Miss R. Well, I can be silent.Thus does he always serve me, whenever I am about to disLucy. Why, indeed, Madam, you seem the close myself to him. [Aside. more alert of the two, I must say. Charles. Why do you not banish me and my Miss R. Now the deuce take the girl, for put-misfortunes for ever from your thoughts? ting that notion into my head: I am sadly afraid Miss R. Ay, wherefore do I not, since you Dudley does not like me; so much encouragement never allowed me a place in yours?-But go, Šir; as I have given him to declare himself, I never I have no right to stay you; go where your heart could get a word from him on the subject! this directs you; go to the happy, the distinguished may be very honourable, but upon my life it 's very fair one. provoking. By the way, I wonder how I look today: Oh! shockingly! hideously pale! like a

Lucy. Dear Madam, let me run and fetch you a cup of the cordial drops.

Lady R. Do, Lucy. [Exit Lucy.] Alas, Sir! ever since I lost my husband; my poor nerves have been shook to pieces;--there hangs his beloved picture; that precious relic, and a plentiful jointure, is all that remains to console me for the best of men."

O'Fla. Let me see-i'faith, a comely personage; by his fur cloak, I suppose, he was in the Russian service; and by the gold chain round his neck, I should guess he had been honoured with the order of St. Catharine.

· Charles. Thus, my dear Charlotte, let us seal our reconciliation![Kissing her hand.] bear with thy infirmities! by Heaven, I know not any one failing in thy whole composition, except, that Lady R. No, no; he meddled with no St. of too great a partiality for an undeserving man. Catharines-that's the habit he wore in his mayMiss R. And you are now taking the very oralty; Sir Stephen was lord mayor of Londoncourse to augment that failing-A thought strikes but he is gone, and has left me, a poor, weak, solime;-I have a commission that you must abso-tary widow, behind him. lutely execute for me; I have immediate occasion for the sum of two hundred pounds: you know my fortune is shut up till I am of age; take this paltry box, it contains my ear-rings, and some other baubles I have no use for; carry it to our opposite neighbour, Mr. Stockwell; I don't know where else to apply; leave it as a deposit in his hands, and beg him to accommodate me with the

sum.

Charles. Dear Charlotte, what are you about to do? How can you possibly want two hundred pounds?

Miss R. How can I possibly do without it, you mean? Doesn't every lady want two hundred pounds -perhaps, I have lost it at play-perhaps, I mean to win as much to it-perhaps, I

want it for two hundred different uses.

Charles. Pooh! pooh! all this is nothing; don't I know you never play?

Miss R. You mistake; I have a spirit to set, not only this trifle, but my whole fortune, upon a stake; therefore make no wry faces. but do as I bid you. You will find Mr. Stockwell a very honourable gentleman.

Enter Lucy, in haste.

Lucy. Dear Madam, as I live, here comes the old lady in a hackney coach.

Miss R. The old chariot has given her a second tumble: away with you! you know your way out, without meeting her. Take the box, and do as I desire you.

Charles. I must not dispute your orders. Farewell! [Exeunt CHARLES and MISS RUSPORT. Enter LADY RUSPORT leaning on MAJOR O'FLAHERTY's arm.

O'Fla. Rest yourself upon my arm; never spare it: 'tis strong enough: it has stood harder service than you can put it to.

Lucy. Mercy upon me, what is the matter? I am frightened out of my wits-Has your ladyship had an accident?

Lady R. O Lucy, the most untoward one in nature. I know not how I shall repair it.

O'Fla. Never go about to repair it, my lady; even build a new one; 'twas but a crazy piece of business at best.

Lucy. Bless me, is the old chariot broke down with you again?

Lady R. Broke, child; I don't know what might have been broke, if, by great good fortune, this obliging gentleman had not been at hand to assist me.

O'Fla. By all means, then, take a strong, able, hearty man, to repair his loss:-if such a plain fellow as one Dennis O'Flaherty can please you, I think I may venture to say, without any disparagement to the gentleman in the fur gown there

Lady R. What are you going to say? don't shock my ears with any comparisons, I desire. O'Fla. Not I, my soul; I don't believe there's any comparison in the case.

