Wit. Do Mrs Mincing, like a screen before a great fire. I confess I do blaze to-day; I am too bright.

Mrs Fain. But, dear Millamant, why were you so long?

Mill. Long! lud! have I not made violent haste? I have asked every living thing I met for you; I have inquired after you, as after a new fashion. Wit. Madam, truce with your similitudesno, you met her husband, and did not ask him for her.

Mir. By your leave, Witwould, that were like inquiring after an old fashion, to ask a husband for his wife.

Wit. Hum! a hit, a hit, a palpable hit, I confess it.

Min. You were dressed before I came abroad. Mill. Ay, that's true-O but then I had Mincing, what had I? why was I so long? Min. O mem, your la'ship staid to peruse a pacquet of letters.

Mill. O ay, letters-I had letters-I am persecuted with letters--I hate letters-nobody knows how to write letters; and yet one has them, one does not know why-they serve one to pin up one's hair.

Wit. Is that the way? Pray, madam, do you pin up your hair with all your letters? I find I must keep copies.

Mill. Only with those in verse, Mr Witwould. I never pin up my hair with prose. I think, I tried once, Mincing?

Min. O mem, I shall never forget it. Wit. Ay, poor Mincing tift and tift all the morning.

Min. Till I had the cramp in my fingers, I'll vow, mem, and all to no purpose. But when your la'ship pins it up with poetry, it sits so pleasant the next day as any thing, and is so pure and so crips.

Wit. Indeed! so crips?

Min. You're such a critic, Mr Witwould. Mill. Mirabell, did you take exceptions last night? O ay, and went away-Now I think on't I'm angry-No, now I think on't I'm pleased-For I believe I gave you some pain. Mir. Does that please you?

Mill. Infinitely; I love to give pain. Mir. You would affect a cruelty, which is not in your nature; your true vanity is in the power of pleasing.

Mill. O, I ask your pardon for that-One's cruelty is one's power, and when one parts with one's cruelty, one parts with one's power; and when one has parted with that, I fancy one's old and ugly.

Mir. Ay, ay, suffer your cruelty to ruin the object of your power, to destroy your lover— And then, how vain, how lost a thing you'll be! Nay, 'tis true: you are no longer handsome, when you have lost your lover; your beauty dies upon the instant; for beauty is the lover's gift; 'tis he bestows your charms-Your glass is all a cheat. The ugly and the old, whom the looking-glass mortifies, yet, after commendation, can be flattered by it, and discover beauties in it; for that reflects our praises, rather than your face.

Mill. O the vanity of these men! Fainall, d'ye hear him? If they did not commend us, we were not handsome! Now, you must know, they could not commend one, if one was not handsome. Beauty the lover's gift!Dear me, what is a lover, that it can give? Why, one makes lovers as fast as one pleases, and they live as long as one pleases, and they die as soon as one pleases: and then, if one pleases, one makes more.

Wit. Very pretty! Why you make no more of making of lovers, madam, than of making so many card-matches.

Mill. One no more owes one's beauty to a lover, than one's wit to an echo: they can but reflect what we look and say; vain, empty things if we are silent or unseen, and want a being.

Mir. Yet, to those two vain, empty things, you owe two of the greatest pleasures of your life. Mill. How so?

Mir. To your lover you owe the pleasure of hearing yourselves praised; and to an echo, the pleasure of hearing yourselves talk.

Wit. But I know a lady, that loves talking so incessantly, she won't give an echo fair play; she has that everlasting rotation of tongue, that an echo must wait till she dies, before it can catch her last words.

Mill. O fiction! Fainall, let us leave these

men.

Mira. Draw off Witwould.

[Aside to MRS FAINALL. Mrs Fain. Immediately: I have a word or two for Mr Witwould.

[Exeunt MRS FAINALL and WItwould. Mira. I would beg a little private audience, too--You had the tyranny to deny me last night; though you knew I came to impart a seeret to you, that concerned my love.

Mill. You saw I was engaged.

Mira. Unkind! You had the leisure to entertain a herd of fools; things, who visit you from their excessive idleness; bestowing on your easiness that time, which is the incumbrance of their lives. How can you find delight in such society? It is impossible they should admire you; they are

not capable; or if they were, it should be to you as a mortification; for sure to please a fool is some degree of folly.

Mill. I please myself--Besides, sometimes to converse with fools is for my health.

Mira. Your health! Is there a worse disease than the conversation of fools?

Mill. Yes, the vapours; fools are physic for it next to assafoetida.

