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Lucy. No, indeed, ma'am.

Lyd. Nor The Mistakes of the Heart?

Lucy. Ma'am, as ill luck would have it, Mr. Bull said Miss Sukey Saunter had just fetched it away.

Lyd. Heigh-ho!

Distress?

Did you inquire for The Delicate

Lucy. Or, The Memoirs of Lady Woodford? Yes, indeed, ma'am. I asked everywhere for it; and I might have brought it from Mr. Frederick's, but Lady Slattern Lounger, who had just sent it home, had so soiled and dog's-eared it, it wa'nt fit for a Christian to read.

Lyd. Heigh-ho-Yes, I always know when Lady Slattern has been before me. She has a most observing thumb; and, I believe, cherishes her nails for the convenience of making marginal notes.-Well, child, what have you brought me ?

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Lucy. Oh! here, ma'am.-[Taking books from under her cloak, and from her pockets.] This is The Gordian Knot, and this Peregrine Pickle. Here are The Tears of Sensibility, and Humphrey Clinker. This is The Memoirs of a Lady of Quality, written by herself, and here the second volume of The Sentimental Journey.

Lyd. Heigh-ho-What are those books by the glass? Lucy. The great one is only The Whole Duty of Man, where I press a few blonds, ma'am.

Lyd. Very well-give me the sal volatile.
Lucy. Is it in a blue cover, ma'am?

Lyd. My smelling-bottle, you simpleton !

Lucy. Oh, the drops -here, ma'am.

Lyd. Hold-here's some one coming-quick, see who it is. [Exit LUCY.] Surely I heard my cousin Julia's voice.

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Re-enter LUCY

Lucy. Lud! ma'am, here is Miss Melville.

Lyd. Is it possible ?-

Enter JULIA

[Exit LUCY

Lyd. My dearest Julia, how delighted am I !—[Embrace.] How unexpected was this happiness!

Jul. True, Lydia and our pleasure is the greater.But what has been the matter ?—you were denied to me at first!

Lyd. Ah, Julia, I have a thousand things to tell you!

-But first inform me what has conjured you to Bath ? Is Sir Anthony here ?

Jul. He is we are arrived within this hour-and I suppose he will be here to wait on Mrs. Malaprop as soon as he is dressed.

Lyd. Then before we are interrupted, let me impart to you some of my distress !—I know your gentle nature will sympathise with me, though your prudence may condemn me! My letters have informed you of my whole connection with Beverley; but I have lost him, Julia! My aunt has discovered our intercourse by a note she intercepted, and has confined me ever since! Yet, would you believe it? she has absolutely fallen in love with a tall Irish baronet she met one night since we have been here, at Lady Macshuffle's rout.

Jul. You jest, Lydia!

Lyd. No, upon my word. She really carries on a kind of correspondence with him, under a feigned name though, till she chooses to be known to him ;-but it is a Delia or a Celia, I assure you.

Jul. Then, surely, she is now more indulgent to her niece. Lyd. Quite the contrary. Since she has discovered her own frailty, she is become more suspicious of mine. Then I must inform you of another plague ?—That odious Acres is to be in Bath to-day, so that I protest I shall be teased out of all spirits!

Jul. Come, come, Lydia, hope for the best-Sir Anthony shall use his interest with Mrs. Malaprop.

Lyd. But you have not heard the worst.

Unfortunately

I had quarrelled with my poor Beverley, just before my aunt made the discovery, and I have not seen him since, to make it up.

Jul. What was his offence?

Lyd. Nothing at all !—But, I don't know how it was, as often as we had been together, we had never had a quarrel, and somehow, I was afraid he would never give me an opportunity. So, last Thursday, I wrote a letter to myself, to inform myself that Beverley was at that time paying his addresses to another woman. I signed it your friend unknown, showed it to Beverley, charged him with his falsehood, put myself in a violent passion, and vowed I'd never see him more.

Jul. And you let him depart so, and have not seen him since ?.!

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Lyd. 'Twas the next day my aunt found the matter out. I intended only to have teased him three days and a half, and now I've lost him for ever.

Jul. If he is as deserving and sincere as you have represented him to me, he will never give you up so.

Yet consider, Lydia, you tell me he is but an ensign, and you have thirty thousand pounds.

Lyd. But you know I lose most of my fortune if I marry without my aunt's consent, till of age; and that is what I have determined to do, ever since I knew the penalty. Nor could I love the man who would wish to wait a day for the alternative.

Jul. Nay, this is caprice!

Lyd. What, does Julia tax me with caprice ?—I thought her lover Faulkland had inured her to it.

Jul. I do not love even his faults.

Lyd. But apropos-you have sent to him, I suppose? Jul. Not yet, upon my word-nor has he the least idea of my being in Bath. Sir Anthony's resolution was so sudden, I could not inform him of it.

