>TRAP. Udso that’s true: Mr. Valentine, I love +mirth, but business must be done. Are you ready +to—</p> +<p>JERE. Sir, your father’s steward says he comes to +make proposals concerning your debts.</p> +<p>VAL. Bid him come in: Mr. Trapland, send away your +officer; you shall have an answer presently.</p> +<p>TRAP. Mr. Snap, stay within call.</p> +<h3>SCENE VII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>, <span +class="smcap">Trapland</span>, <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>,<br /> +<span class="smcap">Steward</span> <i>who whispers</i> <span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>.</p> +<p>SCAN. Here’s a dog now, a traitor in his wine: +sirrah, refund the sack.—Jeremy, fetch him some warm water, +or I’ll rip up his stomach, and go the shortest way to his +conscience.</p> +<p>TRAP. Mr. Scandal, you are uncivil; I did not value your +sack; but you cannot expect it again when I have drunk it.</p> +<p>SCAN. And how do you expect to have your money again +when a gentleman has spent it?</p> +<p>VAL. You need say no more, I understand the conditions; +they are very hard, but my necessity is very pressing: I agree to +’em. Take Mr. Trapland with you, and let him draw the +writing. Mr. Trapland, you know this man: he shall satisfy +you.</p> +<p>TRAP. Sincerely, I am loth to be thus pressing, but my +necessity—</p> +<p>VAL. No apology, good Mr. Scrivener, you shall be +paid.</p> +<p>TRAP. I hope you forgive me; my business +requires—</p> +<h3>SCENE VIII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>.</p> +<p>SCAN. He begs pardon like a hangman at an execution.</p> +<p>VAL. But I have got a reprieve.</p> +<p>SCAN. I am surprised; what, does your father relent?</p> +<p>VAL. No; he has sent me the hardest conditions in the +world. You have heard of a booby brother of mine that was +sent to sea three years ago? This brother, my father hears, +is landed; whereupon he very affectionately sends me word; if I +will make a deed of conveyance of my right to his estate, after +his death, to my younger brother, he will immediately furnish me +with four thousand pounds to pay my debts and make my +fortune. This was once proposed before, and I refused it; +but the present impatience of my creditors for their money, and +my own impatience of confinement, and absence from Angelica, +force me to consent.</p> +<p>SCAN. A very desperate demonstration of your love to +Angelica; and I think she has never given you any assurance of +hers.</p> +<p>VAL. You know her temper; she never gave me any great +reason either for hope or despair.</p> +<p>SCAN. Women of her airy temper, as they seldom think +before they act, so they rarely give us any light to guess at +what they mean. But you have little reason to believe that +a woman of this age, who has had an indifference for you in your +prosperity, will fall in love with your ill-fortune; besides, +Angelica has a great fortune of her own; and great fortunes +either expect another great fortune, or a fool.</p> +<h3>SCENE IX.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>JERE. More misfortunes, sir.</p> +<p>VAL. What, another dun?</p> +<p>JERE. No, sir, but Mr. Tattle is come to wait upon +you.</p> +<p>VAL. Well, I can’t help it, you must bring him up; +he knows I don’t go abroad.</p> +<h3>SCENE X.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>.</p> +<p>SCAN. Pox on him, I’ll be gone.</p> +<p>VAL. No, prithee stay: Tattle and you should never be +asunder; you are light and shadow, and show one another; he is +perfectly thy reverse both in humour and understanding; and as +you set up for defamation, he is a mender of reputations.</p> +<p>SCAN. A mender of reputations! Ay, just as he is a +keeper of secrets, another virtue that he sets up for in the same +manner. For the rogue will speak aloud in the posture of a +whisper, and deny a woman’s name while he gives you the +marks of her person. He will forswear receiving a letter +from her, and at the same time show you her hand in the +superscription: and yet perhaps he has counterfeited the hand +too, and sworn to a truth; but he hopes not to be believed, and +refuses the reputation of a lady’s favour, as a Doctor says +no to a Bishopric only that it may be granted him. In +short, he is public professor of secrecy, and makes proclamation +that he holds private intelligence.—He’s here.</p> +<h3>SCENE XI.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Tattle</span>.</p> +<p>TATT. Valentine, good morrow; Scandal, I am +yours:—that is, when you speak well of me.</p> +<p>SCAN. That is, when I am yours; for while I am my own, +or anybody’s else, that will never happen.</p> +<p>TATT. How inhuman!</p> +<p>VAL. Why Tattle, you need not be much concerned at +anything that he says: for to converse with Scandal, is to play +at losing loadum; you must lose a good name to him before you can +win it for yourself.</p> +<p>TATT. But how barbarous that is, and how unfortunate for +him, that the world shall think the better of any person for his +calumniation! I thank heaven, it has always been a part of +my character to handle the reputations of others very tenderly +indeed.</p> +<p>SCAN. Ay, such rotten reputations as you have to deal +with are to be handled tenderly indeed.</p> +<p>TATT. Nay, but why rotten? Why should you say +rotten, when you know not the persons of whom you speak? +How cruel that is!</p> +<p>SCAN. Not know ’em? Why, thou never +had’st to do with anybody that did not stink to all the +town.</p> +<p>TATT. Ha, ha, ha; nay, now you make a jest of it +indeed. For there is nothing more known than that nobody +knows anything of that nature of me. As I hope to be saved, +Valentine, I never exposed a woman, since I knew what woman +was.</p> +<p>VAL. And yet you have conversed with several.</p> +<p>TATT. To be free with you, I have. I don’t +care if I own that. Nay more (I’m going to say a bold +word now) I never could meddle with a woman that had to do with +anybody else.</p> +<p>SCAN. How?</p> +<p>VAL. Nay faith, I’m apt to believe him. +Except her husband, Tattle.</p> +<p>TATT. Oh, that—</p> +<p>SCAN. What think you of that noble commoner, Mrs. +Drab?</p> +<p>TATT. Pooh, I know Madam Drab has made her brags in +three or four places, that I said this and that, and writ to her, +and did I know not what—but, upon my reputation, she did me +wrong—well, well, that was malice—but I know the +bottom of it. She was bribed to that by one we all +know—a man too. Only to bring me into disgrace with a +certain woman of quality—</p> +<p>SCAN. Whom we all know.</p> +<p>TATT. No matter for that. Yes, yes, everybody +knows. No doubt on’t, everybody knows my +secrets. But I soon satisfied the lady of my innocence; for +I told her: Madam, says I, there are some persons who make it +their business to tell stories, and say this and that of one and +t’other, and everything in the world; and, says I, if your +grace—</p> +<p>SCAN. Grace!</p> +<p>TATT. O Lord, what have I said? My unlucky +tongue!</p> +<p>VAL. Ha, ha, ha.</p> +<p>SCAN. Why, Tattle, thou hast more impudence than one can +in reason expect: I shall have an esteem for thee, well, and, ha, +ha, ha, well, go on, and what did you say to her grace?</p> +<p>VAL. I confess this is something extraordinary.</p> +<p>TATT. Not a word, as I hope to be saved; an errant +<i>lapsus linguæ</i>. Come, let’s talk of +something else.</p> +<p>VAL. Well, but how did you acquit yourself?</p> +<p>TATT. Pooh, pooh, nothing at all; I only rallied with +you—a woman of ordinary rank was a little jealous of me, +and I told her something or other, faith I know not +what.—Come, let’s talk of something else. +[<i>Hums a song</i>.]</p> +<p>SCAN. Hang him, let him alone, he has a mind we should +enquire.</p> +<p>TATT. Valentine, I supped last night with your mistress, +and her uncle, old Foresight: I think your father lies at +Foresight’s.</p> +<p>VAL. Yes.</p> +<p>TATT. Upon my soul, Angelica’s a fine woman. +And so is Mrs. Foresight, and her sister, Mrs. Frail.</p> +<p>SCAN. Yes, Mrs. Frail is a very fine woman, we all know +her.</p> +<p>TATT. Oh, that is not fair.</p> +<p>SCAN. What?</p> +<p>TATT. To tell.</p> +<p>SCAN. To tell what? Why, what do you know of Mrs. +Frail?</p> +<p>TATT. Who, I? Upon honour I don’t know +whether she be man or woman, but by the smoothness of her chin +and roundness of her hips.</p> +<p>SCAN. No?</p> +<p>TATT. No.</p> +<p>SCAN. She says otherwise.</p> +<p>TATT. Impossible!</p> +<p>SCAN. Yes, faith. Ask Valentine else.</p> +<p>TATT. Why then, as I hope to be saved, I believe a woman +only obliges a man to secrecy that she may have the pleasure of +telling herself.</p> +<p>SCAN. No doubt on’t. Well, but has she done +you wrong, or no? You have had her? Ha?</p> +<p>TATT. Though I have more honour than to tell first, I +have more manners than to contradict what a lady has +declared.</p> +<p>SCAN. Well, you own it?</p> +<p>TATT. I am strangely surprised! Yes, yes, I +can’t deny’t if she taxes me with it.</p> +<p>SCAN. She’ll be here by and by, she sees Valentine +every morning.</p> +<p>TATT. How?</p> +<p>VAL. She does me the favour, I mean, of a visit +sometimes. I did not think she had granted more to +anybody.</p> +<p>SCAN. Nor I, faith. But Tattle does not use to +bely a lady; it is contrary to his character. How one may +be deceived in a woman, Valentine?</p> +<p>TATT. Nay, what do you mean, gentlemen?</p> +<p>SCAN. I’m resolved I’ll ask her.</p> +<p>TATT. O barbarous! Why did you not tell me?</p> +<p>SCAN. No; you told us.</p> +<p>TATT. And bid me ask Valentine?</p> +<p>VAL. What did I say? I hope you won’t bring +me to confess an answer when you never asked me the question?</p> +<p>TATT. But, gentlemen, this is the most inhuman +proceeding—</p> +<p>VAL. Nay, if you have known Scandal thus long, and +cannot avoid such a palpable decoy as this was, the ladies have a +fine time whose reputations are in your keeping.</p> +<h3>SCENE XII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>JERE. Sir, Mrs. Frail has sent to know if you are +stirring.</p> +<p>VAL. Show her up when she comes.</p> +<h3>SCENE XIII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>, <span +class="smcap">Tattle</span>.</p> +<p>TATT. I’ll be gone.</p> +<p>VAL. You’ll meet her.</p> +<p>TATT. Is there not a back way?</p> +<p>VAL. If there were, you have more discretion than to +give Scandal such an advantage. Why, your running away will +prove all that he can tell her.</p> +<p>TATT. Scandal, you will not be so ungenerous. Oh, +I shall lose my reputation of secrecy for ever. I shall +never be received but upon public days, and my visits will never +be admitted beyond a drawing-room. I shall never see a +bed-chamber again, never be locked in a closet, nor run behind a +screen, or under a table: never be distinguished among the +waiting-women by the name of trusty Mr. Tattle more. You +will not be so cruel?</p> +<p>VAL. Scandal, have pity on him; he’ll yield to any +conditions.</p> +<p>TATT. Any, any terms.</p> +<p>SCAN. Come, then, sacrifice half a dozen women of good +reputation to me presently. Come, where are you +familiar? And see that they are women of quality, +too—the first quality.</p> +<p>TATT. ’Tis very hard. Won’t a +baronet’s lady pass?</p> +<p>SCAN. No, nothing under a right honourable.</p> +<p>TATT. Oh, inhuman! You don’t expect their +names?</p> +<p>SCAN. No, their titles shall serve.</p> +<p>TATT. Alas, that’s the same thing. Pray +spare me their titles. I’ll describe their +persons.</p> +<p>SCAN. Well, begin then; but take notice, if you are so +ill a painter that I cannot know the person by your picture of +her, you must be condemned, like other bad painters, to write the +name at the bottom.</p> +<p>TATT. Well, first then—</p> +<h3>SCENE XIV.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Mrs. Frail</span>.</p> +<p>TATT. Oh, unfortunate! She’s come already; +will you have patience till another time? I’ll double +the number.</p> +<p>SCAN. Well, on that condition. Take heed you +don’t fail me.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. I shall get a fine reputation by coming to +see fellows in a morning. Scandal, you devil, are you here +too? Oh, Mr. Tattle, everything is safe with you, we +know.</p> +<p>SCAN. Tattle—</p> +<p>TATT. Mum. O madam, you do me too much honour.</p> +<p>VAL. Well, Lady Galloper, how does Angelica?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Angelica? Manners!</p> +<p>VAL. What, you will allow an absent lover—</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. No, I’ll allow a lover present with +his mistress to be particular; but otherwise, I think his passion +ought to give place to his manners.</p> +<p>VAL. But what if he has more passion than manners?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Then let him marry and reform.</p> +<p>VAL. Marriage indeed may qualify the fury of his +passion, but it very rarely mends a man’s manners.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. You are the most mistaken in the world; +there is no creature perfectly civil but a husband. For in +a little time he grows only rude to his wife, and that is the +highest good breeding, for it begets his civility to other +people. Well, I’ll tell you news; but I suppose you +hear your brother Benjamin is landed? And my brother +Foresight’s daughter is come out of the country: I assure +you, there’s a match talked of by the old people. +Well, if he be but as great a sea-beast as she is a land-monster, +we shall have a most amphibious breed. The progeny will be +all otters. He has been bred at sea, and she has never been +out of the country.</p> +<p>VAL. Pox take ’em, their conjunction bodes me no +good, I’m sure.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Now you talk of conjunction, my brother +Foresight has cast both their nativities, and prognosticates an +admiral and an eminent justice of the peace to be the issue male +of their two bodies; ’tis the most superstitious old +fool! He would have persuaded me that this was an unlucky +day, and would not let me come abroad. But I invented a +dream, and sent him to Artimedorus for interpretation, and so +stole out to see you. Well, and what will you give me +now? Come, I must have something.</p> +<p>VAL. Step into the next room, and I’ll give you +something.</p> +<p>SCAN. Ay, we’ll all give you something.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Well, what will you all give me?</p> +<p>VAL. Mine’s a secret.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. I thought you would give me something that +would be a trouble to you to keep.</p> +<p>VAL. And Scandal shall give you a good name.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. That’s more than he has for +himself. And what will you give me, Mr. Tattle?</p> +<p>TATT. I? My soul, madam.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Pooh! No, I thank you, I have enough +to do to take care of my own. Well, but I’ll come and +see you one of these mornings. I hear you have a great many +pictures.</p> +<p>TATT. I have a pretty good collection, at your service, +some originals.</p> +<p>SCAN. Hang him, he has nothing but the Seasons and the +Twelve Cæsars—paltry copies—and the Five +Senses, as ill-represented as they are in himself, and he himself +is the only original you will see there.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Ay, but I hear he has a closet of +beauties.</p> +<p>SCAN. Yes; all that have done him favours, if you will +believe him.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Ay, let me see those, Mr. Tattle.</p> +<p>TATT. Oh, madam, those are sacred to love and +contemplation. No man but the painter and myself was ever +blest with the sight.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Well, but a woman—</p> +<p>TATT. Nor woman, till she consented to have her picture +there too—for then she’s obliged to keep the +secret.</p> +<p>SCAN. No, no; come to me if you’d see +pictures.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. You?</p> +<p>SCAN. Yes, faith; I can shew you your own picture, and +most of your acquaintance to the life, and as like as at +Kneller’s.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. O lying creature! Valentine, does not +he lie? I can’t believe a word he says.</p> +<p>VAL. No indeed, he speaks truth now. For as Tattle +has pictures of all that have granted him favours, he has the +pictures of all that have refused him: if satires, descriptions, +characters, and lampoons are pictures.</p> +<p>SCAN. Yes; mine are most in black and white. And +yet there are some set out in their true colours, both men and +women. I can shew you pride, folly, affectation, +wantonness, inconstancy, covetousness, dissimulation, malice and +ignorance, all in one piece. Then I can shew you lying, +foppery, vanity, cowardice, bragging, lechery, impotence, and +ugliness in another piece; and yet one of these is a celebrated +beauty, and t’other a professed beau. I have +paintings too, some pleasant enough.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Come, let’s hear ’em.</p> +<p>SCAN. Why, I have a beau in a <i>bagnio</i>, cupping for +a complexion, and sweating for a shape.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. So.</p> +<p>SCAN. Then I have a lady burning brandy in a cellar with +a hackney coachman.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. O devil! Well, but that story is not +true.</p> +<p>SCAN. I have some hieroglyphics too; I have a lawyer +with a hundred hands, two heads, and but one face; a divine with +two faces, and one head; and I have a soldier with his brains in +his belly, and his heart where his head should be.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. And no head?</p> +<p>SCAN. No head.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Pooh, this is all invention. Have you +never a poet?</p> +<p>SCAN. Yes, I have a poet weighing words, and selling +praise for praise, and a critic picking his pocket. I have +another large piece too, representing a school, where there are +huge proportioned critics, with long wigs, laced coats, Steinkirk +cravats, and terrible faces; with cat-calls in their hands, and +horn-books about their necks. I have many more of this +kind, very well painted, as you shall see.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Well, I’ll come, if it be but to +disprove you.</p> +<h3>SCENE XIV.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>JERE. Sir, here’s the steward again from your +father.</p> +<p>VAL. I’ll come to him—will you give me +leave? I’ll wait on you again presently.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. No; I’ll be gone. Come, who +squires me to the Exchange? I must call my sister Foresight +there.</p> +<p>SCAN. I will: I have a mind to your sister.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Civil!</p> +<p>TATT. I will: because I have a tendre for your +ladyship.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. That’s somewhat the better reason, to +my opinion.</p> +<p>SCAN. Well, if Tattle entertains you, I have the better +opportunity to engage your sister.</p> +<p>VAL. Tell Angelica I am about making hard conditions to +come abroad, and be at liberty to see her.</p> +<p>SCAN. I’ll give an account of you and your +proceedings. If indiscretion be a sign of love, you are the +most a lover of anybody that I know: you fancy that parting with +your estate will help you to your mistress. In my mind he +is a thoughtless adventurer</p> +<p class="poetry">Who hopes to purchase wealth by selling +land;<br /> +Or win a mistress with a losing hand.</p> +<h2>ACT II.—SCENE I.</h2> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>A room in</i> <span +class="smcap">Foresight’s</span> <i>house</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Foresight</span> <i>and</i> <span +class="smcap">Servant</span>.</p> +<p>FORE. Hey day! What, are all the women of my +family abroad? Is not my wife come home? Nor my +sister, nor my daughter?</p> +<p>SERV. No, sir.</p> +<p>FORE. Mercy on us, what can be the meaning of it? +Sure the moon is in all her fortitudes. Is my niece +Angelica at home?</p> +<p>SERV. Yes, sir.</p> +<p>FORE. I believe you lie, sir.</p> +<p>SERV. Sir?</p> +<p>FORE. I say you lie, sir. It is impossible that +anything should be as I would have it; for I was born, sir, when +the crab was ascending, and all my affairs go backward.</p> +<p>SERV. I can’t tell indeed, sir.</p> +<p>FORE. No, I know you can’t, sir: but I can tell, +and foretell, sir.</p> +<h3>SCENE II.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Nurse</span>.</p> +<p>FORE. Nurse, where’s your young mistress?</p> +<p>NURSE. Wee’st heart, I know not, +they’re none of ’em come home yet. Poor child, +I warrant she’s fond o’ seeing the town. Marry, +pray heaven they ha’ given her any dinner. Good +lack-a-day, ha, ha, ha, Oh, strange! I’ll vow and +swear now, ha, ha, ha, marry, and did you ever see the like!</p> +<p>FORE. Why, how now, what’s the matter?</p> +<p>NURSE. Pray heaven send your worship good luck, marry, +and amen with all my heart, for you have put on one stocking with +the wrong side outward.</p> +<p>FORE. Ha, how? Faith and troth I’m glad of +it; and so I have: that may be good luck in troth, in troth it +may, very good luck. Nay, I have had some omens: I got out +of bed backwards too this morning, without premeditation; pretty +good that too; but then I stumbled coming down stairs, and met a +weasel; bad omens those: some bad, some good, our lives are +chequered. Mirth and sorrow, want and plenty, night and +day, make up our time. But in troth I am pleased at my +stocking; very well pleased at my stocking. Oh, +here’s my niece! Sirrah, go tell Sir Sampson Legend +I’ll wait on him if he’s at leisure:—’tis +now three o’clock, a very good hour for business: Mercury +governs this hour.</p> +<h3>SCENE III.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Angelica</span>, <span +class="smcap">Foresight</span>, <span +class="smcap">Nurse</span>.</p> +<p>ANG. Is it not a good hour for pleasure too, +uncle? Pray lend me your coach; mine’s out of +order.</p> +<p>FORE. What, would you be gadding too? Sure, all +females are mad to-day. It is of evil portent, and bodes +mischief to the master of a family. I remember an old +prophecy written by Messahalah the Arabian, and thus translated +by a reverend Buckinghamshire bard:—</p> +<p class="poetry">‘When housewives all the house +forsake,<br /> +And leave goodman to brew and bake,<br /> +Withouten guile, then be it said,<br /> +That house doth stand upon its head;<br /> +And when the head is set in grond,<br /> +Ne marl, if it be fruitful fond.’