Brain. And what's his name?

Aldo. Nay, for that, you must excuse me; I must not disclose little Judith's secrets.

Mrs Brain. All this while the poor gentleman is left in pain: we must let him out in secret; for I believe the young fellow is so bashful, he would not willingly be seen.

Jud. The best way will be, for father Aldo to lend me the key of his door, which opens into my chamber; and so I can convey him out.

Aldo. [Giving her a key.] Do so, daughter. Not a word of my familiarity with his mother, to prevent bloodshed betwixt us: but I have her name down in my almanack, I warrant her.

Jud. What, kiss and tell, father Aldo? kiss and tell! [Exit.

Mrs Brain. I'll go and pass an hour with Mrs Tricksy. [Exit.

Enter LIMBERHAM.

Brain. What, the lusty lover Limberham!

Enter WOODALL, at another door.

Aldo. O here's a monsieur, new come over, and a fellow-lodger; I must endear you two to one another.

Brain. Sir, 'tis my extreme ambition to be better known to you; you come out of the country I adore. And how does the dear Battist[8]? I long for some of his new compositions in the last opera. A propos! I have had the most happy invention this morning, and a tune trouling in my head; I rise immediately in my night-gown and slippers, down I put the notes slap-dash, made words to them like lightning; and I warrant you have them at the circle in the evening.

Wood. All were complete, sir, if S. Andre would make steps to them.

Brain. Nay, thanks to my genius, that care's over: you shall see, you shall see. But first the air. [Sings.] Is it not very fine? Ha, messieurs!

Limb. The close of it is the most ravishing I ever heard!

Brain. I dwell not on your commendations. What say you, sir? [To WOOD.] Is it not admirable? Do you enter into it?

Wood. Most delicate cadence!

Brain. Gad, I think so, without vanity. Battist and I have but one soul. But the close, the close! [Sings it thrice over.] I have words too upon the air; but I am naturally so bashful!

Wood. Will you oblige me, sir?

Brain. You might command me, sir; for I sing too en cavalier: but—

Limb. But you would be entreated, and say, Nolo, nolo, nolo, three times, like any bishop, when your mouth waters at the diocese.

Brain. I have no voice; but since this gentleman commands me, let the words commend themselves. [Sings. My Phillis is charming—

Limb. But why, of all names, would you chuse a Phillis? There have been so many Phillises in songs, I thought there had not been another left, for love or money.

Brain. If a man should listen to a fop! [Sings. My Phillis—

Aldo. Before George, I am on t'other side: I think, as good no song, as no Phillis.

Brain. Yet again!—My Phillis— [Sings.

Limb. Pray, for my sake, let it be your Chloris.

Brain. [Looking scornfully at him.] My Phillis— [Sings.

Limb. You had as good call her your Succuba.

Brain. Morbleu! will you not give me leave? I am full of Phillis. [Sings.] My Phillis—

Limb. Nay, I confess, Phillis is a very pretty name.

Brain. Diable! Now I will not sing, to spite you. By the world, you are not worthy of it. Well, I have a gentleman's fortune; I have courage, and make no inconsiderable figure in the world: yet I would quit my pretensions to all these, rather than not be author of this sonnet, which your rudeness has irrevocably lost.

Limb. Some foolish French quelque chose, I warrant you.

Brain. Quelque chose! O ignorance, in supreme perfection! he means a kek shose[9].

Limb. Why a kek shoes let it be then! and a kek shoes for your song.

Brain. I give to the devil such a judge. Well, were I to be born again, I would as soon be the elephant, as a wit; he's less a monster in this age of malice. I could burn my sonnet, out of rage.

Limb. You may use your pleasure with your own.

Wood. His friends would not suffer him: Virgil was not permitted to burn his AEneids.

Brain. Dear sir, I'll not die ungrateful for your approbation. [Aside to WOOD.] You see this fellow? he is an ass already; he has a handsome mistress, and you shall make an ox of him ere long.

Wood. Say no more, it shall be done.

Limb. Hark you, Mr Woodall; this fool Brainsick grows insupportable; he's a public nuisance; but I scorn to set my wit against him: he has a pretty wife: I say no more; but if you do not graff him—

Wood. A word to the wise: I shall consider him, for your sake.

Limb. Pray do, sir: consider him much.

Wood. Much is the word.—This feud makes well for me. [Aside.

Brain. [To WOOD.] I'll give you the opportunity, and rid you of him.—Come away, little Limberham; you, and I, and father Aldo, will take a turn together in the square.

Aldo. We will follow you immediately.

Limb. Yes, we will come after you, bully Brainsick: but I hope you will not draw upon us there.

Brain. If you fear that, Bilbo shall be left behind.

Limb. Nay, nay, leave but your madrigal behind: draw not that upon us, and it is no matter for your sword. [Exit BRAIN.

Enter TRICKSY, and MRS BRAINSICK, with a note for each.

Wood. [Aside.] Both together! either of them, apart, had been my business: but I shall never play well at this three-hand game.

Limb. O Pug, how have you been passing your time?

Trick. I have been looking over the last present of orange gloves you made me; and methinks I do not like the scent.—O Lord, Mr Woodall, did you bring those you wear from Paris?

Wood. Mine are Roman, madam.

Trick. The scent I love, of all the world. Pray let me see them.

Mrs Brain. Nay, not both, good Mrs Tricksy; for I love that scent as well as you.

Wood. [Pulling them off, and giving each one.] I shall find two dozen more of women's gloves among my trifles, if you please to accept them, ladies.

Trick. Look to it; we shall expect them.—Now to put in my billet-doux!

Mrs Brain. So, now, I have the opportunity to thrust in my note.

Trick. Here, sir, take your glove again; the perfume's too strong for me.

Mrs Brain. Pray take the other to it; though I should have kept it for a pawn. [Mrs BRAINSICK'S note falls out, LIMB. takes it up.

Limb. What have we here? [Reads.] for Mr Woodall!

Both Women. Hold, hold, Mr Limberham! [They snatch it.

Aldo. Before George, son Limberham, you shall read it.

Wood. By your favour, sir, but he must not.

Trick. He'll know my hand, and I am ruined!

Mrs Brain. Oh, my misfortune! Mr Woodall, will you suffer your secrets to be discovered!

Wood. It belongs to one of them, that's certain.—Mr Limberham, I must desire you to restore this letter; it is from my mistress.

Trick. The devil's in him; will he confess?

Wood. This paper was sent me from her this morning; and I was so fond of it, that I left it in my glove: If one of the ladies had found it there, I should have been laughed at most unmercifully.

Mrs Brain. That's well come off!

Limb. My heart was at my mouth, for fear it had been Pug's. [Aside.]—There 'tis again—Hold, hold; pray let me see it once more: a mistress, said you?

Aldo. Yes, a mistress, sir. I'll be his voucher, he has a mistress, and a fair one too.

Limb. Do you know it, father Aldo.

Aldo. Know it! I know the match is as good as made already: old Woodall and I are all one. You, son, were sent for over on purpose; the articles for her jointure are all concluded, and a friend of mine drew them.

Limb. Nay, if father Aldo knows it, I am satisfied.

Aldo. But how came you by this letter, son Woodall? let me examine you.

Wood. Came by it! (pox, he has non-plus'd me!) How do you say I came by it, father Aldo?

Aldo. Why, there's it, now. This morning I met your mistress's father, Mr you know who—

Wood. Mr who, sir?

Aldo. Nay, you shall excuse me for that; but we are intimate: his name begins with some vowel or consonant, no matter which: Well, her father gave me this very numerical letter, subscribed, for Mr. Woodall.

Limb. Before George, and so it is.

Aldo. Carry me this letter, quoth he, to your son Woodall; 'tis from my daughter such a one, and then whispered me her name.

Wood. Let me see; I'll read it once again.

Limb. What, are you not acquainted with the contents of it?

Wood. O, your true lover will read you over a letter from his mistress, a thousand times.

Trick. Ay, two thousand, if he be in the humour.

Wood. Two thousand! then it must be hers. [Reads to himself.] "Away to your chamber immediately, and I'll give my fool the slip."—The fool! that may be either the keeper, or the husband; but commonly the keeper is the greater. Humh! without subscription! it must be Tricksy.—Father Aldo, pr'ythee rid me of this coxcomb.

Aldo. Come, son Limberham, we let our friend Brainsick walk too long alone: Shall we follow him? we must make haste; for I expect a whole bevy of whores, a chamber-full of temptation this afternoon: 'tis my day of audience.

Limb. Mr Woodall, we leave you here—you remember? [Exeunt LIMB. and ALDO.

Wood. Let me alone.—Ladies, your servant; I have a little private business with a friend of mine.

Mrs Brain. Meaning me.—Well, sir, your servant.

Trick. Your servant, till we meet again. [Exeunt severally.

SCENE II.—Mr WOODALL'S Chamber.

Mrs BRAINSICK alone.

Mrs Brain. My note has taken, as I wished: he will be here immediately. If I could but resolve to lose no time, out of modesty; but it is his part to be violent, for both our credits. Never so little force and ruffling, and a poor weak woman is excused. [Noise.] Hark, I hear him coming.—Ah me! the steps beat double: He comes not alone. If it should be my husband with him! where shall I hide myself? I see no other place, but under his bed: I must lie as silently as my fear will suffer me. Heaven send me safe again to my own chamber! [Creeps under the Bed.

Enter WOODALL and TRICKSY.

Wood. Well, fortune at the last is favourable, and now you are my prisoner.

Trick. After a quarter of an hour, I suppose, I shall have my liberty upon easy terms. But pray let us parley a little first.

Wood. Let it be upon the bed then. Please you to sit?

Trick. No matter where; I am never the nearer to your wicked purpose. But you men are commonly great comedians in love-matters; therefore you must swear, in the first place—

Wood. Nay, no conditions: The fortress is reduced to extremity; and you must yield upon discretion, or I storm.

Trick. Never to love any other woman.

Wood. I kiss the book upon it. [Kisses her. Mrs BRAIN. pinches him from underneath the Bed.] Oh, are you at your love-tricks already? If you pinch me thus, I shall bite your lip.

Trick. I did not pinch you: But you are apt, I see, to take any occasion of gathering up more close to me.—Next, you shall not so much as look on Mrs Brainsick.

Wood. Have you done? these covenants are so tedious!

Trick. Nay, but swear then.