Re-enter Lucy, with a bottle and glass. Lady R. Oh, are you come? Give me the drops--I'm all in a flutter.

O'Fla. Harkye, sweetheart, what are those same drops? Have you any more left in the bottle? I didn't care if I took a little sip of them myself.

Lucy. Oh, Sir, they are called the cordial restorative elixir, or the nervous golden drops; they are only for ladies' cases.

O'Fla. Yes, yes, my dear, there are gentlemen as well as ladies, that stand in need of those same golden drops; they'd suit my case to a tittle.

Lady R. Well, major, did you give old Dudley my letter, and will the silly man do as I bid him, and be gone.

O'Fla. You are obey'd-he's on his march. Lady R. That 's well; you have managed this matter to perfection; I didn't think he would have been so easily prevailed upon,

O'Fla. At the first word: no difficulty in life; 'twas the very thing he was determined to do, before I came; I never met a more obliging gentle

man.

Lady R. Well, 'tis no matter; so I am but rid of him, and his distresses: would you believe it, Major O'Flaherty, it was but this morning he sent a-begging to me for money to fit him out upon some wildgoose expedition to the coast of Africa, I know not where.

O'Fla. Well, you sent him what he wanted? Lady R. I sent him what he deservc:l, a flat refusal.

O'Fla. You refused him?
Lady R. Most undoubtedly.
O'Fla. You sent him nothing?
Lady R. Not a shilling.

O'Fla. Good morning to you-Your servant

[Going. Lady R. Hey day! what ails the man? Where are you going?

O'Fla. Out of your house, before the roof falls on my head-to poor Dudley, to share the little

modicum that thirty years' hard service has left me; I wish it was more, for his sake.

Lady L. Very well, Sir, take your course; I sha'n't attempt to stop you; I shall survive it; it will not break my heart, if I never see you more. O'Fla. Break your heart! No, o'my conscience, will it not. You preach, and you pray, and you turn up your eyes, and all the while you are as hard-hearted as a hyena-A hyena, truly! by my soul, there isn't in the whole creation so savage an animal as a human creature without pity!

Lady R. A hyena, truly!

ACT III.

Bel. Then depend upon it, these are not the only trinkets she means to dedicate to Captain Dudley.-As for me, Stockwell, indeed, wants me to marry; but till I can get this bewitching girl, this incognita, out of my head, I can never think of any other woman.

Enter a SERVANT, and delivers a Letter. Hey day! where can I have picked up a correspondent already? 'Tis a most execrable manuscript-Let me see-Martha Fulmer-Who. Exit.is Martha Fulmer ?-Pshaw! I wont be at the [Exit. trouble of deciphering her damned pothooks.— Hold, hold, hold; what have we got here?

SCENE I-A Room in STOCKWELL'S House.

STOCKWELL and BELCOUR.

Dear Sir,-1 have discovered the lady you was so much smitten with, and can procure you an interview with her; if you can be as generous to a pretty girl, as you was to a paltry old captain-How did she find that out?- -you need not despair; come to me Bel-immediately; the lady is now in my house, and exMARTHA FULMER. pects you. Yours,

Stock. Gratify me so far, however, Mr. cour, as to see Miss Rusport; carry her the sum she wants, and return the poor girl her box of Othou dear, lovely, and enchanting paper! which diamonds, which Dudley left in my hands: you I was about to tear into a thousand scraps, devoutknow what to say on the occasion better than Ily I entreat thy pardon: I have slighted thy condo; that part of your commission I leave to your own discretion, and you may season it with what gallantry you think fit.

Bel. You could not have pitched upon a greater bungler at gallantry than myself, if you had rummaged every company in the city, and the whole court of aldermen into the bargain;part of your errand, however, I will do; but whether it shall be with an ill grace or a good one, depends upon the caprice of a moment, the humour of the lady, the mode of our meeting, and a thousand undefinable small circumstances, that, nevertheless, determine us upon all the great occasions of life.

Stock. I persuade myself you will find Miss Rusport an ingenious, worthy, animated girl.

tents, which are delicious: slandered thy characters, which are divine; and all the atonement I can make, is implicitly to obey thy mandates.

