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Love. Objection!-No, I like company, you know, of all things; I'll go and join them: who are they all? Mrs. Love. You know them all; and there's your friend Sir Brilliant there.

Love. Is he there? I'm glad of it. But, pray now, how comes this about?

Mrs. Love. I intend to do it often.

Love. Do you?

Mrs. Love. Ay, and not look tamely on, while you revel luxuriously in a course of pleasure. I shall pursue my own plan of diversion.

Love. Do so, do so, ma'am: the change in your temper will be very pleasing.

Mrs. Love. I shall, indeed, sir. I'm in earnest. Love. By all means follow your own inclinations. Mrs. Love. And so I shall, sir, I assure you. [Sings. Love. What the devil is the matter with her? And what in the name of wonder does all this mean?

Mrs. Love. Mean, sir!-It means-it means-it means -it means-how can you ask me what it means ?Well, to be sure, the sobriety of that question!-Do you think a woman of spirit can have leisure to tell her meaning, when she is all air, alertness, pleasure, and enjoyment?

Love. She is mad!-Stark mad!

Mrs. Love. You're mistaken, sir,-not mad, but in spirits, that's all. No offence, I hope-Am I too flighty for you? Perhaps I am: you are of a saturnine disposition, inclined to think a little or so. Well, don't let me interrupt you; don't let me be of any inconvenience. That would be the unpolitest thing; for a married couple to interfere and encroach on each other's pleasures! O hideous! it would be gothic to the last degree. Ha ha! ha!

Love. [Forcing a laugh.] Ha! ha!—Ma'am, you— ha! ha! you are perfectly right.

Mrs. Love. Nay, but I don't like that laugh now, I

positively don't like it. Can't you laugh out as you were used to do? For my part, I'm determined to do nothing else all the rest of my life.

Love. This is the most astonishing thing! Ma'am, I don't rightly comprehend

Mrs. Love. Oh lud! oh lud!-with that important face! Well, but come, now; what don't you comprehend?

Love. There is something in this treatment that I don't so well

Mrs. Love. Oh, are you there, sir! How quickly they, who have no sensibility for the peace and happiness of others, can feel for themselves, Mr. Lovemore!-But that's a grave reflection, and I hate reflection.

Love. What has she got into her head? This sudden change, Mrs. Lovemore, let me tell you, is a little alarming, and

Mrs. Love. Nay, don't be frightened; there is no harm in innocent mirth, I hope? Never look so grave upon it. I assure you, sir, that though, on your part, you seem determined to offer constant indignities to your wife, and though the laws of retaliation would in some sort exculpate her, if, when provoked to the utmost, exasperated beyond all enduring, she should in her turn make him know what it is to receive an injury in the tenderest point

Love. Madam!

:

[Angrily.

Mrs. Love. Well, well, don't be frightened. I say, I sh'n't retaliate my own honour will secure you there, you may depend upon it.-You won't come and play a game at cards? Well, do as you like.-Well, you won't come? No, no, I see you won't-What say you to a bit of supper with us?-Nor that neither-Follow your inclinations: it is not material where a body eats: -the company expects me- -Your servant, Mr. Lovemore, yours, yours. [Exit, singing.

Love. This is a frolic I never saw her in before!Laugh all the rest of my life!-laws of retaliation!an injury in the tenderest point!-the company expects me,-Your servant, my dear!-yours, yours! [Mimicking her.] What the devil is all this? Some of her female friends have been tampering with her. Zounds, I must begin to look a little sharp after the lady. I'll go this moment into the card-room, and watch whom she whispers with, whom she ogles with, and every circumstance that can lead to[Going,

Enter MUSLIN in a hurry.

Mus. Madam, madam,—here's your letter; I would not for all the world that my master

Love. What, is she mad too? What's the matter, woman?

Mus. Nothing, sir,-nothing; I wanted a word with my lady, that's all, sir.

