Way of the World E-book
Author: William Congreve
Genre: Comedy, Drama
1700
THE WAY OF THE WORLD
by William Congreve
Electronically Enhanced Text (c) Copyright 1996, World Library(R)
THE WAY OF THE WORLD
-
Audire est operae pretium, procedere recte
Qui moechis non vultis.- HORAT. Lib. i. Sat. 2.
-
Metuat, doti deprensa.- Ibid.
COMMENDATORY VERSES
-
To Mr. CONGREVE, occasioned by his Comedy called
"The Way of the World."
-
WHEN pleasure's falling to the low delight,
In the vain joys of the uncertain sight;
No sense of wit when rude spectators know,
But in distorted gesture, farce and show;
How could, great author, your aspiring mind
Dare to write only to the few refined?
Yet though that nice ambition you pursue,
'Tis not in Congreve's power to please but few.
Implicitly devoted to his fame,
Well-dressed barbarians know his awful name.
Though senseless they're of mirth, but when they laugh,
As they feel wine, but when, till drunk, they quaff.
On you from fate a lavish portion fell
In every way of writing to excel.
Your muse applause to Arabella brings,
In notes as sweet as Arabella sings.
Whene'er you draw an undissembled woe,
With sweet distress your rural numbers flow:
Pastora's the complaint of every swain,
Pastora still the echo of the plain!
Or if your muse describe, with warming force,
The wounded Frenchman falling from his horse;
And her own William glorious in the strife,
Bestowing on the prostrate foe his life:
You the great act as generously rehearse,
And all the English fury's in your verse.
By your selected scenes and handsome choice,
Ennobled Comedy exalts her voice;
You check unjust esteem and fond desire,
And teach to scorn what else we should admire:
The just impression taught by you we bear,
The player acts the world, the world the player;
Whom still that world unjustly disesteems,
Though he alone professes what he seems.
But when your muse assumes her tragic part,
She conquers and she reigns in every heart:
To mourn with her men cheat their private woe,
And generous pity's all the grief they know.
The widow, who, impatient of delay,
From the town joys must mask it to the play,
Joins with your Mourning Bride's resistless moan,
And weeps a loss she slighted when her own:
You give us torment, and you give us ease,
And vary our afflictions as you please.
Is not a heart so kind as yours in pain,
To load your friends with cares you only feign;
Your friends in grief, composed yourself, to leave?
But 'tis the only way you'll e'er deceive.
Then still, great sir, your moving power employ,
To lull our sorrow, and correct our joy.
RICHARD STEELE.
To the Right Honourable
RALPH, EARL OF MONTAGUE, &c.
-
MY LORD,
Whether the world will arraign me of vanity or not, that I have
presumed to dedicate this comedy to your Lordship, I am yet in
doubt; though, it may be, it is some degree of vanity even to doubt of
it. One who has at any time had the honour of your Lordship's
conversation, cannot be supposed to think very meanly of that which he
would prefer to your perusal; yet it were to incur the imputation of
too much sufficiency, to pretend to such a merit as might abide the
test of your Lordship's censure.
Whatever value may be wanting to this play while yet it is mine,
will be sufficiently made up to it when it is once become your
Lordship's; and it is my security that I cannot have overrated it more
by my dedication, than your Lordship will dignify it by your
patronage.
That it succeeded on the stage, was almost beyond my expectation;
for but little of it was prepared for that general taste which seems
now to be predominant in the palates of our audience.
Those characters which are meant to be ridiculed in most of our
comedies, are of fools so gross, that, in my humble opinion, they
should rather disturb than divert the well-natured and reflecting part
of an audience; they are rather objects of charity than contempt;
and instead of moving our mirth, they ought very often to excite our
compassion.
This reflection moved me to design some characters which should
appear ridiculous, not so much through a natural folly (which is
incorrigible, and therefore not proper for the stage) as through an
affected wit; a wit, which at the same time that it is affected, is
also false. As there is some difficulty in the formation of a
character of this nature, so there is some hazard which attends the
progress of its success upon the stage; for many come to a play so
overcharged with criticism, that they very often let fly their
censure, when through their rashness they have mistaken their aim.