Enter STOCKWELL.

Stock. Mr. Belcour, here are the jewels; this letter encloses bills for the money; and, if you will deliver it to Miss Rusport, you'll have no further trouble on that score.

Bel. Ah! Sir, the letter, which I have been reading, disqualifies me for delivering the letter, which you have been writing; I have other game on foot, the loveliest girl my eyes ever feasted upon is started in view, and the world cannot now divert me from pursuing her.

Stock. Hey day! What has turned you thus on a sudden?

Bel. Why, I like her the better, as a woman; but name her not to me as a wife! No, if ever I marry, it must be a stayed, sober, considerate Bel. A woman; one that can turn, and overdamsel, with blood in her veins as cold as a tur-turn me and my tottering resolutions every way tle's; quick of scent as a vulture when danger's she will. Oh, Sir, if this is folly in me, you must in the wind; wary and sharp-sighted as a hawk rail at nature: you must chide the sun, that was when treachery is on foot: with such a com- vertical at my birth, and would not wink upon my panion at my elbow, for ever whispering in my nakedness, but swaddled me in the broadest, hotear-Have a care of this man, he 's a cheat; don't test, glare of his meridian beams. go near that woman, she 's a jilt; overhead there's a scaffold, underfoot there's a well. Oh, Sir! such a woman might lead me up and down this great city without difficulty or danger; but with a girl of Miss Rusport's complexion, heaven and earth, Sir! we should be duped, undone, and distracted, in a fortnight.

Stock. Ha ha ha! Why, you are become wondrous circumspect of a sudden, pupil: and if you can find such a prudent damsel as you describe, you have my consent-only beware how you choose: discretion is not the reigning quality amongst the fine ladies of the present time; and, I think, in Miss Rusport's particular, I have given you no bad counsel.

Bel. Well, well, if you'll fetch me the jewels, I believe, I can undertake to carry them to her: but as for the money, I'll have nothing to do with that: Dudley would be your fittest ambassador on that occasion: and, if I mistake not, the most agreeable to the lady.

Stock. Why, indeed, from what I know of the matter, it may not improbably be destined to find its way into his pockets. [Exit.

Stock. Mere rhapsody: mere childish rhapsody: the libertine's familiar plea.-Nature made us, 'tis true, but we are the responsible creatures of our own faults and follies. Bel. Sir!

Stock. Slave of every face you meet, some hussy has inveigled you; some handsome profligate (the town is full of them;) and, when once fairly bankrupt in constitution as well as fortune, nature no longer serves as your excuse for being vicious, necessity, perhaps, will stand your friend, and you'll reform.

Bel. You are severe.

Stock. It fits me to be so-it well becomes a father-I would say, a friend-How strangely I forget myself! How difficult it is to counterfeit indifference, and put a mask upon the heart!

[Aside.

Bel. How could you tempt me so? Had you not inadvertently dropped the name of father, I fear our friendship, short as it has been, would scarce have held me-But even your mistake I reverence-Give me your hand-'tis over.

Stock. Generous young man! because I bore

you the affection of a father, I rashly took up the | Captain Dudley know that I introduced you to authority of one. I ask your pardon-pursue his daughter, he is a man of such scrupulous hoyour course; I have no right to stop it-What nour would you have me do with these things?

Bel. This, if I might advise: carry the money to Miss Rusport immediately; never let generosity wait for its materials; that part of the business presses. Give me the jewels: I'll find an opportunity of delivering them into her hands; and your visit may pave the way for my reception.

Bel. What do you tell me! is she daughter to the old gentleman I met here this morning? Mrs. Ful. The same; him you was so generous to.

Bel. There's an end to the matter then at once; it shall never be said of me, that I took advantage of the father's necessities to trepan the daughter. Going.

Mrs. Ful. So, so, I've made a wrong cast; he's one of your conscientious sinners, I find; but 1 wont lose him thus-Ha, ha, ha!

Bel. What is it you laugh at?