</p> +<p>Fruitful, the head fruitful, that bodes horns; the fruit of +the head is horns. Dear niece, stay at home—for by +the head of the house is meant the husband; the prophecy needs no +explanation.</p> +<p>ANG. Well, but I can neither make you a cuckold, uncle, +by going abroad, nor secure you from being one by staying at +home.</p> +<p>FORE. Yes, yes; while there’s one woman left, the +prophecy is not in full force.</p> +<p>ANG. But my inclinations are in force; I have a mind to +go abroad, and if you won’t lend me your coach, I’ll +take a hackney or a chair, and leave you to erect a scheme, and +find who’s in conjunction with your wife. Why +don’t you keep her at home, if you’re jealous of her +when she’s abroad? You know my aunt is a little +retrograde (as you call it) in her nature. Uncle, I’m +afraid you are not lord of the ascendant, ha, ha, ha!</p> +<p>FORE. Well, Jill-flirt, you are very pert, and always +ridiculing that celestial science.</p> +<p>ANG. Nay, uncle, don’t be angry—if you are, +I’ll reap up all your false prophecies, ridiculous dreams, +and idle divinations. I’ll swear you are a nuisance +to the neighbourhood. What a bustle did you keep against +the last invisible eclipse, laying in provision as ’twere +for a siege. What a world of fire and candle, matches and +tinder-boxes did you purchase! One would have thought we +were ever after to live under ground, or at least making a voyage +to Greenland, to inhabit there all the dark season.</p> +<p>FORE. Why, you malapert slut—</p> +<p>ANG. Will you lend me your coach, or I’ll go +on—nay, I’ll declare how you prophesied popery was +coming only because the butler had mislaid some of the apostle +spoons, and thought they were lost. Away went religion and +spoon-meat together. Indeed, uncle, I’ll indite you +for a wizard.</p> +<p>FORE. How, hussy! Was there ever such a provoking +minx?</p> +<p>NURSE. O merciful father, how she talks!</p> +<p>ANG. Yes, I can make oath of your unlawful midnight +practices, you and the old nurse there—</p> +<p>NURSE. Marry, heaven defend! I at midnight +practices? O Lord, what’s here to do? I in +unlawful doings with my master’s worship—why, did you +ever hear the like now? Sir, did ever I do anything of your +midnight concerns but warm your bed, and tuck you up, and set the +candle and your tobacco-box and your urinal by you, and now and +then rub the soles of your feet? O Lord, I!</p> +<p>ANG. Yes, I saw you together through the key-hole of the +closet one night, like Saul and the witch of Endor, turning the +sieve and shears, and pricking your thumbs, to write poor +innocent servants’ names in blood, about a little nutmeg +grater which she had forgot in the caudle-cup. Nay, I know +something worse, if I would speak of it.</p> +<p>FORE. I defy you, hussy; but I’ll remember this, +I’ll be revenged on you, cockatrice. I’ll +hamper you. You have your fortune in your own hands, but +I’ll find a way to make your lover, your prodigal +spendthrift gallant, Valentine, pay for all, I will.</p> +<p>ANG. Will you? I care not, but all shall out +then. Look to it, nurse: I can bring witness that you have +a great unnatural teat under your left arm, and he another; and +that you suckle a young devil in the shape of a tabby-cat, by +turns, I can.</p> +<p>NURSE. A teat, a teat—I an unnatural teat! +Oh, the false, slanderous thing; feel, feel here, if I have +anything but like another Christian. [<i>Crying</i>.]</p> +<p>FORE. I will have patience, since it is the will of the +stars I should be thus tormented. This is the effect of the +malicious conjunctions and oppositions in the third house of my +nativity; there the curse of kindred was foretold. But I +will have my doors locked up;—I’ll punish you: not a +man shall enter my house.</p> +<p>ANG. Do, uncle, lock ’em up quickly before my aunt +come home. You’ll have a letter for alimony to-morrow +morning. But let me be gone first, and then let no mankind +come near the house, but converse with spirits and the celestial +signs, the bull and the ram and the goat. Bless me! +There are a great many horned beasts among the twelve signs, +uncle. But cuckolds go to heaven.</p> +<p>FORE. But there’s but one virgin among the twelve +signs, spitfire, but one virgin.</p> +<p>ANG. Nor there had not been that one, if she had had to +do with anything but astrologers, uncle. That makes my aunt +go abroad.</p> +<p>FORE. How, how? Is that the reason? Come, +you know something; tell me and I’ll forgive you. Do, +good niece. Come, you shall have my coach and +horses—faith and troth you shall. Does my wife +complain? Come, I know women tell one another. She is +young and sanguine, has a wanton hazel eye, and was born under +Gemini, which may incline her to society. She has a mole +upon her lip, with a moist palm, and an open liberality on the +mount of Venus.</p> +<p>ANG. Ha, ha, ha!</p> +<p>FORE. Do you laugh? Well, gentlewoman, +I’ll—but come, be a good girl, don’t perplex +your poor uncle, tell me—won’t you speak? Odd, +I’ll—</p> +<h3>SCENE IV.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Servant</span>.</p> +<p>SERV. Sir Sampson is coming down to wait upon you.</p> +<p>ANG. Good-bye, uncle—call me a chair. +I’ll find out my aunt, and tell her she must not come +home.</p> +<p>FORE. I’m so perplexed and vexed, I’m not +fit to receive him; I shall scarce recover myself before the hour +be past. Go nurse, tell Sir Sampson I’m ready to wait +on him.</p> +<p>NURSE. Yes, sir,</p> +<p>FORE. Well—why, if I was born to be a cuckold, +there’s no more to be said—he’s here +already.</p> +<h3>SCENE V.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Foresight</span>, <i>and</i> <span +class="smcap">Sir Sampson Legend</span> <i>with a paper</i>.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Nor no more to be done, old boy; that’s +plain—here ’tis, I have it in my hand, old Ptolomey, +I’ll make the ungracious prodigal know who begat him; I +will, old Nostrodamus. What, I warrant my son thought +nothing belonged to a father but forgiveness and affection; no +authority, no correction, no arbitrary power; nothing to be done, +but for him to offend and me to pardon. I warrant you, if +he danced till doomsday he thought I was to pay the piper. +Well, but here it is under black and white, <i>signatum</i>, +<i>sigillatum</i>, and <i>deliberatum</i>; that as soon as my son +Benjamin is arrived, he’s to make over to him his right of +inheritance. Where’s my daughter that is to +be?—Hah! old Merlin! body o’ me, I’m so glad +I’m revenged on this undutiful rogue.</p> +<p>FORE. Odso, let me see; let me see the paper. Ay, +faith and troth, here ’tis, if it will but hold. I +wish things were done, and the conveyance made. When was +this signed, what hour? Odso, you should have consulted me +for the time. Well, but we’ll make haste—</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Haste, ay, ay; haste enough. My son Ben +will be in town to-night. I have ordered my lawyer to draw +up writings of settlement and jointure—all shall be done +to-night. No matter for the time; prithee, brother +Foresight, leave superstition. Pox o’ the time; +there’s no time but the time present, there’s no more +to be said of what’s past, and all that is to come will +happen. If the sun shine by day, and the stars by night, +why, we shall know one another’s faces without the help of +a candle, and that’s all the stars are good for.</p> +<p>FORE. How, how? Sir Sampson, that all? Give +me leave to contradict you, and tell you you are ignorant.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. I tell you I am wise; and <i>sapiens +dominabitur astris</i>; there’s Latin for you to prove it, +and an argument to confound your Ephemeris.—Ignorant! +I tell you, I have travelled old Fircu, and know the globe. +I have seen the antipodes, where the sun rises at midnight, and +sets at noon-day.</p> +<p>FORE. But I tell you, I have travelled, and travelled in +the celestial spheres, know the signs and the planets, and their +houses. Can judge of motions direct and retrograde, of +sextiles, quadrates, trines and oppositions, fiery-trigons and +aquatical-trigons. Know whether life shall be long or +short, happy or unhappy, whether diseases are curable or +incurable. If journeys shall be prosperous, undertakings +successful, or goods stolen recovered; I know—</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. I know the length of the Emperor of +China’s foot; have kissed the Great Mogul’s slippers, +and rid a-hunting upon an elephant with a Cham of Tartary. +Body o’ me, I have made a cuckold of a king, and the +present majesty of Bantam is the issue of these loins.</p> +<p>FORE. I know when travellers lie or speak truth, when +they don’t know it themselves.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. I have known an astrologer made a cuckold in +the twinkling of a star; and seen a conjurer that could not keep +the devil out of his wife’s circle.</p> +<p>FORE. What, does he twit me with my wife too? I +must be better informed of this. [<i>Aside</i>.] Do +you mean my wife, Sir Sampson? Though you made a cuckold of +the king of Bantam, yet by the body of the sun—</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. By the horns of the moon, you would say, +brother Capricorn.</p> +<p>FORE. Capricorn in your teeth, thou modern Mandeville; +Ferdinand Mendez Pinto was but a type of thee, thou liar of the +first magnitude. Take back your paper of inheritance; send +your son to sea again. I’ll wed my daughter to an +Egyptian mummy, e’er she shall incorporate with a contemner +of sciences, and a defamer of virtue.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Body o’ me, I have gone too far; I must +not provoke honest Albumazar:—an Egyptian mummy is an +illustrious creature, my trusty hieroglyphic; and may have +significations of futurity about him; odsbud, I would my son were +an Egyptian mummy for thy sake. What, thou art not angry +for a jest, my good Haly? I reverence the sun, moon and +stars with all my heart. What, I’ll make thee a +present of a mummy: now I think on’t, body o’ me, I +have a shoulder of an Egyptian king that I purloined from one of +the pyramids, powdered with hieroglyphics, thou shalt have it +brought home to thy house, and make an entertainment for all the +philomaths, and students in physic and astrology in and about +London.</p> +<p>FORE. But what do you know of my wife, Sir Sampson?</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Thy wife is a constellation of virtues; +she’s the moon, and thou art the man in the moon. +Nay, she is more illustrious than the moon; for she has her +chastity without her inconstancy: ’sbud I was but in +jest.</p> +<h3>SCENE VI.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. How now, who sent for you? Ha! +What would you have?</p> +<p>FORE. Nay, if you were but in jest—who’s +that fellow? I don’t like his physiognomy.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. My son, sir; what son, sir? My son +Benjamin, hoh?</p> +<p>JERE. No, sir, Mr. Valentine, my master; ’tis the +first time he has been abroad since his confinement, and he comes +to pay his duty to you.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Well, sir.</p> +<h3>SCENE VII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Foresight</span>, <span class="smcap">Sir +Sampson</span>, <span class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>JERE. He is here, sir.</p> +<p>VAL. Your blessing, sir.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. You’ve had it already, sir; I think I +sent it you to-day in a bill of four thousand pound: a great deal +of money, brother Foresight.</p> +<p>FORE. Ay, indeed, Sir Sampson, a great deal of money for +a young man; I wonder what he can do with it!</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Body o’ me, so do I. Hark ye, +Valentine, if there be too much, refund the superfluity; dost +hear, boy?</p> +<p>VAL. Superfluity, sir? It will scarce pay my +debts. I hope you will have more indulgence than to oblige +me to those hard conditions which my necessity signed to.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Sir, how, I beseech you, what were you pleased +to intimate, concerning indulgence?</p> +<p>VAL. Why, sir, that you would not go to the extremity of +the conditions, but release me at least from some part.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Oh, sir, I understand you—that’s +all, ha?</p> +<p>VAL. Yes, sir, all that I presume to ask. But what +you, out of fatherly fondness, will be pleased to add, shall be +doubly welcome.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. No doubt of it, sweet sir; but your filial +piety, and my fatherly fondness would fit like two tallies. +Here’s a rogue, brother Foresight, makes a bargain under +hand and seal in the morning, and would be released from it in +the afternoon; here’s a rogue, dog, here’s conscience +and honesty; this is your wit now, this is the morality of your +wits! You are a wit, and have been a beau, and may be +a—why sirrah, is it not here under hand and seal—can +you deny it?</p> +<p>VAL. Sir, I don’t deny it.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Sirrah, you’ll be hanged; I shall live +to see you go up Holborn Hill. Has he not a rogue’s +face? Speak brother, you understand physiognomy, a hanging +look to me—of all my boys the most unlike me; he has a +damned Tyburn face, without the benefit o’ the clergy.</p> +<p>FORE. Hum—truly I don’t care to discourage a +young man,—he has a violent death in his face; but I hope +no danger of hanging.</p> +<p>VAL. Sir, is this usage for your son?—For that old +weather-headed fool, I know how to laugh at him; but you, +sir—</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. You, sir; and you, sir: why, who are you, +sir?</p> +<p>VAL. Your son, sir.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. That’s more than I know, sir, and I +believe not.</p> +<p>VAL. Faith, I hope not.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. What, would you have your mother a +whore? Did you ever hear the like? Did you ever hear +the like? Body o’ me—</p> +<p>VAL. I would have an excuse for your barbarity and +unnatural usage.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Excuse! Impudence! Why, sirrah, +mayn’t I do what I please? Are not you my +slave? Did not I beget you? And might not I have +chosen whether I would have begot you or no? ’Oons, +who are you? Whence came you? What brought you into +the world? How came you here, sir? Here, to stand +here, upon those two legs, and look erect with that audacious +face, ha? Answer me that! Did you come a volunteer +into the world? Or did I, with the lawful authority of a +parent, press you to the service?</p> +<p>VAL. I know no more why I came than you do why you +called me. But here I am, and if you don’t mean to +provide for me, I desire you would leave me as you found me.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. With all my heart: come, uncase, strip, and go +naked out of the world as you came into ’t.</p> +<p>VAL. My clothes are soon put off. But you must +also divest me of reason, thought, passions, inclinations, +affections, appetites, senses, and the huge train of attendants +that you begot along with me.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Body o’ me, what a manyheaded monster +have I propagated!</p> +<p>VAL. I am of myself, a plain, easy, simple creature, and +to be kept at small expense; but the retinue that you gave me are +craving and invincible; they are so many devils that you have +raised, and will have employment.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. ’Oons, what had I to do to get +children,—can’t a private man be born without all +these followers? Why, nothing under an emperor should be +born with appetites. Why, at this rate, a fellow that has +but a groat in his pocket may have a stomach capable of a ten +shilling ordinary.</p> +<p>JERE. Nay, that’s as clear as the sun; I’ll +make oath of it before any justice in Middlesex.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Here’s a cormorant too. +’S’heart this fellow was not born with you? I +did not beget him, did I?</p> +<p>JERE. By the provision that’s made for me, you +might have begot me too. Nay, and to tell your worship +another truth, I believe you did, for I find I was born with +those same whoreson appetites too, that my master speaks of.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Why, look you there, now. I’ll +maintain it, that by the rule of right reason, this fellow ought +to have been born without a palate. ’S’heart, +what should he do with a distinguishing taste? I warrant +now he’d rather eat a pheasant, than a piece of poor John; +and smell, now, why I warrant he can smell, and loves perfumes +above a stink. Why there’s it; and music, don’t +you love music, scoundrel?</p> +<p>JERE. Yes; I have a reasonable good ear, sir, as to jigs +and country dances, and the like; I don’t much matter your +solos or sonatas, they give me the spleen.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. The spleen, ha, ha, ha; a pox confound +you—solos or sonatas? ’Oons, whose son are +you? How were you engendered, muckworm?</p> +<p>JERE. I am by my father, the son of a chair-man; my +mother sold oysters in winter, and cucumbers in summer; and I +came upstairs into the world; for I was born in a cellar.</p> +<p>FORE. By your looks, you should go upstairs out of the +world too, friend.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. And if this rogue were anatomized now, and +dissected, he has his vessels of digestion and concoction, and so +forth, large enough for the inside of a cardinal, this son of a +cucumber.—These things are unaccountable and +unreasonable. Body o’ me, why was not I a bear, that +my cubs might have lived upon sucking their paws? Nature +has been provident only to bears and spiders; the one has its +nutriment in his own hands; and t’other spins his +habitation out of his own entrails.</p> +<p>VAL. Fortune was provident enough to supply all the +necessities of my nature, if I had my right of inheritance.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Again! ’Oons, han’t you four +thousand pounds? If I had it again, I would not give thee a +groat.—What, would’st thou have me turn pelican, and +feed thee out of my own vitals? S’heart, live by your +wits: you were always fond of the wits, now let’s see, if +you have wit enough to keep yourself. Your brother will be +in town to-night or to-morrow morning, and then look you perform +covenants, and so your friend and servant:—come, brother +Foresight.</p> +<h3>SCENE VIII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>JERE. I told you what your visit would come to.</p> +<p>VAL. ’Tis as much as I expected. I did not +come to see him, I came to see Angelica: but since she was gone +abroad, it was easily turned another way, and at least looked +well on my side. What’s here? Mrs. Foresight +and Mrs. Frail, they are earnest. I’ll avoid +’em. Come this way, and go and enquire when Angelica +will return.</p> +<h3>SCENE IX.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Mrs. +Foresight</span> <i>and</i> <span class="smcap">Mrs. +Frail</span>.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. What have you to do to watch me? +’S’life I’ll do what I please.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. You will?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Yes, marry will I. A great piece of +business to go to Covent Garden Square in a hackney coach, and +take a turn with one’s friend.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Nay, two or three turns, I’ll take my +oath.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Well, what if I took twenty—I warrant +if you had been there, it had been only innocent +recreation. Lord, where’s the comfort of this life if +we can’t have the happiness of conversing where we +like?</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. But can’t you converse at home? I +own it, I think there’s no happiness like conversing with +an agreeable man; I don’t quarrel at that, nor I +don’t think but your conversation was very innocent; but +the place is public, and to be seen with a man in a hackney coach +is scandalous. What if anybody else should have seen you +alight, as I did? How can anybody be happy while +they’re in perpetual fear of being seen and censured? +Besides, it would not only reflect upon you, sister, but me.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Pooh, here’s a clutter: why should it +reflect upon you? I don’t doubt but you have thought +yourself happy in a hackney coach before now. If I had gone +to Knight’s Bridge, or to Chelsea, or to Spring Garden, or +Barn Elms with a man alone, something might have been said.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Why, was I ever in any of those places? +What do you mean, sister?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Was I? What do you mean?</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. You have been at a worse place.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. I at a worse place, and with a man!</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. I suppose you would not go alone to the +World’s End.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. The World’s End! What, do you +mean to banter me?</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Poor innocent! You don’t know +that there’s a place called the World’s End? +I’ll swear you can keep your countenance purely: +you’d make an admirable player.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. I’ll swear you have a great deal of +confidence, and in my mind too much for the stage.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Very well, that will appear who has most; you +never were at the World’s End?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. No.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. You deny it positively to my face?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Your face, what’s your face?</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. No matter for that, it’s as good a face +as yours.