Wood. I do promise, I do swear, I do any thing. [Mrs BRAIN. runs a pin into him.] Oh, the devil! what do you mean to run pins into me? this is perfect caterwauling.

Trick. You fancy all this; I would not hurt you for the world. Come, you shall see how well I love you. [Kisses him: Mrs BRAIN. pricks her.] Oh! I think you have needles growing in your bed. [Both rise up.

Wood. I will see what is the matter in it.

Saint. [Within.] Mr Woodall, where are you, verily?

Wood. Pox verily her! it is my landlady: Here, hide yourself behind the curtains, while I run to the door, to stop her entry.

Trick. Necessity has no law; I must be patient. [She gets into the Bed, and draws the clothes over her.

Enter SAINTLY.

Saint. In sadness, gentleman, I can hold no longer: I will not keep your wicked counsel, how you were locked up in the chest; for it lies heavy upon my conscience, and out it must, and shall.

Wood. You may tell, but who will believe you? where's your witness?

Saint. Verily, heaven is my witness.

Wood. That's your witness too, that you would have allured me to lewdness, have seduced a hopeful young man, as I am; you would have enticed youth: Mark that, beldam.

Saint. I care not; my single evidence is enough to Mr Limberham; he will believe me, that thou burnest in unlawful lust to his beloved: So thou shalt be an outcast from my family.

Wood. Then will I go to the elders of thy church, and lay thee open before them, that thou didst feloniously unlock that chest, with wicked intentions of purloining: So thou shalt be excommunicated from the congregation, thou Jezebel, and delivered over to Satan.

Saint. Verily, our teacher will not excommunicate me, for taking the spoils of the ungodly, to clothe him; for it is a judged case amongst us, that a married woman may steal from her husband, to relieve a brother. But yet them mayest atone this difference betwixt us; verily, thou mayest.

Wood. Now thou art tempting me again. Well, if I had not the gift of continency, what might become of me?

Saint. The means have been offered thee, and thou hast kicked with the heel. I will go immediately to the tabernacle of Mr Limberham, and discover thee, O thou serpent, in thy crooked paths. [Going.

Wood. Hold, good landlady, not so fast; let me have time to consider on't; I may mollify, for flesh is frail. An hour or two hence we will confer together upon the premises.

Saint. Oh, on the sudden, I feel myself exceeding sick! Oh! oh!

Wood. Get you quickly to your closet, and fall to your mirabilis; this is no place for sick people. Begone, begone!

Saint. Verily, I can go no farther.

Wood. But you shall, verily. I will thrust you down, out of pure pity.

Saint. Oh, my eyes grow dim! my heart quops, and my back acheth! here I will lay me down, and rest me. [Throws herself suddenly down upon the Bed; TRICKSY shrieks, and rises; Mrs BRAIN. rises from under the Bed in a fright.

Wood. So! here's a fine business! my whole seraglio up in arms!

Saint. So, so; if Providence had not sent me hither, what folly had been this day committed!

Trick. Oh the old woman in the oven! we both overheard your pious documents: Did we not, Mrs Brainsick?

Mrs Brain. Yes, we did overhear her; and we will both testify against her.

Wood. I have nothing to say for her. Nay, I told her her own; you can both bear me witness. If a sober man cannot be quiet in his own chamber for her—

Trick. For, you know, sir, when Mrs Brainsick and I over-heard her coming, having been before acquainted with her wicked purpose, we both agreed to trap her in it.

Mrs Brain. And now she would 'scape herself, by accusing us! but let us both conclude to cast an infamy upon her house, and leave it.

Saint. Sweet Mr Woodall, intercede for me, or I shall be ruined.

Wood. Well, for once I'll be good-natured, and try my interest.— Pray, ladies, for my sake, let this business go no farther.

Trick. and Mrs Brain. You may command us.

Wood. For, look you, the offence was properly to my person; and charity has taught me to forgive my enemies. I hope, Mrs Saintly, this will be a warning to you, to amend your life: I speak like a Christian, as one that tenders the welfare of your soul.

Saint. Verily, I will consider.

Wood. Why, that is well said.—[Aside.] Gad, and so must I too; for my people is dissatisfied, and my government in danger: But this is no place for meditation.—Ladies, I wait on you. [Exeunt.

ACT IV.—SCENE I.

Enter ALDO and GEOFFERY.

Aldo. Despatch, Geoffery, despatch: The outlying punks will be upon us, ere I am in a readiness to give audience. Is the office well provided?

Geoff. The stores are very low, sir: Some dolly petticoats, and manteaus we have; and half a dozen pair of laced shoes, bought from court at second hand.

Aldo. Before George, there is not enough to rig out a mournival of whores: They'll think me grown a mere curmudgeon. Mercy on me, how will this glorious trade be carried on, with such a miserable stock!

Geoff. I hear a coach already stopping at the door.

Aldo. Well, somewhat in ornament for the body, somewhat in counsel for the mind; one thing must help out another, in this bad world: Whoring must go on.

Enter Mrs OVERDON, and her Daughter PRUE.

Mrs Over. Ask blessing, Prue: He is the best father you ever had.

Aldo. Bless thee, and make thee a substantial, thriving whore. Have your mother in your eye, Prue; it is good to follow good example. How old are you, Prue? Hold up your head, child.

Pru. Going o'my sixteen, father Aldo.

Aldo. And you have been initiated but these two years: Loss of time, loss of precious time! Mrs Overdon, how much have you made of Prue, since she has been man's meat?

Mrs Over. A very small matter, by my troth; considering the charges I have been at in her education: Poor Prue was born under an unlucky planet; I despair of a coach for her. Her first maiden-head brought me in but little, the weather-beaten old knight, that bought her of me, beat down the price so low. I held her at an hundred guineas, and he bid ten; and higher than thirty would not rise.

Aldo. A pox of his unlucky handsel! He can but fumble, and will not pay neither.

Pru. Hang him; I could never endure him, father: He is the filthiest old goat; and then he comes every day to our house, and eats out his thirty guineas; and at three months end, he threw me off.

Mrs Over. And since then, the poor child has dwindled, and dwindled away. Her next maiden-head brought me but ten; and from ten she fell to five; and at last to a single guinea: She has no luck to keeping; they all leave her, the more my sorrow.

Aldo. We must get her a husband then in the city; they bite rarely at a stale whore at this end of the town, new furbished up in a tawdry manteau.

Mrs Over. No: Pray let her try her fortune a little longer in the world first: By my troth, I should be loth to be at all this cost, in her French, and her singing, to have her thrown away upon a husband.

Aldo. Before George, there can come no good of your swearing, Mrs Overdon: Say your prayers, Prue, and go duly to church o'Sundays, you'll thrive the better all the week. Come, have a good heart, child; I will keep thee myself: Thou shalt do my little business; and I'll find thee an able young fellow to do thine.

Enter Mrs PAD.

Daughter Pad, you are welcome: What, you have performed the last Christian office to your keeper; I saw you follow him up the heavy hill to Tyburn. Have you had never a business since his death?

Mrs Pad. No indeed, father; never since execution-day. The night before, we lay together most lovingly in Newgate; and the next morning he lift up his eyes, and prepared his soul with a prayer, while one might tell twenty; and then mounted the cart as merrily, as if he had been going for a purse.

Aldo. You are a sorrowful widow, daughter Pad; but I'll take care of you.—Geoffery, see her rigged out immediately for a new voyage: Look in figure 9, in the upper drawer, and give her out the flowered justacorps, with the petticoat belonging to it.

Mrs Pad. Could you not help to prefer me, father?

Aldo. Let me see—let me see:—Before George, I have it, and it comes as pat too! Go me to the very judge that sate upon him; it is an amorous, impotent old magistrate, and keeps admirably. I saw him leer upon you from the bench: He will tell you what is sweeter than strawberries and cream, before you part.

Enter Mrs TERMAGANT.

Mrs Term. O father, I think I shall go mad.

Aldo. You are of the violentest temper, daughter Termagant! When had you a business last?

Mrs Term. The last I had was with young Caster, that son-of-a-whore gamester: he brought me to taverns, to draw in young cullies, while he bubbled them at play; and, when he had picked up a considerable sum, and should divide, the cheating dog would sink my share, and swear,—Damn him, he won nothing.

Aldo. Unconscionable villain, to cozen you in your own calling!

Mrs Term. When he loses upon the square, he comes home zoundsing and blooding; first beats me unmercifully, and then squeezes me to the last penny. He has used me so, that, Gad forgive me, I could almost forswear my trade. The rogue starves me too: He made me keep Lent last year till Whitsuntide, and out-faced me with oaths it was but Easter. And what mads me most, I carry a bastard of the rogue's in my belly; and now he turns me off, and will not own it.

Mrs Over. Lord, how it quops! you are half a year gone, madam.— [Laying her hand on her belly.

Mrs Term. I feel the young rascal kicking already, like his father.—Oh, there is an elbow thrusting out: I think, in my conscience, he is palming and topping in my belly; and practising for a livelihood, before he comes into the world.

Aldo. Geoffery, set her down in the register, that I may provide her a mid-wife, and a dry and wet nurse: When you are up again, as heaven send you a good hour, we will pay him off at law, i'faith. You have him under black and white, I hope?

Mrs Term. Yes, I have a note under his hand for two hundred pounds.

Aldo. A note under his hand! that is a chip in porridge; it is just nothing.—Look, Geoffery, to the figure 12, for old half-shirts for childbed linen.

Enter Mrs HACKNEY.

Hack. O, madam Termagant, are you here? Justice, father Aldo, justice!

Aldo. Why, what is the matter, daughter Hackney?

Hack. She has violated the law of nations; for yesterday she inveigled my own natural cully from me, a married lord, and made him false to my bed, father.

Term. Come, you are an illiterate whore. He is my lord now; and, though you call him fool, it is well known he is a critic, gentlewoman. You never read a play in all your life; and I gained him by my wit, and so I'll keep him.

Hack. My comfort is, I have had the best of him; he can take up no more, till his father dies: And so, much good may do you with my cully, and my clap into the bargain.

Aldo. Then there is a father for your child, my lord's son and heir by Mr Caster. But henceforward, to preserve peace betwixt you, I ordain, that you shall ply no more in my daughter Hackney's quarters: You shall have the city, from White-Chapel to Temple-Bar, and she shall have to Covent-Garden downwards: At the play-houses, she shall ply the boxes, because she has the better face; and you shall have the pit, because you can prattle best out of a vizor mask.