This I had occasion lately to observe; for this play had been acted
two or three days, before some of these hasty judges could find the
leisure to distinguish betwixt the character of a Witwoud and a
Truewit.
I must beg your Lordship's pardon for this digression from the
true course of this epistle; but that it may not seem altogether
impertinent, I beg that I may plead the occasion of it, in part of
that excuse of which I stand in need, for recommending this comedy
to your protection. It is only by the countenance of your Lordship,
and the few so qualified, that such who wrote with care and pains
can hope to be distinguished; for the prostituted name of poet
promiscuously levels all that bear it.
Terence, the most correct writer in the world, had a Scipio and a
Laelius, if not to assist him, at least to support him in his
reputation; and notwithstanding his extraordinary merit, it may be
their countenance was not more than necessary.
The purity of his style, the delicacy of his turns, and the justness
of his characters, were all of them beauties which the greater part of
his audience were incapable of tasting; some of the coarsest strokes
of Plautus, so severely censured by Horace, were more likely to affect
the multitude; such who come with expectation to laugh at the last act
of a play, and are better entertained with two or three unseasonable
jests, than with the artful solution of the fable.
As Terence excelled in his performances, so had he great
advantages to encourage his undertakings; for he built most on the
foundations of Menander; his plots were generally modelled, and his
characters ready drawn to his hand. He copied Menander, and Menander
had no less light in the formation of his characters, from the
observations of Theophrastus, of whom he was a disciple; and
Theophrastus, it is known, was not only the disciple, but the
immediate successor of Aristotle, the first and greatest judge of
poetry. These were great models to design by- and the further
advantage which Terence possessed, towards giving his plays the due
ornaments of purity of style and justness of manners, was not less
considerable, from the freedom of conversation which was permitted him
with Laelius and Scipio, two of the greatest and most polite men of
his age. And indeed the privilege of such a conversation is the only
certain means of attaining to the perfection of dialogue.
If it has happened in any part of this comedy, that I have gained
a turn of style or expression more correct, or at least, more
corrigible, than in those which I have formerly written, I must,
with equal pride and gratitude, ascribe it to honour of your
Lordship's admitting me into your conversation, and that of a
society where everybody else was so well worthy of you, in your
retirement last summer from the town; for it was immediately after
that this comedy was written. If I have failed in my performance, it
is only to be regretted, where there were so many, not inferior either
to a Scipio or a Laelius, that there should be one wanting equal in
capacity to a Terence.
If I am not mistaken, poetry is almost the only art which has not
yet laid claim to your Lordship's patronage. Architecture and
painting, to the great honour of our country, have flourished under
your influence and protection. In the mean time, poetry, the eldest
sister of all arts, and parent of most, seems to have resigned her
birthright, by having neglected to pay her duty to your Lordship,
and by permitting others of a later extraction, to prepossess that
place in your esteem to which none can pretend a better title. Poetry,
in its nature, is sacred to the good and great; the relation between
them is reciprocal, and they are ever propitious to it. It is the
privilege of poetry to address to them, and it is their prerogative
alone to give it protection.
This received maxim is a general apology for all writers who
consecrate their labours to great men; but I could wish at this
time, that this address were exempted from the common pretence of
all dedications; and that I can distinguish your Lordship even among
the most deserving, so this offering might become remarkable by some
particular instance of respect, which should assure your Lordship,
that I am, with all due sense of your extreme worthiness and humanity,
my Lord, your Lordship's most obedient, and most obliged humble
servant,
WILL. CONGREVE.
PROLOGUE
SPOKEN BY MR. BETTERTON
-
Of those few fools who with ill stars are curst,
Sure scribbling fools, called poets, fare the worst:
For they're a sort of fools which Fortune makes,
And after she has made 'em fools, forsakes.