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Not by a dozen years’ wearing. +But I do deny it positively to your face, then.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. I’ll allow you now to find fault with +my face; for I’ll swear your impudence has put me out of +countenance. But look you here now, where did you lose this +gold bodkin? Oh, sister, sister!</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. My bodkin!</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Nay, ’tis yours, look at it.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Well, if you go to that, where did you find +this bodkin? Oh, sister, sister! Sister every +way.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Oh, devil on’t, that I could not +discover her without betraying myself. [<i>Aside</i>.]</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. I have heard gentlemen say, sister, that one +should take great care, when one makes a thrust in fencing, not +to lie open oneself.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. It’s very true, sister. Well, +since all’s out, and as you say, since we are both wounded, +let us do what is often done in duels, take care of one another, +and grow better friends than before.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. With all my heart: ours are but slight flesh +wounds, and if we keep ’em from air, not at all +dangerous. Well, give me your hand in token of sisterly +secrecy and affection.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Here ’tis, with all my heart.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Well, as an earnest of friendship and +confidence, I’ll acquaint you with a design that I +have. To tell truth, and speak openly one to another, +I’m afraid the world have observed us more than we have +observed one another. You have a rich husband, and are +provided for. I am at a loss, and have no great stock +either of fortune or reputation, and therefore must look sharply +about me. Sir Sampson has a son that is expected to-night, +and by the account I have heard of his education, can be no +conjurer. The estate you know is to be made over to +him. Now if I could wheedle him, sister, ha? You +understand me?</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. I do, and will help you to the utmost of my +power. And I can tell you one thing that falls out luckily +enough; my awkward daughter-in-law, who you know is designed to +be his wife, is grown fond of Mr. Tattle; now if we can improve +that, and make her have an aversion for the booby, it may go a +great way towards his liking you. Here they come together; +and let us contrive some way or other to leave ’em +together.</p> +<h3>SCENE X.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Tattle</span> <i>and</i> <span class="smcap">Miss +Prue</span>.</p> +<p>MISS. Mother, mother, mother, look you here!</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Fie, fie, Miss, how you bawl! Besides, +I have told you, you must not call me mother.</p> +<p>MISS. What must I call you then, are you not my +father’s wife?</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Madam; you must say madam. By my soul, +I shall fancy myself old indeed to have this great girl call me +mother. Well, but Miss, what are you so overjoyed at?</p> +<p>MISS. Look you here, madam, then, what Mr. Tattle has +given me. Look you here, cousin, here’s a snuff-box; +nay, there’s snuff in’t. Here, will you have +any? Oh, good! How sweet it is. Mr. Tattle is +all over sweet, his peruke is sweet, and his gloves are sweet, +and his handkerchief is sweet, pure sweet, sweeter than +roses. Smell him, mother—madam, I mean. He gave +me this ring for a kiss.</p> +<p>TATT. O fie, Miss, you must not kiss and tell.</p> +<p>MISS. Yes; I may tell my mother. And he says +he’ll give me something to make me smell so. Oh, pray +lend me your handkerchief. Smell, cousin; he says +he’ll give me something that will make my smocks smell this +way. Is not it pure? It’s better than lavender, +mun. I’m resolved I won’t let nurse put any +more lavender among my smocks—ha, cousin?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Fie, Miss; amongst your linen, you must +say. You must never say smock.</p> +<p>MISS. Why, it is not bawdy, is it, cousin?</p> +<p>TATT. Oh, madam; you are too severe upon Miss; you must +not find fault with her pretty simplicity: it becomes her +strangely. Pretty Miss, don’t let ’em persuade +you out of your innocency.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Oh, demm you toad. I wish you +don’t persuade her out of her innocency.</p> +<p>TATT. Who, I, madam? O Lord, how can your ladyship +have such a thought? Sure, you don’t know me.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Ah devil, sly devil. He’s as +close, sister, as a confessor. He thinks we don’t +observe him.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. A cunning cur, how soon he could find out a +fresh, harmless creature; and left us, sister, presently.</p> +<p>TATT. Upon reputation</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. They’re all so, sister, these +men. They love to have the spoiling of a young thing, they +are as fond of it, as of being first in the fashion, or of seeing +a new play the first day. I warrant it would break Mr. +Tattle’s heart to think that anybody else should be +beforehand with him.</p> +<p>TATT. O Lord, I swear I would not for the +world—</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. O hang you; who’ll believe you? +You’d be hanged before you’d confess. We know +you—she’s very pretty! Lord, what pure red and +white!—she looks so wholesome; ne’er stir: I +don’t know, but I fancy, if I were a man—</p> +<p>MISS. How you love to jeer one, cousin.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Hark’ee, sister, by my soul the girl is +spoiled already. D’ee think she’ll ever endure +a great lubberly tarpaulin? Gad, I warrant you she +won’t let him come near her after Mr. Tattle.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. O my soul, I’m afraid +not—eh!—filthy creature, that smells all of pitch and +tar. Devil take you, you confounded toad—why did you +see her before she was married?</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Nay, why did we let him—my husband will +hang us. He’ll think we brought ’em +acquainted.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Come, faith, let us be gone. If my +brother Foresight should find us with them, he’d think so, +sure enough.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. So he would—but then leaving them +together is as bad: and he’s such a sly devil, he’ll +never miss an opportunity.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. I don’t care; I won’t be seen +in’t.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Well, if you should, Mr. Tattle, you’ll +have a world to answer for; remember I wash my hands of it. +I’m thoroughly innocent.</p> +<h3>SCENE XI.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Tattle</span>, +<span class="smcap">Miss Prue</span>.</p> +<p>MISS. What makes ’em go away, Mr. Tattle? +What do they mean, do you know?</p> +<p>TATT. Yes my dear; I think I can guess, but hang me if I +know the reason of it.</p> +<p>MISS. Come, must not we go too?</p> +<p>TATT. No, no, they don’t mean that.</p> +<p>MISS. No! What then? What shall you and I do +together?</p> +<p>TATT. I must make love to you, pretty Miss; will you let +me make love to you?</p> +<p>MISS. Yes, if you please.</p> +<p>TATT. Frank, i’Gad, at least. What a pox +does Mrs. Foresight mean by this civility? Is it to make a +fool of me? Or does she leave us together out of good +morality, and do as she would be done by?—Gad, I’ll +understand it so. [<i>Aside</i>.]</p> +<p>MISS. Well; and how will you make love to me—come, +I long to have you begin,—must I make love too? You +must tell me how.</p> +<p>TATT. You must let me speak, Miss, you must not speak +first; I must ask you questions, and you must answer.</p> +<p>MISS. What, is it like the catechism? Come then, +ask me.</p> +<p>TATT. D’ye think you can love me?</p> +<p>MISS. Yes.</p> +<p>TATT. Pooh, pox, you must not say yes already; I +shan’t care a farthing for you then in a twinkling.</p> +<p>MISS. What must I say then?</p> +<p>TATT. Why you must say no, or you believe not, or you +can’t tell—</p> +<p>MISS. Why, must I tell a lie then?</p> +<p>TATT. Yes, if you’d be well bred. All well +bred persons lie.—Besides, you are a woman, you must never +speak what you think: your words must contradict your thoughts; +but your actions may contradict your words. So when I ask +you if you can love me, you must say no, but you must love me +too. If I tell you you are handsome, you must deny it, and +say I flatter you. But you must think yourself more +charming than I speak you: and like me, for the beauty which I +say you have, as much as if I had it myself. If I ask you +to kiss me, you must be angry, but you must not refuse me. +If I ask you for more, you must be more angry,—but more +complying; and as soon as ever I make you say you’ll cry +out, you must be sure to hold your tongue.</p> +<p>MISS. O Lord, I swear this is pure. I like it +better than our old-fashioned country way of speaking one’s +mind;—and must not you lie too?</p> +<p>TATT. Hum—yes—but you must believe I speak +truth.</p> +<p>MISS. O Gemini! Well, I always had a great mind to +tell lies; but they frighted me, and said it was a sin.</p> +<p>TATT. Well, my pretty creature; will you make me happy +by giving me a kiss?</p> +<p>MISS. No, indeed; I’m angry at you. [<i>Runs +and kisses him</i>.]</p> +<p>TATT. Hold, hold, that’s pretty well, but you +should not have given it me, but have suffered me to have taken +it.</p> +<p>MISS. Well, we’ll do it again.</p> +<p>TATT. With all my heart.—Now then, my little +angel. [<i>Kisses her</i>.]</p> +<p>MISS. Pish.</p> +<p>TATT. That’s right,—again, my charmer. +[<i>Kisses again</i>.]</p> +<p>MISS. O fie, nay, now I can’t abide you.</p> +<p>TATT. Admirable! That was as well as if you had +been born and bred in Covent Garden. And won’t you +shew me, pretty miss, where your bed-chamber is?</p> +<p>MISS. No, indeed won’t I; but I’ll run +there, and hide myself from you behind the curtains.</p> +<p>TATT. I’ll follow you.</p> +<p>MISS. Ah, but I’ll hold the door with both hands, +and be angry;—and you shall push me down before you come +in.</p> +<p>TATT. No, I’ll come in first, and push you down +afterwards.</p> +<p>MISS. Will you? Then I’ll be more angry and +more complying.</p> +<p>TATT. Then I’ll make you cry out.</p> +<p>MISS. Oh, but you shan’t, for I’ll hold my +tongue.</p> +<p>TATT. O my dear apt scholar!</p> +<p>MISS. Well, now I’ll run and make more haste than +you.</p> +<p>TATT. You shall not fly so fast, as I’ll +pursue.</p> +<h2>ACT III.—SCENE I.</h2> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Nurse</span> +<i>alone</i>.</p> +<p>NURSE. Miss, Miss, Miss Prue! Mercy on me, marry +and amen. Why, what’s become of the child? Why +Miss, Miss Foresight! Sure she has locked herself up in her +chamber, and gone to sleep, or to prayers: Miss, Miss,—I +hear her.—Come to your father, child; open the door. +Open the door, Miss. I hear you cry husht. O Lord, +who’s there? [<i>peeps</i>] What’s here to +do? O the Father! A man with her! Why, miss, I +say; God’s my life, here’s fine doings +towards—O Lord, we’re all undone. O you young +harlotry [<i>knocks</i>]. Od’s my life, won’t +you open the door? I’ll come in the back way.</p> +<h3>SCENE II.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Tattle</span>, +<span class="smcap">Miss Prue</span>.</p> +<p>MISS. O Lord, she’s coming, and she’ll tell +my father; what shall I do now?</p> +<p>TATT. Pox take her; if she had stayed two minutes +longer, I should have wished for her coming.</p> +<p>MISS. O dear, what shall I say? Tell me, Mr. +Tattle, tell me a lie.</p> +<p>TATT. There’s no occasion for a lie; I could never +tell a lie to no purpose. But since we have done nothing, +we must say nothing, I think. I hear her,—I’ll +leave you together, and come off as you can. [<i>Thrusts +her in</i>, <i>and shuts the door</i>.]</p> +<h3>SCENE III.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Tattle</span>, +<span class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>, <span +class="smcap">Angelica</span>.</p> +<p>ANG. You can’t accuse me of inconstancy; I never +told you that I loved you.</p> +<p>VAL. But I can accuse you of uncertainty, for not +telling me whether you did or not.</p> +<p>ANG. You mistake indifference for uncertainty; I never +had concern enough to ask myself the question.</p> +<p>SCAN. Nor good-nature enough to answer him that did ask +you; I’ll say that for you, madam.</p> +<p>ANG. What, are you setting up for good-nature?</p> +<p>SCAN. Only for the affectation of it, as the women do +for ill-nature.</p> +<p>ANG. Persuade your friend that it is all +affectation.</p> +<p>SCAN. I shall receive no benefit from the opinion; for I +know no effectual difference between continued affectation and +reality.</p> +<p>TATT. [<i>coming up</i>]. Scandal, are you +in private discourse? Anything of secrecy? [<i>Aside +to</i> <span class="smcap">Scandal</span>.]</p> +<p>SCAN. Yes, but I dare trust you; we were talking of +Angelica’s love to Valentine. You won’t speak +of it.</p> +<p>TATT. No, no, not a syllable. I know that’s +a secret, for it’s whispered everywhere.</p> +<p>SCAN. Ha, ha, ha!</p> +<p>ANG. What is, Mr. Tattle? I heard you say +something was whispered everywhere.</p> +<p>SCAN. Your love of Valentine.</p> +<p>ANG. How!</p> +<p>TATT. No, madam, his love for your ladyship. Gad +take me, I beg your pardon,—for I never heard a word of +your ladyship’s passion till this instant.</p> +<p>ANG. My passion! And who told you of my passion, +pray sir?</p> +<p>SCAN. Why, is the devil in you? Did not I tell it +you for a secret?</p> +<p>TATT. Gadso; but I thought she might have been trusted +with her own affairs.</p> +<p>SCAN. Is that your discretion? Trust a woman with +herself?</p> +<p>TATT. You say true, I beg your pardon. I’ll +bring all off. It was impossible, madam, for me to imagine +that a person of your ladyship’s wit and gallantry could +have so long received the passionate addresses of the +accomplished Valentine, and yet remain insensible; therefore you +will pardon me, if, from a just weight of his merit, with your +ladyship’s good judgment, I formed the balance of a +reciprocal affection.</p> +<p>VAL. O the devil, what damned costive poet has given +thee this lesson of fustian to get by rote?</p> +<p>ANG. I dare swear you wrong him, it is his own. +And Mr. Tattle only judges of the success of others, from the +effects of his own merit. For certainly Mr. Tattle was +never denied anything in his life.</p> +<p>TATT. O Lord! Yes, indeed, madam, several +times.</p> +<p>ANG. I swear I don’t think ’tis +possible.</p> +<p>TATT. Yes, I vow and swear I have; Lord, madam, +I’m the most unfortunate man in the world, and the most +cruelly used by the ladies.</p> +<p>ANG. Nay, now you’re ungrateful.</p> +<p>TATT. No, I hope not, ’tis as much ingratitude to +own some favours as to conceal others.</p> +<p>VAL. There, now it’s out.</p> +<p>ANG. I don’t understand you now. I thought +you had never asked anything but what a lady might modestly +grant, and you confess.</p> +<p>SCAN. So faith, your business is done here; now you may +go brag somewhere else.</p> +<p>TATT. Brag! O heavens! Why, did I name +anybody?</p> +<p>ANG. No; I suppose that is not in your power; but you +would if you could, no doubt on’t.</p> +<p>TATT. Not in my power, madam! What, does your +ladyship mean that I have no woman’s reputation in my +power?</p> +<p>SCAN. ’Oons, why, you won’t own it, will +you? [<i>Aside</i>.]</p> +<p>TATT. Faith, madam, you’re in the right; no more I +have, as I hope to be saved; I never had it in my power to say +anything to a lady’s prejudice in my life. For as I +was telling you, madam, I have been the most unsuccessful +creature living, in things of that nature; and never had the good +fortune to be trusted once with a lady’s secret, not +once.</p> +<p>ANG. No?</p> +<p>VAL. Not once, I dare answer for him.</p> +<p>SCAN. And I’ll answer for him; for I’m sure +if he had, he would have told me; I find, madam, you don’t +know Mr. Tattle.</p> +<p>TATT. No indeed, madam, you don’t know me at all, +I find. For sure my intimate friends would have +known—</p> +<p>ANG. Then it seems you would have told, if you had been +trusted.</p> +<p>TATT. O pox, Scandal, that was too far put. Never +have told particulars, madam. Perhaps I might have talked +as of a third person; or have introduced an amour of my own, in +conversation, by way of novel; but never have explained +particulars.</p> +<p>ANG. But whence comes the reputation of Mr. +Tattle’s secrecy, if he was never trusted?</p> +<p>SCAN. Why, thence it arises—the thing is +proverbially spoken; but may be applied to him—as if we +should say in general terms, he only is secret who never was +trusted; a satirical proverb upon our sex. There’s +another upon yours—as she is chaste, who was never asked +the question. That’s all.</p> +<p>VAL. A couple of very civil proverbs, truly. +’Tis hard to tell whether the lady or Mr. Tattle be the +more obliged to you. For you found her virtue upon the +backwardness of the men; and his secrecy upon the mistrust of the +women.</p> +<p>TATT. Gad, it’s very true, madam, I think we are +obliged to acquit ourselves. And for my part—but your +ladyship is to speak first.</p> +<p>ANG. Am I? Well, I freely confess I have resisted +a great deal of temptation.</p> +<p>TATT. And i’Gad, I have given some temptation that +has not been resisted.</p> +<p>VAL. Good.</p> +<p>ANG. I cite Valentine here, to declare to the court, how +fruitless he has found his endeavours, and to confess all his +solicitations and my denials.</p> +<p>VAL. I am ready to plead not guilty for you; and guilty +for myself.</p> +<p>SCAN. So, why this is fair, here’s demonstration +with a witness.</p> +<p>TATT. Well, my witnesses are not present. But I +confess I have had favours from persons. But as the favours +are numberless, so the persons are nameless.</p> +<p>SCAN. Pooh, this proves nothing.</p> +<p>TATT. No? I can show letters, lockets, pictures, +and rings; and if there be occasion for witnesses, I can summon +the maids at the chocolate-houses, all the porters at Pall Mall +and Covent Garden, the door-keepers at the Playhouse, the drawers +at Locket’s, Pontack’s, the Rummer, Spring Garden, my +own landlady and <i>valet de chambre</i>; all who shall make oath +that I receive more letters than the Secretary’s office, +and that I have more vizor-masks to enquire for me, than ever +went to see the Hermaphrodite, or the Naked Prince. And it +is notorious that in a country church once, an enquiry being made +who I was, it was answered, I was the famous Tattle, who had +ruined so many women.</p> +<p>VAL. It was there, I suppose, you got the nickname of +the Great Turk.</p> +<p>TATT. True; I was called Turk-Tattle all over the +parish. The next Sunday all the old women kept their +daughters at home, and the parson had not half his +congregation. He would have brought me into the spiritual +court, but I was revenged upon him, for he had a handsome +daughter whom I initiated into the science. But I repented +it afterwards, for it was talked of in town. And a lady of +quality that shall be nameless, in a raging fit of jealousy, came +down in her coach and six horses, and exposed herself upon my +account; Gad, I was sorry for it with all my heart. You +know whom I mean—you know where we raffled—</p> +<p>SCAN. Mum, Tattle.</p> +<p>VAL. ’Sdeath, are not you ashamed?</p> +<p>ANG. O barbarous! I never heard so insolent a +piece of vanity. Fie, Mr. Tattle; I’ll swear I could +not have believed it. Is this your secrecy?</p> +<p>TATT. Gadso, the heat of my story carried me beyond my +discretion, as the heat of the lady’s passion hurried her +beyond her reputation. But I hope you don’t know whom +I mean; for there was a great many ladies raffled. Pox +on’t, now could I bite off my tongue.</p> +<p>SCAN. No, don’t; for then you’ll tell us no +more. Come, I’ll recommend a song to you upon the +hint of my two proverbs, and I see one in the next room that will +sing it. [<i>Goes to the door</i>.]</p> +<p>TATT. For heaven’s sake, if you do guess, say +nothing; Gad, I’m very unfortunate.</p> +<p>SCAN. Pray sing the first song in the last new play.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">SONG.<br /> +Set by Mr. John Eccles.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">I.</p> +<p class="poetry">A nymph and a swain to Apollo once prayed,<br +/> +The swain had been jilted, the nymph been betrayed:<br /> +Their intent was to try if his oracle knew<br /> +E’er a nymph that was chaste, or a swain that was true.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">II.</p> +<p class="poetry">Apollo was mute, and had like t’have been +posed,<br /> +But sagely at length he this secret disclosed:<br /> +He alone won’t betray in whom none will confide,<br /> +And the nymph may be chaste that has never been tried.</p> +<h3>SCENE IV.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Sir Sampson</span>, <span class="smcap">Mrs. +Frail</span>, <span class="smcap">Miss Prue</span>, <i>and</i> +<span class="smcap">Servant</span>.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Is Ben come? Odso, my son Ben +come? Odd, I’m glad on’t. Where is +he? I long to see him. Now, Mrs. Frail, you shall see +my son Ben. Body o’ me, he’s the hopes of my +family. I han’t seen him these three years—I +warrant he’s grown. Call him in, bid him make +haste. I’m ready to cry for joy.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Now Miss, you shall see your husband.</p> +<p>MISS. Pish, he shall be none of my husband. +[<i>Aside to Frail</i>.]</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Hush. Well he shan’t; leave that +to me. I’ll beckon Mr. Tattle to us.</p> +<p>ANG. Won’t you stay and see your brother?</p> +<p>VAL. We are the twin stars, and cannot shine in one +sphere; when he rises I must set. Besides, if I should +stay, I don’t know but my father in good nature may press +me to the immediate signing the deed of conveyance of my estate; +and I’ll defer it as long as I can. Well, +you’ll come to a resolution.</p> +<p>ANG. I can’t. Resolution must come to me, or +I shall never have one.