[Exit. Stock. Be it so: good morning to you. Farewell, advice! Away goes he upon the wing for pleasure. What various passions he awakens in me! He pains, yet pleases me; affrights, offends, yet grows upon my heart. His very failings set Mrs. Ful. Your absolute inexperience; have him off-for ever trespassing, for ever atoning, I you lived so very little time in this country, as not almost think he would not be so perfect, were he to know that, between young people of equal ages, free from fault:-I must dissemble longer; and the term of sister often is a cover for that of misyet how painful the experiment!-Even now he 'stress? This young lady is, in that sense of the gone upon some wild adventure; and who can word, sister to young Dudley, and consequently tell what mischief may befall him: O nature, daughter to my old lodger. what it is to be a father! [Exit.

Mrs. Ful. Why, sure, Mr. Fulmer, I may be allowed to rear a chicken of my own hatching, as they say. Who first sprung the thought, but 1, pray? Who first contrived the plot? Who proposed the letter, but I, I?

Bel. Indeed! are you serious?

Mrs. Ful. Can you doubt it? I must have been pretty well assured of that, before I invited you hither.

Bel. That's true; she cannot be a woman of honour, and Dudley is an unconscionable young rogue, to think of keeping one fine girl in pay, by raising contributions on another: he shall therefore give her up: she is a dear, bewitching, mischievous, little devil, and he shall positively give

her up.

Mrs. Ful. Ay, now the freak has taken you deed, and certain of success. again; I say give her up; there's one way, in

Bel. What's that?

Ful. And who dogged the gentleman home? Who found out his name, fortune, connexion: Mrs. Ful. Out-bid him, never dream of outthat he was a West Indian, fresh landed, and full blustering him. All things, then, will be made of cash; a gull to our heart's content; a hot-brain-easy enough; let me see; some little genteel ed, headlong spark, that would run into our trap, like a wheatear under a turf, but I, I, I? Mrs. Ful. Hark! he's come; disappear, march; and leave the field open to my machination. [Erit FULMER.

Enter BELCOUR.

Bel. O thou dear minister to my happiness, let me embrace thee! Why, thou art my polar star, my propitious constellation, by which I navigate my impatient bark into the port of pleasure and delight.

Mrs. Ful. Oh, you men are sly creatures! Do you remember now, you cruel, what you said to me this morning?

Bel. All a jest, a frolic; never think on't; bury it for ever in oblivion: thou! why, thou art all over nectar and ambrosia, powder of pearl and odour of roses; thou hast the youth of Hebe, the beauty of Venus, and the pen of Sappho; but, in the name of all that 's lovely, where's the lady? I expected to find her with you.

Mrs. Ful. No doubt you did, and these raptures were designed for her; but where have you loitered? the lady's gone-you are too late; girls of her sort are not to be kept waiting, like negro slaves in your sugar plantations.

Bel. Gone! whither is she gone? tell me, that I may follow her.

Mrs. Ful. Hold, hold, not so fast, young gentleman, this is a case of some delicacy; should

present to begin with: what have you got about you? Ay, search; I can bestow it to advantage, there's no time to be lost.

Bel. Hang it, confound it! a plague upon 't, say I! I haven't a guinea left in my pocket; parted from my whole stock here this morning, and have forgot to supply myself since.

Mrs. Ful. Mighty well; let it pass, then: there's an end; think no more of the lady that's all.

Bel. Distraction! think no more of her? let me only step home, and provide myself; I'll be back with you in an instant.

Mrs. Ful. Pooh! pooh! that 's a wretched shift; have you nothing of value about you? Money's a coarse, slovenly vehicle, fit only to bribe electors in a borough; there are more graceful ways of purchasing a lady's favours; rings, trinkets, jewels!

must

Bel. Jewels! Gadso, I protest I had forgot: I have a case of jewels; but they wont do; not part from them: no, no, they are appropriated; they are none of my own.

Mrs. Ful. Let me see, let me see! Ay, now, this were something like: pretty creatures! how they sparkle; these would ensure success. Bel. Indeed!

Mrs. Ful. These would make her your own for ever.

Bel. Then the deuce take them, for belonging to another person; I could find in my heart to give them the girl, and swear I've lost them.