Mrs Pad. Then all friends, and confederates. Now let us have father Aldo's delight, and so adjourn the house.

Aldo. Well said, daughter.—Lift up your voices, and sing like nightingales, you tory rory jades. Courage, I say; as long as the merry pence hold out, you shall none of you die in Shoreditch.

Enter WOODALL.

A hey, boys, a hey! here he comes, that will swinge you all! down, you little jades, and worship him; it is the genius of whoring.

Wood. And down went chairs and table, and out went every candle. Ho, brave old patriarch in the middle of the church militant! whores of all sorts; forkers and ruin-tailed: Now come I gingling in with my bells, and fly at the whole covey.

Aldo. A hey, a hey, boys! the town's thy own; burn, ravish, and destroy!

Wood. We will have a night of it, like Alexander, when he burnt Persepolis: tuez, tuez, tuez! point de quartier. [He runs in amongst them, and they scuttle about the room.

Enter SAINTLY, PLEASANCE, JUDITH, with Broom-sticks.

Saint. What, in the midst of Sodom! O thou lewd young man! my indignation boils over against these harlots; and thus I sweep them from out my family.

Pleas. Down with the Suburbians, down with them.

Aldo. O spare my daughters, Mrs Saintly! Sweet Mrs Pleasance, spare my flesh and blood!

Wood. Keep the door open, and help to secure the retreat, father: There is no pity to be expected. [The Whores run out, followed by SAINTLY, PLEASANCE, and JUDITH.

Aldo. Welladay, welladay! one of my daughters is big with bastard, and she laid at her gascoins most unmercifully! every stripe she had, I felt it: The first fruit of whoredom is irrecoverably lost!

Wood. Make haste, and comfort her.

Aldo. I will, I will; and yet I have a vexatious business, which calls me first another way. The rogue, my son, is certainly come over; he has been seen in town four days ago.

Wood. It is impossible: I'll not believe it.

Aldo. A friend of mine met his old man, Giles, this very morning, in quest of me; and Giles assured him, his master is lodged in this very street.

Wood. In this very street! how knows he that?

Aldo. He dogged him to the corner of it; and then my son turned back, and threatened him. But I'll find out Giles, and then I'll make such an example of my reprobate! [Exit.

Wood. If Giles be discovered, I am undone!—Why, Gervase, where are you, sirrah! Hey, hey!

Enter GERVASE.

Run quickly to that betraying rascal Giles, a rogue, who would take Judas's bargain out of his hands, and undersell him. Command him strictly to mew himself up in his lodgings, till farther orders: and in case he be refractory, let him know, I have not forgot to kick and cudgel. That memento would do well for you too, sirrah.

Gerv. Thank your worship; you have always been liberal of your hands to me.

Wood. And you have richly deserved it.

Gerv. I will not say, who has better deserved it of my old master.

Wood. Away, old Epictetus, about your business, and leave your musty morals, or I shall—

Gerv. Nay, I won't forfeit my own wisdom so far as to suffer for it. Rest you merry: I'll do my best, and heaven mend all. [Exit.

Enter SAINTLY.

Saint. Verily, I have waited till you were alone, and am come to rebuke you, out of the zeal of my spirit.

Wood. It is the spirit of persecution. Dioclesian, and Julian the apostate, were but types of thee. Get thee hence, thou old Geneva testament: thou art a part of the ceremonial law, and hast been abolished these twenty years.

Saint. All this is nothing, sir. I am privy to your plots: I'll discover them to Mr Limberham, and make the house too hot for you.

Wood. What, you can talk in the language of the world, I see!

Saint. I can, I can, sir; and in the language of the flesh and devil too, if you provoke me to despair: You must, and shall be mine, this night.

Wood. The very ghost of queen Dido in the ballad.[10]

Saint. Delay no longer, or—

Wood. Or! you will not swear, I hope?

Saint. Uds-niggers but I will; and that so loud, that Mr Limberham shall hear me.

Wood. Uds-niggers, I confess, is a very dreadful oath. You could lie naturally before, as you are a fanatic; if you can swear such rappers too, there is hope of you; you may be a woman of the world in time. Well, you shall be satisfied, to the utmost farthing, to-night, and in your own chamber.

Saint. Or, expect to-morrow—

Wood. All shall be atoned ere then. Go, provide the bottle of clary, the Westphalia ham, and other fortifications of nature; we shall see what may be done. What! an old woman must not be cast away. [Chucks her.

Saint. Then, verily, I am appeased.

Wood. Nay, no relapsing into verily; that is in our bargain. Look how she weeps for joy! It is a good old soul, I warrant her.

Saint. You will not fail?

Wood. Dost thou think I have no compassion for thy gray hairs? Away, away; our love may be discovered: We must avoid scandal; it is thy own maxim. [Exit SAINTLY. They are all now at ombre; and Brainsick's maid has promised to send her mistress up.

Enter PLEASANCE.

That fury here again!

Pleas. [Aside.] I'll conquer my proud spirit, I am resolved on it, and speak kindly to him.—What, alone, sir! If my company be not troublesome; or a tender young creature, as I am, may safely trust herself with a man of such prowess, in love affairs—It wonnot be.

Wood. So! there is one broadside already: I must sheer off. [Aside.

Pleas. What, you have been pricking up and down here upon a cold scent[11]; but, at last, you have hit it off, it seems! Now for a fair view at the wife or mistress: up the wind, and away with it: Hey, Jowler!—I think I am bewitched, I cannot hold.

Wood. Your servant, your servant, madam: I am in a little haste at present. [Going.

Pleas. Pray resolve me first, for which of them you lie in ambush; for, methinks, you have the mien of a spider in her den. Come, I know the web is spread, and whoever comes, Sir Cranion stands ready to dart out, hale her in, and shed his venom.

Wood. [Aside.] But such a terrible wasp, as she, will spoil the snare, if I durst tell her so.

Pleas. It is unconscionably done of me, to debar you the freedom and civilities of the house. Alas, poor gentleman! to take a lodging at so dear a rate, and not to have the benefit of his bargain!—Mischief on me, what needed I have said that? [Aside.

Wood. The dialogue will go no farther. Farewell, gentle, quiet lady.

Pleas. Pray stay a little; I'll not leave you thus.

Wood. I know it; and therefore mean to leave you first.

Pleas. O, I find it now! you are going to set up your bills, like a love-mountebank, for the speedy cure of distressed widows, old ladies, and languishing maids in the green-sickness: a sovereign remedy.

Wood. That last, for maids, would be thrown away: Few of your age are qualified for the medicine. What the devil would you be at, madam?

Pleas. I am in the humour of giving you good counsel. The wife can afford you but the leavings of a fop; and to a witty man, as you think yourself, that is nauseous: The mistress has fed upon a fool so long, she is carrion too, and common into the bargain. Would you beat a ground for game in the afternoon, when my lord mayor's pack had been before you in the morning?

Wood. I had rather sit five hours at one of his greasy feasts, then hear you talk.

Pleas. Your two mistresses keep both shop and warehouse; and what they cannot put off in gross, to the keeper and the husband, they sell by retail to the next chance-customer. Come, are you edified?

Wood. I am considering how to thank you for your homily; and, to make a sober application of it, you may have some laudable design yourself in this advice.

Pleas. Meaning, some secret inclination to that amiable person of yours?

Wood. I confess, I am vain enough to hope it; for why should you remove the two dishes, but to make me fall more hungrily on the third?

Pleas. Perhaps, indeed, in the way of honour—

Wood. Paw, paw! that word honour has almost turned my stomach: it carries a villainous interpretation of matrimony along with it. But, in a civil way, I could be content to deal with you, as the church does with the heads of your fanatics, offer you a lusty benefice to stop your mouth; if fifty guineas, and a courtesy more worth, will win you.

Pleas. Out upon thee! fifty guineas! Dost thou think I'll sell myself? And at a playhouse price too? Whenever I go, I go all together: No cutting from the whole piece; he who has me shall have the fag-end with the rest, I warrant him. Be satisfied, thy sheers shall never enter into my cloth. But, look to thyself, thou impudent belswagger: I will he revenged; I will. [Exit.

Wood. The maid will give warning, that is my comfort; for she is bribed on my side. I have another kind of love to this girl, than to either of the other two; but a fanatic's daughter, and the noose of matrimony, are such intolerable terms! O, here she comes, who will sell me better cheap.

SCENE opens to BRAINSICK'S Apartment.

Enter Mrs BRAINSICK.

Mrs Brain. How now, sir? what impudence is this of yours, to approach my lodgings?

Wood. You lately honoured mine; and it is the part of a well-bred man, to return your visit.

Mrs Brain. If I could have imagined how base a fellow you had been, you should not then have been troubled with my company.

Wood. How could I guess, that you intended me the favour, without first acquainting me?

Mrs Brain. Could I do it, ungrateful as you are, with more obligation to you, or more hazard to myself, than by putting my note into your glove?

Wood. Was it yours, then? I believed it came from Mrs Tricksy.

Mrs Brain. You wished it so; which made you so easily believe it. I heard the pleasant dialogue betwixt you.

Wood. I am glad you did; for you could not but observe, with how much care I avoided all occasions of railing at you; to which she urged me, like a malicious woman, as she was.

Mrs Brain. By the same token, you vowed and swore never to look on Mrs Brainsick!

Wood. But I had my mental reservations in a readiness. I had vowed fidelity to you before; and there went my second oath, i'faith: it vanished in a twinkling, and never gnawed my conscience in the least.

Mrs Brain. Well, I shall never heartily forgive you.

Jud. [Within.] Mr Brainsick, Mr Brainsick, what do you mean, to make my lady lose her game thus? Pray, come back, and take up her cards again.

Mrs Brain. My husband, as I live! Well, for all my quarrel to you, step immediately into that little dark closet: it is for my private occasions; there is no lock, but he will not stay.

Wood. Thus am I ever tantalized! [Goes in.

Enter BRAINSICK.

Brain. What, am I become your drudge? your slave? the property of all your pleasures? Shall I, the lord and master of your life, become subservient; and the noble name of husband be dishonoured? No, though all the cards were kings and queens, and Indies to be gained by every deal—

Mrs Brain. My dear, I am coming to do my duty. I did but go up a little, (I whispered you for what) and am returning immediately.

