in my conscience, Pug, this had been thy Italian merchanto. Wood. Sir, I see you mistake me for some other: I should be happy to be better known to you. Limb. Sir, I beg your pardon, with all my hearto. Before George, I was caught again there! But you are so very like a paltry fellow, who came to sell Pug essences this morning, that one would swear those eyes, and that nose and mouth, belonged to that rascal. Wood. You must pardon me, sir, if I do not much relish the close of your compliment. Trick. Their eyes are nothing like :-you'll have a quarrel. Limb. Not very like, I confess. Trick. Their nose and mouth are quite different. Limb. As Pug says, they are quite different, indeed; but I durst have sworn it had been he; and, therefore, once again, I demand your pardono. Trick. Come, let us go down; by this time Gervase has brought the smith, and then Mrs Pleasance may have her chest. Please you, sir, to bear us company. Wood. At your service, madam. Limb. Pray lead the way, sir. Wood. 'Tis against my will, sir; but I must leave you in possession. ACT III. [Exeunt. SCENE I. Enter SAINTLY and PLEASANCE. Pleas. Never fear it, I'll be a spy upon his actions; he shall neither whisper nor gloat on either of them, but I'll ring him such a peal! Saint. Above all things, have a care of him your self; for surely there is witchcraft betwixt his lips : He is a wolf within the sheepfold; and therefore I will be earnest, that you may not fall. [Exit. Pleas. Why should my mother be so inquisitive about this lodger? I half suspect old Eve herself has a mind to be nibbling at the pippin. He makes love to one of them, I am confident; it may be to both; for, methinks, I should have done so, if I had been a man; but the damned petticoats have perverted me to honesty, and therefore I have a grudge to him for the privilege of his sex. He shuns me, too, and that vexes me; for, though I would deny him, I scorn he should not think me worth a civil question. Re-enter WOODALL, with TRICKSY, Mrs BRAINSICK, JUDITH, and Music. Mrs Brain. Come, your works, your works; they shall have the approbation of Mrs Pleasance. Trick. No more apologies; give Judith the words, she sings at sight. Jud. I'll try my skill. A SONG FROM THE ITALIAN. By a dismal cypress lying, Damon cried, all pale and dying,- Every nymph mourns me, Thus while I languish; She only scorns me, Who caused my anguish. No love returning me, but all hope denying; By a dismal cypress lying, Like a swan, so sung he dying, Kind is death, that ends my pain, Pleas. By these languishing eyes, and those simagres of yours, we are given to understand, sir, you have a mistress in this company; come, make a free discovery which of them your poetry is to charm, and put the other out of pain. Trick. No doubt 'twas meant to Mrs Brainsick. Mrs Brain. We wives are despicable creatures; we know it, madam, when a mistress is in presence. Pleas. Why this ceremony betwixt you? "Tis a likely proper fellow, and looks as he could people a new isle of Pines.* Mrs Brain. "Twere a work of charity to convert a fair young schismatick, like you, if 'twere but to gain you to a better opinion of the government. Pleas. If I am not mistaken in you, too, he has works of charity enough upon his hands already; but 'tis a willing soul, I'll warrant him, eager upon the quarry, and as sharp as a governor of CoventGarden. Wood. Sure this is not the phrase of your family! I thought to have found a sanctified sister; but I suspect now, madam, that if your mother kept a pension in your father's time, there might be some gentleman-lodger in the house; for I humbly conceive you are of the half-strain at least. Pleas. For all the rudeness of your language, I am resolved to know upon what voyage you are bound; you privateer of love, you Argier's man, that cruize up and down for prize in the Straitsmouth; which of the vessels would you snap now? *Alluding to the imaginary history of Pine, a merchant's clerk, who, being wrecked on a desert island in the South Seas, bestowed on it his own name, and peopled it by the assistance of his master's daughter and her two maid servants, who had escaped from the wreck by his aid. Trick. We are both under safe convoy, madam; a lover and a husband. Pleas. Nay, for your part, you are notably guarded, I confess; but keepers have their rooks, as well as gamesters; but they only venture under them till they pick up a sum, and then push for themselves. Wood. [Aside.] A plague of her suspicions; they'll ruin me on that side. Pleas. So; let but little minx go proud, and the dogs in Covent-Garden have her in the wind immediately; all pursue the scent. Trick. Not to a boarding-house, I hope? Pleas. If they were wise, they would rather go to a brothel house; for there most mistresses have left behind them their maiden-heads, of blessed memory; and those, which would not go off in that market, are carried about by bawds, and sold at doors, like stale flesh in baskets. Then for your honesty, or justness, as you call it, to your keepers, your kept-mistress is originally a punk; and let the cat be changed into a lady never so formally, she still retains her natural property of mousing. Mrs Brain. You are very sharp upon the mistresses; but I hope you'll spare the wives. Pleas. Yes, as much as your husbands do after the first month of marriage; but you requite their negligence in house-hold duties, by making them husbands of the first head, ere the year be over. Wood. [Aside.] She has me there, too! Pleas. And as for you, young gallantWood. Hold, I beseech you! a truce for me. Pleas. In troth, I pity you; for you have undertaken a most difficult task,-to cozen two women, who are no babies in their art: if you bring it about, you perform as much as he that cheated the very lottery. Wood. Ladies, I am sorry this should happen to you for my sake: She is in a raging fit, you see; 'tis best withdrawing, till the spirit of prophecy has left her. Trick. I'll take shelter in my chamber,-whither, I hope, he'll have the grace to follow me. to follow me. [Aside. Mrs Brain. And now I think on't, I have some letters to despatch. [Exeunt TRICK. and Mrs BRAIN. severally. Pleas. Now, good John among the maids, how mean you to bestow your time? Away to your study, I advise you; invoke your muses, and make madrigals upon absence. Wood. I would go to China, or Japan, to be rid of that impetuous clack of yours. Farewell, thou legion of tongues in one woman! Pleas. Will you not stay, sir? it may be I have a little business with you. Wood. Yes, the second part of the same tune! Strike by yourself, sweet 'larum; you're true bellmetal, I warrant you. [Exit. Pleas. This spitefulness of mine will be my ruin : To rail them off, was well enough; but to talk him away, too! O tongue, tongue, thou wert given for a curse to all our sex! Enter JUDITH. Jud. Madam, your mother would speak with you. Pleas. I will not come; I'm mad, I think; I come immediately. Well, I'll go in, and vent my passion, by railing at them, and him too, [Exit. Jud. You may enter in safety, sir; the enemy's marched off. Re-enter WOODALL. Wood. Nothing, but the love I bear thy mistress, |