</p> +<p>SCAN. Come, Valentine, I’ll go with you; +I’ve something in my head to communicate to you.</p> +<h3>SCENE V.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Angelica</span>, <span class="smcap">Sir +Sampson</span>, <span class="smcap">Tattle</span>, <span +class="smcap">Mrs. Frail</span>, <span class="smcap">Miss +Prue</span>.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. What, is my son Valentine gone? What, is +he sneaked off, and would not see his brother? +There’s an unnatural whelp! There’s an +ill-natured dog! What, were you here too, madam, and could +not keep him? Could neither love, nor duty, nor natural +affection oblige him? Odsbud, madam, have no more to say to +him, he is not worth your consideration. The rogue has not +a drachm of generous love about him—all interest, all +interest; he’s an undone scoundrel, and courts your estate: +body o’ me, he does not care a doit for your person.</p> +<p>ANG. I’m pretty even with him, Sir Sampson; for if +ever I could have liked anything in him, it should have been his +estate too; but since that’s gone, the bait’s off, +and the naked hook appears.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Odsbud, well spoken, and you are a wiser woman +than I thought you were, for most young women now-a-days are to +be tempted with a naked hook.</p> +<p>ANG. If I marry, Sir Sampson, I’m for a good +estate with any man, and for any man with a good estate; +therefore, if I were obliged to make a choice, I declare +I’d rather have you than your son.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Faith and troth, you’re a wise woman, +and I’m glad to hear you say so; I was afraid you were in +love with the reprobate. Odd, I was sorry for you with all +my heart. Hang him, mongrel, cast him off; you shall see +the rogue show himself, and make love to some desponding Cadua of +fourscore for sustenance. Odd, I love to see a young +spendthrift forced to cling to an old woman for support, like ivy +round a dead oak; faith I do, I love to see ’em hug and +cotton together, like down upon a thistle.</p> +<h3>SCENE VI.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Ben Legend</span> <i>and</i> <span +class="smcap">Servant</span>.</p> +<p>BEN. Where’s father?</p> +<p>SERV. There, sir, his back’s toward you.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. My son Ben! Bless thee, my dear +body. Body o’ me, thou art heartily welcome.</p> +<p>BEN. Thank you, father, and I’m glad to see +you.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Odsbud, and I’m glad to see thee; kiss +me, boy, kiss me again and again, dear Ben. [<i>Kisses +him</i>.]</p> +<p>BEN. So, so, enough, father, Mess, I’d rather kiss +these gentlewomen.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. And so thou shalt. Mrs. Angelica, my son +Ben.</p> +<p>BEN. Forsooth, if you please. [<i>Salutes +her</i>.] Nay, mistress, I’m not for dropping anchor +here; about ship, i’faith. [<i>Kisses +Frail</i>.] Nay, and you too, my little cock-boat—so +[<i>Kisses Miss</i>].</p> +<p>TATT. Sir, you’re welcome ashore.</p> +<p>BEN. Thank you, thank you, friend.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Thou hast been many a weary league, Ben, since +I saw thee.</p> +<p>BEN. Ay, ay, been! Been far enough, an’ that +be all. Well, father, and how do all at home? How +does brother Dick, and brother Val?</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Dick—body o’ me—Dick has +been dead these two years. I writ you word when you were at +Leghorn.</p> +<p>BEN. Mess, that’s true; marry! I had +forgot. Dick’s dead, as you say. Well, and +how? I have a many questions to ask you. Well, you +ben’t married again, father, be you?</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. No; I intend you shall marry, Ben; I would not +marry for thy sake.</p> +<p>BEN. Nay, what does that signify? An’ you +marry again—why then, I’ll go to sea again, so +there’s one for t’other, an’ that be all. +Pray don’t let me be your hindrance—e’en marry +a God’s name, an the wind sit that way. As for my +part, mayhap I have no mind to marry.</p> +<p>FRAIL. That would be pity—such a handsome young +gentleman.</p> +<p>BEN. Handsome! he, he, he! nay, forsooth, an you be for +joking, I’ll joke with you, for I love my jest, an’ +the ship were sinking, as we sayn at sea. But I’ll +tell you why I don’t much stand towards matrimony. I +love to roam about from port to port, and from land to land; I +could never abide to be port-bound, as we call it. Now, a +man that is married has, as it were, d’ye see, his feet in +the bilboes, and mayhap mayn’t get them out again when he +would.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Ben’s a wag.</p> +<p>BEN. A man that is married, d’ye see, is no more +like another man than a galley-slave is like one of us free +sailors; he is chained to an oar all his life, and mayhap forced +to tug a leaky vessel into the bargain.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. A very wag—Ben’s a very wag; only +a little rough, he wants a little polishing.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Not at all; I like his humour mightily: +it’s plain and honest—I should like such a humour in +a husband extremely.</p> +<p>BEN. Say’n you so, forsooth? Marry, and I +should like such a handsome gentlewoman for a bed-fellow +hugely. How say you, mistress, would you like going to +sea? Mess, you’re a tight vessel, an well rigged, an +you were but as well manned.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. I should not doubt that if you were master +of me.</p> +<p>BEN. But I’ll tell you one thing, an you come to +sea in a high wind, or that lady—you may’nt carry so +much sail o’ your head—top and top gallant, by the +mess.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. No, why so?</p> +<p>BEN. Why, an you do, you may run the risk to be overset, +and then you’ll carry your keels above water, he, he, +he!</p> +<p>ANG. I swear, Mr. Benjamin is the veriest wag in +nature—an absolute sea-wit.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Nay, Ben has parts, but as I told you before, +they want a little polishing. You must not take anything +ill, madam.</p> +<p>BEN. No, I hope the gentlewoman is not angry; I mean all +in good part, for if I give a jest, I’ll take a jest, and +so forsooth you may be as free with me.</p> +<p>ANG. I thank you, sir, I am not at all offended. +But methinks, Sir Sampson, you should leave him alone with his +mistress. Mr. Tattle, we must not hinder lovers.</p> +<p>TATT. Well, Miss, I have your promise. [<i>Aside +to Miss</i>.]</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Body o’ me, madam, you say true. +Look you, Ben, this is your mistress. Come, Miss, you must +not be shame-faced; we’ll leave you together.</p> +<p>MISS. I can’t abide to be left alone; mayn’t +my cousin stay with me?</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. No, no. Come, let’s away.</p> +<p>BEN. Look you, father, mayhap the young woman +mayn’t take a liking to me.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. I warrant thee, boy: come, come, we’ll +be gone; I’ll venture that.</p> +<h3>SCENE VII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Ben</span>, +<i>and</i> <span class="smcap">Miss Prue</span>.</p> +<p>BEN. Come mistress, will you please to sit down? for an +you stand a stern a that’n, we shall never grapple +together. Come, I’ll haul a chair; there, an you +please to sit, I’ll sit by you.</p> +<p>MISS. You need not sit so near one, if you have anything +to say, I can hear you farther off, I an’t deaf.</p> +<p>BEN. Why that’s true, as you say, nor I an’t +dumb, I can be heard as far as another,—I’ll heave +off, to please you. [<i>Sits farther off</i>.] An we +were a league asunder, I’d undertake to hold discourse with +you, an ’twere not a main high wind indeed, and full in my +teeth. Look you, forsooth, I am, as it were, bound for the +land of matrimony; ’tis a voyage, d’ye see, that was +none of my seeking. I was commanded by father, and if you +like of it, mayhap I may steer into your harbour. How say +you, mistress? The short of the thing is, that if you like +me, and I like you, we may chance to swing in a hammock +together.</p> +<p>MISS. I don’t know what to say to you, nor I +don’t care to speak with you at all.</p> +<p>BEN. No? I’m sorry for that. But pray +why are you so scornful?</p> +<p>MISS. As long as one must not speak one’s mind, +one had better not speak at all, I think, and truly I won’t +tell a lie for the matter.</p> +<p>BEN. Nay, you say true in that, it’s but a folly +to lie: for to speak one thing, and to think just the contrary +way is, as it were, to look one way, and to row another. +Now, for my part, d’ye see, I’m for carrying things +above board, I’m not for keeping anything under +hatches,—so that if you ben’t as willing as I, say so +a God’s name: there’s no harm done; mayhap you may be +shame-faced; some maidens thof they love a man well enough, yet +they don’t care to tell’n so to’s face. +If that’s the case, why, silence gives consent.</p> +<p>MISS. But I’m sure it is not so, for I’ll +speak sooner than you should believe that; and I’ll speak +truth, though one should always tell a lie to a man; and I +don’t care, let my father do what he will; I’m too +big to be whipt, so I’ll tell you plainly, I don’t +like you, nor love you at all, nor never will, that’s more: +so there’s your answer for you; and don’t trouble me +no more, you ugly thing.</p> +<p>BEN. Look you, young woman, you may learn to give good +words, however. I spoke you fair, d’ye see, and +civil. As for your love or your liking, I don’t value +it of a rope’s end; and mayhap I like you as little as you +do me: what I said was in obedience to father. Gad, I fear +a whipping no more than you do. But I tell you one thing, +if you should give such language at sea, you’d have a cat +o’ nine tails laid cross your shoulders. Flesh! who +are you? You heard t’other handsome young woman speak +civilly to me of her own accord. Whatever you think of +yourself, gad, I don’t think you are any more to compare to +her than a can of small-beer to a bowl of punch.</p> +<p>MISS. Well, and there’s a handsome gentleman, and +a fine gentleman, and a sweet gentleman, that was here that loves +me, and I love him; and if he sees you speak to me any more, +he’ll thrash your jacket for you, he will, you great +sea-calf.</p> +<p>BEN. What, do you mean that fair-weather spark that was +here just now? Will he thrash my jacket? +Let’n,—let’n. But an he comes near me, +mayhap I may giv’n a salt eel for’s supper, for all +that. What does father mean to leave me alone as soon as I +come home with such a dirty dowdy? Sea-calf? I +an’t calf enough to lick your chalked face, you cheese-curd +you:—marry thee? Oons, I’ll marry a Lapland +witch as soon, and live upon selling contrary winds and wrecked +vessels.</p> +<p>MISS. I won’t be called names, nor I won’t +be abused thus, so I won’t. If I were a man +[<i>cries</i>]—you durst not talk at his rate. No, +you durst not, you stinking tar-barrel.</p> +<h3>SCENE VIII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Mrs. Foresight</span> <i>and</i> <span +class="smcap">Mrs. Frail</span>.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. They have quarrelled, just as we could +wish.</p> +<p>BEN. Tar-barrel? Let your sweetheart there call me +so, if he’ll take your part, your Tom Essence, and +I’ll say something to him; gad, I’ll lace his +musk-doublet for him, I’ll make him stink: he shall smell +more like a weasel than a civet-cat, afore I ha’ done with +’en.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Bless me, what’s the matter, +Miss? What, does she cry? Mr. Benjamin, what have you +done to her?</p> +<p>BEN. Let her cry: the more she cries the less +she’ll—she has been gathering foul weather in her +mouth, and now it rains out at her eyes.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Come, Miss, come along with me, and tell me, +poor child.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Lord, what shall we do? There’s +my brother Foresight and Sir Sampson coming. Sister, do you +take Miss down into the parlour, and I’ll carry Mr. +Benjamin into my chamber, for they must not know that they are +fallen out. Come, sir, will you venture yourself with +me? [<i>Looking kindly on him</i>.]</p> +<p>BEN. Venture, mess, and that I will, though ’twere +to sea in a storm.</p> +<h3>SCENE IX.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Sir +Sampson</span> <i>and</i> <span +class="smcap">Foresight</span>.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. I left ’em together here; what, are they +gone? Ben’s a brisk boy: he has got her into a +corner; father’s own son, faith, he’ll touzle her, +and mouzle her. The rogue’s sharp set, coming from +sea; if he should not stay for saving grace, old Foresight, but +fall to without the help of a parson, ha? Odd, if he should +I could not be angry with him; ’twould be but like me, a +chip of the old block. Ha! thou’rt melancholic, old +Prognostication; as melancholic as if thou hadst spilt the salt, +or pared thy nails on a Sunday. Come, cheer up, look about +thee: look up, old stargazer. Now is he poring upon the +ground for a crooked pin, or an old horse-nail, with the head +towards him.</p> +<p>FORE. Sir Sampson, we’ll have the wedding +to-morrow morning.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. With all my heart.</p> +<p>FORE. At ten a’clock, punctually at ten.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. To a minute, to a second; thou shalt set thy +watch, and the bridegroom shall observe its motions; they shall +be married to a minute, go to bed to a minute; and when the alarm +strikes, they shall keep time like the figures of St. +Dunstan’s clock, and <i>consummatum est</i> shall ring all +over the parish.</p> +<h3>SCENE X.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>.</p> +<p>SCAN. Sir Sampson, sad news.</p> +<p>FORE. Bless us!</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Why, what’s the matter?</p> +<p>SCAN. Can’t you guess at what ought to afflict you +and him, and all of us, more than anything else?</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Body o’ me, I don’t know any +universal grievance, but a new tax, or the loss of the Canary +fleet. Unless popery should be landed in the West, or the +French fleet were at anchor at Blackwall.</p> +<p>SCAN. No. Undoubtedly, Mr. Foresight knew all +this, and might have prevented it.</p> +<p>FORE. ’Tis no earthquake!</p> +<p>SCAN. No, not yet; nor whirlwind. But we +don’t know what it may come to. But it has had a +consequence already that touches us all.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Why, body o’ me, out with’t.</p> +<p>SCAN. Something has appeared to your son +Valentine. He’s gone to bed upon’t, and very +ill. He speaks little, yet he says he has a world to +say. Asks for his father and the wise Foresight; talks of +Raymond Lully, and the ghost of Lilly. He has secrets to +impart, I suppose, to you two. I can get nothing out of him +but sighs. He desires he may see you in the morning, but +would not be disturbed to-night, because he has some business to +do in a dream.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Hoity toity, what have I to do with his dreams +or his divination? Body o’ me, this is a trick to +defer signing the conveyance. I warrant the devil will tell +him in a dream that he must not part with his estate. But +I’ll bring him a parson to tell him that the devil’s +a liar:—or if that won’t do, I’ll bring a +lawyer that shall out-lie the devil. And so I’ll try +whether my blackguard or his shall get the better of the day.</p> +<h3>SCENE XI.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Scandal</span>, +<span class="smcap">Foresight</span>.</p> +<p>SCAN. Alas, Mr. Foresight, I’m afraid all is not +right. You are a wise man, and a conscientious man, a +searcher into obscurity and futurity, and if you commit an error, +it is with a great deal of consideration, and discretion, and +caution—</p> +<p>FORE. Ah, good Mr. Scandal—</p> +<p>SCAN. Nay, nay, ’tis manifest; I do not flatter +you. But Sir Sampson is hasty, very hasty. I’m +afraid he is not scrupulous enough, Mr. Foresight. He has +been wicked, and heav’n grant he may mean well in his +affair with you. But my mind gives me, these things cannot +be wholly insignificant. You are wise, and should not be +over-reached, methinks you should not—</p> +<p>FORE. Alas, Mr. Scandal,—<i>humanum est +errare</i>.</p> +<p>SCAN. You say true, man will err; mere man will +err—but you are something more. There have been wise +men; but they were such as you, men who consulted the stars, and +were observers of omens. Solomon was wise, but +how?—by his judgment in astrology. So says Pineda in +his third book and eighth chapter—</p> +<p>FORE. You are learned, Mr. Scandal.</p> +<p>SCAN. A trifler—but a lover of art. And the +Wise Men of the East owed their instruction to a star, which is +rightly observed by Gregory the Great in favour of +astrology. And Albertus Magnus makes it the most valuable +science, because, says he, it teaches us to consider the +causation of causes, in the causes of things.</p> +<p>FORE. I protest I honour you, Mr. Scandal. I did +not think you had been read in these matters. Few young men +are inclined—</p> +<p>SCAN. I thank my stars that have inclined me. But +I fear this marriage and making over this estate, this +transferring of a rightful inheritance, will bring judgments upon +us. I prophesy it, and I would not have the fate of +Cassandra not to be believed. Valentine is disturbed; what +can be the cause of that? And Sir Sampson is hurried on by +an unusual violence. I fear he does not act wholly from +himself; methinks he does not look as he used to do.</p> +<p>FORE. He was always of an impetuous nature. But as +to this marriage, I have consulted the stars, and all appearances +are prosperous—</p> +<p>SCAN. Come, come, Mr. Foresight, let not the prospect of +worldly lucre carry you beyond your judgment, nor against your +conscience. You are not satisfied that you act justly.</p> +<p>FORE. How?</p> +<p>SCAN. You are not satisfied, I say. I am loth to +discourage you, but it is palpable that you are not +satisfied.</p> +<p>FORE. How does it appear, Mr. Scandal? I think I +am very well satisfied.</p> +<p>SCAN. Either you suffer yourself to deceive yourself, or +you do not know yourself.</p> +<p>FORE. Pray explain yourself.</p> +<p>SCAN. Do you sleep well o’ nights?</p> +<p>FORE. Very well.</p> +<p>SCAN. Are you certain? You do not look so.</p> +<p>FORE. I am in health, I think.</p> +<p>SCAN. So was Valentine this morning; and looked just +so.</p> +<p>FORE. How? Am I altered any way? I +don’t perceive it.</p> +<p>SCAN. That may be, but your beard is longer than it was +two hours ago.</p> +<p>FORE. Indeed! Bless me!</p> +<h3>SCENE XII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Mrs. Foresight</span>.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Husband, will you go to bed? It’s +ten a’clock. Mr. Scandal, your servant.</p> +<p>SCAN. Pox on her, she has interrupted my +design—but I must work her into the project. You keep +early hours, madam.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Mr. Foresight is punctual; we sit up after +him.</p> +<p>FORE. My dear, pray lend me your glass, your little +looking-glass.</p> +<p>SCAN. Pray lend it him, madam. I’ll tell you +the reason.</p> +<p>[<i>She gives him the glass</i>: <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span> <i>and she whisper</i>.] My +passion for you is grown so violent, that I am no longer master +of myself. I was interrupted in the morning, when you had +charity enough to give me your attention, and I had hopes of +finding another opportunity of explaining myself to you, but was +disappointed all this day; and the uneasiness that has attended +me ever since brings me now hither at this unseasonable hour.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Was there ever such impudence, to make love +to me before my husband’s face? I’ll swear +I’ll tell him.</p> +<p>SCAN. Do. I’ll die a martyr rather than +disclaim my passion. But come a little farther this way, +and I’ll tell you what project I had to get him out of the +way; that I might have an opportunity of waiting upon you. +[<i>Whisper</i>. <span class="smcap">Foresight</span> +<i>looking in the glass</i>.]</p> +<p>FORE. I do not see any revolution here; methinks I look +with a serene and benign aspect—pale, a little +pale—but the roses of these cheeks have been gathered many +years;—ha! I do not like that sudden flushing. +Gone already! hem, hem, hem! faintish. My heart is pretty +good; yet it beats; and my pulses, ha!—I have +none—mercy on me—hum. Yes, here they +are—gallop, gallop, gallop, gallop, gallop, gallop, +hey! Whither will they hurry me? Now they’re +gone again. And now I’m faint again, and pale again, +and hem! and my hem! breath, hem! grows short; hem! hem! he, he, +hem!</p> +<p>SCAN. It takes: pursue it in the name of love and +pleasure.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. How do you do, Mr. Foresight!</p> +<p>FORE. Hum, not so well as I thought I was. Lend me +your hand.</p> +<p>SCAN. Look you there now. Your lady says your +sleep has been unquiet of late.</p> +<p>FORE. Very likely.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Oh, mighty restless, but I was afraid to tell +him so. He has been subject to talking and starting.</p> +<p>SCAN. And did not use to be so?</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Never, never, till within these three nights; +I cannot say that he has once broken my rest since we have been +married.</p> +<p>FORE. I will go to bed.</p> +<p>SCAN. Do so, Mr. Foresight, and say your prayers. +He looks better than he did.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Nurse, nurse!</p> +<p>FORE. Do you think so, Mr. Scandal?</p> +<p>SCAN. Yes, yes. I hope this will be gone by +morning, taking it in time.</p> +<p>FORE. I hope so.</p> +<h3>SCENE XIII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Nurse</span>.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Nurse; your master is not well; put him to +bed.</p> +<p>SCAN. I hope you will be able to see Valentine in the +morning. You had best take a little diacodion and +cowslip-water, and lie upon your back: maybe you may dream.