With Nature's oafs 'tis quite a different case,
For Fortune favours all her idiot-race.
In her own nest the cuckoo-eggs we find,
O'er which she broods to hatch the changeling-kind.
No portion for her own she has to spare,
So much she dotes on her adopted care.
-
Poets are bubbles, by the town drawn in,
Suffered at first some trifling stakes to win;
But what unequal hazards do they run!
Each time they write they venture all they've won:
The squire that's buttered still, is sure to be undone.
This author heretofore has found your favour;
But pleads no merit from his past behaviour.
To build on that might prove a vain presumption,
Should grants, to poets made, admit resumption:
And in Parnassus he must lose his seat,
If that be found a forfeited estate.
-
He owns with toil he wrought the following scenes;
But, if they're naught, ne'er spare him for his pains:
Damn him the more; have no commiseration
For dulness on mature deliberation,
He swears he'll not resent one hissed-off scene,
Nor, like those peevish wits, his play maintain,
Who, to assert their sense, your taste arraign.
Some plot we think he has, and some new thought;
Some humour too, no farce; but that's a fault.
Satire, he thinks, you ought not to expect;
For so reformed a town who dares correct?
To please, this time, has been his sole pretence,
He'll not instruct, lest it should give offence.
Should he by chance a knave or fool expose,
That hurts none here, sure here are none of those:
In short, our play shall (with your leave to show it)
Give you one instance of a passive poet,
Who to your judgments yields all resignation;
So save or damn, after your own discretion.
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
-
FAINALL, in love with MRS. MARWOOD.
MIRABELL, in love with MRS. MILLAMANT.
WITWOUD, -|
> Followers of Mrs. Millamant.
PETULANT,-|
SIR WILFULL WITWOUD, half Brother to WITWOUD,
and Nephew to LADY WISHFORT.
WAITWELL, Servant to MIRABELL.
-
LADY WISHFORT, Enemy to MIRABELL,
for having falsely pretended love to her.
MRS. MILLAMANT, a fine Lady, Niece to LADY WISHFORT,
and loves MIRABELL.
MRS. MARWOOD, Friend to MR. FAINALL, and likes MIRABELL.
MRS. FAINALL, Daughter to LADY WISHFORT,
and Wife to FAINALL, formerly Friend to MIRABELL.
FOIBLE, Woman to LADY WISHFORT.
MINCING. Woman to MRS. MILLAMANT.
BETTY, Waiting-maid at a Chocolate-house.
PEG, Maid to LADY WISHFORT.
-
Coachmen, Dancers, Footmen, and Attendants.
-
SCENE- LONDON.
ACT THE FIRST
SCENE I
A Chocolate House
-
MIRABELL and FAINALL, rising from cards, BETTY waiting.
-
MIR. You are a fortunate man, Mr. Fainall!
FAIN. Have we done?
MIR. What you please: I'll play on to entertain you.
FAIN. No, I'll give you your revenge another time, when you are not
so indifferent; you are thinking of something else now, and play
too negligently; the coldness of a losing gamester lessens the
pleasure of the winner. I'd no more play with a man that
slighted his ill fortune than I'd make love to a woman who
undervalued the loss of her reputation.
MIR. You have a taste extremely delicate, and are for refining on
your pleasures.
FAIN. Prithee, why so reserved? Something has put you out of humour.
MIR. Not at all: I happen to be grave to day, and you are gay;
that's all.
FAIN. Confess, Millamant and you quarrelled last night after I left
you; my fair cousin has some humours that would tempt the
patience of a Stoic. What, some coxcomb came in, and was well
received by her, while you were by?
MIR. Witwoud and Petulant; and what was worse, her aunt, your wife's
mother, my evil genius: or to sum up all in her own name, my old
Lady Wishfort came in.
FAIN. O there it is then! She has a lasting passion for you, and
with reason.- What, then my wife was there?