Mira. You are not in a course of fools? Mill. Mirabell, if you persist in this offensive freedom-you'll displease me-I think I must resolve, after all, not to have you-We shan't

agree.

Mira. Not in our physic, it may be.

Mill. And yet our distemper, in all likelihood, will be the same; for we shall be sick of one another. I shan't endure to be reprimanded, nor instructed; 'tis so dull to act always by advice, and so tedious to be told of one's faults I can't bear it. Well, I won't have you, Mirabell I'm resolved——I think—---you may go

-Ha, ha, ha! What would you give, that you could help loving me?

Mira. I would give something that you did not know I could not help it.

Mill. Come, don't look grave, then. what do you say to me?

Well, Mira. I say, that a man may as soon make a friend by his wit, or a fortune by his honesty, as win a woman with plain-dealing and sincerity.

Mill. Sententious, Mirabell? Prithee don't look with that violent and inflexible wise face, like Solomon at the dividing of the child, in an old tapestry hanging.

Mira. You are merry, madam; but I would persuade you for a moment to be serious.

Mill. What, with that face? No, if you keep your countenance, 'tis impossible I should hold mine. Well, after all, there is something very moving in a love-sick face. Ha, ha, ha!—Well, I won't laugh, don't be peevish-Heigho! now I'll be melancholy; as melancholy as a watchlight. Well, Mirabell, if ever you will win me, Woo me now- -Nay, if you are so tedious, fare you well; I see they are walking away.

Mira. Can you not find in the variety of your disposition one moment—

Mill. To hear you tell me Foible's married, and your plot like to speed--No!

Mira. But how you came to know it

Mill. Without the help of conjuration, you can't imagine; unless she should tell me herself. Which of the two it may have been, I will leave you to consider; and when you have done thinking of that, think of me.

[Exeunt MILLAMANT and MINCING. Mira. I have something more---GoneThink of you! to think of a whirlwind, though 'twere in a whirlwind, were a case of more steady contemplation; a very tranquillity of mind and Bansion. A fellow, that lives in a windmill, has

not a more whimsical dwelling than the heart of a man, that is lodged in a woman. There is no point of the compass, to which they cannot turn, and by which they are not turned; and by one as well as another; for motion, not method, is their occupation. To know this, and yet continue to be in love, is to be made wise from the dictates of reason, and yet persevere to play the fool by the force of instinct-O here come my pair of turtles--What! billing so sweetly! is not Valentine's day over with you yet? [Enter WAITWELL and FOIBLE.] Sirrah, Waitwell, why sure you think you were married for your own recreation, and not for my conveniency.

Wait. Your pardon, sir. With submission, we have indeed been billing; but still with an eye to business, sir. I have instructed her as well as I could. If she can take your directions as readily as my instructions, sir, your affairs are in a prosperous way.

Mira. Give you joy, Mrs Foible.

Foi. O-las, sir, I'm so ashamed----I'm afraid my lady has been in a thousand inquietudes for me. But I protest, sir, I made as much haste as I could.

Wait. That she did indeed, sir. It was my fault that she did not make more.

Mira. That I believe.

Foi. I told my lady as you instructed me, sir: that I had a prospect of seeing Sir Rowland, your uncle; and that I would put her ladyship's picture in my pocket to shew him; which, I'll be sure to say has made him so enamoured of her beauty, that he burns with impatience to lie at her ladyship's feet, and worship the original.

Mira. Excellent Foible! Matrimony has made you eloquent in love.

Wait. I think she has profited, sir; I think so.
Foi. You have seen madam Millamant, sir?
Mira. Yes.

Foi. I told her, sir, because I did not know that you might find an opportunity; she had so much company last night.

Mira. Your diligence will merit more---in the mean time[Gives money. Foi. O dear sir, your humble servant! Wait. Spouse!

Mira. Stand off, sir, not a penny---Go on and prosper, Foible-----The lease shall be made good, and the farm stocked, if we succeed.

Foi. I don't question your generosity, sir: and you need not doubt of success. If you have no more commands, sir, I'll be gone; I'm sure my lady is at her toilet, and can't dress till I come--O dear, I'm sure that [looking out] was Mrs Marwood that went by in a mask; if she has seen me with you I'm sure she'll tell my lady. I'll make haste home and prevent her. Your servant, sir. B'w'ye, Waitwell. [Exit.

Wait. Sir Rowland, if you please. The jade's so pert upon her preferment, she forgets herself.