Brain. Your sex is but one universal ordure, a nuisance, and incumbrance of that majestic creature, man: yet I myself am mortal too. Nature's necessities have called me up; produce your utensil of urine.

Mrs Brain. It is not in the way, child: You may go down into the garden.

Brain. The voyage is too far: though the way were paved with pearls and diamonds, every step of mine is precious, as the march of monarchs.

Mrs Brain. Then my steps, which are not so precious, shall be employed for you: I will call up Judith.

Brain. I will not dance attendance. At the present, your closet shall be honoured.

Mrs Brain. O lord, dear, it is not worthy to receive such a man as you are.

Brain. Nature presses; I am in haste.

Mrs Brain. He must be discovered, and I unavoidably undone! [Aside. [BRAINSICK goes to the door, and WOODALL meets him: She shrieks out.

Brain. Monsieur Woodall!

Wood. Sir, begone, and make no noise, or you will spoil all.

Brain. Spoil all, quotha! what does he mean, in the name of wonder?

Wood. [Taking him aside.] Hark you, Mr Brainsick, is the devil in you, that you and your wife come hither, to disturb my intrigue, which you yourself engaged me in, with Mrs Tricksy, to revenge you on Limberham? Why, I had made an appointment with her here; but, hearing somebody come up, I retired into the closet, till I was satisfied it was not the keeper.

Brain. But why this intrigue in my wife's chamber?

Wood. Why, you turn my brains, with talking to me of your wife's chamber! do you lie in common? the wife and husband, the keeper and the mistress?

Mrs Brain. I am afraid they are quarrelling; pray heaven I get off.

Brain. Once again, I am the sultan of this place: Mr Limberham is the mogul of the next mansion.

Wood. Though I am a stranger in the house, it is impossible I should be so much mistaken: I say, this is Limberham's lodging.

Brain. You would not venture a wager of ten pounds, that you are not mistaken?

Wood. It is done: I will lay you.

Brain. Who shall be judge?

Wood. Who better than your wife? She cannot be partial, because she knows not on which side you have laid.

Brain. Content.—Come hither, lady mine: Whose lodgings are these? who is lord, and grand seignior of them?

Mrs Brain. [Aside.] Oh, goes it there?—Why should you ask me such a question, when every body in the house can tell they are 'nown dear's?

Brain. Now are you satisfied? Children and fools, you know the proverb—

Wood. Pox on me! nothing but such a positive coxcomb as I am, would have laid his money upon such odds; as if you did not know your own lodgings better than I, at half a day's warning! And that which vexes me more than the loss of my money, is the loss of my adventure! [Exit.

Brain. It shall be spent: We will have a treat with it. This is a fool of the first magnitude.

Mrs Brain. Let my own dear alone, to find a fool out.

Enter LIMBERHAM.

Limb. Bully Brainsick, Pug has sent me to you on an embassy, to bring you down to cards again; she is in her mulligrubs already; she will never forgive you the last vol you won. It is but losing a little to her, out of complaisance, as they say, to a fair lady; and whatever she wins, I will make up to you again in private.

Brain. I would not be that slave you are, to enjoy the treasures of the east. The possession of Peru, and of Potosi, should not buy me to the bargain.

Limb. Will you leave your perboles, and come then?

Brain. No; for I have won a wager, to be spent luxuriously at Long's; with Pleasance of the party, and Termagant Tricksy; and I will pass, in person, to the preparation: Come, matrimony. [Exeunt BRAINSICK, Mrs BRAIN.

Enter SAINTLY, and PLEASANCE.

Pleas. To him: I'll second you: now for mischief!

Saint. Arise, Mr Limberham, arise; for conspiracies are hatched against you, and a new Faux is preparing to blow up your happiness.

Limb. What is the matter, landlady? Pr'ythee, speak good honest English, and leave thy canting.

Saint. Verily, thy beloved is led astray, by the young man Woodall, that vessel of uncleanness: I beheld them communing together; she feigned herself sick, and retired to her tent in the garden-house; and I watched her out-going, and behold he followed her.

Pleas. Do you stand unmoved, and hear all this?

Limb. Before George, I am thunder-struck!

Saint. Take to thee thy resolution, and avenge thyself.

Limb. But give me leave to consider first: A man must do nothing rashly.

Pleas. I could tear out the villain's eyes, for dishonouring you, while you stand considering, as you call it. Are you a man, and suffer this?

Limb. Yes, I am a man; but a man's but a man, you know: I am recollecting myself, how these things can be.

Saint. How they can be! I have heard them; I have seen them.

Limb. Heard them, and seen them! It may be so; but yet I cannot enter into this same business: I am amazed, I must confess; but the best is, I do not believe one word of it.

Saint. Make haste, and thine own eyes shall testify against her.

Limb. Nay, if my own eyes testify, it may be so:—but it is impossible, however; for I am making a settlement upon her, this very day.

Pleas. Look, and satisfy yourself, ere you make that settlement on so false a creature.

Limb. But yet, if I should look, and not find her false, then I must cast in another hundred, to make her satisfaction.

Pleas. Was there ever such a meek, hen-hearted creature!

Saint. Verily, thou has not the spirit of a cock-chicken.

Limb. Before George, but I have the spirit of a lion, and I will tear her limb from limb—if I could believe it.

Pleas. Love, jealousy, and disdain, how they torture me at once! and this insensible creature—were I but in his place—[To him.] Think, that this very instant she is yours no more: Now, now she is giving up herself, with so much violence of love, that if thunder roared, she could not hear it.

Limb. I have been whetting all this while: They shall be so taken in the manner, that Mars and Venus shall be nothing to them.

Pleas. Make haste; go on then.

Limb. Yes, I will go on;—and yet my mind misgives me plaguily.

Saint. Again backsliding!

Pleas. Have you no sense of honour in you?

Limb. Well, honour is honour, and I must go: But I shall never get me such another Pug again! O, my heart! my poor tender heart! it is just breaking with Pug's unkindness! [They drag him out.

SCENE II.—WOODALL and TRICKSY discovered in the Garden-house.

Enter GERVASE to them.

Gerv. Make haste, and save yourself, sir; the enemy's at hand: I have discovered him from the corner, where you set me sentry.

Wood. Who is it?

Gerv. Who should it be, but Limberham? armed with a two-hand fox. O Lord, O Lord!

Trick. Enter quickly into the still-house, both of you, and leave me to him: There is a spring-lock within, to open it when we are gone.

Wood. Well, I have won the party and revenge, however: A minute longer, and I had won the tout. [They go in: She locks the Door.

Enter LIMBERHAM, with a great Sword.

Limb. Disloyal Pug!

Trick. What humour is this? you are drunk, it seems: Go sleep.

Limb. Thou hast robbed me of my repose for ever: I am like Macbeth, after the death of good king Duncan; methinks a voice says to me,—Sleep no more; Tricksy has murdered sleep.

Trick. Now I find it: You are willing to save your settlement, and are sent by some of your wise counsellors, to pick a quarrel with me.

Limb. I have been your cully above these seven years; but, at last, my eyes are opened to your witchcraft; and indulgent heaven has taken care of my preservation. In short, madam, I have found you out; and, to cut off preambles, produce your adulterer.

Trick. If I have any, you know him best: You are the only ruin of my reputation. But if I have dishonoured my family, for the love of you, methinks you should be the last man to upbraid me with it.

Limb. I am sure you are of the family of your abominable great grandam Eve; but produce the man, or, by my father's soul—

Trick. Still I am in the dark.

Limb. Yes, you have been in the dark; I know it: But I shall bring you to light immediately.

Trick. You are not jealous?

Limb. No; I am too certain to be jealous: But you have a man here, that shall be nameless; let me see him.

Trick. Oh, if that be your business, you had best search: And when you have wearied yourself, and spent your idle humour, you may find me above, in my chamber, and come to ask my pardon. [Going.

Limb. You may go, madam; but I shall beseech your ladyship to leave the key of the still-house door behind you: I have a mind to some of the sweet-meats you have locked up there; you understand me. Now, for the old dog-trick! you have lost the key, I know already, but I am prepared for that; you shall know you have no fool to deal with.

Trick. No; here is the key: Take it, and satisfy your foolish curiosity.

Limb. [Aside.] This confidence amazes me! If those two gipsies have abused me, and I should not find him there now, this would make an immortal quarrel.

Trick. [Aside.] I have put him to a stand.

Limb. Hang it, it is no matter; I will be satisfied: If it comes to a rupture, I know the way to buy my peace. Pug, produce the key.

Trick. [Takes him about the neck.] My dear, I have it for you: come, and kiss me. Why would you be so unkind to suspect my faith now! when I have forsaken all the world for you.—[Kiss again.] But I am not in the mood of quarrelling to-night; I take this jealousy the best way, as the effect of your passion. Come up, and we will go to bed together, and be friends. [Kiss again.

Limb. [Aside.] Pug is in a pure humour to-night, and it would vex a man to lose it; but yet I must be satisfied:—and therefore, upon mature consideration, give me the key.

Trick. You are resolved, then?

Limb. Yes, I am resolved; for I have sworn to myself by Styx; and that is an irrevocable oath.

Trick. Now, see your folly: There's the key. [Gives it him.

Limb. Why, that is a loving Pug; I will prove thee innocent immediately: And that will put an end to all controversies betwixt us.

Trick. Yes, it shall put an end to all our quarrels: Farewell for the last time, sir. Look well upon my face, that you may remember it; for, from this time forward, I have sworn it irrevocably too, that you shall never see it more.

Limb. Nay, but hold a little, Pug. What's the meaning of this new commotion?

Trick. No more; but satisfy your foolish fancy, for you are master: and, besides, I am willing to be justified.

Limb. Then you shall be justified. [Puts the Key in the Door.

Trick. I know I shall: Farewell.

Limb. But, are you sure you shall?

Trick. No, no, he is there: You'll find him up in the chimney, or behind the door; or, it may be, crowded into some little galley-pot.

Limb. But you will not leave me, if I should look?

Trick. You are not worthy my answer: I am gone. [Going out.

Limb. Hold, hold, divine Pug, and let me recollect a little.—This is no time for meditation neither: while I deliberate, she may be gone. She must be innocent, or she could never be so confident and careless.—Sweet Pug, forgive me. [Kneels.

Trick. I am provoked too far.

Limb. It is the property of a goddess to forgive. Accept of this oblation; with this humble kiss, I here present it to thy fair hand: I conclude thee innocent without looking, and depend wholly upon thy mercy. [Offers the Key.

