adoration is, madam. Common lovers kneel; I was prostrate. Laura. You do me infinite honour. -Disgustful wretch! You are thinner than you were, Don Sancho: I protest, now I observe you, you are much altered! Gasp. Ay, madam-fretting. Your absence threw me into a fever, and that destroyed my bloom :-You see, I look almost a middle-aged man, now. Laura. No, really; far from it, I assure you. The fop is as wrinkled as a baboon! [Aside. Gasp. Then jealousy-that gave me a jaundice.My niece's husband, I hear, Don Carlos, has been my happy rival. Oh, my blade will hardly keep in its scabbard, when I think of him. Laura. Think no more of him-he has been long banished my thoughts, be assured. I wonder you gave your niece to him, with such a fortune. Gasp. Gave! she gave herself; and, as to fortune, she had not a pistole from me. Laura. 'Twas, indeed, unnecessary, with so fine an estate as she had in Leon. Gasp. My niece an estate in Leon! Not enough to give shelter to a field mouse; and if he has told you so, he is a braggart. Laura. Told me so-I have the writings; he has made over the lands to me. Gasp. Made over the lands to you!—Oh, a deceiver! I begin to suspect a plot. Pray let me see this extraordinary deed. [She runs to a Cabinet.] A plot, I'll be sworn! Laura. Here is the deed which made that estate mine for ever. No, sir, I will intrust it in no hand but my own. Yet look over me, and read the description of the lands. Gasp. [Reading through his Glass.] H-m-m-: In the vicinage of Rosalvo, bounded on the west by the river- ―h—m—m, on the east by the forest——Oh, an artful dog! I need read no further; I see how the thing is. Laura. How, sir!--but hold I am breathless with fear. -Stay a moment— Gasp. Nay, madam, don't be afraid! 'Tis my estate-that's all; the very castle where I was born; and which I never did, nor ever will, bestow on any Don in the two Castiles. Dissembling rogue! Bribe with a fictitious title to my estate-ha! ha! ha! Laura. [Aside.] Curses follow him! The villain I employed, must have been his creature; his reluct ance all art; and, whilst I believed myself undoing him, was duped myself! you Gasp. Could you suppose I'd give Carlos such an estate for running away with my niece? No, no !— the vineyards, and the corn fields, and the woods of Rosalva, are not for him.-I've somebody else in my eye-in my eye, observe me-to give those to:Can't you guess who it is? Laura. No, indeed!-He gives me a glimmering that saves me from despair! [Aside. Gasp. I won't tell you, unless you'll bribe me-I won't indeed. [Kisses her Cheek.] There, now I'll tell you-they are all for you. Yes, this estate, to which you have taken such a fancy, shall be yours.—I'll give you the deeds, if you'll promise to love me, you little, cruel thing! Laura. Can you be serious? Gasp. I'll sign and seal to-morrow. Laura. Noble Don Sancho! Thus then I annihilate the proof of his perfidy, and my weakness.— Thus I tear to atoms his detested name; and as I tread on these, so would I on his heart. Enter VICTORIA. Vict. My children then are saved! [In transport. Carlos was a villain, and deceived me.-Why this strange air? Ah, I see the cause-you think me ruined, and will abandon me. Yes, I see it in thy averted face; thou dar'st not meet my eyes. If I misjudge thee, speak! Vict. Laura, I cannot speak.-You little guess the emotions of my heart.-Heaven knows, I pity you! Laura. Pity! Oh, villain! and has thy love already snatched the form of pity? Base, deceitfulCar. [Without.] Stand off, loose your weak hold; I'm come for vengeance! Enter CARLOS. Where is this youth? Where is the blooming rival, for whom I have been betrayed? Hold me not, base woman! In vain the stripling flies me; for, by Hea ven, my sword shall in his bosom write its master's wrongs! [VICTORIA first goes towards the Flat, then re turns, takes off her Hat, and drops on one Knee. Vict. Strike, strike it here! Plunge it deep into that bosom, already wounded by a thousand stabs, keener and more painful than your sword can give.— Here lives all the gnawing anguish of love betrayed; here live the pangs of disappointed hopes, hopes sanctified by holiest vows, which have been written in the book of Heaven.- -Hah! he sinks.- -[She flies to him.]-Oh! my Carlos! my beloved! my husband! forgive my too severe reproaches; thou art dear, yet dear as ever, to Victoria's heart! Car. [Recovering.] Oh, you know not what you do you know not what you are. Oh, Victoria, thou art a beggar! Vict. No, we are rich, we are happy! See there, the fragments of that fatal deed, which, had I not re covered, we had been indeed undone; yet still not wretched, could my Carlos think so! Car. The fragments of the deed! the deed which that base woman Vict. Speak not so harshly.- -To you, madam, I fear, I seem reprehensible; yet, when you consider duties as a wife and mother, you will forgive me. -Be not afraid of poverty-a woman has deceived, but she will not desert you! my Laura. Is this real? Can I be awake? Vict. Oh, may'st thou indeed awake to virtue !— You have talents that might grace the highest of our sex; be no longer unjust to such precious gifts, by burying them in dishonour.-Virtue is our first, most awful duty; bow, Laura ! bow before her throne, and mourn in ceaseless tears, that ever you forgot her heavenly precepts ! Laura. So, by a smooth speech about virtue, you think to cover the injuries I sustain. Vile, insinuating monster!-but thou knowest me not.-Revenge is sweeter to my heart than love; and if there is a law in Spain to gratify that passion, your virtue shall have another field for exercise. [Exit. Cer. [Turning towards VICTORIA.] My hated rival, and my charming wife! How many sweet mysteries have you to unfold?——Oh, Victoria! my soul thanks thee, but I dare not yet say I love thee, till ten thousand acts of watchful tenderness, have proved how deep the sentiment's engraved. Vict. Can it be true that I have been unhappy?— But the mysteries, my Carlos, are already explained to you-Gasper's resemblance to my uncle Gasp. Yes, sir, I was always apt at resemblancesIn our plays at home, I am always Queen Cleopatra -You know she was but a gipsey queen, and I hits her off to a nicety. Car. Come, my Victoria--Oh, there is a painful pleasure in my bosom-To gaze on thee, to listen to, and to love thee, seems like the bliss of angels' cheering whispers to repentant sinners. [Exeunt CARLOS and VICTORIA. Gasp. Lord help 'em! how easily the women are taken in! SCENE III. [Exit. The Prado. Enter MINETTE. Min. Ah, here comes the man at last, after I have been sauntering in sight of his lodgings these two hours. Now, if my scheme takes, what a happy person I shall be! and sure, as I was Donna Olivia today, to please my lady, I may be Donna Olivia tonight, to please myself. I'll address him as the maid of a lady who has taken a fancy to him, then convey him to our house-then retire, and then come in again, and, with a vast deal of confusion, confess I sent my maid for him. If he should dislike my forwardness, the censure will fall on 'my lady; if he should be pleased with my person, the advantage will be mine. But perhaps he's come here on some wicked frolic or other.-I'll watch him at a distance be fore I speak. [Exil. Enter DON JULIO, Julio. Not here, 'faith; though she gave me last night but a faint refusal, and I had a right, by all the rules of gallantry, to construe that into an assent.Then she's a jilt--Hang her, I feel I am uneasyThe first woman that ever gave me pain.-I am |