Mira. Come, sir, will you endeavour to forget yourself and transform into sir Rowland ?

Wait. Why, sir, it will be impossible I should remember myself. [Exit MIRABELL.] Married, knighted, and attended all in one day! 'tis enough to make any man forget himself. The difficulty will be how to recover my acquaintance and familiarity with my former self; and fall from

my transformation to a reformation into Waitwell. Nay, I shan't be quite the same Waitwell, neither; for now, I remember, I'm married, and can't be my own again.

Ay, there's my grief; that's the sad change of life; To lose my title, and yet keep my wife.

SCENE I-A room in LADY WISH FORT's house.

LADY WISHFORT at her toilet, PEG waiting. Lady Wish. MERCIFUL, no news of Foible yet?

Peg. No, madam.

Lady Wish. I have no more patience-If I have not fretted myself till I am pale again, there's no veracity in me. Fetch me the red-the red, do you hear, sweet-heart! an arrant ash-colour, as I'm a person. Look you how this wench stirs why dost thou not fetch me a little red? didst thou not hear me, mopus?

Peg. The red ratafia, does your ladyship mean, or the cherry-brandy?

Lady Wish. Ratafia, fool! no, fool, not the ratafia, fool!-Grant me patience! I mean the Spanish paper, ideot; complexion. Darling paint, paint, paint! dost thou understand that, changeling? dangling thy hands like bobbins before thee! why dost thou not stir, puppet? thou wooden thing upon wires.

Peg. Lord, madam, your ladyship is so impatient-I cannot come at the paint, madam; Mrs Foible has locked it up, and carried the key with her.

Lady Wish. Plague take you both- -Fetch me the cherry-brandy, then. [Erit PEG.] I'm as pale and as faint-I look like Mrs Qualmsick, the curate's wife, that's always breeding- -Wench, come, come, wench, what art thou doing? sipping! tasting! save thee, dost thou not know the bottle?

Enter PEG with a bottle and china cup.

Lady Wish. A cup, save thee! and what a cup hast thou brought! dost thou take me for a fairy, to drink out of an acorn? why didst thou not bring thy thimble? hast thou ne'er a brass thimble clinking in thy pocket, with a bit of nutmeg? I warrant thee. Come, fill, fill- -So-again. See who that is. [One knocks.] Set down the bottle first. Here, here, under the table-What, would'st thou go with the bottle in thy hand, like a tapster? [Exit PEG.] As I'm a person, this wench has lived in an inn upon the road, before she came to me, like Maritornes, the Asturian, in Don Quixote,

Mrs Mar. I'm surprised to find your ladyship in dishabille at this time of day.

Lady Wish. Foible's a lost thing; has been abroad since morning, and never heard of since. Mrs Mar. I saw her but now, as I came masked through the park, in conference with Mirabell.

Lady Wish. With Mirabell! you call my blood into my face, with mentioning that traitor. She durst not have the confidence. I sent her to negociate an affair, in which, if I'm detected, I'm undone. If that wheedling villain has wrought upon Foible to detect me, I'm ruined. Oh, my dear friend! I'm a wretch of wretches, if I'm detected.

Mrs Mar. O, madam, you cannot suspect Mrs Foible's integrity.

Lady Wish. O, he carries poison in his tongue, that would corrupt integrity itself. If she has given him an opportunity, she has as good as put her integrity into his hands. Ah, dear Marwood! what's integrity to an opportunity?-Hark, I hear her!-Dear friend, retire into my closet, that I may examine her with more freedom-You'll pardon me, dear friend, I can make bold with you— There are books over the chimney-Quarles and Pryn, and the Short View of the Stage, with Bunyan's works, to entertain you

[Erit MRS MARWOOD. [Exit PEG.

Go, you thing, and send her in.

Enter FOIBLE. Lady Wish. O, Foible! where hast thou been! what hast thou been doing?

Foi. Madam, I have seen the party.
Lady Wish. But what hast thou done?

Foi. Nay, 'tis your ladyship has done, and are to do; I have only promised. But a man so enamoured!-so transported! well, if worshipping of pictures be a sin-poor sir Rowland, I say.

Lady Wish. The miniature has been counted

like-But hast thou not betrayed me, Foible? hast thou not detected me to that faithless Mirabell? -What hadst thou to do with him in the park? answer me, has he got nothing out of thee?