Lyd. Well, Julia, you are your own mistress (though under the protection of Sir Anthony), yet have you, for this long year, been a slave to the caprice, the whim, the jealousy of this ungrateful Faulkland, who will ever delay assuming the right of a husband, while you suffer him to be equally imperious as a lover.

Jul. Nay, you are wrong entirely. We were contracted before my father's death. That, and some consequent embarrassments, have delayed what I know to be my Faulkland's most ardent wish. He is too generous to trifle on such a point :-and for his character, you wrong him there too. No, Lydia, he is too proud, too noble to be jealous; if he is captious, 'tis without dissembling; if fretful, without rudeness Unused to the fopperies of love, he is negligent of the little duties expected from a lover but being unhackneyed in the passion, his affection is ardent and sincere; and as it engrosses his whole soul, he expects every thought and emotion of his mistress to move in unison with his. Yet, though his pride calls for this full return, his humility makes him undervalue those qualities in him which would entitle him to it; and 1 feeling why he should be loved to the degree he wishes, he still suspects that he is not loved enough. This temper, I must own, has cost me many unhappy hours; but I have

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learned to think myself his debtor, for those imperfections which arise from the ardour of his attachment.

Lyd. Well, I cannot blame you for defending him. But tell me candidly, Julia, had he never saved your life do you think you should have been attached to him as you are ?-Believe me, the rude blast that overset your boat was a prosperous gale of love to him.

Jul. Gratitude may have strengthened my attachment to Mr. Faulkland, but I loved him before he had preserved me; yet surely that alone were an obligation sufficient.

Lyd. Obligation! why a water spaniel would have done as much!-Well, I should never think of giving my heart to a man because he could swim.

¦ Jul. Come, Lydia, you are too inconsiderate.

Lyd. Nay, I do but jest.-What's here?

Re-enter LUCY in a hurry

Lucy. O ma'am, here is Sir Anthony Absolute just come home with your aunt.

Lyd. They'll not come here.-Lucy, do you watch.

[Exit LUCY Jul. Yet I must go, Sir Anthony does not know I am here, and if we meet, he'll detain me, to show me the town. I'll take another opportunity of paying my respects to Mrs. Malaprop, when she shall treat me, as long as she chooses, with her select words so ingeniously misapplied, without being mispronounced.

Re-enter LUCY

Lucy. O Lud! ma'am, they are both coming upstairs. Lyd. Well, I'll not detain you, coz.-Adieu, my dear Julia, I'm sure you are in haste to send to Faulkland.There-through my room you'll find another staircase. Jul. Adieu ! [Embraces LYDIA and exit

Lyd. Here, my dear Lucy, hide. these books. Quick, quick.-Fling Peregrine Pickle under the toilet-throw Roderick Random into the closet-put The Innocent Adultery into The Whole Duty of Man-thrust Lord Aimworth under the sofa-cram Ovid behind the bolster-thereput The Man of Feeling into your pocket-so, so-now lay Mrs. Chapone in sight, and leave Fordyce's Sermons open on the table.

Lucy. O burn it, ma'am the hair-dresser has torn away as far as Proper Pride.

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Lyd. Never mind-open at Sobriety.-Fling me Lord Chesterfield's Letters. Now for 'em. [Exit LUCY

Enter MRS. MALAPROP, and SIR ANTHONY Absolute

Mrs. Mal. There, Sir Anthony, there sits the deliberate simpleton who wants to disgrace her family, and lavish herself on a fellow not worth a shilling.

Lyd. Madam, I thought you once

Mrs. Mal. You thought, miss! I don't know any business you have to think at all-thought does not become a young woman. But the point we would request of you is, that you will promise to forget this fellow-to illiterate him, I say, quite from your memory.

Lyd. Ah, madam ! our memories are independent of our wills. It is not so easy to forget.

Mrs. Mal. But I say it is, miss; there is nothing on earth so easy as to forget, if a person chooses to set about it. I'm sure I have as much forgot your poor dear uncle as if he had never existed-and I thought it my duty so to do; and let me tell you, Lydia, these violent memories don't become a young woman.

Sir. Anth. Why, sure, she won't pretend to remember what she's ordered not !—ay, this comes of her reading! Lyd. What crime, madam, have I committed, to be treated thus ?

Mrs. Mal. Now don't attempt to extirpate yourself from the matter; you know I have proof controvertible of it. But tell me, will you promise to do as you're bid? Will you take a husband of your friends' choosing?

Lyd. Madam, I must tell you plainly, that had I no preference for any one else, the choice you have made would be my aversion,

Mrs. Mal. What business have you, miss, with preference and aversion? They don't become a young woman; and you ought to know, that as both always wear off, 'tis safest in matrimony to begin with a little aversion, I am sure I hated your poor dear uncle before marriage as if he'd been a blackamoor-and yet, miss, you are sensible what a wife I made and when it pleased Heaven to release me from him, 'tis unknown what tears I shed!

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