Trick. No, keep it, keep it: the lodgings are your own.

Limb. If I should keep it, I were unworthy of forgiveness: I will no longer hold this fatal instrument of our separation.

Trick. [Taking it.] Rise, sir: I will endeavour to overcome my nature, and forgive you; for I am so scrupulously nice in love, that it grates my very soul to be suspected: Yet, take my counsel, and satisfy yourself.

Limb. I would not be satisfied, to be possessor of Potosi, as my brother Brainsick says. Come to bed, dear Pug.—Now would not I change my condition, to be an eastern monarch! [Exeunt.

Enter WOODALL and GERVASE.

Gerv. O lord, sir, are we alive!

Wood. Alive! why, we were never in any danger: Well, she is a rare manager of a fool!

Gerv. Are you disposed yet to receive good counsel? Has affliction wrought upon you?

Wood. Yes, I must ask thy advice in a most important business. I have promised a charity to Mrs Saintly, and she expects it with a beating heart a-bed: Now, I have at present no running cash to throw away; my ready money is all paid to Mrs Tricksy, and the bill is drawn upon me for to-night.

Gerv. Take advice of your pillow.

Wood. No, sirrah; since you have not the grace to offer yours, I will for once make use of my authority and command you to perform the foresaid drudgery in my place.

Gerv. Zookers, I cannot answer it to my conscience.

Wood. Nay, an your conscience can suffer you to swear, it shall suffer you to lie too: I mean in this sense. Come, no denial, you must do it; she is rich, and there is a provision for your life.

Gerv. I beseech you, sir, have pity on my soul.

Wood. Have you pity of your body: There is all the wages you must expect.

Gerv. Well, sir, you have persuaded me: I will arm my conscience with a resolution of making her an honourable amends by marriage; for to-morrow morning a parson shall authorise my labours, and turn fornication into duty. And, moreover, I will enjoin myself, by way of penance, not to touch her for seven nights after.

Wood. Thou wert predestinated for a husband, I see, by that natural instinct: As we walk, I will instruct thee how to behave thyself, with secrecy and silence.

Gerv. I have a key of the garden, to let us out the back-way into the street, and so privately to our lodging.

Wood. 'Tis well: I will plot the rest of my affairs a-bed; for it is resolved that Limberham shall not wear horns alone: and I am impatient till I add to my trophy the spoils of Brainsick. [Exeunt.

ACT V.—SCENE I.

Enter WOODALL and JUDITH.

Jud. Well, you are a lucky man! Mrs Brainsick is fool enough to believe you wholly innocent; and that the adventure of the garden-house, last night, was only a vision of Mrs Saintly's.

Wood. I knew, if I could once speak with her, all would be set right immediately; for, had I been there, look you—

Jud. As you were, most certainly.

Wood. Limberham must have found me out; that fe-fa-fum of a keeper would have smelt the blood of a cuckold-maker: They say, he was peeping and butting about in every cranny.

Jud. But one. You must excuse my unbelief, though Mrs Brainsick is better satisfied. She and her husband, you know, went out this morning to the New Exchange: There she has given him the slip; and pretending to call at her tailor's to try her stays for a new gown—

Wood. I understand thee;—she fetched me a short turn, like a hare before her muse, and will immediately run hither to covert?

Jud. Yes; but because your chamber will be least suspicious, she appoints to meet you there; that, if her husband should come back, he may think her still abroad, and you may have time—

Wood. To take in the horn-work. It happens as I wish; for Mrs Tricksy, and her keeper, are gone out with father Aldo, to complete her settlement; my landlady is safe at her morning exercise with my man Gervase, and her daughter not stirring: the house is our own, and iniquity may walk bare-faced.

Jud. And, to make all sure, I am ordered to be from home. When I come back again, I shall knock at your door, with, Speak, brother, speak; [Singing. Is the deed done?

Wood. Long ago, long ago;—and then we come panting out together. Oh, I am ravished with the imagination on't!

Jud. Well, I must retire; good-morrow to you, sir. [Exit.

Wood. Now do I humbly conceive, that this mistress in matrimony will give me more pleasure than the former; for your coupled spaniels, when they are once let loose, are afterwards the highest rangers.

Enter Mrs BRAINSICK, running.

Mrs Brain. Oh dear Mr Woodall, what shall I do?

Wood. Recover breath, and I'll instruct you in the next chamber.

Mrs Brain. But my husband follows me at heels.

Wood. Has he seen you?

Mrs Brain. I hope not: I thought I had left him sure enough at the Exchange; but, looking behind me, as I entered into the house, I saw him walking a round rate this way.

Wood. Since he has not seen you, there is no danger; you need but step into my chamber, and there we will lock ourselves up, and transform him in a twinkling.

Mrs Brain. I had rather have got into my own; but Judith is gone out with the key, I doubt.

Wood. Yes, by your appointment. But so much the better; for when the cuckold finds no company, he will certainly go a sauntering again.

Mrs Brain. Make haste, then.

Wood. Immediately.—[Goes to open the Door hastily, and breaks his Key.] What is the matter here? the key turns round, and will not open! As I live, we are undone! with too much haste it is broken!

Mrs Brain. Then I am lost; for I cannot enter into my own.

Wood. This next room is Limberham's. See! the door's open; and he and his mistress are both abroad.

Mrs Brain. There is no remedy, I must venture in; for his knowing I am come back so soon, must be cause of jealousy enough, if the fool should find me.

Wood. [Looking in.] See there! Mrs Tricksy has left her Indian gown upon the bed; clap it on, and turn your back: he will easily mistake you for her, if he should look in upon you.

Mrs Brain. I will put on my vizor-mask, however, for more security. [Noise.] Hark! I hear him. [Goes in.

Enter BRAINSICK.

Brain. What, in a musty musing, monsieur Woodall! Let me enter into the affair.

Wood. You may guess it, by the post I have taken up.

Brain. O, at the door of the damsel Tricksy! your business is known by your abode; as the posture of a porter before a gate, denotes to what family he belongs. [Looks in.] It is an assignation, I see; for yonder she stands, with her back toward me, drest up for the duel, with all the ornaments of the east. Now for the judges of the field, to divide the sun and wind betwixt the combatants, and a tearing trumpeter to sound the charge.

Wood. It is a private quarrel, to be decided without seconds; and therefore you would do me a favour to withdraw.

Brain. Your Limberham is nearer than you imagine: I left him almost entering at the door.

Wood. Plague of all impertinent cuckolds! they are ever troublesome to us honest lovers: so intruding!

Brain. They are indeed, where their company is not desired.

Wood. Sure he has some tutelar devil to guard his brows! just when she had bobbed him, and made an errand home, to come to me!

Brain. It is unconscionably done of him. But you shall not adjourn your love for this: the Brainsick has an ascendant over him; I am your guarantee; he is doomed a cuckold, in disdain of destiny.

Wood. What mean you?

Brain. To stand before the door with my brandished blade, and defend the entrance: He dies upon the point, if he approaches.

Wood. If I durst trust it, it is heroic.

Brain. It is the office of a friend: I will do it.

Wood. [Aside.] Should he know hereafter his wife were here, he would think I had enjoyed her, though I had not; it is best venturing for something. He takes pains enough, on conscience, for his cuckoldom; and, by my troth, has earned it fairly.—But, may a man venture upon your promise?

Brain. Bars of brass, and doors of adamant, could not more secure you.

Wood. I know it; but still gentle means are best: You may come to force at last. Perhaps you may wheedle him away: it is but drawing a trope or two upon him.

Brain. He shall have it, with all the artillery of eloquence.

Wood. Ay, ay; your figure breaks no bones. With your good leave.— [Goes in.

Brain. Thou hast it, boy. Turn to him, madam; to her Woodall: and St George for merry England. Tan ta ra ra ra, ra ra! Dub, a dub, dub; Tan ta ra ra ra.

Enter LIMBERHAM.

Limb. How now, bully Brainsick! What, upon the Tan ta ra, by yourself?

Brain. Clangor, taratantara, murmur.

Limb. Commend me to honest lingua Franca. Why, this is enough to stun a Christian, with your Hebrew, and your Greek, and such like Latin.

Brain. Out, ignorance!

Limb. Then ignorance, by your leave; for I must enter. [Attempts to pass.

Brain. Why in such haste? the fortune of Greece depends not on it.

Limb. But Pug's fortune does: that is dearer to me than Greece, and sweeter than ambergrease.

Brain. You will not find her here. Come, you are jealous; you are haunted with a raging fiend, that robs you of your sweet repose.

Limb. Nay, an you are in your perbole's again! Look you, it is Pug is jealous of her jewels: she has left the key of her cabinet behind, and has desired me to bring it back to her.

Brain. Poor fool! he little thinks she is here before him!—Well, this pretence will never pass on me; for I dive deeper into your affairs; you are jealous. But, rather than my soul should be concerned for a sex so insignificant—Ha! the gods! If I thought my proper wife were now within, and prostituting all her treasures to the lawless love of an adulterer, I would stand as intrepid, as firm, and as unmoved, as the statue of a Roman gladiator.

Limb. [In the same tone.] Of a Roman gladiator!—Now are you as mad as a March hare; but I am in haste, to return to Pug: yet, by your favour, I will first secure the cabinet.

Brain. No, you must not.

Limb. Must not? What, may not a man come by you, to look upon his own goods and chattels, in his own chamber?

Brain. No; with this sabre I defy the destinies, and dam up the passage with my person; like a rugged rock, opposed against the roaring of the boisterous billows. Your jealousy shall have no course through me, though potentates and princes—

Limb. Pr'ythee, what have we to do with potentates and princes? Will you leave your troping, and let me pass?

Brain. You have your utmost answer.

Limb. If this maggot bite a little deeper, we shall have you a citizen of Bethlem yet, ere dog-days. Well, I say little; but I will tell Pug on it. [Exit.

Brain. She knows it already, by your favour— [Knocking. Sound a retreat, you lusty lovers, or the enemy will charge you in the flank, with a fresh reserve: March off, march off upon the spur, ere he can reach you.

Enter WOODALL.

Wood. How now, baron Tell-clock[12], is the passage clear?

Brain. Clear as a level, without hills or woods, and void of ambuscade.

Wood. But Limberham will return immediately, when he finds not his mistress where he thought he left her.