</p> +<p>FORE. I thank you, Mr. Scandal, I will. Nurse, let +me have a watch-light, and lay the Crumbs of Comfort by me.</p> +<p>NURSE. Yes, sir.</p> +<p>FORE. And—hem, hem! I am very faint.</p> +<p>SCAN. No, no, you look much better.</p> +<p>FORE. Do I? And, d’ye hear, bring me, let me +see—within a quarter of twelve, hem—he, +hem!—just upon the turning of the tide, bring me the +urinal; and I hope, neither the lord of my ascendant, nor the +moon will be combust; and then I may do well.</p> +<p>SCAN. I hope so. Leave that to me; I will erect a +scheme; and I hope I shall find both Sol and Venus in the sixth +house.</p> +<p>FORE. I thank you, Mr. Scandal, indeed that would be a +great comfort to me. Hem, hem! good night.</p> +<h3>SCENE XIV.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Scandal</span>, +<span class="smcap">Mrs. Foresight</span>.</p> +<p>SCAN. Good night, good Mr. Foresight; and I hope Mars +and Venus will be in conjunction;—while your wife and I are +together.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Well; and what use do you hope to make of +this project? You don’t think that you are ever like +to succeed in your design upon me?</p> +<p>SCAN. Yes, faith I do; I have a better opinion both of +you and myself than to despair.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Did you ever hear such a toad? +Hark’ee, devil: do you think any woman honest?</p> +<p>SCAN. Yes, several, very honest; they’ll cheat a +little at cards, sometimes, but that’s nothing.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Pshaw! but virtuous, I mean?</p> +<p>SCAN. Yes, faith, I believe some women are virtuous too; +but ’tis as I believe some men are valiant, through +fear. For why should a man court danger or a woman shun +pleasure?</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Oh, monstrous! What are conscience and +honour?</p> +<p>SCAN. Why, honour is a public enemy, and conscience a +domestic thief; and he that would secure his pleasure must pay a +tribute to one and go halves with t’other. As for +honour, that you have secured, for you have purchased a perpetual +opportunity for pleasure.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. An opportunity for pleasure?</p> +<p>SCAN. Ay, your husband, a husband is an opportunity for +pleasure: so you have taken care of honour, and ’tis the +least I can do to take care of conscience.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. And so you think we are free for one +another?</p> +<p>SCAN. Yes, faith I think so; I love to speak my +mind.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Why, then, I’ll speak my mind. +Now as to this affair between you and me. Here you make +love to me; why, I’ll confess it does not displease +me. Your person is well enough, and your understanding is +not amiss.</p> +<p>SCAN. I have no great opinion of myself, but I think +I’m neither deformed nor a fool.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. But you have a villainous character: you are +a libertine in speech, as well as practice.</p> +<p>SCAN. Come, I know what you would say: you think it more +dangerous to be seen in conversation with me than to allow some +other men the last favour; you mistake: the liberty I take in +talking is purely affected for the service of your sex. He +that first cries out stop thief is often he that has stol’n +the treasure. I am a juggler, that act by confederacy; and +if you please, we’ll put a trick upon the world.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Ay; but you are such an universal juggler, +that I’m afraid you have a great many confederates.</p> +<p>SCAN. Faith, I’m sound.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Oh, fie—I’ll swear you’re +impudent.</p> +<p>SCAN. I’ll swear you’re handsome.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Pish, you’d tell me so, though you did +not think so.</p> +<p>SCAN. And you’d think so, though I should not tell +you so. And now I think we know one another pretty +well.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. O Lord, who’s here?</p> +<h3>SCENE XV.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Mrs. Frail</span> <i>and</i> <span +class="smcap">Ben</span>.</p> +<p>BEN. Mess, I love to speak my mind. Father has +nothing to do with me. Nay, I can’t say that neither; +he has something to do with me. But what does that +signify? If so be that I ben’t minded to be steered +by him; ’tis as thof he should strive against wind and +tide.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Ay, but, my dear, we must keep it secret +till the estate be settled; for you know, marrying without an +estate is like sailing in a ship without ballast.</p> +<p>BEN. He, he, he; why, that’s true; just so for all +the world it is indeed, as like as two cable ropes.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. And though I have a good portion, you know +one would not venture all in one bottom.</p> +<p>BEN. Why, that’s true again; for mayhap one bottom +may spring a leak. You have hit it indeed: mess, +you’ve nicked the channel.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Well, but if you should forsake me after +all, you’d break my heart.</p> +<p>BEN. Break your heart? I’d rather the +<i>Mary-gold</i> should break her cable in a storm, as well as I +love her. Flesh, you don’t think I’m +false-hearted, like a landman. A sailor will be honest, +thof mayhap he has never a penny of money in his pocket. +Mayhap I may not have so fair a face as a citizen or a courtier; +but, for all that, I’ve as good blood in my veins, and a +heart as sound as a biscuit.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. And will you love me always?</p> +<p>BEN. Nay, an I love once, I’ll stick like pitch; +I’ll tell you that. Come, I’ll sing you a song +of a sailor.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Hold, there’s my sister, I’ll +call her to hear it.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Well; I won’t go to bed to my husband +to-night, because I’ll retire to my own chamber, and think +of what you have said.</p> +<p>SCAN. Well; you’ll give me leave to wait upon you +to your chamber door, and leave you my last instructions?</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Hold, here’s my sister coming towards +us.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. If it won’t interrupt you I’ll +entertain you with a song.</p> +<p>BEN. The song was made upon one of our +ship’s-crew’s wife. Our boatswain made the +song. Mayhap you may know her, sir. Before she was +married she was called buxom Joan of Deptford.</p> +<p>SCAN. I have heard of her.</p> +<p>BEN. [<i>Sings</i>]:—</p> +<p style="text-align: center">BALLAD.<br /> +Set by <span class="smcap">Mr. John Eccles</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">I.</p> +<p class="poetry">A soldier and a sailor,<br /> +A tinker and a tailor,<br /> +Had once a doubtful strife, sir,<br /> +To make a maid a wife, sir,<br /> + Whose name was buxom Joan.<br /> +For now the time was ended,<br /> +When she no more intended<br /> +To lick her lips at men, sir,<br /> +And gnaw the sheets in vain, sir,<br /> + And lie o’ nights alone.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">II.</p> +<p class="poetry">The soldier swore like thunder,<br /> +He loved her more than plunder,<br /> +And shewed her many a scar, sir,<br /> +That he had brought from far, sir,<br /> + With fighting for her sake.<br /> +The tailor thought to please her<br /> +With offering her his measure.<br /> +The tinker, too, with mettle<br /> +Said he could mend her kettle,<br /> + And stop up ev’ry leak.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">III.</p> +<p class="poetry">But while these three were prating,<br /> +The sailor slyly waiting,<br /> +Thought if it came about, sir,<br /> +That they should all fall out, sir,<br /> + He then might play his part.<br /> +And just e’en as he meant, sir,<br /> +To loggerheads they went, sir,<br /> +And then he let fly at her<br /> +A shot ’twixt wind and water,<br /> + That won this fair maid’s heart.</p> +<p>BEN. If some of our crew that came to see me are not +gone, you shall see that we sailors can dance sometimes as well +as other folks. [<i>Whistles</i>.] I warrant that +brings ’em, an they be within hearing. [<i>Enter +seamen</i>]. Oh, here they be—and fiddles along +with ’em. Come, my lads, let’s have a round, +and I’ll make one. [<i>Dance</i>.]</p> +<p>BEN. We’re merry folks, we sailors: we han’t +much to care for. Thus we live at sea; eat biscuit, and +drink flip, put on a clean shirt once a quarter; come home and +lie with our landladies once a year, get rid of a little money, +and then put off with the next fair wind. How d’ye +like us?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Oh, you are the happiest, merriest men +alive.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. We’re beholden to Mr. Benjamin for this +entertainment. I believe it’s late.</p> +<p>BEN. Why, forsooth, an you think so, you had best go to +bed. For my part, I mean to toss a can, and remember my +sweet-heart, afore I turn in; mayhap I may dream of her.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Mr. Scandal, you had best go to bed and dream +too.</p> +<p>SCAN. Why, faith, I have a good lively imagination, and +can dream as much to the purpose as another, if I set about +it. But dreaming is the poor retreat of a lazy, hopeless, +and imperfect lover; ’tis the last glimpse of love to +worn-out sinners, and the faint dawning of a bliss to wishing +girls and growing boys.</p> +<p class="poetry">There’s nought but willing, waking love, +that can<br /> +Make blest the ripened maid and finished man.</p> +<h2>ACT IV.—SCENE I.</h2> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Valentine’s +lodging</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Scandal</span> +<i>and</i> <span class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>SCAN. Well, is your master ready? does he look madly and +talk madly?</p> +<p>JERE. Yes, sir; you need make no great doubt of +that. He that was so near turning poet yesterday morning +can’t be much to seek in playing the madman to-day.</p> +<p>SCAN. Would he have Angelica acquainted with the reason +of his design?</p> +<p>JERE. No, sir, not yet. He has a mind to try +whether his playing the madman won’t make her play the +fool, and fall in love with him; or at least own that she has +loved him all this while and concealed it.</p> +<p>SCAN. I saw her take coach just now with her maid, and +think I heard her bid the coachman drive hither.</p> +<p>JERE. Like enough, sir, for I told her maid this +morning, my master was run stark mad only for love of her +mistress.—I hear a coach stop; if it should be she, sir, I +believe he would not see her, till he hears how she takes it.</p> +<p>SCAN. Well, I’ll try her:—’tis +she—here she comes.</p> +<h3>SCENE II.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Angelica</span> <i>with</i> <span +class="smcap">Jenny</span>.</p> +<p>ANG. Mr. Scandal, I suppose you don’t think it a +novelty to see a woman visit a man at his own lodgings in a +morning?</p> +<p>SCAN. Not upon a kind occasion, madam. But when a +lady comes tyrannically to insult a ruined lover, and make +manifest the cruel triumphs of her beauty, the barbarity of it +something surprises me.</p> +<p>ANG. I don’t like raillery from a serious +face. Pray tell me what is the matter?</p> +<p>JERE. No strange matter, madam; my master’s mad, +that’s all. I suppose your ladyship has thought him +so a great while.</p> +<p>ANG. How d’ye mean, mad?</p> +<p>JERE. Why, faith, madam, he’s mad for want of his +wits, just as he was poor for want of money; his head is +e’en as light as his pockets, and anybody that has a mind +to a bad bargain can’t do better than to beg him for his +estate.</p> +<p>ANG. If you speak truth, your endeavouring at wit is +very unseasonable.</p> +<p>SCAN. She’s concerned, and loves him. +[<i>Aside</i>.]</p> +<p>ANG. Mr. Scandal, you can’t think me guilty of so +much inhumanity as not to be concerned for a man I must own +myself obliged to? Pray tell me truth.</p> +<p>SCAN. Faith, madam, I wish telling a lie would mend the +matter. But this is no new effect of an unsuccessful +passion.</p> +<p>ANG. [<i>Aside</i>.] I know not what to +think. Yet I should be vexed to have a trick put upon +me. May I not see him?</p> +<p>SCAN. I’m afraid the physician is not willing you +should see him yet. Jeremy, go in and enquire.</p> +<h3>SCENE III.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Scandal</span>, +<span class="smcap">Angelica</span>, <span +class="smcap">Jenny</span>.</p> +<p>ANG. Ha! I saw him wink and smile. I fancy +’tis a trick—I’ll try.—I would disguise +to all the world a failing which I must own to you: I fear my +happiness depends upon the recovery of Valentine. Therefore +I conjure you, as you are his friend, and as you have compassion +upon one fearful of affliction, to tell me what I am to hope +for—I cannot speak—but you may tell me, tell me, for +you know what I would ask?</p> +<p>SCAN. So, this is pretty plain. Be not too much +concerned, madam; I hope his condition is not desperate. An +acknowledgment of love from you, perhaps, may work a cure, as the +fear of your aversion occasioned his distemper.</p> +<p>ANG. [<i>Aside</i>.] Say you so; nay, then, +I’m convinced. And if I don’t play trick for +trick, may I never taste the pleasure of +revenge.—Acknowledgment of love! I find you have +mistaken my compassion, and think me guilty of a weakness I am a +stranger to. But I have too much sincerity to deceive you, +and too much charity to suffer him to be deluded with vain +hopes. Good nature and humanity oblige me to be concerned +for him; but to love is neither in my power nor inclination, and +if he can’t be cured without I suck the poison from his +wounds, I’m afraid he won’t recover his senses till I +lose mine.</p> +<p>SCAN. Hey, brave woman, i’faith—won’t +you see him, then, if he desire it?</p> +<p>ANG. What signify a madman’s desires? +Besides, ’twould make me uneasy:—if I don’t see +him, perhaps my concern for him may lessen. If I forget +him, ’tis no more than he has done by himself; and now the +surprise is over, methinks I am not half so sorry as I was.</p> +<p>SCAN. So, faith, good nature works apace; you were +confessing just now an obligation to his love.</p> +<p>ANG. But I have considered that passions are +unreasonable and involuntary; if he loves, he can’t help +it; and if I don’t love, I can’t help it; no more +than he can help his being a man, or I my being a woman: or no +more than I can help my want of inclination to stay longer +here. Come, Jenny.</p> +<h3>SCENE IV.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Scandal</span>, +<span class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>SCAN. Humh! An admirable composition, faith, this +same womankind.</p> +<p>JERE. What, is she gone, sir?</p> +<p>SCAN. Gone? Why, she was never here, nor anywhere +else; nor I don’t know her if I see her, nor you +neither.</p> +<p>JERE. Good lack! What’s the matter +now? Are any more of us to be mad? Why, sir, my +master longs to see her, and is almost mad in good earnest with +the joyful news of her being here.</p> +<p>SCAN. We are all under a mistake. Ask no +questions, for I can’t resolve you; but I’ll inform +your master. In the meantime, if our project succeed no +better with his father than it does with his mistress, he may +descend from his exaltation of madness into the road of common +sense, and be content only to be made a fool with other +reasonable people. I hear Sir Sampson. You know your +cue; I’ll to your master.</p> +<h3>SCENE V.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Jeremy</span>, +<span class="smcap">Sir Sampson Legend</span>, <i>with a</i> +<span class="smcap">Lawyer</span>.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. D’ye see, Mr. Buckram, here’s the +paper signed with his own hand.</p> +<p>BUCK. Good, sir. And the conveyance is ready drawn +in this box, if he be ready to sign and seal.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Ready, body o’ me? He must be +ready. His sham-sickness shan’t excuse him. Oh, +here’s his scoundrel. Sirrah, where’s your +master?</p> +<p>JERE. Ah sir, he’s quite gone.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Gone! What, he is not dead?</p> +<p>JERE. No, sir, not dead.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. What, is he gone out of town, run away, ha? +has he tricked me? Speak, varlet.</p> +<p>JERE. No, no, sir, he’s safe enough, sir, an he +were but as sound, poor gentleman. He is indeed here, sir, +and not here, sir.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Hey day, rascal, do you banter me? +Sirrah, d’ye banter me? Speak, sirrah, where is he? +for I will find him.</p> +<p>JERE. Would you could, sir, for he has lost +himself. Indeed, sir, I have a’most broke my heart +about him—I can’t refrain tears when I think of him, +sir: I’m as melancholy for him as a passing-bell, sir, or a +horse in a pound.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. A pox confound your similitudes, sir. +Speak to be understood, and tell me in plain terms what the +matter is with him, or I’ll crack your fool’s +skull.</p> +<p>JERE. Ah, you’ve hit it, sir; that’s the +matter with him, sir: his skull’s cracked, poor gentleman; +he’s stark mad, sir.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Mad!</p> +<p>BUCK. What, is he <i>non compos</i>?</p> +<p>JERE. Quite <i>non compos</i>, sir.</p> +<p>BUCK. Why, then, all’s obliterated, Sir Sampson, +if he be <i>non compos mentis</i>; his act and deed will be of no +effect, it is not good in law.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Oons, I won’t believe it; let me see +him, sir. Mad—I’ll make him find his +senses.</p> +<p>JERE. Mr. Scandal is with him, sir; I’ll knock at +the door.</p> +<p>[<i>Goes to the scene</i>, <i>which opens</i>.]</p> +<h3>SCENE VI.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Sir +Sampson</span>, <span class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>, <span class="smcap">Jeremy</span>, +<i>and</i> <span class="smcap">Lawyer</span>. <span +class="smcap">Valentine</span> <i>upon a couch disorderly +dressed</i>.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. How now, what’s here to do?</p> +<p>VAL. Ha! Who’s that? +[<i>Starting</i>.]</p> +<p>SCAN. For heav’n’s sake softly, sir, and +gently; don’t provoke him.</p> +<p>VAL. Answer me: who is that, and that?</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Gads bobs, does he not know me? Is he +mischievous? I’ll speak gently. Val, Val, dost +thou not know me, boy? Not know thy own father, Val? +I am thy own father, and this is honest Brief Buckram, the +lawyer.</p> +<p>VAL. It may be so—I did not know you—the +world is full. There are people that we do know, and people +that we do not know, and yet the sun shines upon all alike. +There are fathers that have many children, and there are children +that have many fathers. ’Tis strange! But I am +Truth, and come to give the world the lie.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Body o’ me, I know not what to say to +him.</p> +<p>VAL. Why does that lawyer wear black? Does he +carry his conscience withoutside? Lawyer what art +thou? Dost thou know me?</p> +<p>BUCK. O Lord, what must I say? Yes, sir,</p> +<p>VAL. Thou liest, for I am Truth. ’Tis hard I +cannot get a livelihood amongst you. I have been sworn out +of Westminster Hall the first day of every term—let me +see—no matter how long. But I’ll tell you one +thing: it’s a question that would puzzle an arithmetician, +if you should ask him, whether the Bible saves more souls in +Westminster Abbey, or damns more in Westminster Hall. For +my part, I am Truth, and can’t tell; I have very few +acquaintance.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Body o’ me, he talks sensibly in his +madness. Has he no intervals?</p> +<p>JERE. Very short, sir.</p> +<p>BUCK. Sir, I can do you no service while he’s in +this condition. Here’s your paper, sir—he may +do me a mischief if I stay. The conveyance is ready, sir, +if he recover his senses.</p> +<h3>SCENE VII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Sir +Sampson</span>, <span class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>, <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Hold, hold, don’t you go yet.</p> +<p>SCAN. You’d better let him go, sir, and send for +him if there be occasion; for I fancy his presence provokes him +more.</p> +<p>VAL. Is the lawyer gone? ’Tis well, then we +may drink about without going together by the ears—heigh +ho! What a’clock is’t? My father +here! Your blessing, sir.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. He recovers—bless thee, Val; how dost +thou do, boy?</p> +<p>VAL. Thank you, sir, pretty well. I have been a +little out of order, Won’t you please to sit, sir?</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Ay, boy. Come, thou shalt sit down by +me.</p> +<p>VAL. Sir, ’tis my duty to wait.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. No, no; come, come, sit thee down, honest +Val. How dost thou do? Let me feel thy pulse. +Oh, pretty well now, Val. Body o’ me, I was sorry to +see thee indisposed; but I’m glad thou art better, honest +Val.</p> +<p>VAL. I thank you, sir.</p> +<p>SCAN. Miracle! The monster grows loving. +[<i>Aside</i>.]</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Let me feel thy hand again, Val. It does +not shake; I believe thou canst write, Val. Ha, boy? thou +canst write thy name, Val. Jeremy, step and overtake Mr. +Buckram, bid him make haste back with the conveyance; quick, +quick. [<i>In whisper to</i> <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.]</p> +<h3>SCENE VIII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Sir +Sampson</span>, <span class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>.</p> +<p>SCAN. That ever I should suspect such a heathen of any +remorse! [<i>Aside</i>.]</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Dost thou know this paper, Val? I know +thou’rt honest, and wilt perform articles. [<i>Shows +him the paper</i>, <i>but holds it out of his reach</i>.]</p> +<p>VAL. Pray let me see it, sir. You hold it so far +off that I can’t tell whether I know it or no.