Love. You would not for the world that your master -What was you going to say?—what paper's that? Mus. Paper, sir!

Love. Paper, sir! Let me see it.

Mus. Lard, sir! how can you ask a body for such a thing? It's a letter to me, sir, a letter from the country-a letter from my sister, sir. She bids me to buy her a shiver de fize cap, and a sixteenth in the lottery; and tells me of a number she dreamt of, that's all, sir: I'll put it up.

Love. Let me look at it. Give it me this moment. [Reads.] To Mrs. Lovemore!-Brilliant Fashion.

This is a letter from the country, is it?

Mus. That, sir-that is-no, sir,-no ;-that's not sister's letter.-If you will give me that back, sir, I'll show you the right one.

Love. Where did you get this?

Mus. Sir!

Love. Where did you get it?-Tell me truth

Mus. Dear heart, you fright a body so-in the parlour, sir-I found it there.

Love. Very well!-leave the room.

Mus. The devil fetch it, I was never so out in my politics in all my days.

[Exit. Love. A pretty epistle truly this seems to be-Let me read it.

[Reads.]

Permit me, dear madam, to throw myself on my knees, for on my knees I must address you, and in that humble posture, to implore your compassion.-Compassion with a vengeance on him- Think you see me now with tender, melting, supplicating eyes, languishing at your feet. -Very well, sir.- ·Can you find it in your heart to persist in cruelty ?-Grant me but access to you once more, and in addition to what I already said this morning I will urge such motives--Urge motives, will ye?——as will suggest to you, that you should no longer hesitate in gratitude to reward him, who still on his knees, here makes a vow to you of eternal constancy and love.

BRILLIANT FASHION.

So! so! so! your very humble servant, Sir Brilliant Fashion! This is your friendship for me, is it?You are mighty kind, indeed, sir,-but I thank you as much as if you had really done me the favour: and Mrs. Lovemore, I'm your humble servant too. She intends to laugh all the rest of her life! This letter will change her note. Yonder she comes along the gallery, and Sir Brilliant in full chase of her. They come this way. Could I but detect them both now! I'll step aside; and who knows but the devil may tempt them to their undoing. At least I'll try. A polite husband I am: there's the coast clear for you, madam. [Exit.

! ་ ་

Enter MRS. LOVEMORE and SIR BRILLIANT.

Mrs. Love. I tell you, Sir Brilliant, your civility is odious, your compliments fulsome, and your solicita

tions impertinent, sir.-I must make use of harsh language, sir: you provoke it, and I can't refrain.

Sir Bril. Not retiring to solitude and discontent again, I hope, madam! Have a care, my dear Mrs. Lovemore, of a relapse.

Mrs. Love. No danger of that, sir: don't be so solicitous about me. Why would you leave the company? Let me entreat you to return, sir.

Sir Bril. By heaven, there is more rapture in being one moment vis-a-vis with you, than in the company of a whole drawing-room of beauties. Round you are melting pleasures, tender transports, youthful loves, and blooming graces, all unfelt, neglected, and despised, by a tasteless, cold, languid, unimpassioned husband, while they might be all so much better employed to the purposes of ecstasy and bliss.

Mrs. Love. I desire, Sir Brilliant, you will desist from this unequalled insolence. I am not to be treated in this manner;—and I assure you, sir, that were I not afraid of the ill consequences that might follow, I should not hesitate a moment to acquaint Mr. Lovemore with your whole behaviour.

-A

Sir Bril. She won't tell her husband then!charming creature, and blessings on her for so convenient a hint. She yields, by all that's wicked; what shall I say to overwhelm her senses in a flood of non[Aside. Go, my heart's envoys, tender sighs, make haste,— Still drink delicious poison from thy eye,—

sense?

Raptures and paradise

Pant on thy lip, and to thy heart be press'd.

[Forcing her all this time.

Enter MR. LOVEMORE.

Love. Zoons! this is too much.

Sir Bril. [Kneels down to buckle his shoe.] This con

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