Foi. So, mischief has been before-hand with me; what shall I say? [Aside.] Alas! madam, could I help it, if I met that confident thing? was I in fault? If you had heard how he used me, and all upon your ladyship's account, I'm sure you would not suspect my fidelity. Nay, if that had been the worst, I could have borne it: but he had a fling at your ladyship, too; and, then, I could not hold: but, i'faith, I gave him

his own.

Lady Wish. Me! what did the filthy fellow say?

Foi. O, madam! 'tis a shame to say what he said-With his taunts and his fleers, tossing up his nose. Humph,' says he, 'what, you are a hatching some plot,' says he, 'you are so early abroad, or catering,' says he, ferreting for some disbanded officer, I warrant-Half-pay is but thin subsistence !-says he. Well, what pension does your lady propose? Let me see;' says he, what, she must come down pretty deep now; she's superannuated,' says he, and

Lady Wish. Odds my life, I'll have him-I'll have him murdered! I'll have him poisoned! Where does he eat? I'll marry a drawer, to have him poisoned in his wine.

Foi. Poison him! poisoning's too good for him. Starve him, madam, starve him; marry sir Rowland, and get him disinherited. O, you would bless yourself, to hear what he said.

Lady Wish. A villain! superannuated!

his taylor. Yes, he shall have my niece with her fortune, he shall.

Foi. He! I hope to see him lodge in Ludgate first, and angle into Black Friars for brass farthings, with an old mitten.

Lady Wish. Ay, dear Foible; thank thee for that, dear Foible. He has put me out of all patience. I shall never recompose my features, to receive sir Rowland with any œconomy of face. The wretch has fretted me, that I am absolutely decayed. Look, Foible!

Foi. Your ladyship has frowned a little too rashly, indeed, madam. The are some cracks discernible in the white varnish.

Lady Wish. Let me see the glass-Cracks, say'st thou? why, I am arrantly flayed !—I look like an old peeled wall. Thou must repair me, Foible, before sir Rowland comes, or I shall never keep up to my picture.

Foi. I warrant you, madam; a little art once made your picture like you; and, now, a little of the same art must make you like your picture. Your picture must sit for you, madam.

Lady Wish. But art thou sure sír Rowland will not fail to come? or will he not fail, when he does come? will he be importunate, Foible? for, if he should not be importunate-I shall never break decorums--I shall die with confusion, if I am forced to advance—Oh, no! I can never advance! I shall swoon if he should expect advances. No, I hope sir Rowland is better bred, than to put a lady to the necessity of breaking her forms. I won't be too coy, neither.-I won't give him despair-But a little disdain is not amiss; a little scorn is alluring.

Lady Wish. Audacious villain! handle me! would he durst?-Frippery! old frippery! Was there ever such a foul-mouthed fellow? I'll be married to-morrow; I'll be contracted to-night.

Foi. The sooner the better, madam.

Lady Wish. Will sir Rowland be here, say'st thou? when, Foible?

Foi. Incontinently, madam. No new sheriff's wife expects the return of her husband after knighthood, with that impatience, in which sir Rowland burns for the dear hour of kissing your ladyship's hand after dinner.

Lady Wish. Frippery! superannuated frippery! I'll frippery the villain; I'll reduce him to frippery and rags: A tatterdemallion—I hope to see him hung with tatters, like a Long-lane penthouse, or a gibbet thief: A slander-mouthed railer! I warrant the spendthrift prodigal is in debt as much as the million lottery, or the whole court upon a birth-day. I'll spoil his credit with

affects it, but she wants features. Is sir Rowland handsome? let my toilet be removed-I'll dress above. I'll receive sir Rowland here. Is he handsome? don't answer me. I won't know : I'll be surprised; I'll be taken by surprise. Foi. By storm, madam, sir Rowland's a brisk

man.

Lady Wish. Is he? O, then, he'll importune, if he's a brisk man. Let my things be removed. good Foible. [Exit LADY WISHFORT.

Enter MRS FAINALL.

Mrs Fain. O, Foible, I have been in a fright lest I should come too late! That devil, Marwood, saw you in the park with Mirabell, and, I'm afraid, will discover it to my lady.

Foi. Discover what, madam!

Mrs Fain. Nay, nay, put not on that strange face. I am privy to the whole design, and know that Waitwell, to whom thou wert this morning married, is to personate Mirabell's uncle, and, as such, winning my lady, to involve her in those

difficulties, from which Mirabell only must release her, by his making his conditions to have my cousin, and her fortune, left to her own disposal.

Foi. O, dear madam, I beg your pardon! It was not my confidence in your ladyship, that was deficient; but, I thought the former good correspondence between your ladyship and Mr Mirabell might have hindered his communicating this

secret.