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. See it, boy? Ay, ay; why, thou dost see +it—’tis thy own hand, Vally. Why, let me see, I +can read it as plain as can be. Look you here. +[<i>Reads</i>.] <i>The condition of this +obligation</i>—Look you, as plain as can be, so it +begins—and then at the bottom—<i>As witness my +hand</i>, <span class="smcap">VALENTINE LEGEND</span>, in great +letters. Why, ’tis as plain as the nose in +one’s face. What, are my eyes better than +thine? I believe I can read it farther off yet; let me +see. [<i>Stretches his arm as far as he can</i>.]</p> +<p>VAL. Will you please to let me hold it, sir?</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Let thee hold it, sayest thou? Ay, with +all my heart. What matter is it who holds it? What +need anybody hold it? I’ll put it up in my pocket, +Val, and then nobody need hold it. [<i>Puts the paper in +his pocket</i>.] There, Val; it’s safe enough, +boy. But thou shalt have it as soon as thou hast set thy +hand to another paper, little Val.</p> +<h3>SCENE IX.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span> <i>with</i> <span +class="smcap">Buckram</span>.</p> +<p>VAL. What, is my bad genius here again! Oh no, +’tis the lawyer with an itching palm; and he’s come +to be scratched. My nails are not long enough. Let me +have a pair of red-hot tongs quickly, quickly, and you shall see +me act St. Dunstan, and lead the devil by the nose.</p> +<p>BUCK. O Lord, let me begone: I’ll not venture +myself with a madman.</p> +<h3>SCENE X.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Sir +Sampson</span>, <span class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>, <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>VAL. Ha, ha, ha; you need not run so fast, honesty will +not overtake you. Ha, ha, ha, the rogue found me out to be +<i>in forma pauperis</i> presently.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Oons! What a vexation is here! I +know not what to do, or say, nor which way to go.</p> +<p>VAL. Who’s that that’s out of his way? +I am Truth, and can set him right. Harkee, friend, the +straight road is the worst way you can go. He that follows +his nose always, will very often be led into a stink. +<i>Probatum est</i>. But what are you for? religion or +politics? There’s a couple of topics for you, no more +like one another than oil and vinegar; and yet those two, beaten +together by a state-cook, make sauce for the whole nation.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. What the devil had I to do, ever to beget +sons? Why did I ever marry?</p> +<p>VAL. Because thou wert a monster, old boy! The two +greatest monsters in the world are a man and a woman! +What’s thy opinion?</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Why, my opinion is, that those two monsters +joined together, make yet a greater, that’s a man and his +wife.</p> +<p>VAL. Aha! Old True-penny, say’st thou +so? Thou hast nicked it. But it’s wonderful +strange, Jeremy.</p> +<p>JERE. What is, sir?</p> +<p>VAL. That gray hairs should cover a green head—and +I make a fool of my father. What’s here! +<i>Erra Pater</i>: or a bearded sibyl? If Prophecy comes, +Truth must give place.</p> +<h3>SCENE XI.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Sir +Sampson</span>, <span class="smcap">Scandal</span>, <span +class="smcap">Foresight</span>, <span class="smcap">Miss +Foresight</span>, <span class="smcap">Mrs. Frail</span>.</p> +<p>FORE. What says he? What, did he prophesy? +Ha, Sir Sampson, bless us! How are we?</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Are we? A pox o’ your +prognostication. Why, we are fools as we use to be. +Oons, that you could not foresee that the moon would predominate, +and my son be mad. Where’s your oppositions, your +trines, and your quadrates? What did your Cardan and your +Ptolemy tell you? Your Messahalah and your Longomontanus, +your harmony of chiromancy with astrology. Ah! pox +on’t, that I that know the world and men and manners, that +don’t believe a syllable in the sky and stars, and sun and +almanacs and trash, should be directed by a dreamer, an +omen-hunter, and defer business in expectation of a lucky hour, +when, body o’ me, there never was a lucky hour after the +first opportunity.</p> +<h3>SCENE XII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Scandal</span>, +<span class="smcap">Foresight</span>, <span class="smcap">Mrs. +Foresight</span>, <span class="smcap">Mrs. Frail</span>.</p> +<p>FORE. Ah, Sir Sampson, heav’n help your +head. This is none of your lucky hour; <i>Nemo omnibus +horis sapit</i>. What, is he gone, and in contempt of +science? Ill stars and unconvertible ignorance attend +him.</p> +<p>SCAN. You must excuse his passion, Mr. Foresight, for he +has been heartily vexed. His son is <i>non compos +mentis</i>, and thereby incapable of making any conveyance in +law; so that all his measures are disappointed.</p> +<p>FORE. Ha! say you so?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. What, has my sea-lover lost his anchor of +hope, then? [<i>Aside to</i> <span class="smcap">Mrs. +Foresight</span>.]</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. O sister, what will you do with him?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Do with him? Send him to sea again in +the next foul weather. He’s used to an inconstant +element, and won’t be surprised to see the tide turned.</p> +<p>FORE. Wherein was I mistaken, not to foresee this? +[<i>Considers</i>.]</p> +<p>SCAN. Madam, you and I can tell him something else that +he did not foresee, and more particularly relating to his own +fortune. [<i>Aside to</i> <span class="smcap">Mrs. +Foresight</span>.]</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. What do you mean? I don’t +understand you.</p> +<p>SCAN. Hush, softly,—the pleasures of last night, +my dear, too considerable to be forgot so soon.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Last night! And what would your +impudence infer from last night? Last night was like the +night before, I think.</p> +<p>SCAN. ’Sdeath, do you make no difference between +me and your husband?</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Not much,—he’s superstitious, and +you are mad, in my opinion.</p> +<p>SCAN. You make me mad. You are not serious. +Pray recollect yourself.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Oh yes, now I remember, you were very +impertinent and impudent,—and would have come to bed to +me.</p> +<p>SCAN. And did not?</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Did not! With that face can you ask the +question?</p> +<p>SCAN. This I have heard of before, but never +believed. I have been told, she had that admirable quality +of forgetting to a man’s face in the morning that she had +lain with him all night, and denying that she had done favours +with more impudence than she could grant ’em. Madam, +I’m your humble servant, and honour you.—You look +pretty well, Mr. Foresight: how did you rest last night?</p> +<p>FORE. Truly, Mr. Scandal, I was so taken up with broken +dreams and distracted visions that I remember little.</p> +<p>SCAN. ’Twas a very forgetting night. But +would you not talk with Valentine? Perhaps you may +understand him; I’m apt to believe there is something +mysterious in his discourses, and sometimes rather think him +inspired than mad.</p> +<p>FORE. You speak with singular good judgment, Mr. +Scandal, truly. I am inclining to your Turkish opinion in +this matter, and do reverence a man whom the vulgar think +mad. Let us go to him.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Sister, do you stay with them; I’ll +find out my lover, and give him his discharge, and come to +you. O’ my conscience, here he comes.</p> +<h3>SCENE XIII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Mrs. +Frail</span>, <span class="smcap">Ben</span>.</p> +<p>BEN. All mad, I think. Flesh, I believe all the +calentures of the sea are come ashore, for my part.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Mr. Benjamin in choler!</p> +<p>BEN. No, I’m pleased well enough, now I have found +you. Mess, I have had such a hurricane upon your account +yonder.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. My account; pray what’s the +matter?</p> +<p>BEN. Why, father came and found me squabbling with yon +chitty-faced thing as he would have me marry, so he asked what +was the matter. He asked in a surly sort of a way—it +seems brother Val is gone mad, and so that put’n into a +passion; but what did I know that? what’s that to +me?—so he asked in a surly sort of manner, and gad I +answered ’n as surlily. What thof he be my father, I +an’t bound prentice to ’n; so faith I told ’n +in plain terms, if I were minded to marry, I’d marry to +please myself, not him. And for the young woman that he +provided for me, I thought it more fitting for her to learn her +sampler and make dirt-pies than to look after a husband; for my +part I was none of her man. I had another voyage to make, +let him take it as he will.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. So, then, you intend to go to sea again?</p> +<p>BEN. Nay, nay, my mind run upon you, but I would not +tell him so much. So he said he’d make my heart ache; +and if so be that he could get a woman to his mind, he’d +marry himself. Gad, says I, an you play the fool and marry +at these years, there’s more danger of your head’s +aching than my heart. He was woundy angry when I +gave’n that wipe. He hadn’t a word to say, and +so I left’n, and the green girl together; mayhap the bee +may bite, and he’ll marry her himself, with all my +heart.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. And were you this undutiful and graceless +wretch to your father?</p> +<p>BEN. Then why was he graceless first? If I am +undutiful and graceless, why did he beget me so? I did not +get myself.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. O impiety! How have I been +mistaken! What an inhuman, merciless creature have I set my +heart upon? Oh, I am happy to have discovered the shelves +and quicksands that lurk beneath that faithless, smiling +face.</p> +<p>BEN. Hey toss! What’s the matter now? +Why, you ben’t angry, be you?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Oh, see me no more,—for thou wert born +amongst rocks, suckled by whales, cradled in a tempest, and +whistled to by winds; and thou art come forth with fins and +scales, and three rows of teeth, a most outrageous fish of +prey.</p> +<p>BEN. O Lord, O Lord, she’s mad, poor young woman: +love has turned her senses, her brain is quite overset. +Well-a-day, how shall I do to set her to rights?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. No, no, I am not mad, monster; I am wise +enough to find you out. Hadst thou the impudence to aspire +at being a husband with that stubborn and disobedient +temper? You that know not how to submit to a father, +presume to have a sufficient stock of duty to undergo a +wife? I should have been finely fobbed indeed, very finely +fobbed.</p> +<p>BEN. Harkee, forsooth; if so be that you are in your +right senses, d’ye see, for ought as I perceive I’m +like to be finely fobbed,—if I have got anger here upon +your account, and you are tacked about already. What +d’ye mean, after all your fair speeches, and stroking my +cheeks, and kissing and hugging, what would you sheer off +so? Would you, and leave me aground?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. No, I’ll leave you adrift, and go +which way you will.</p> +<p>BEN. What, are you false-hearted, then?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Only the wind’s changed.</p> +<p>BEN. More shame for you,—the wind’s +changed? It’s an ill wind blows nobody +good,—mayhap I have a good riddance on you, if these be +your tricks. What, did you mean all this while to make a +fool of me?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Any fool but a husband.</p> +<p>BEN. Husband! Gad, I would not be your husband if +you would have me, now I know your mind: thof you had your weight +in gold and jewels, and thof I loved you never so well.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Why, can’st thou love, Porpuss?</p> +<p>BEN. No matter what I can do; don’t call +names. I don’t love you so well as to bear that, +whatever I did. I’m glad you show yourself, +mistress. Let them marry you as don’t know you. +Gad, I know you too well, by sad experience; I believe he that +marries you will go to sea in a hen-pecked frigate—I +believe that, young woman—and mayhap may come to an anchor +at Cuckolds-Point; so there’s a dash for you, take it as +you will: mayhap you may holla after me when I won’t come +to.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Ha, ha, ha, no doubt on’t.—<i>My +true love is gone to sea</i>. [<i>Sings</i>]</p> +<h3>SCENE XIV.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Mrs. +Frail</span>, <span class="smcap">Mrs. Foresight</span>.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. O sister, had you come a minute sooner, you +would have seen the resolution of a lover:—honest Tar and I +are parted;—and with the same indifference that we +met. O’ my life I am half vexed at the insensibility +of a brute that I despised.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. What then, he bore it most heroically?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Most tyrannically; for you see he has got +the start of me, and I, the poor forsaken maid, am left +complaining on the shore. But I’ll tell you a hint +that he has given me: Sir Sampson is enraged, and talks +desperately of committing matrimony himself. If he has a +mind to throw himself away, he can’t do it more effectually +than upon me, if we could bring it about.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Oh, hang him, old fox, he’s too +cunning; besides, he hates both you and me. But I have a +project in my head for you, and I have gone a good way towards +it. I have almost made a bargain with Jeremy, +Valentine’s man, to sell his master to us.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Sell him? How?</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Valentine raves upon Angelica, and took me +for her, and Jeremy says will take anybody for her that he +imposes on him. Now, I have promised him mountains, if in +one of his mad fits he will bring you to him in her stead, and +get you married together and put to bed together; and after +consummation, girl, there’s no revoking. And if he +should recover his senses, he’ll be glad at least to make +you a good settlement. Here they come: stand aside a +little, and tell me how you like the design.</p> +<h3>SCENE XV.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Mrs. +Foresight</span>, <span class="smcap">Mrs. Frail</span>, <span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>, <span +class="smcap">Foresight</span>, <i>and</i> <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>SCAN. And have you given your master a hint of their +plot upon him? [<i>To</i> <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.]</p> +<p>JERE. Yes, sir; he says he’ll favour it, and +mistake her for Angelica.</p> +<p>SCAN. It may make us sport.</p> +<p>FORE. Mercy on us!</p> +<p>VAL. Husht—interrupt me not—I’ll +whisper prediction to thee, and thou shalt prophesy. I am +Truth, and can teach thy tongue a new trick. I have told +thee what’s past,—now I’ll tell what’s to +come. Dost thou know what will happen +to-morrow?—Answer me not—for I will tell thee. +To-morrow, knaves will thrive through craft, and fools through +fortune, and honesty will go as it did, frost-nipt in a summer +suit. Ask me questions concerning to-morrow.</p> +<p>SCAN. Ask him, Mr. Foresight.</p> +<p>FORE. Pray what will be done at court?</p> +<p>VAL. Scandal will tell you. I am Truth; I never +come there.</p> +<p>FORE. In the city?</p> +<p>VAL. Oh, prayers will be said in empty churches at the +usual hours. Yet you will see such zealous faces behind +counters, as if religion were to be sold in every shop. Oh, +things will go methodically in the city: the clocks will strike +twelve at noon, and the horned herd buzz in the exchange at +two. Wives and husbands will drive distinct trades, and +care and pleasure separately occupy the family. +Coffee-houses will be full of smoke and stratagem. And the +cropt prentice, that sweeps his master’s shop in the +morning, may ten to one dirty his sheets before night. But +there are two things that you will see very strange: which are +wanton wives with their legs at liberty, and tame cuckolds with +chains about their necks. But hold, I must examine you +before I go further. You look suspiciously. Are you a +husband?</p> +<p>FORE. I am married.</p> +<p>VAL. Poor creature! Is your wife of Covent Garden +parish?</p> +<p>FORE. No; St. Martin’s-in-the-Fields.</p> +<p>VAL. Alas, poor man; his eyes are sunk, and his hands +shrivelled; his legs dwindled, and his back bowed: pray, pray, +for a metamorphosis. Change thy shape and shake off age; +get thee Medea’s kettle and be boiled anew; come forth with +lab’ring callous hands, a chine of steel, and Atlas +shoulders. Let Taliacotius trim the calves of twenty +chairmen, and make thee pedestals to stand erect upon, and look +matrimony in the face. Ha, ha, ha! That a man should +have a stomach to a wedding supper, when the pigeons ought rather +to be laid to his feet, ha, ha, ha!</p> +<p>FORE. His frenzy is very high now, Mr. Scandal.</p> +<p>SCAN. I believe it is a spring tide.</p> +<p>FORE. Very likely, truly. You understand these +matters. Mr. Scandal, I shall be very glad to confer with +you about these things which he has uttered. His sayings +are very mysterious and hieroglyphical.</p> +<p>VAL. Oh, why would Angelica be absent from my eyes so +long?</p> +<p>JERE. She’s here, sir.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Now, sister.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. O Lord, what must I say?</p> +<p>SCAN. Humour him, madam, by all means.</p> +<p>VAL. Where is she? Oh, I see her—she comes, +like riches, health, and liberty at once, to a despairing, +starving, and abandoned wretch. Oh, welcome, welcome.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. How d’ye, sir? Can I serve +you?</p> +<p>VAL. Harkee; I have a secret to tell you: Endymion and +the moon shall meet us upon Mount Latmos, and we’ll be +married in the dead of night. But say not a word. +Hymen shall put his torch into a dark lanthorn, that it may be +secret; and Juno shall give her peacock poppy-water, that he may +fold his ogling tail, and Argus’s hundred eyes be shut, +ha! Nobody shall know but Jeremy.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. No, no, we’ll keep it secret, it shall +be done presently.</p> +<p>VAL. The sooner the better. Jeremy, come +hither—closer—that none may overhear us. +Jeremy, I can tell you news: Angelica is turned nun, and I am +turning friar, and yet we’ll marry one another in spite of +the pope. Get me a cowl and beads, that I may play my +part,—for she’ll meet me two hours hence in black and +white, and a long veil to cover the project, and we won’t +see one another’s faces, till we have done something to be +ashamed of; and then we’ll blush once for all.</p> +<h3>SCENE XVI.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Tattle</span> <i>and</i> <span +class="smcap">Angelica</span>.</p> +<p>JERE. I’ll take care, and—</p> +<p>VAL. Whisper.</p> +<p>ANG. Nay, Mr. Tattle, if you make love to me, you spoil +my design, for I intend to make you my confidant.</p> +<p>TATT. But, madam, to throw away your person—such a +person!—and such a fortune on a madman!</p> +<p>ANG. I never loved him till he was mad; but don’t +tell anybody so.</p> +<p>SCAN. How’s this! Tattle making love to +Angelica!</p> +<p>TATT. Tell, madam? Alas, you don’t know +me. I have much ado to tell your ladyship how long I have +been in love with you—but encouraged by the impossibility +of Valentine’s making any more addresses to you, I have +ventured to declare the very inmost passion of my heart. O +madam, look upon us both. There you see the ruins of a poor +decayed creature—here, a complete and lively figure, with +youth and health, and all his five senses in perfection, madam, +and to all this, the most passionate lover—</p> +<p>ANG. O fie, for shame, hold your tongue. A +passionate lover, and five senses in perfection! When you +are as mad as Valentine, I’ll believe you love me, and the +maddest shall take me.</p> +<p>VAL. It is enough. Ha! Who’s here?</p> +<p>FRAIL. O Lord, her coming will spoil all. +[<i>To</i> <span class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.]</p> +<p>JERE. No, no, madam, he won’t know her; if he +should, I can persuade him.</p> +<p>VAL. Scandal, who are these? Foreigners? If +they are, I’ll tell you what I think,—get away all +the company but Angelica, that I may discover my design to +her. [<i>Whisper</i>.]</p> +<p>SCAN. I will—I have discovered something of Tattle +that is of a piece with Mrs. Frail. He courts Angelica; if +we could contrive to couple ’em +together.—Hark’ee—[<i>Whisper</i>.]</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. He won’t know you, cousin; he knows +nobody.</p> +<p>FORE. But he knows more than anybody. O niece, he +knows things past and to come, and all the profound secrets of +time.</p> +<p>TATT. Look you, Mr. Foresight, it is not my way to make +many words of matters, and so I shan’t say much,—but +in short, d’ye see, I will hold you a hundred pounds now, +that I know more secrets than he.</p> +<p>FORE. How! I cannot read that knowledge in your +face, Mr. Tattle. Pray, what do you know?</p> +<p>TATT. Why, d’ye think I’ll tell you, +sir? Read it in my face? No, sir, ’tis written +in my heart; and safer there, sir, than letters writ in juice of +lemon, for no fire can fetch it out. I am no blab, sir.</p> +<p>VAL. Acquaint Jeremy with it, he may easily bring it +about. They are welcome, and I’ll tell ’em so +myself. [<i>To</i> <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>.] What, do you look strange +upon me? Then I must be plain. [<i>Coming up to +them</i>.] I am Truth, and hate an old acquaintance with a +new face. [<span class="smcap">Scandal</span> <i>goes aside +with</i> <span class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.]</p> +<p>TATT. Do you know me, Valentine?</p> +<p>VAL. You? Who are you? No, I hope not.</p> +<p>TATT. I am Jack Tattle, your friend.</p> +<p>VAL. My friend, what to do? I am no married man, +and thou canst not lie with my wife. I am very poor, and +thou canst not borrow money of me. Then what employment +have I for a friend?