Brain. Friendship, which has done much, will yet do more. [Shows a key.] With this passe par tout, I will instantly conduct her to my own chamber, that she may out-face the keeper, she has been there; and, when my wife returns, who is my slave, I will lay my conjugal commands upon her, to affirm, they have been all this time together.

Wood. I shall never make you amends for this kindness, my dear Padron. But would it not be better, if you would take the pains to run after Limberham, and stop him in his way ere he reach the place where he thinks he left his mistress; then hold him in discourse as long as possibly you can, till you guess your wife may be returned, that so they may appear together?

Brain. I warrant you: laissez faire a Marc Antoine. [Exit.

Wood. Now, madam, you may venture out in safety.

Mrs Brain. [Entering.] Pray heaven I may. [Noise.

Wood. Hark! I hear Judith's voice: it happens well that she's returned: slip into your chamber immediately, and send back the gown.

Mrs Brain. I will:—but are not you a wicked man, to put me into all this danger? [Exit.

Wood. Let what can happen, my comfort is, at least, I have enjoyed. But this is no place for consideration. Be jogging, good Mr Woodall, out of this family, while you are well; and go plant in some other country, where your virtues are not so famous. [Going.

Enter TRICKSY, with a box of writings.

Trick. What, wandering up and down, as if you wanted an owner? Do you know that I am lady of the manor; and that all wefts and strays belong to me?

Wood. I have waited for you above an hour; but friar Bacon's head has been lately speaking to me,—that time is past. In a word, your keeper has been here, and will return immediately; we must defer our happiness till some more favourable time.

Trick. I fear him not; he has this morning armed me against himself, by this settlement; the next time he rebels, he gives me a fair occasion of leaving him for ever.

Wood. But is this conscience in you? not to let him have his bargain, when he has paid so dear for it?

Trick. You do not know him: he must perpetually be used ill, or he insults. Besides, I have gained an absolute dominion over him: he must not see, when I bid him wink. If you argue after this, either you love me not, or dare not.

Wood. Go in, madam: I was never dared before. I'll but scout a little, and follow you immediately. [TRICK. goes in.] I find a mistress is only kept for other men: and the keeper is but her man in a green livery, bound to serve a warrant for the doe, whenever she pleases, or is in season.

Enter JUDITH, with the Night-gown.

Jud. Still you're a lucky man! Mr Brainsick has been exceeding honourable: he ran, as if a legion of bailiffs had been at his heels, and overtook Limberham in the street. Here, take the gown; lay it where you found it, and the danger's over.

Wood. Speak softly; Mrs Tricksy is returned. [Looks in.] Oh, she's gone into her closet, to lay up her writings: I can throw it on the bed, ere she perceive it has been wanting. [Throws it in.

Jud. Every woman would not have done this for you, which I have done.

Wood. I am sensible of it, little Judith; there's a time to come shall pay for all. I hear her returning: not a word; away. [Exit JUDITH.

Re-enter TRICKSY.

Trick. What, is a second summons needful? my favours have not been so cheap, that they should stick upon my hands. It seems, you slight your bill of fare, because you know it; or fear to be invited to your loss.

Wood. I was willing to secure my happiness from interruption. A true soldier never falls upon the plunder, while the enemy is in the field.

Trick. He has been so often baffled, that he grows contemptible. Were he here, should he see you enter into my closet; yet—

Wood. You are like to be put upon the trial, for I hear his voice.

Trick. 'Tis so: go in, and mark the event now: be but as unconcerned, as you are safe, and trust him to my management.

Wood. I must venture it; because to be seen here would have the same effect, as to be taken within. Yet I doubt you are too confident. [He goes in.

Enter LIMBERHAM and BRAINSICK.

Limb. How now, Pug? returned so soon!

Trick. When I saw you came not for me, I was loth to be long without you.

Limb. But which way came you, that I saw you not?

Trick. The back way; by the garden door.

Limb. How long have you been here?

Trick. Just come before you.

Limb. O, then all's well. For, to tell you true, Pug, I had a kind of villainous apprehension that you had been here longer: but whatever thou sayest is an oracle, sweet Pug, and I am satisfied.

Brain. [Aside.] How infinitely she gulls him! and he so stupid not to find it! [To her.] If he be still within, madam, (you know my meaning?) here's Bilbo ready to forbid your keeper entrance.

Trick. [Aside.] Woodall must have told him of our appointment.—What think you of walking down, Mr Limberham?

Limb. I'll but visit the chamber a little first.

Trick. What new maggot's this? you dare not, sure, be jealous!

Limb. No, I protest, sweet Pug, I am not: only to satisfy my curiosity; that's but reasonable, you know.

Trick. Come, what foolish curiosity?

Limb. You must know, Pug, I was going but just now, in obedience to your commands, to enquire of the health and safety of your jewels, and my brother Brainsick most barbarously forbade me entrance:—nay, I dare accuse you, when Pug's by to back me;—but now I am resolved I will go see them, or somebody shall smoke for it.

Brain. But I resolve you shall not. If she pleases to command my person, I can comply with the obligation of a cavalier.

Trick. But what reason had you to forbid him, then, sir?

Limb. Ay, what reason had you to forbid me, then, sir?

Brain. 'Twas only my caprichio, madam.—Now must I seem ignorant of what she knows full well. [Aside.

Trick. We'll enquire the cause at better leisure; come down, Mr Limberham.

Limb. Nay, if it were only his caprichio, I am satisfied; though I must tell you, I was in a kind of huff, to hear him Tan ta ra, tan ta ra, a quarter of an hour together; for Tan ta ra is but an odd kind of sound, you know, before a man's chamber.

Enter PLEASANCE.

Pleas. [Aside.] Judith has assured me, he must be there; and, I am resolved, I'll satisfy my revenge at any rate upon my rivals.

Trick. Mrs Pleasance is come to call us: pray let us go.

Pleas. Oh dear, Mr Limberham, I have had the dreadfullest dream to-night, and am come to tell it you: I dreamed you left your mistress's jewels in your chamber, and the door open.

Limb. In good time be it spoken; and so I did, Mrs Pleasance.

Pleas. And that a great swinging thief came in, and whipt them out.

Limb. Marry, heaven forbid!

Trick. This is ridiculous: I'll speak to your mother, madam, not to suffer you to eat such heavy suppers.

Limb. Nay, that's very true; for, you may remember she fed very much upon larks and pigeons; and they are very heavy meat, as Pug says.

Trick. The jewels are all safe; I looked on them.

Brain. Will you never stand corrected, Mrs Pleasance?

Pleas. Not by you; correct your matrimony.—And methought, of a sudden this thief was turned to Mr Woodall; and that, hearing Mr Limberham come, he slipt for fear into the closet.

Trick. I looked all over it; I'm sure he is not there.—Come away, dear.

Brain. What, I think you are in a dream too, brother Limberham.

Limb. If her dream should come out now! 'tis good to be sure, however.

Trick. You are sure; have not I said it?—You had best make Mr Woodall a thief, madam.

Pleas. I make him nothing, madam: but the thief in my dream was like Mr Woodall; and that thief may have made Mr Limberham something.

Limb. Nay, Mr Woodall is no thief, that's certain; but if a thief should be turned to Mr Woodall, that may be something.

Trick. Then I'll fetch out the jewels: will that satisfy you?

Brain. That shall satisfy him.

Limb. Yes, that shall satisfy me.

Pleas. Then you are a predestinated fool, and somewhat worse, that shall be nameless. Do you not see how grossly she abuses you? my life on't, there's somebody within, and she knows it; otherwise she would suffer you to bring out the jewels.

Limb. Nay, I am no predestinated fool; and therefore, Pug, give way.

Trick. I will not satisfy your humour.

Limb. Then I will satisfy it myself: for my generous blood is up, and I'll force my entrance.

Brain. Here's Bilbo, then, shall bar you; atoms are not so small, as I will slice the slave. Ha! fate and furies!

Limb. Ay, for all your fate and furies, I charge you, in his majesty's name, to keep the peace: now, disobey authority, if you dare.

Trick. Fear him not, sweet Mr Brainsick.

Pleas. to Brain. But, if you should hinder him, he may trouble you at law, sir, and say you robbed him of his jewels.

Limb. That is well thought on. I will accuse him heinously; there—and therefore fear and tremble.

Brain. My allegiance charms me: I acquiesce. The occasion is plausible to let him pass.—Now let the burnished beams upon his brow blaze broad, for the brand he cast upon the Brainsick. [Aside.

Trick. Dear Mr Limberham, come back, and hear me.

Limb. Yes, I will hear thee, Pug.

Pleas. Go on; my life for yours, he is there.

Limb. I am deaf as an adder; I will not hear thee, nor have no commiseration. [Struggles from her, and rushes in.

Trick. Then I know the worst, and care not. [LIMBERHAM comes running out with the Jewels, followed by WOODALL, with his Sword drawn.

Limb. O save me, Pug, save me! [Gets behind her.

Wood. A slave, to come and interrupt me at my devotions! but I will—

Limb. Hold, hold, since you are so devout; for heaven's sake, hold!

Brain. Nay, monsieur Woodall!

Trick. For my sake, spare him.

Limb. Yes, for Pug's sake, spare me.

Wood. I did his chamber the honour, when my own was not open, to retire thither; and he to disturb me, like a profane rascal as he was.

Limb. [Aside.] I believe he had the devil for his chaplain, an' a man durst tell him so.

Wood. What is that you mutter?

Limb. Nay, nothing; but that I thought you had not been so well given. I was only afraid of Pug's jewels.

Wood. What, does he take me for a thief? nay then—

Limb. O mercy, mercy!

Pleas. Hold, sir; it was a foolish dream of mine that set him on. I dreamt, a thief, who had been just reprieved for a former robbery, was venturing his neck a minute after in Mr Limberham's closet.

Wood. Are you thereabouts, i'faith! A pox of Artemidorus[13].

Trick. I have had a dream, too, concerning Mrs Brainsick, and perhaps—

Wood. Mrs Tricksy, a word in private with you, by your keeper's leave.

Limb. Yes, sir, you may speak your pleasure to her; and, if you have a mind to go to prayers together, the closet is open.

Wood. [To TRICK.] You but suspect it at most, and cannot prove it: if you value me, you will not engage me in a quarrel with her husband.

Trick. Well, in hope you will love me, I will obey.

Brain. Now, damsel Tricksy, your dream, your dream!