Mrs Fain. Dear Foible, forget that.

cess.

Foi. O, dear madam, Mr Mirabell is such a sweet winning gentleman-But your ladyship is the pattern of generosity-Sweet lady, to be so good! Mr Mirabell cannot chuse but be grateful. I find your ladyship has his heart still. Now, madam, I can safely tell your ladyship our sucMrs Marwood has told my lady; but, I warrant, I managed myself. I turned it all for the better. I told my lady that Mr Mirabell railed at her. I laid horrid things to his charge, I'll vow; and my lady is so incensed, that she'll be contracted to sir Rowland to-night, she says; -I warrant I worked her up, that he may have her for asking for, as they say of a Welch maidenhead.

Mrs Fain. O rare Foible!

Foi. Madam, I beg your ladyship to acquaint Mr Mirabell of his success. I would be seen as little as possible to speak to him; besides, I believe madam Marwood watches me-She has a penchant; but, I know Mr Mirabell can't abide her.--[Calls.]-John-remove my lady's toilet. Madam, your servant. My lady is so impatient, I fear she'll come for me, if I stay. Mrs Fain. I'll go with you up the back-stairs, | [Exeunt.

lest I should meet her.

Enter MRS MARWOOD, from the closet. Mrs Mar. Indeed, Mrs Engine, is it thus with you? Are you become a go-between of this importance? Yes, I shall watch you. Why, this wench is the pass-partout, a very master-key to every body's strong-box. My friend Fainall, have you carried it so swimmingly? I thought there was something in it; but it seems it is over with you. Your loathing is not from a want of appetite, then, but from a surfeit; else you could never be so cool to fall from a principal to be an assistant: to procure for him! a pattern of generosity, that I confess. Well, Mr Fainall, you have met with your match. O man, man! woman, woman! The devil's an ass! if I were a painter, I would draw him like an idiot, a driveller, with a bib and bells. Man should have his head and horns, and woman the rest of him. Poor simple fiend! Madam Marwood has a penchant, but he can't abide her-Twere better for him you had not been his confessor in that affair, without you could have kept his counsel closer. I shall not prove another pattern of ge

nerosity-he has not obliged me to that with those excesses of himself; and now I'll have none of him. Here comes the good lady, panting ripe ; with a heart full of hope, and a head full of care, like any chemist upon the day of projection.

Enter LADY WISHFORT.

Lady Wish. O dear Marwood, what shall I say for this rude forgetfulness? But my dear friend is all goodness.

Mrs Mar. No apologies, dear madam. I have been very well entertained.

Lady Wish. As I'm a person, I am in a very chaos to think I should so forget myself-But I have such an olio of affairs, really I know not what to do [Calls.]-Foible!-I expect my nephew, sir Wilfull, every moment, too-Why, Foible-He means to travel for improvement.

Mrs Mar. Methinks sir Wilfull should rather think of marrying, than travelling at his years. I hear he is turned of forty.

Lady Wish. O, he's in less danger of being spoiled by his travels-I am against my nephew's marrying too young. It will be time enough, when he comes back, and has acquired discretion to chuse for himself.

Mrs Mar. Methinks Mrs Millamant and he would make a very fit match. He may travel afterwards. Tis a thing very usual with young gentlemen.

Lady Wish. I promise you I have thought on't And, since 'tis your judgment, I'll think on't again. I assure you I will; I value your judgement extremely. On my word I'll propose it. [Enter FOIBLE.] Come, come, Foible-I had forgot my nephew will be here before dinner-I must make haste.

Foi. Mr Witwould and Mr Petulant are come to dine with your ladyship.

Lady Wish. O dear, I can't appear, till I am dressed. Dear Marwood, shall I be free with you again, and beg you to entertain them? I'll make all imaginable haste. Dear friend, excuse me.

· [Exeunt LADY WISHFORT and FOIBLE.

Enter MRS MILLAMANT and MINCING. Mill. Sure, never any thing was so unbred as that odious mau. Marwood, your servant.

Mrs Mar. You have a colour; what's the matter?

Mill. That horrid fellow, Petulant, has provoked me into a flame--I have broke my fanMincing, lend me yours-is not all the powder out of my hair?

Mrs Mar. No. What has he done?

Mill. Nay, he has done nothing; he has only talked-Nay, he has said nothing, neither; but he has contradicted every thing, that has been said. For my part, I thought Witwould and he would have quarrelled.