MIR. Yes, and Mrs. Marwood, and three or four more, whom I never saw
before. Seeing me, they all put on their grave faces, whispered
one another; then complained aloud of the vapours, and after
fell into a profound silence.
FAIN. They had a mind to be rid of you.
MIR. For which reason I resolved not to stir. At last the
good old lady broke through her painful taciturnity with an
invective against long visits. I would not have understood her,
but Millamant joining in the argument, I rose, and, with a
constrained smile, told her, I thought nothing was so easy as to
know when a visit began to be troublesome. She reddened, and I
withdrew, without expecting her reply.
FAIN. You were to blame to resent what she spoke only in
compliance with her aunt.
MIR. She is more mistress of herself than to be under the necessity
of such a resignation.
FAIN. What! though half her fortune depends upon her marrying with
my lady's approbation?
MIR. I was then in such a humour, that I should have been better
pleased if she had been less discreet,
FAIN. Now, I remember, I wonder not they were weary of you; last
night was one of their cabal nights; they have 'em three times
a-week, and meet by turns at one another's apartments, where
they come together like the coroner's inquest, to sit upon the
murdered reputations of the week. You and I are excluded; and it
was once proposed that all the male sex should be excepted; but
somebody moved that, to avoid scandal, there might be one man of
the community; upon which motion Witwoud and Petulant were
enrolled members.
MIR. And who may have been the foundress of this sect? My Lady
Wishfort, I warrant, who publishes her detestation of mankind;
and full of the vigour of fifty-five, declares for a friend and
ratafia; and let posterity shift for itself, she'll breed no
more.
FAIN. The discovery of your sham addresses to her, to conceal your
love to her niece, has provoked this separation; had you
dissembled better, things might have continued in the state of
nature.
MIR. I did as much as man could, with any reasonable conscience; I
proceeded to the very last act of flattery with her, and was
guilty of a song in her commendation. Nay, I got a friend to put
her into a lampoon, and compliment her with the imputation of an
affair with a young fellow, which I carried so far, that I told
her the malicious town took notice that she was grown fat of a
sudden; and when she lay in of a dropsy, persuaded her she was
reported to be in labour. The devil's in't, if an old woman is
to be flattered further, unless a man should endeavour downright
personally to debauch her; and that my virtue forbade me. But
for the discovery of this amour I am indebted to your friend, or
your wife's friend, Mrs. Marwood.
FAIN. What should provoke her to be your enemy, unless she has made
you advances which you have slighted? Women do not easily
forgive omissions of that nature.
MIR. She was always civil to me till of late.- I confess I am not
one of those coxcombs who are apt to interpret a woman's good
manners to her prejudice, and think that she who does not refuse
'em everything, can refuse 'em nothing.
FAIN. You are a gallant man, Mirabell; and though you may have
cruelty enough not to satisfy a lady's longing, you have too
much generosity not to be tender of her honour. Yet you speak
with an indifference which seems to be affected, and confesses
you are conscious of a negligence.
MIR. You pursue the argument with a distrust that seems to be
unaffected, and confesses you are conscious of a concern for
which the lady is more indebted to you than is your wife.
FAIN. Fy, fy, friend! if you grow censorious I must leave you.- I'll
look upon the gamesters in the next room.
MIR. Who are they?
FAIN. Petulant and Witwoud.- [To BETTY.] Bring me some chocolate.
[Exit.
MIR. Betty, what says your clock?
BET. Turned of the last canonical hour, sir. [Exit.
MIR. How pertinently the jade answers me!- [Looking on his
watch.]- Ha! almost one o'clock!- O, y'are come!
-
Enter Footman.
-
Well, is the grand affair over? You have been something tedious.
FOOT. Sir, there's such coupling at Pancras, that they stand behind
one another, as 'twere in a country dance. Ours was the last
couple to lead up; and no hopes appearing of despatch; besides,
the parson growing hoarse, we were afraid his lungs would have
failed before it came to our turn; so we drove round to
Duke's-place; and there they were rivetted in a trice.