Mrs. Ful. Ay, do, say they were stolen out of your pocket.

Bel. No, hang it, that 's dishonourable; here, give me the paltry things, I'll write you an order on my merchant, for double their value.

Mrs. Ful. An order! No order for me! no order upon merchants, with their value received, and three days' grace; their noting, protesting, and endorsing, and all their counting-house formalities; I'll have nothing to do with them; leave your diamonds with me, and give your order for the value of them to the owner: the money would be as good as the trinkets, I warrant you.

Bel. Hey! how! I never thought of that; but a breach of trust; 'tis impossible: I never can consent; therefore give me the jewels back again. Mrs. Ful. Take them; I am now to tell you, the lady is in this house.

Bel. In this house?

Mrs. Ful. You must expect to hear her talk of her father, as she calls him, and her brother, and your bounty to her family."

Bel. Ay, ay, never mind what she talks of, only bring her.

Mrs. Ful. You'll be prepared upon that head? Bel. I shall be prepared, never fear: away with you.

Lou. But, as neither he nor my father were fortunate enough to be at home, I could not resist the opportunity

Bel. Nor I neither, by my soul, Madam: let us improve it, therefore. I am in love with you to distraction; I was charmed at the first glance; I attempted to accost you: you fled; I followed; but was defeated of an interview; at length I have obtained one, and seize the opportunity of casting my person and my fortune at your feet.

Lou. You astonish me! Are you in your senses, or do you make a jest of my misfortunes? Do you ground pretences on your generosity, or do you make a practice of this folly with every woman you meet?

Bel. Upon my life, no: as you are the handsomest woman I ever met, so you are the first to whom I ever made the like professions: as for my generosity, Madam, I must refer you on that score to this good lady, who I believe has something to offer in my behalf.

Lou. Don't build upon that, Sir; I must have better proofs of your generosity, than the mere divestment of a little superfluous dross, before I can credit the sincerity of professions so abruptly delivered. [Exit hastily.

Bel. Oh! ye gods and goddesses, how her anger animates her beauty! [Going out. Mrs. Ful. But, hold, I had forgot: not a word Mrs. Ful. Stay, Sir; if you stir a step after of the diamonds; leave that matter to my ma-her, I renounce your interest for ever; why, you'll nagement. ruin every thing.

Bel. Well, I must have her, cost what it will: I see she understands her own value though; a little superfluous dross, truly! she must have better proofs of my generosity!

Mrs. Ful. 'Tis exactly as I told you; your money she calls dross; she's too proud to stain her fingers with your coin; bait your hook well with jewels; try that experiment, and she's your own."

Bel. Hell and vexation! Get out of the room, or I shall run distracted. [Exit MRS. FULMER.] Of a certain, Belcour, thou art born to be the fool of woman! sure no man sins with so much repentance, or repents with so little amendment, as I do. I cannot give away another person's property, honour forbids me; and I positively cannot give up the girl; love, passion, constitution, every thing protests against that. How shall I decide? I cannot bring myself to break a trust, and I am not at present in the humour to balk my inclinations. Is there no middle way? Let me consider-There is, there is: my good genius has presented me with one: apt, obvious, honourable, the girl shall not go without her baubles: I'll not go without the girl; Miss Rusport sha'n't lose her diamonds; I'll save Dudley from destruc-meet her? tion, and every party shall be a gainer by the project.

Enter MRS. FULMER, introducing MISS DUDLEY.

Mrs. Ful. Miss Dudley, this is the worthy gentleman you wish to see; this is Mr. Belcour.

Bel. Take them; let them go; lay them at her feet; I must get out of the scrape as I can; my propensity is irresistible: there; you have them; they are yours; they are hers; but, remember, they are a trust; I commit them to her keeping, till I can buy them off, with something she shall think more valuable; now tell me when shall I

Mrs. Ful. How can I tell that? don't you see what an alarm you have put her into? Oh! you're a rare one! but go your ways for this while; leave her to my management, and come to me at seven this evening; but remember not to bring empty pockets with you-Ha, ha, ha!

[Exeunt severally.