</p> +<p>TATT. Ha! a good open speaker, and not to be trusted +with a secret.</p> +<p>ANG. Do you know me, Valentine?</p> +<p>VAL. Oh, very well.</p> +<p>ANG. Who am I?</p> +<p>VAL. You’re a woman. One to whom +heav’n gave beauty, when it grafted roses on a briar. +You are the reflection of heav’n in a pond, and he that +leaps at you is sunk. You are all white, a sheet of lovely, +spotless paper, when you first are born; but you are to be +scrawled and blotted by every goose’s quill. I know +you; for I loved a woman, and loved her so long, that I found out +a strange thing: I found out what a woman was good for.</p> +<p>TATT. Ay, prithee, what’s that?</p> +<p>VAL. Why, to keep a secret.</p> +<p>TATT. O Lord!</p> +<p>VAL. Oh, exceeding good to keep a secret; for though she +should tell, yet she is not to be believed.</p> +<p>TATT. Hah! good again, faith.</p> +<p>VAL. I would have music. Sing me the song that I +like.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">SONG<br /> +Set by <span class="smcap">Mr. Finger</span>.</p> +<p class="poetry">I tell thee, Charmion, could I time +retrieve,<br /> +And could again begin to love and live,<br /> +To you I should my earliest off’ring give;<br /> + I know my eyes would lead my heart to you,<br /> + And I should all my vows and oaths renew,<br /> + But to be plain, I never would be true.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">II.</p> +<p class="poetry">For by our weak and weary truth, I find,<br /> +Love hates to centre in a point assign’d?<br /> +But runs with joy the circle of the mind.<br /> + Then never let us chain what should be free,<br /> + But for relief of either sex agree,<br /> + Since women love to change, and so do we.</p> +<p>No more, for I am melancholy. [<i>Walks musing</i>.]</p> +<p>JERE. I’ll do’t, sir. [<i>To</i> <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>.]</p> +<p>SCAN. Mr. Foresight, we had best leave him. He may +grow outrageous, and do mischief.</p> +<p>FORE. I will be directed by you.</p> +<p>JERE. [<i>To</i> <span class="smcap">Mrs. +Frail</span>.] You’ll meet, madam? I’ll +take care everything shall be ready.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Thou shalt do what thou wilt; in short, I +will deny thee nothing.</p> +<p>TATT. Madam, shall I wait upon you? [<i>To</i> +<span class="smcap">Angelica</span>.]</p> +<p>ANG. No, I’ll stay with him; Mr. Scandal will +protect me. Aunt, Mr. Tattle desires you would give him +leave to wait on you.</p> +<p>TATT. Pox on’t, there’s no coming off, now +she has said that. Madam, will you do me the honour?</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Mr. Tattle might have used less ceremony.</p> +<h3>SCENE XVII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Angelica</span>, <span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>.</p> +<p>SCAN. Jeremy, follow Tattle.</p> +<p>ANG. Mr. Scandal, I only stay till my maid comes, and +because I had a mind to be rid of Mr. Tattle.</p> +<p>SCAN. Madam, I am very glad that I overheard a better +reason which you gave to Mr. Tattle; for his impertinence forced +you to acknowledge a kindness for Valentine, which you denied to +all his sufferings and my solicitations. So I’ll +leave him to make use of the discovery, and your ladyship to the +free confession of your inclinations.</p> +<p>ANG. O heav’ns! You won’t leave me +alone with a madman?</p> +<p>SCAN. No, madam; I only leave a madman to his +remedy.</p> +<h3>SCENE XVIII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Angelica</span>, <span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>.</p> +<p>VAL. Madam, you need not be very much afraid, for I +fancy I begin to come to myself.</p> +<p>ANG. Ay, but if I don’t fit you, I’ll be +hanged. [<i>Aside</i>.]</p> +<p>VAL. You see what disguises love makes us put on. +Gods have been in counterfeited shapes for the same reason; and +the divine part of me, my mind, has worn this mask of madness and +this motley livery, only as the slave of love and menial creature +of your beauty.</p> +<p>ANG. Mercy on me, how he talks! Poor +Valentine!</p> +<p>VAL. Nay, faith, now let us understand one another, +hypocrisy apart. The comedy draws toward an end, and let us +think of leaving acting and be ourselves; and since you have +loved me, you must own I have at length deserved you should +confess it.</p> +<p>ANG. [<i>Sighs</i>.] I would I had loved +you—for heav’n knows I pity you, and could I have +foreseen the bad effects, I would have striven; but that’s +too late. [<i>Sighs</i>.]</p> +<p>VAL. What sad effects?—what’s too +late? My seeming madness has deceived my father, and +procured me time to think of means to reconcile me to him, and +preserve the right of my inheritance to his estate; which +otherwise, by articles, I must this morning have resigned. +And this I had informed you of to-day, but you were gone before I +knew you had been here.</p> +<p>ANG. How! I thought your love of me had caused +this transport in your soul; which, it seems, you only +counterfeited, for mercenary ends and sordid interest.</p> +<p>VAL. Nay, now you do me wrong; for if any interest was +considered it was yours, since I thought I wanted more than love +to make me worthy of you.</p> +<p>ANG. Then you thought me mercenary. But how am I +deluded by this interval of sense to reason with a madman?</p> +<p>VAL. Oh, ’tis barbarous to misunderstand me +longer.</p> +<h3>SCENE XIX.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>ANG. Oh, here’s a reasonable creature—sure +he will not have the impudence to persevere. Come, Jeremy, +acknowledge your trick, and confess your master’s madness +counterfeit.</p> +<p>JERE. Counterfeit, madam! I’ll maintain him +to be as absolutely and substantially mad as any freeholder in +Bethlehem; nay, he’s as mad as any projector, fanatic, +chymist, lover, or poet in Europe.</p> +<p>VAL. Sirrah, you be; I am not mad.</p> +<p>ANG. Ha, ha, ha! you see he denies it.</p> +<p>JERE. O Lord, madam, did you ever know any madman mad +enough to own it?</p> +<p>VAL. Sot, can’t you apprehend?</p> +<p>ANG. Why, he talked very sensibly just now.</p> +<p>JERE. Yes, madam; he has intervals. But you see he +begins to look wild again now.</p> +<p>VAL. Why, you thick-skulled rascal, I tell you the farce +is done, and I will be mad no longer. [<i>Beats +him</i>.]</p> +<p>ANG. Ha, ha, ha! is he mad or no, Jeremy?</p> +<p>JERE. Partly, I think,—for he does not know his +own mind two hours. I’m sure I left him just now in +the humour to be mad, and I think I have not found him very quiet +at this present. Who’s there? [<i>One +knocks</i>.]</p> +<p>VAL. Go see, you sot.—I’m very glad that I +can move your mirth though not your compassion.</p> +<p>ANG. I did not think you had apprehension enough to be +exceptions. But madmen show themselves most by +over-pretending to a sound understanding, as drunken men do by +over-acting sobriety. I was half inclining to believe you, +till I accidently touched upon your tender part: but now you have +restored me to my former opinion and compassion.</p> +<p>JERE. Sir, your father has sent to know if you are any +better yet. Will you please to be mad, sir, or how?</p> +<p>VAL. Stupidity! You know the penalty of all +I’m worth must pay for the confession of my senses; +I’m mad, and will be mad to everybody but this lady.</p> +<p>JERE. So—just the very backside of +truth,—but lying is a figure in speech that interlards the +greatest part of my conversation. Madam, your +ladyship’s woman.</p> +<h3>SCENE XX.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Angelica</span>, <span +class="smcap">Jenny</span>.</p> +<p>ANG. Well, have you been there?—Come hither.</p> +<p>JENNY. Yes, madam; Sir Sampson will wait upon you +presently. [<i>Aside to</i> <span +class="smcap">Angelica</span>.]</p> +<p>VAL. You are not leaving me in this uncertainty?</p> +<p>ANG. Would anything but a madman complain of +uncertainty? Uncertainty and expectation are the joys of +life. Security is an insipid thing, and the overtaking and +possessing of a wish discovers the folly of the chase. +Never let us know one another better, for the pleasure of a +masquerade is done when we come to show our faces; but I’ll +tell you two things before I leave you: I am not the fool you +take me for; and you are mad and don’t know it.</p> +<h3>SCENE XXI.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>VAL. From a riddle you can expect nothing but a +riddle. There’s my instruction and the moral of my +lesson.</p> +<p>JERE. What, is the lady gone again, sir? I hope +you understood one another before she went?</p> +<p>VAL. Understood! She is harder to be understood +than a piece of Egyptian antiquity or an Irish manuscript: you +may pore till you spoil your eyes and not improve your +knowledge.</p> +<p>JERE. I have heard ’em say, sir, they read hard +Hebrew books backwards; maybe you begin to read at the wrong +end.</p> +<p>VAL. They say so of a witch’s prayer, and dreams +and Dutch almanacs are to be understood by contraries. But +there’s regularity and method in that; she is a medal +without a reverse or inscription, for indifference has both sides +alike. Yet, while she does not seem to hate me, I will +pursue her, and know her if it be possible, in spite of the +opinion of my satirical friend, Scandal, who says—</p> +<p class="poetry">That women are like tricks by sleight of +hand,<br /> +Which, to admire, we should not understand.</p> +<h2>ACT V.—SCENE I.</h2> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>A room in Foresight’s +house</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Angelica</span> +<i>and</i> <span class="smcap">Jenny</span>.</p> +<p>ANG. Where is Sir Sampson? Did you not tell me he +would be here before me?</p> +<p>JENNY. He’s at the great glass in the dining-room, +madam, setting his cravat and wig.</p> +<p>ANG. How! I’m glad on’t. If he +has a mind I should like him, it’s a sign he likes me; and +that’s more than half my design.</p> +<p>JENNY. I hear him, madam.</p> +<p>ANG. Leave me; and, d’ye hear, if Valentine should +come, or send, I am not to be spoken with.</p> +<h3>SCENE II.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Angelica</span>, <span class="smcap">Sir +Sampson</span>.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. I have not been honoured with the commands of +a fair lady a great while,—odd, madam, you have revived +me,—not since I was five-and-thirty.</p> +<p>ANG. Why, you have no great reason to complain, Sir +Sampson, that is not long ago.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Zooks, but it is, madam, a very great while: +to a man that admires a fine woman as much as I do.</p> +<p>ANG. You’re an absolute courtier, Sir Sampson.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Not at all, madam,—odsbud, you wrong +me,—I am not so old neither, to be a bare courtier, only a +man of words. Odd, I have warm blood about me yet, and can +serve a lady any way. Come, come, let me tell you, you +women think a man old too soon, faith and troth you do. +Come, don’t despise fifty; odd, fifty, in a hale +constitution, is no such contemptible age.</p> +<p>ANG. Fifty a contemptible age! Not at all; a very +fashionable age, I think. I assure you, I know very +considerable beaus that set a good face upon fifty. +Fifty! I have seen fifty in a side box by candle-light +out-blossom five-and-twenty.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Outsides, outsides; a pize take ’em, +mere outsides. Hang your side-box beaus; no, I’m none +of those, none of your forced trees, that pretend to blossom in +the fall, and bud when they should bring forth fruit: I am of a +long-lived race, and inherit vigour; none of my ancestors married +till fifty, yet they begot sons and daughters till fourscore: I +am of your patriarchs, I, a branch of one of your antedeluvian +families, fellows that the flood could not wash away. Well, +madam, what are your commands? Has any young rogue +affronted you, and shall I cut his throat? Or—</p> +<p>ANG. No, Sir Sampson, I have no quarrel upon my +hands. I have more occasion for your conduct than your +courage at this time. To tell you the truth, I’m +weary of living single and want a husband.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Odsbud, and ’tis pity you should. +Odd, would she would like me, then I should hamper my young +rogues. Odd, would she would; faith and troth she’s +devilish handsome. [<i>Aside</i>.] Madam, you deserve +a good husband, and ’twere pity you should be thrown away +upon any of these young idle rogues about the town. Odd, +there’s ne’er a young fellow worth hanging—that +is a very young fellow. Pize on ’em, they never think +beforehand of anything; and if they commit matrimony, ’tis +as they commit murder, out of a frolic, and are ready to hang +themselves, or to be hanged by the law, the next morning. +Odso, have a care, madam.</p> +<p>ANG. Therefore I ask your advice, Sir Sampson. I +have fortune enough to make any man easy that I can like: if +there were such a thing as a young agreeable man, with a +reasonable stock of good nature and sense—for I would +neither have an absolute wit nor a fool.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Odd, you are hard to please, madam: to find a +young fellow that is neither a wit in his own eye, nor a fool in +the eye of the world, is a very hard task. But, faith and +troth, you speak very discreetly; for I hate both a wit and a +fool.</p> +<p>ANG. She that marries a fool, Sir Sampson, forfeits the +reputation of her honesty or understanding; and she that marries +a very witty man is a slave to the severity and insolent conduct +of her husband. I should like a man of wit for a lover, +because I would have such an one in my power; but I would no more +be his wife than his enemy. For his malice is not a more +terrible consequence of his aversion than his jealousy is of his +love.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. None of old Foresight’s sibyls ever +uttered such a truth. Odsbud, you have won my heart; I hate +a wit: I had a son that was spoiled among ’em, a good +hopeful lad, till he learned to be a wit; and might have risen in +the state. But, a pox on’t, his wit run him out of +his money, and now his poverty has run him out of his wits.</p> +<p>ANG. Sir Sampson, as your friend, I must tell you you +are very much abused in that matter: he’s no more mad than +you are.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. How, madam! Would I could prove it.</p> +<p>ANG. I can tell you how that may be done. But it +is a thing that would make me appear to be too much concerned in +your affairs.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Odsbud, I believe she likes me. +[<i>Aside</i>.] Ah, madam, all my affairs are scarce worthy +to be laid at your feet; and I wish, madam, they were in a better +posture, that I might make a more becoming offer to a lady of +your incomparable beauty and merit. If I had Peru in one +hand, and Mexico in t’other, and the Eastern Empire under +my feet, it would make me only a more glorious victim to be +offered at the shrine of your beauty.</p> +<p>ANG. Bless me, Sir Sampson, what’s the matter?</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Odd, madam, I love you. And if you would +take my advice in a husband—</p> +<p>ANG. Hold, hold, Sir Sampson. I asked your advice +for a husband, and you are giving me your consent. I was +indeed thinking to propose something like it in jest, to satisfy +you about Valentine: for if a match were seemingly carried on +between you and me, it would oblige him to throw off his disguise +of madness, in apprehension of losing me: for you know he has +long pretended a passion for me.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Gadzooks, a most ingenious +contrivance—if we were to go through with it. But why +must the match only be seemingly carried on? Odd, let it be +a real contract.</p> +<p>ANG. Oh, fie, Sir Sampson, what would the world say?</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Say? They would say you were a wise +woman and I a happy man. Odd, madam, I’ll love you as +long as I live, and leave you a good jointure when I die.</p> +<p>ANG. Ay; but that is not in your power, Sir Sampson: for +when Valentine confesses himself in his senses, he must make over +his inheritance to his younger brother.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Odd, you’re cunning, a wary +baggage! Faith and troth, I like you the better. But, +I warrant you, I have a proviso in the obligation in favour of +myself. Body o’ me, I have a trick to turn the +settlement upon the issue male of our two bodies begotten. +Odsbud, let us find children and I’ll find an estate!</p> +<p>ANG. Will you? Well, do you find the estate and +leave t’other to me.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. O rogue! But I’ll trust you. +And will you consent? Is it a match then?</p> +<p>ANG. Let me consult my lawyer concerning this +obligation, and if I find what you propose practicable, +I’ll give you my answer.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. With all my heart: come in with me, and +I’ll lend you the bond. You shall consult your +lawyer, and I’ll consult a parson. Odzooks, I’m +a young man—odzooks, I’m a young man, and I’ll +make it appear,—odd, you’re devilish handsome. +Faith and troth, you’re very handsome, and I’m very +young and very lusty. Odsbud, hussy, you know how to +choose, and so do I. Odd, I think we are very well +met. Give me your hand, odd, let me kiss it; ’tis as +warm and as soft—as what? Odd, as t’other +hand—give me t’other hand, and I’ll mumble +’em and kiss ’em till they melt in my mouth.</p> +<p>ANG. Hold, Sir Sampson. You’re profuse of +your vigour before your time. You’ll spend your +estate before you come to it.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. No, no, only give you a rent-roll of my +possessions. Ah, baggage, I warrant you for little +Sampson. Odd, Sampson’s a very good name for an able +fellow: your Sampsons were strong dogs from the beginning.</p> +<p>ANG. Have a care and don’t over-act your +part. If you remember, Sampson, the strongest of the name, +pulled an old house over his head at last.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Say you so, hussy? Come, let’s go +then; odd, I long to be pulling too; come away. Odso, +here’s somebody coming.</p> +<h3>SCENE III.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Tattle</span>, +<span class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.</p> +<p>TATT. Is not that she gone out just now?</p> +<p>JERE. Ay, sir; she’s just going to the place of +appointment. Ah, sir, if you are not very faithful and +close in this business, you’ll certainly be the death of a +person that has a most extraordinary passion for your +honour’s service.</p> +<p>TATT. Ay, who’s that?</p> +<p>JERE. Even my unworthy self, sir. Sir, I have had +an appetite to be fed with your commands a great while; and now, +sir, my former master having much troubled the fountain of his +understanding, it is a very plausible occasion for me to quench +my thirst at the spring of your bounty. I thought I could +not recommend myself better to you, sir, than by the delivery of +a great beauty and fortune into your arms, whom I have heard you +sigh for.</p> +<p>TATT. I’ll make thy fortune; say no more. +Thou art a pretty fellow, and canst carry a message to a lady, in +a pretty soft kind of phrase, and with a good persuading +accent.</p> +<p>JERE. Sir, I have the seeds of rhetoric and oratory in +my head: I have been at Cambridge.</p> +<p>TATT. Ay; ’tis well enough for a servant to be +bred at an university: but the education is a little too pedantic +for a gentleman. I hope you are secret in your nature: +private, close, ha?</p> +<p>JERE. Oh, sir, for that, sir, ’tis my chief +talent: I’m as secret as the head of Nilus.</p> +<p>TATT. Ay? Who’s he, though? A privy +counsellor?</p> +<p>JERE. O ignorance! [<i>Aside</i>.] A cunning +Egyptian, sir, that with his arms would overrun the country, yet +nobody could ever find out his head-quarters.</p> +<p>TATT. Close dog! A good whoremaster, I warrant +him:—the time draws nigh, Jeremy. Angelica will be +veiled like a nun, and I must be hooded like a friar, ha, +Jeremy?</p> +<p>JERE. Ay, sir; hooded like a hawk, to seize at first +sight upon the quarry. It is the whim of my master’s +madness to be so dressed, and she is so in love with him +she’ll comply with anything to please him. Poor lady, +I’m sure she’ll have reason to pray for me, when she +finds what a happy exchange she has made, between a madman and so +accomplished a gentleman.</p> +<p>TATT. Ay, faith, so she will, Jeremy: you’re a +good friend to her, poor creature. I swear I do it hardly +so much in consideration of myself as compassion to her.</p> +<p>JERE. ’Tis an act of charity, sir, to save a fine +woman with thirty thousand pound from throwing herself away.</p> +<p>TATT. So ’tis, faith; I might have saved several +others in my time, but, i’gad, I could never find in my +heart to marry anybody before.</p> +<p>JERE. Well, sir, I’ll go and tell her my +master’s coming, and meet you in half a quarter of an hour +with your disguise at your own lodgings. You must talk a +little madly: she won’t distinguish the tone of your +voice.</p> +<p>TATT. No, no; let me alone for a counterfeit. +I’ll be ready for you.</p> +<h3>SCENE IV.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Tattle</span>, +<span class="smcap">Miss Prue</span>.</p> +<p>MISS. O Mr. Tattle, are you here? I’m glad I +have found you; I have been looking up and down for you like +anything, till I’m as tired as anything in the world.</p> +<p>TATT. Oh, pox, how shall I get rid of this foolish +girl? [<i>Aside</i>.]</p> +<p>MISS. Oh, I have pure news, I can tell you, pure +news. I must not marry the seaman now—my father says +so. Why won’t you be my husband? You say you +love me, and you won’t be my husband. And I know you +may be my husband now, if you please.</p> +<p>TATT. Oh, fie, miss; who told you so, child?</p> +<p>MISS. Why, my father. I told him that you loved +me.</p> +<p>TATT. Oh, fie, miss; why did you do so? And who +told you so, child?</p> +<p>MISS. Who? Why, you did; did not you?</p> +<p>TATT. Oh, pox, that was yesterday, miss, that was a +great while ago, child. I have been asleep since; slept a +whole night, and did not so much as dream of the matter.