am in no haste. On the contrary, I think the occasion fortunate that allows me to begin an acquaintance with a person of so amiable an appearance. I don't know whether that pert foreigner has led me into an error-but without being too inquisitive, may I ask if you make any part of this family?

Miss Alton. Madam, I am under Miss Alscrip's protection: I imagine I am represented as her dependent: I am not ashamed of humble circumstances, that are not the consequences of indiscretion.

Lady E. That with such claims to respect you should be in any circumstances of humiliation, is a disgrace to the age we live in.

Miss Alton. Madam, my humiliation (if such it be) is just. Perhaps I have been too proud, and my heart required this self-correction. A life of retired industry might have been more pleasing to me; but an orphan a stranger-ignorant and diffident, I preferred my present situation, as one less exposed to misrepresentation. [Bell rings.] I can no longer detain Miss Alscrip from the honour of receiving your ladyship. [A respectful Courtesy, and exit.

Lady E. There is something strangely mysterious and affecting in all this-what delicacy of sentiment --what softness of manners! and how well do these qualities accord with that sigh for Clifford ! she has been proud-proud of what ?-of Clifford's love. It is too plain. But then to account for her present condition? He has betrayed and abandoned her-too plain again, I fear.-She talked too of a self-corrected heart-take example, Emily, and recall thine from an object, which it ought more than ever to renounce. But here come the Alscrip and her friend: lud! lud! lud! how shall I recover my spirits! I must attempt it, and if I lose my present thoughts in a trial of extravagance, be it of theirs.or my own, it will be a happy expedient.

Enter Miss ALSCRIP and MRS. BLANDIsh.

[MISS ALSCRIP runs up to LADY EMILY and kisses her Forehead.

Lady E. I ask your pardon, madam, for being so awkward, but I confess I did not expect so elevated a salute,

Miss Als. Dear Lady Emily, I had no notion of its not being universal. In France, the touch of the lips, just between the eyebrows, has been adopted for years. Lady E. I perfectly acknowledge the propriety of the custom. It is almost the only spot of the face where the touch would not risk a confusion of complexions.

Miss Als. He he he! what a pretty thought!

Mrs. Blandish. How I have longed for this day!Come, let me put an end to ceremony, and join the hands of the sweetest pair that ever nature and fortune marked for connexion. [Joins their Hands. Miss Als. Thank you, my good Blandish, though I was determined to break the ice, Lady Emily, in the first place I met you. But you were not at Lady Dovecourt's last night.

Lady E. [Affectedly.] No, I went home directly from the Opera: projected the revival of a cap: read a page in the trials of Temper; went to bed and dreamed I was Belinda in the Rape of the Lock.

Mrs. Blandish. Elegant creature!

Miss Als. [Aside.] I must have that air, if I die for it. [Imitating.] I too came home early; supped with my old gentleman; made him explain my marriage articles, dower, and heirs entail; read a page in a trial of divorce, and dreamed of a rose-colour equipage, with emblems of Cupids issuing out of coronets. Mrs. Blandish. Oh, you sweet twins of perfection -what equality in every thing! I have thought of a name for you-The Inseparable Inimitables.

Miss Als. I declare I shall like it exceedinglyone sees so few uncopied originals-the thing I cannot bear

Lady E. Is vulgar imitation-I must catch the words from your mouth, to show you how we agree. Miss Als. Exactly. Not that one wishes to be without affectation.

Lady E. Oh! mercy forbid !

Miss Als. But to catch a manner, and weave it, as I may say, into one's own originality. Mrs. Blandish. Pretty! pretty!

Lady E. That's the art-Lord, if one lived entirely upon one's own whims, who would not be run ont in a twelvemonth?

Miss Als. Dear Lady Emily, don't you dote upon folly ?

Lady E. To ecstacy. I only despair of seeing it well kept up.

Miss Als. I flatter myself there is no great danger of that.

Lady E. You are mistaken. We have, 'tis true, some examples of the extravaganza in high life, that no other country can match; but withal, many a false sister, that starts as one would think, in the very heyday of the fantastic, yet comes to a stand-still in the midst of the course.

Mrs. Blandish. Poor, spiritless creatures!

Lady E. Do you know there is more than one duchess who has been seen in the same carriage with her husband-like two doves in a basket, in the print of Conjugal Felicity; and another has been detectedI almost blush to name it

Mrs. Blandish. Bless us! where? and how? and how?

Lady E. In nursing her own child!

Miss Als. Oh! barbarism!For Heaven's sake let us change the subject. You were mentioning a

revived cap, Lady Emily; any thing of the Henry Quatre ?

Lady E. Quite different. An English mob under the chin, and artless ringlets, in natural colour, that shall restore an admiration for Prior's Nut-brown Maid.

Miss Als. Horrid! shocking!

Lady E. Absolutely necessary. To be different from the rest of the world, we must now revert to nature: Make haste, or you have so much to undo, you will be left behind.

Miss Als. I dare say so. But who can vulgarize all at once? What will the French say?

Lady E. 'Oh, we shall have a new treaty for the interchange of fashions and follies, and then say, they will complain, as they do of other treaties, that we out manufactured them.

Miss Als. Fashions and follies! O what a charming contention!

Lady E. Yes, and one, thank Heaven, so perfectly well understood on both sides, that no counter declaration will be wanted to explain it.

Miss Als. [With an affected drop of her Lip in her Laugh.] He! he! he he! he! he!

Lady E. My dear Miss Alscrip, what are you doing? I must correct you as I love you. Sure you must have observed the drop of the under lip is exploded since Lady Simpermode broke a tooth-[Sets her Mouth affectedly.]—I am preparing the cast of the lips for the ensuing winter-thus-It is to be called the Paphian mimp.

Miss Als. [Imitating.] I swear I think it pretty-I must try to get it.

Lady E. Nothing so easy. It is done by one cabalistical word, like a metamorphosis in the fairy tales. You have only, when before your glass, to keep pronouncing to yourself nimini-pimini-the lips cannot fail taking their plie.

Miss Als. Nimini-pimini-imini, mimini-oh, it's delightfully infantine-and so innocent, to be kissing one's own lips.

Lady E. You have it to a charm--does it not become her infinitely, Mrs. Blandish?

Mrs. Blandish. Our friend's features must succeed in every grace! but never so much as in a quick change of extremes.

Enter SERVANT.

Serv. Madam, Lord Gayville desires to know if you are at home?

Miss Als. A strange formality!

Lady E. [Aside.] No brother ever came more opportunely to a sister's relief, "I have fooled it to the top of my bent."

Miss Als. Desire Miss Alton to come to me. [Exit SERVANT.] Lady Emily, you must not blame me; I am supporting the cause of our sex, and must punish a lover for some late inattentions-I shall not see him.

Lady E. Oh cruel!

[Sees Miss ALTon.

Enter MISS ALTON.

Miss Alscrip, you have certainly the most elegant companion in the world.

Miss Als. Dear, do you think so? an ungain, dull sort of a body, in my mind; but we'll try her in the present business. Miss Alton, you must do me a favour. I want to plague my husband that is to beyou must take my part-you must double me like a second actress at Paris, when the first has the vapours. Miss Alton. Really, madam, the task you would impose upon me—

Miss Als. Will be a great improvement to you, and quite right for me.-Don't be grave, Lady Emily[Whose attention is fixed on Miss ALTON.] Your bro