Trick. It was something of a flagelet, that a shepherd played upon so sweetly, that three women followed him for his music, and still one of them snatched it from the other.

Pleas. [Aside.] I understand her; but I find she is bribed to secrecy.

Limb. That flagelet was, by interpretation,—but let that pass; and Mr Woodall, there, was the shepherd, that played the tan ta ra upon it: but a generous heart, like mine, will endure the infamy no longer; therefore, Pug, I banish thee for ever.

Trick. Then farewell.

Limb. Is that all you make of me?

Trick. I hate to be tormented with your jealous humours, and am glad to be rid of them.

Limb. Bear witness, good people, of her ingratitude! Nothing vexes me, but that she calls me jealous; when I found him as close as a butterfly in her closet.

Trick. No matter for that; I knew not he was there.

Limb. Would I could believe thee!

Wood. You have both our words for it.

Trick. Why should you persuade him against his will?

Limb. Since you won't persuade me, I care not much; here are the jewels in my possession, and I'll fetch out the settlement immediately.

Wood. [Shewing the Box.] Look you, sir, I'll spare your pains; four hundred a-year will serve to comfort a poor cast mistress.

Limb. I thought what would come of your devil's pater nosters!

Brain. Restore it to him for pity, Woodall.

Trick. I make him my trustee; he shall not restore it.

Limb. Here are jewels, that cost me above two thousand pounds; a queen might wear them. Behold this orient necklace, Pug! 'tis pity any neck should touch it, after thine, that pretty neck! but oh, 'tis the falsest neck that e'er was hanged in pearl.

Wood. 'Twould become your bounty to give it her at parting.

Limb. Never the sooner for your asking. But oh, that word parting! can I bear it? if she could find in her heart but so much grace, as to acknowledge what a traitress she has been, I think, in my conscience I could forgive her.

Trick. I'll not wrong my innocence so much, nor this gentleman's; but, since you have accused us falsely, four hundred a-year betwixt us two will make us some part of reparation.

Wood. I answer you not, but with my leg, madam.

Pleas. [Aside.] This mads me; but I cannot help it.

Limb. What, wilt thou kill me, Pug, with thy unkindness, when thou knowest I cannot live without thee? It goes to my heart, that this wicked fellow—

Wood. How's that, sir?

Limb. Under the rose, good Mr Woodall; but, I speak it with all submission, in the bitterness of my spirit, that you, or any man, should have the disposing of my four hundred a-year gratis; therefore dear Pug, a word in private, with your permission, good Mr Woodall.

Trick. Alas, I know, by experience, I may safely trust my person with you. [Exeunt LIMB. and TRICK.

Enter ALDO.

Pleas. O, father Aldo, we have wanted you! Here has been made the rarest discovery!

Brain. With the most comical catastrophe!

Wood. Happily arrived, i'faith, my old sub-fornicator; I have been taken up on suspicion here with Mrs Tricksy.

Aldo. To be taken, to be seen! Before George, that's a point next the worst, son Woodall.

Wood. Truth is, I wanted thy assistance, old Methusalem; but, my comfort is, I fell greatly.

Aldo. Well, young Phaeton, that's somewhat yet, if you made a blaze at your departure.

Enter GILES, Mrs BRAINSICK, and JUDITH.

Giles. By your leave, gentlemen, I have followed an old master of mine these two long hours, and had a fair course at him up the street; here he entered, I'm sure.

Aldo. Whoop holyday! our trusty and well-beloved Giles, most welcome! Now for some news of my ungracious son.

Wood. [Aside.] Giles here! O rogue, rogue! Now, would I were safe stowed over head and ears in the chest again.

Aldo. Look you now, son Woodall, I told you I was not mistaken; my rascal's in town, with a vengeance to him.

Giles. Why, this is he, sir; I thought you had known him.

Aldo. Known whom?

Giles. Your son here, my young master.

Aldo. Do I dote? or art thou drunk, Giles?

Giles. Nay, I am sober enough, I'm sure; I have been kept fasting almost these two days.

Aldo. Before George, 'tis so! I read it in that leering look: What a Tartar have I caught!

Brain. Woodall his son!

Pleas. What, young father Aldo!

Aldo. [Aside.] Now cannot I for shame hold up my head, to think what this young rogue is privy to!

Mrs Brain. The most dumb interview I ever saw!

Brain. What, have you beheld the Gorgon's head on either side?

Aldo. Oh, my sins! my sins! and he keeps my book of conscience too! He can display them, with a witness! Oh, treacherous young devil!

Wood. [Aside.] Well, the squib's run to the end of the line, and now for the cracker: I must bear up.

Aldo. I must set a face of authority on the matter, for my credit.—Pray, who am I? do you know me, sir?

Wood. Yes, I think I should partly know you, sir: You may remember some private passages betwixt us.

Aldo. [Aside.] I thought as much; he has me already!—But pray, sir, why this ceremony amongst friends? Put on, put on; and let us hear what news from France. Have you heard lately from my son? does he continue still the most hopeful and esteemed young gentleman in Paris? does he manage his allowance with the same discretion? and, lastly, has he still the same respect and duty for his good old father?

Wood. Faith, sir, I have been too long from my catechism, to answer so many questions; but, suppose there be no news of your quondam son, you may comfort up your heart for such a loss; father Aldo has a numerous progeny about the town, heaven bless them.

Aldo. It is very well, sir; I find you have been searching for your relations, then, in Whetstone's Park[14]!

Wood. No, sir; I made some scruple of going to the foresaid place, for fear of meeting my own father there.

Aldo. Before George, I could find in my heart to disinherit thee.

Pleas. Sure you cannot be so unnatural.

Wood. I am sure I am no bastard; witness one good quality I have. If any of your children have a stronger tang of the father in them, I am content to be disowned.

Aldo. Well, from this time forward, I pronounce thee—no son of mine.

Wood. Then you desire I should proceed to justify I am lawfully begotten? The evidence is ready, sir; and, if you please, I shall relate, before this honourable assembly, those excellent lessons of morality you gave me at our first acquaintance. As, in the first place—

Aldo. Hold, hold; I charge thee hold, on thy obedience. I forgive thee heartily: I have proof enough thou art my son; but tame thee that can, thou art a mad one.

Pleas. Why this is as it should be.

Aldo. [To him.] Not a word of any passages betwixt us; it is enough we know each other; hereafter we will banish all pomp and ceremony, and live familiarly together. I'll be Pylades, and thou mad Orestes, and we will divide the estate betwixt us, and have fresh wenches, and ballum rankum every night.

Wood. A match, i'faith: and let the world pass.

Aldo. But hold a little; I had forgot one point: I hope you are not married, nor engaged?

Wood. To nothing but my pleasures, I.

Aldo. A mingle of profit would do well though. Come, here is a girl; look well upon her; it is a mettled toad, I can tell you that: She will make notable work betwixt two sheets, in a lawful way.

Wood. What, my old enemy, Mrs Pleasance!

Mrs Brain. Marry Mrs Saintly's daughter!

Aldo. The truth is, she has past for her daughter, by my appointment; but she has as good blood running in her veins, as the best of you. Her father, Mr Palms, on his death-bed, left her to my care and disposal, besides a fortune of twelve hundred a year; a pretty convenience, by my faith.

Wood. Beyond my hopes, if she consent.

Aldo. I have taken some care of her education, and placed her here with Mrs Saintly, as her daughter, to avoid her being blown upon by fops, and younger brothers. So now, son, I hope I have matched your concealment with my discovery; there is hit for hit, ere I cross the cudgels.

Pleas. You will not take them up, sir?

Wood. I dare not against you, madam: I am sure you will worst me at all weapons. All I can say is, I do not now begin to love you.

Aldo. Let me speak for thee: Thou shalt be used, little Pleasance, like a sovereign princess: Thou shalt not touch a bit of butchers' meat in a twelve-month; and thou shall be treated—

Pleas. Not with ballum rankum every night, I hope!

Aldo. Well, thou art a wag; no more of that. Thou shall want neither man's meat, nor woman's meat, as far as his provision will hold out.

Pleas. But I fear he is so horribly given to go a house-warming abroad, that the least part of the provision will come to my share at home.

Wood. You will find me so much employment in my own family, that I shall have little need to look out for journey-work.

Aldo. Before George, he shall do thee reason, ere thou sleepest.

Pleas. No; he shall have an honourable truce for one day at least; for it is not fair to put a fresh enemy upon him.

Mrs Brain. [To PLEAS.] I beseech you, madam, discover nothing betwixt him and me.

Pleas. [To her.] I am contented to cancel the old score; but take heed of bringing me an after-reckoning.

Enter GERVASE, leading SAINTLY.

Gerv. Save you, gentlemen; and you, my quondam master: You are welcome all, as I may say.

Aldo. How now, sirrah? what is the matter?

Gerv. Give good words, while you live, sir; your landlord, and Mr Saintly, if you please.

Wood. Oh, I understand the business; he is married to the widow.

Saint. Verily the good work is accomplished.

Brain. But, why Mr Saintly?

Gerv. When a man is married to his betters, it is but decency to take her name. A pretty house, a pretty situation, and prettily furnished! I have been unlawfully labouring at hard duty; but a parson has soldered up the matter: Thank your worship, Mr Woodall—How? Giles here!

Wood. This business is out, and I am now Aldo. My father has forgiven me, and we are friends.

Gerv. When will Giles, with his honesty, come to this?

Wood. Nay, do not insult too much, good Mr Saintly: Thou wert but my deputy; thou knowest the widow intended it to me.

Gerv. But I am satisfied she performed it with me, sir. Well, there is much good will in these precise old women; they are the most zealous bed-fellows! Look, an' she does not blush now! you see there is grace in her.

Wood. Mr Limberham, where are you? Come, cheer up, man! How go matters on your side of the country? Cry him, Gervase.

Gerv. Mr Limberham, Mr Limberham, make your appearance in the court, and save your recognizance.

Enter LIMBERHAM and TRICKSY.

Wood. Sir, I should now make a speech to you in my own defence; but the short of all is this: If you can forgive what is past, your hand, and I'll endeavour to make up the breach betwixt you and your mistress: If not, I am ready to give you the satisfaction of a gentleman.