</p> +<p>MISS. Pshaw—oh, but I dreamt that it was so, +though.</p> +<p>TATT. Ay, but your father will tell you that dreams come +by contraries, child. Oh, fie; what, we must not love one +another now. Pshaw, that would be a foolish thing +indeed. Fie, fie, you’re a woman now, and must think +of a new man every morning and forget him every night. No, +no, to marry is to be a child again, and play with the same +rattle always. Oh, fie, marrying is a paw thing.</p> +<p>MISS. Well, but don’t you love me as well as you +did last night then?</p> +<p>TATT. No, no, child, you would not have me.</p> +<p>MISS. No? Yes, but I would, though.</p> +<p>TATT. Pshaw, but I tell you you would not. You +forget you’re a woman and don’t know your own +mind.</p> +<p>MISS. But here’s my father, and he knows my +mind.</p> +<h3>SCENE V.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Foresight</span>.</p> +<p>FORE. O Mr. Tattle, your servant, you are a close man; +but methinks your love to my daughter was a secret I might have +been trusted with. Or had you a mind to try if I could +discover it by my art? Hum, ha! I think there is +something in your physiognomy that has a resemblance of her; and +the girl is like me.</p> +<p>TATT. And so you would infer that you and I are +alike? What does the old prig mean? I’ll banter +him, and laugh at him, and leave him. [<i>Aside</i>.] +I fancy you have a wrong notion of faces.</p> +<p>FORE. How? What? A wrong notion? How +so?</p> +<p>TATT. In the way of art: I have some taking features, +not obvious to vulgar eyes, that are indications of a sudden turn +of good fortune in the lottery of wives, and promise a great +beauty and great fortune reserved alone for me, by a private +intrigue of destiny, kept secret from the piercing eye of +perspicuity, from all astrologers, and the stars themselves.</p> +<p>FORE. How! I will make it appear that what you say +is impossible.</p> +<p>TATT. Sir, I beg your pardon, I’m in +haste—</p> +<p>FORE. For what?</p> +<p>TATT. To be married, sir, married.</p> +<p>FORE. Ay, but pray take me along with you, +sir—</p> +<p>TATT. No, sir; ’tis to be done privately. I +never make confidants.</p> +<p>FORE. Well, but my consent, I mean. You +won’t marry my daughter without my consent?</p> +<p>TATT. Who? I, sir? I’m an absolute +stranger to you and your daughter, sir.</p> +<p>FORE. Hey day! What time of the moon is this?</p> +<p>TATT. Very true, sir, and desire to continue so. I +have no more love for your daughter than I have likeness of you, +and I have a secret in my heart which you would be glad to know +and shan’t know, and yet you shall know it, too, and be +sorry for’t afterwards. I’d have you to know, +sir, that I am as knowing as the stars, and as secret as the +night. And I’m going to be married just now, yet did +not know of it half an hour ago; and the lady stays for me, and +does not know of it yet. There’s a mystery for you: I +know you love to untie difficulties. Or, if you can’t +solve this, stay here a quarter of an hour, and I’ll come +and explain it to you.</p> +<h3>SCENE VI.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Foresight</span>, <span class="smcap">Miss +Prue</span>.</p> +<p>MISS. O father, why will you let him go? +Won’t you make him to be my husband?</p> +<p>FORE. Mercy on us, what do these lunacies portend? +Alas! he’s mad, child, stark wild.</p> +<p>MISS. What, and must not I have e’er a husband, +then? What, must I go to bed to nurse again, and be a child +as long as she’s an old woman? Indeed but I +won’t. For now my mind is set upon a man, I will have +a man some way or other. Oh, methinks I’m sick when I +think of a man; and if I can’t have one, I would go to +sleep all my life: for when I’m awake it makes me wish and +long, and I don’t know for what. And I’d rather +be always asleep than sick with thinking.</p> +<p>FORE. Oh, fearful! I think the girl’s +influenced too. Hussy, you shall have a rod.</p> +<p>MISS. A fiddle of a rod, I’ll have a husband; and +if you won’t get me one, I’ll get one for +myself. I’ll marry our Robin the butler; he says he +loves me, and he’s a handsome man, and shall be my husband: +I warrant he’ll be my husband, and thank me too, for he +told me so.</p> +<h3>SCENE VII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>, <span class="smcap">Mrs. +Foresight</span>, <i>and</i> <span +class="smcap">Nurse</span>.</p> +<p>FORE. Did he so? I’ll dispatch him +for’t presently. Rogue! O nurse, come +hither.</p> +<p>NURSE. What is your worship’s pleasure?</p> +<p>FORE. Here, take your young mistress and lock her up +presently, till farther orders from me. Not a word, Hussy; +do what I bid you, no reply, away. And bid Robin make ready +to give an account of his plate and linen, d’ye hear: +begone when I bid you.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. What’s the matter, husband?</p> +<p>FORE. ’Tis not convenient to tell you now. +Mr. Scandal, heav’n keep us all in our senses—I fear +there is a contagious frenzy abroad. How does +Valentine?</p> +<p>SCAN. Oh, I hope he will do well again. I have a +message from him to your niece Angelica.</p> +<p>FORE. I think she has not returned since she went abroad +with Sir Sampson. Nurse, why are you not gone?</p> +<h3>SCENE VIII.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Foresight</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>, <span class="smcap">Mrs. +Foresight</span>, <span class="smcap">Ben</span>.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Here’s Mr. Benjamin, he can tell us if +his father be come home.</p> +<p>BEN. Who? Father? Ay, he’s come home +with a vengeance.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Why, what’s the matter?</p> +<p>BEN. Matter! Why, he’s mad.</p> +<p>FORE. Mercy on us, I was afraid of this. And +there’s the handsome young woman, she, as they say, brother +Val went mad for, she’s mad too, I think.</p> +<p>FORE. Oh, my poor niece, my poor niece, is she gone +too? Well, I shall run mad next.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Well, but how mad? How d’ye +mean?</p> +<p>BEN. Nay, I’ll give you leave to guess. +I’ll undertake to make a voyage to Antegoa—no, hold; +I mayn’t say so, neither. But I’ll sail as far +as Leghorn and back again before you shall guess at the matter, +and do nothing else. Mess, you may take in all the points +of the compass, and not hit right.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Your experiment will take up a little too +much time.</p> +<p>BEN. Why, then, I’ll tell you; there’s a new +wedding upon the stocks, and they two are a-going to be married +to rights.</p> +<p>SCAN. Who?</p> +<p>BEN. Why, father and—the young woman. I +can’t hit of her name.</p> +<p>SCAN. Angelica?</p> +<p>BEN. Ay, the same.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Sir Sampson and Angelica? +Impossible!</p> +<p>BEN. That may be—but I’m sure it is as I +tell you.</p> +<p>SCAN. ’Sdeath, it’s a jest. I +can’t believe it.</p> +<p>BEN. Look you, friend, it’s nothing to me whether +you believe it or no. What I say is true, d’ye see, +they are married, or just going to be married, I know not +which.</p> +<p>FORE. Well, but they are not mad, that is, not +lunatic?</p> +<p>BEN. I don’t know what you may call madness. +But she’s mad for a husband, and he’s horn mad, I +think, or they’d ne’er make a match together. +Here they come.</p> +<h3>SCENE IX.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Sir Sampson</span>, <span +class="smcap">Angelica</span>, <span +class="smcap">Buckram</span>.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Where is this old soothsayer, this uncle of +mine elect? Aha, old Foresight, Uncle Foresight, wish me +joy, Uncle Foresight, double joy, both as uncle and astrologer; +here’s a conjunction that was not foretold in all your +Ephemeris. The brightest star in the blue +firmament—<i>is shot from above</i>, <i>in a jelly of +love</i>, and so forth; and I’m lord of the +ascendant. Odd, you’re an old fellow, Foresight; +uncle, I mean, a very old fellow, Uncle Foresight: and yet you +shall live to dance at my wedding; faith and troth, you +shall. Odd, we’ll have the music of the +sphere’s for thee, old Lilly, that we will, and thou shalt +lead up a dance in Via Lactea.</p> +<p>FORE. I’m thunderstruck! You are not married +to my niece?</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Not absolutely married, uncle; but very near +it, within a kiss of the matter, as you see. [<i>Kisses</i> +<span class="smcap">Angelica</span>.]</p> +<p>ANG. ’Tis very true, indeed, uncle. I hope +you’ll be my father, and give me.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. That he shall, or I’ll burn his +globes. Body o’ me, he shall be thy father, +I’ll make him thy father, and thou shalt make me a father, +and I’ll make thee a mother, and we’ll beget sons and +daughters enough to put the weekly bills out of countenance.</p> +<p>SCAN. Death and hell! Where’s Valentine?</p> +<h3>SCENE X.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Sir +Sampson</span>, <span class="smcap">Angelica</span>, <span +class="smcap">Foresight</span>, <span class="smcap">Mrs. +Foresight</span>, <span class="smcap">Ben</span>, <span +class="smcap">Buckram</span>.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. This is so surprising.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. How! What does my aunt say? +Surprising, aunt? Not at all for a young couple to make a +match in winter: not at all. It’s a plot to undermine +cold weather, and destroy that usurper of a bed called a +warming-pan.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. I’m glad to hear you have so much fire +in you, Sir Sampson.</p> +<p>BEN. Mess, I fear his fire’s little better than +tinder; mayhap it will only serve to light up a match for +somebody else. The young woman’s a handsome young +woman, I can’t deny it: but, father, if I might be your +pilot in this case, you should not marry her. It’s +just the same thing as if so be you should sail so far as the +Straits without provision.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Who gave you authority to speak, sirrah? +To your element, fish, be mute, fish, and to sea, rule your helm, +sirrah, don’t direct me.</p> +<p>BEN. Well, well, take you care of your own helm, or you +mayn’t keep your new vessel steady.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Why, you impudent tarpaulin! Sirrah, do +you bring your forecastle jests upon your father? But I +shall be even with you, I won’t give you a groat. Mr. +Buckram, is the conveyance so worded that nothing can possibly +descend to this scoundrel? I would not so much as have him +have the prospect of an estate, though there were no way to come +to it, but by the North-East Passage.</p> +<p>BUCK. Sir, it is drawn according to your directions; +there is not the least cranny of the law unstopt.</p> +<p>BEN. Lawyer, I believe there’s many a cranny and +leak unstopt in your conscience. If so be that one had a +pump to your bosom, I believe we should discover a foul +hold. They say a witch will sail in a sieve: but I believe +the devil would not venture aboard o’ your +conscience. And that’s for you.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Hold your tongue, sirrah. How now, +who’s here?</p> +<h3>SCENE XI.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center">[<i>To them</i>] <span +class="smcap">Tattle</span> <i>and</i> <span class="smcap">Mrs. +Frail</span>.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. O sister, the most unlucky accident.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. What’s the matter?</p> +<p>TATT. Oh, the two most unfortunate poor creatures in the +world we are.</p> +<p>FORE. Bless us! How so?</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Ah, Mr. Tattle and I, poor Mr. Tattle and I +are—I can’t speak it out.</p> +<p>TATT. Nor I. But poor Mrs. Frail and I +are—</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. Married.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. Married! How?</p> +<p>TATT. Suddenly—before we knew where we +were—that villain Jeremy, by the help of disguises, tricked +us into one another.</p> +<p>FORE. Why, you told me just now you went hence in haste +to be married.</p> +<p>ANG. But I believe Mr. Tattle meant the favour to me: I +thank him.</p> +<p>TATT. I did, as I hope to be saved, madam; my intentions +were good. But this is the most cruel thing, to marry one +does not know how, nor why, nor wherefore. The devil take +me if ever I was so much concerned at anything in my life.</p> +<p>ANG. ’Tis very unhappy, if you don’t care +for one another.</p> +<p>TATT. The least in the world—that is for my part: +I speak for myself. Gad, I never had the least thought of +serious kindness.—I never liked anybody less in my +life. Poor woman! Gad, I’m sorry for her too, +for I have no reason to hate her neither; but I believe I shall +lead her a damned sort of a life.</p> +<p>MRS. FORE. He’s better than no husband at +all—though he’s a coxcomb. [<i>To</i> <span +class="smcap">Frail</span>.]</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL [<i>to her</i>]. Ay, ay, it’s well +it’s no worse.—Nay, for my part I always despised Mr. +Tattle of all things; nothing but his being my husband could have +made me like him less.</p> +<p>TATT. Look you there, I thought as much. Pox +on’t, I wish we could keep it secret; why, I don’t +believe any of this company would speak of it.</p> +<p>MRS. FRAIL. But, my dear, that’s impossible: the +parson and that rogue Jeremy will publish it.</p> +<p>TATT. Ay, my dear, so they will, as you say.</p> +<p>ANG. Oh, you’ll agree very well in a little time; +custom will make it easy to you.</p> +<p>TATT. Easy! Pox on’t, I don’t believe +I shall sleep to-night.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Sleep, quotha! No; why, you would not +sleep o’ your wedding-night? I’m an older +fellow than you, and don’t mean to sleep.</p> +<p>BEN. Why, there’s another match now, as thof a +couple of privateers were looking for a prize and should fall +foul of one another. I’m sorry for the young man with +all my heart. Look you, friend, if I may advise you, when +she’s going—for that you must expect, I have +experience of her—when she’s going, let her go. +For no matrimony is tough enough to hold her; and if she +can’t drag her anchor along with her, she’ll break +her cable, I can tell you that. Who’s here? The +madman?</p> +<h3>SCENE <i>the Last</i>.</h3> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>, <span +class="smcap">Scandal</span>, <span class="smcap">Sir +Sampson</span>, <span class="smcap">Angelica</span>, <span +class="smcap">Foresight</span>, <span class="smcap">Mrs. +Foresight</span>, <span class="smcap">Tattle</span>, <span +class="smcap">Mrs. Frail</span>, <span class="smcap">Ben</span>, +<span class="smcap">Jeremy</span>, <span +class="smcap">Buckram</span>.</p> +<p>VAL. No; here’s the fool, and if occasion be, +I’ll give it under my hand.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. How now?</p> +<p>VAL. Sir, I’m come to acknowledge my errors, and +ask your pardon.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. What, have you found your senses at last +then? In good time, sir.</p> +<p>VAL. You were abused, sir: I never was distracted.</p> +<p>FORE. How! Not mad! Mr. Scandal—</p> +<p>SCAN. No, really, sir. I’m his witness; it +was all counterfeit.</p> +<p>VAL. I thought I had reasons—but it was a poor +contrivance, the effect has shown it such.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Contrivance! What, to cheat me? to cheat +your father? Sirrah, could you hope to prosper?</p> +<p>VAL. Indeed, I thought, sir, when the father endeavoured +to undo the son, it was a reasonable return of nature.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Very good, sir. Mr. Buckram, are you +ready? Come, sir, will you sign and seal?</p> +<p>VAL. If you please, sir; but first I would ask this lady +one question.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Sir, you must ask me leave first. That +lady? No, sir, you shall ask that lady no questions till +you have asked her blessing, sir: that lady is to be my wife.</p> +<p>VAL. I have heard as much, sir; but I would have it from +her own mouth.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. That’s as much as to say I lie, sir, and +you don’t believe what I say.</p> +<p>VAL. Pardon me, sir. But I reflect that I very +lately counterfeited madness; I don’t know but the frolic +may go round.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Come, chuck, satisfy him, answer him. +Come, come, Mr. Buckram, the pen and ink.</p> +<p>BUCK. Here it is, sir, with the deed; all is +ready. [<span class="smcap">Valentine</span> <i>goes to</i> +<span class="smcap">Angelica</span>.]</p> +<p>ANG. ’Tis true, you have a great while pretended +love to me; nay, what if you were sincere? Still you must +pardon me if I think my own inclinations have a better right to +dispose of my person than yours.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Are you answered now, sir?</p> +<p>VAL. Yes, sir.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Where’s your plot, sir? and your +contrivance now, sir? Will you sign, sir? Come, will +you sign and seal?</p> +<p>VAL. With all my heart, sir.</p> +<p>SCAN. ’Sdeath, you are not mad indeed, to ruin +yourself?</p> +<p>VAL. I have been disappointed of my only hope, and he +that loses hope may part with anything. I never valued +fortune but as it was subservient to my pleasure, and my only +pleasure was to please this lady. I have made many vain +attempts, and find at last that nothing but my ruin can effect +it; which, for that reason, I will sign to—give me the +paper.</p> +<p>ANG. Generous Valentine! [<i>Aside</i>.]</p> +<p>BUCK. Here is the deed, sir.</p> +<p>VAL. But where is the bond by which I am obliged to sign +this?</p> +<p>BUCK. Sir Sampson, you have it.</p> +<p>ANG. No, I have it, and I’ll use it as I would +everything that is an enemy to Valentine. [<i>Tears the +paper</i>.]</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. How now?</p> +<p>VAL. Ha!</p> +<p>ANG. Had I the world to give you, it could not make me +worthy of so generous and faithful a passion. Here’s +my hand:—my heart was always yours, and struggled very hard +to make this utmost trial of your virtue. [<i>To</i> <span +class="smcap">Valentine</span>.]</p> +<p>VAL. Between pleasure and amazement I am lost. But +on my knees I take the blessing.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Oons, what is the meaning of this?</p> +<p>BEN. Mess, here’s the wind changed again. +Father, you and I may make a voyage together now.</p> +<p>ANG. Well, Sir Sampson, since I have played you a trick, +I’ll advise you how you may avoid such another. Learn +to be a good father, or you’ll never get a second +wife. I always loved your son, and hated your unforgiving +nature. I was resolved to try him to the utmost; I have +tried you too, and know you both. You have not more faults +than he has virtues, and ’tis hardly more pleasure to me +that I can make him and myself happy than that I can punish +you.</p> +<p>VAL. If my happiness could receive addition, this kind +surprise would make it double.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. Oons, you’re a crocodile.</p> +<p>FORE. Really, Sir Sampson, this is a sudden eclipse.</p> +<p>SIR SAMP. You’re an illiterate old fool, and +I’m another.</p> +<p>TATT. If the gentleman is in disorder for want of a +wife, I can spare him mine.—Oh, are you there, sir? +I’m indebted to you for my happiness. [<i>To</i> +<span class="smcap">Jeremy</span>.]</p> +<p>JERE. Sir, I ask you ten thousand pardons: ’twas +an errant mistake. You see, sir, my master was never mad, +nor anything like it. Then how could it be otherwise?</p> +<p>VAL. Tattle, I thank you; you would have interposed +between me and heaven, but Providence laid purgatory in your +way. You have but justice.</p> +<p>SCAN. I hear the fiddles that Sir Sampson provided for +his own wedding; methinks ’tis pity they should not be +employed when the match is so much mended. Valentine, +though it be morning, we may have a dance.</p> +<p>VAL. Anything, my friend, everything that looks like joy +and transport.</p> +<p>SCAN. Call ’em, Jeremy.</p> +<p>ANG. I have done dissembling now, Valentine; and if that +coldness which I have always worn before you should turn to an +extreme fondness, you must not suspect it.</p> +<p>VAL. I’ll prevent that suspicion: for I intend to +dote to that immoderate degree that your fondness shall never +distinguish itself enough to be taken notice of. If ever +you seem to love too much, it must be only when I can’t +love enough.</p> +<p>ANG. Have a care of promises; you know you are apt to +run more in debt than you are able to pay.</p> +<p>VAL. Therefore I yield my body as your prisoner, and +make your best on’t.</p> +<p>SCAN. The music stays for you. [<i>Dance</i>.]</p> +<p>SCAN. Well, madam, you have done exemplary justice in +punishing an inhuman father and rewarding a faithful lover. +But there is a third good work which I, in particular, must thank +you for: I was an infidel to your sex, and you have converted +me. For now I am convinced that all women are not like +fortune, blind in bestowing favours, either on those who do not +merit or who do not want ’em.</p> +<p>ANG. ’Tis an unreasonable accusation that you lay +upon our sex: you tax us with injustice, only to cover your own +want of merit. You would all have the reward of love, but +few have the constancy to stay till it becomes your due. +Men are generally hypocrites and infidels: they pretend to +worship, but have neither zeal nor faith. How few, like +Valentine, would persevere even to martyrdom, and sacrifice their +interest to their constancy! In admiring me, you misplace +the novelty.</p> +<p class="poetry">The miracle to-day is, that we find<br /> +A lover true; not that a woman’s kind.</p> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LOVE FOR LOVE***</p> +<pre> + + +***** This file should be named 1244-h.htm or 1244-h.zip****** + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/2/4/1244 + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will +be renamed. + +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part +of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm +concept and trademark. 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