Limb. Sir, I am a peaceable man, and a good Christian, though I say it, and desire no satisfaction from any man. Pug and I are partly agreed upon the point already; and therefore lay thy hand upon thy heart, Pug, and, if thou canst, from the bottom of thy soul, defy mankind, naming no body, I'll forgive thy past enormities; and, to give good example to all Christian keepers, will take thee to be my wedded wife; and thy four hundred a-year shall be settled upon thee, for separate maintenance.

Trick. Why, now I can consent with honour.

Aldo. This is the first business that was ever made up without me.

Wood. Give you joy, Mr Bridegroom.

Limb. You may spare your breath, sir, if you please; I desire none from you. It is true, I am satisfied of her virtue, in spite of slander; but, to silence calumny, I shall civilly desire you henceforth, not to make a chapel-of-ease of Pug's closet.

Pleas. [Aside.] I'll take care of false worship, I'll warrant him. He shall have no more to do with Bel and the Dragon.

Brain. Come hither, wedlock, and let me seal my lasting love upon thy lips. Saintly has been seduced, and so has Tricksy; but thou alone art kind and constant. Hitherto I have not valued modesty, according to its merit; but hereafter, Memphis shall not boast a monument more firm than my affection.

Wood. A most excellent reformation, and at a most seasonable time! The moral of it is pleasant, if well considered. Now, let us to dinner.—Mrs Saintly, lead the way, as becomes you, in your own house. [The rest going off.

Pleas. Your hand, sweet moiety.

Wood. And heart too, my comfortable importance. Mistress and wife, by turns, I have possessed: He, who enjoys them both in one, is blessed.

Footnotes: 1. The Mahommedan doctrine of predestination is well known. They reconcile themselves to all dispensations, by saying, "They are written on the forehead" of him, to whose lot they have fallen.

2. The custom of drinking supernaculum, consisted in turning down the cup upon the thumb-nail of the drinker after his pledge, when, if duly quaffed off, no drop of liquor ought to appear upon his nail.

With that she set it to her nose, And off at once the rumkin goes; No drops beside her muzzle falling, Until that she had supped it all in: Then turning't topsey on her thumb, Says—look, here's supernaculum. Cotton's Virgil travestie.

This custom seems to have been derived from the Germans, who held, that if a drop appeared on the thumb, it presaged grief and misfortune to the person whose health was drunk.

3. This piece of dirty gallantry seems to have been fashionable:

Come, Phyllis, thy finger, to begin the go round; How the glass in thy hand with charms does abound! You and the wine to each other lend arms, And I find that my love Does for either improve, For that does redouble, as you double your charms.

4. Dapper, a silly character in Jonson's Alchemist, tricked by an astrologer, who persuades him the queen of fairies is his aunt.

5. The mask, introduced in the first act of the Maid's Tragedy, ends with the following dialogue betwixt Cinthia and Night:

Cinthia Whip up thy team, The day breaks here, and yon sun-flaring beam Shot from the south. Say, which way wilt thou go?

Night. I'll vanish into mists.

Cinthia. I into day.

6. In spring 1677, whilst the treaty of Nimeguen was under discussion, the French took the three important frontier towns, Valenciennes, St Omer, and Cambray. The Spaniards seemed, with the most passive infatuation, to have left the defence of Flanders to the Prince of Orange and the Dutch.

7. Alluding to the imaginary history of Pine, a merchant's clerk, who, being wrecked on a desert island in the South Seas, bestowed on it his own name, and peopled it by the assistance of his master's daughter and her two maid servants, who had escaped from the wreck by his aid.

8. Sulli, the famous composer.

9. It would seem that about this time the French were adopting their present mode of pronunciation, so capriciously distinct from the orthography.

10. "Queen Dido, or the wandering Prince of Troy," an old ballad, printed in the "Reliques of Ancient Poetry," in which the ghost of queen Dido thus addresses the perfidious AEneas:

Therefore prepare thy flitting soul, To wander with me in the air; When deadly grief shall make it howl, Because of me thou took'st no care. Delay not time, thy glass is run, Thy date is past, thy life is done.

11. Pricking, in hare-hunting, is tracking the foot of the game by the eye, when the scent is lost.]

12. The facetious Tom Brown, in his 2d dialogue on Mr Bayes' changing his religion, introduces our poet saying,

"Likewise he (Cleveland) having the misfortune to call that domestic animal a cock,

The Baron Tell-clock of the night,

I could never, igad, as I came home from the tavern, meet a watchman or so, but I presently asked him, 'Baron Tell-clock of the night, pr'ythee how goes the time?"

13. Artemidorus, the sophist of Cnidos, was the soothsayer who prophesied the death of Caesar. Shakespeare has introduced him in his tragedy of "Julius Caesar."

14. A common rendezvous of the rakes and bullies of the time; "For when they expected the most polished hero in Nemours, I gave them a ruffian reeking from Whetstone's Park." Dedication to Lee's "Princess of Cleves." In his translation of Ovid's "Love Elegies," Lib. II, Eleg. XIX. Dryden mentions, "an easy Whetstone whore."



EPILOGUE.

SPOKEN BY LIMBERHAM.

I beg a boon, that, ere you all disband, Some one would take my bargain off my hand: To keep a punk is but a common evil; To find her false, and marry,—that's the devil. Well, I ne'er acted part in all my life, But still I was fobbed off with some such wife. I find the trick; these poets take no pity Of one that is a member of the city. We cheat you lawfully, and in our trades; You cheat us basely with your common jades. Now I am married, I must sit down by it; But let me keep my dear-bought spouse in quiet. Let none of you damned Woodalls of the pit, Put in for shares to mend our breed in wit; We know your bastards from our flesh and blood, Not one in ten of yours e'er comes to good. In all the boys, their fathers' virtues shine, But all the female fry turn Pugs—like mine. When these grow up, Lord, with what rampant gadders Our counters will be thronged, and roads with padders! This town two bargains has, not worth one farthing,— A Smithfield horse, and wife of Covent-Garden[1].

Footnote: 1. Alluding to an old proverb, that whoso goes to Westminster for a wife, to St Paul's for a man, and to Smithfield for a horse, may meet with a whore, a knave, and a jade. Falstaff, on being informed that Bardolph is gone to Smithfield to buy him a horse, observes, "I bought him in Paul's, and he'll buy me a horse in Smithfield; an I could get me but a wife in the stews, I were manned, horsed, and wived." Second Part of Henry IV. Act I. Scene II.

* * * * *

OEDIPUS.

A

TRAGEDY.

Hi proprium decus et partum indignantur honorem, Ni teneant— VIRG.

Vos exemplaria Graeca Nocturna versate manu, versate diurna. HORAT.



OEDIPUS.

The dreadful subject of this piece has been celebrated by several ancient and modern dramatists. Of seven tragedies of Sophocles which have reached our times, two are founded on the history of OEdipus. The first of these, called "OEdipus Tyrannus," has been extolled by every critic since the days of Aristotle, for the unparalleled art with which the story is managed. The dreadful secret, the existence of which is announced by the pestilence, and by the wrath of the offended deities, seems each moment on the verge of being explained, yet, till the last act, the reader is still held in horrible suspense. Every circumstance, resorted to for the purpose of evincing the falsehood of the oracle, tends gradually to confirm the guilt of OEdipus, and to accelerate the catastrophe; while his own supposed consciousness of innocence, at once interests us in his favour, and precipitates the horrible discovery. Dryden, who arranged the whole plan of the following tragedy, although assisted by Lee in the execution, was fully aware of the merit of the "OEdipus Tyrannus;" and, with the addition of the under-plot of Adrastus and Eurydice, has traced out the events of the drama, in close imitation of Sophocles. The Grecian bard, however, in concurrence with the history or tradition of Greece, has made OEdipus survive the discovery of his unintentional guilt, and reserved him, in blindness and banishment, for the subject of his second tragedy of "OEdipus Coloneus." This may have been well judged, considering that the audience were intimately acquainted with the important scenes which were to follow among the descendants of OEdipus, with the first and second wars against Thebes, and her final conquest by the ancestors of those Athenians, before whom the play was rehearsed, led on by their demi-god Theseus. They were also prepared to receive, with reverence and faith, the belief on which the whole interest turns, that if OEdipus should be restored to Thebes, the vengeance of the gods against the devoted city might be averted; and to applaud his determination to remain on Athenian ground, that the predestined curse might descend on his unnatural sons and ungrateful country. But while the modern reader admires the lofty tone of poetry and high strain of morality which pervades "OEdipus Coloneus," it must appear more natural to his feelings, that the life of the hero, stained with unintentional incest and parricide, should be terminated, as in Dryden's play, upon the discovery of his complicated guilt and wretchedness. Yet there is something awful in the idea of the monarch, blind and exiled, innocent in intention, though so horribly criminal in fact, devoted, as it were, to the infernal deities, and sacred from human power and violence by the very excess of his guilt and misery. The account of the death of OEdipus Coloneus reaches the highest tone of sublimity. While the lightning flashes around him, he expresses the feeling, that his hour is come; and the reader anticipates, that, like Malefort in the "Unnatural Combat," he is to perish by a thunder-bolt. Yet, for the awful catastrophe, which we are artfully led to expect, is substituted a mysterious termination, still more awful. OEdipus arrays himself in splendid apparel, and dismisses his daughters and the attending Athenians. Theseus alone remains with him. The storm subsides, and the attendants return to the place, but OEdipus is there no longer—he had not perished by water, by sword, nor by fire—no one but Theseus knew the manner of his death. With an impressive hint, that it was as strange and wonderful as his life had been dismally eventful, the poet drops a curtain over the fate of his hero. This last sublime scene Dryden has not ventured to imitate; and the rants of Lee are a poor substitute for the calm and determined despair of the "OEdipus Coloneus."

Seneca, perhaps to check the seeds of vice in Nero, his pupil, to whom incest and blood were afterwards so familiar[1], composed the Latin tragedy on the subject of OEdipus, which is alluded to by Dryden in the following preface. The cold declamatory rhetorical stile of that philosopher was adapted precisely to counteract the effect, which a tale of terror produces on the feelings and imagination. His taste exerted itself in filling up and garnishing the more trifling passages, which Sophocles had passed over as unworthy of notice, and in adjusting incidents laid in the heroic age of Grecian simplicity, according to the taste and customs of the court of Nero[2]. Yet though devoid of dramatic effect, of fancy, and of genius, the OEdipus of Seneca displays the masculine eloquence and high moral sentiment of its author; and if it does not interest us in the scene of fiction, it often compels us to turn our thoughts inward, and to study our own hearts.