MIR. So, so, you are sure they are married.
FOOT. Married and bedded, sir; I am witness.
MIR. Have you the certificate?
FOOT. Here it is, sir.
MIR. Has the tailor brought Waitwell's clothes home, and the new
liveries?
FOOT. Yes, sir.
MIR. That's well. Do you go home again, d'ye hear, and adjourn the
consummation till further orders. Bid Waitwell shake his ears,
and Dame Partlet rustle up her feathers, and meet me at one
o'clock by Rosamond's Pond, that I may see her before she
returns to her lady; and as you tender your ears be secret.
[Exeunt.
SCENE II
The same
-
MIRABELL, FAINALL, and BETTY.
-
FAIN. Joy of your success, Mirabell; you look pleased.
MIR. Ay; I have been engaged in a matter of some sort of mirth,
which is not yet ripe for discovery. I am glad this is not a
cabal night. I wonder, Fainall, that you who are married, and
of consequence should be discreet, will suffer your wife to be
of such a party.
FAIN. Faith, I am not jealous. Besides, most who are engaged are
women and relations; and for the men, they are of a kind too
contemptible to give scandal.
MIR. I am of another opinion. The greater the coxcomb, always the
more the scandal: for a woman, who is not a fool, can have but
one reason for associating with a man who is one.
FAIN. Are you jealous as often as you see Witwoud entertained by
Millamant?
MIR. Of her understanding I am, if not of her person.
FAIN. You do her wrong; for, to give her her due, she has wit.
MIR. She has beauty enough to make any man think so; and
complaisance enough not to contradict him who shall tell her so.
FAIN. For a passionate lover, methinks you are a man somewhat too
discerning in the failings of your mistress.
MIR. And for a discerning man, somewhat too passionate a lover; for
I like her with all her faults; nay, like her for her faults.
Her follies are so natural, or so artful, that they become her;
and those affectations which in another woman would be odious,
serve but to make her more agreeable. I'll tell thee, Fainall,
she once used me with that insolence, that in revenge I took her
to pieces; sifted her, and separated her failings; I studied
'em, and got 'em by rote. The catalogue was so large, that I was
not without hopes one day or other to hate her heartily: to
which end I so used myself to think of 'em, that at length,
contrary to my design and expectation, they gave me every hour
less and less disturbance; till in a few days it became habitual
to me to remember 'em without being displeased. They are now
grown as familiar to me as my own frailties; and in all
probability, in a little time longer, I shall like 'em as well.
FAIN. Marry her, marry her! be half as well acquainted with her
charms, as you are with her defects, and my life on't, you are
your own man again.
MIR. Say you so?
FAIN. Ay, ay, I have experience: I have a wife, and so forth.
-
Enter Messenger.
-
MES. Is one Squire Witwoud here?
BET. Yes, what's your business?
MES. I have a letter for him, from his brother Sir Wilfull, which I
am charged to deliver into his own hands.
BET. He's in the next room, friend- that way.
[Exit Messenger.
MIR. What, is the chief of that noble family in town, Sir Wilfull
Witwoud?
FAIN. He is expected to-day. Do you know him?
MIR. I have seen him. He promises to be an extraordinary person; I
think you have the honour to be related to him.
FAIN. Yes; he is half brother to this Witwoud by a former wife, who
was sister to my Lady Wishfort, my wife's mother. If you marry
Millamant, you must call cousins too.
MIR. I had rather be his relation than his acquaintance.
FAIN. He comes to town in order to equip himself for travel.
MIR. For travel! why, the man that I mean is above forty.
FAIN. No matter for that; 'tis for the honour of England,
that all Europe should know we have blockheads of all ages.
MIR. I wonder there is not an act of parliament to save the credit
of the nation, and prohibit the exportation of fools.
FAIN. By no means; 'tis better as 'tis. 'Tis better to trade with a
little loss, than to be quite eaten up with being over-stocked.
MIR. Pray, are the follies of this knight-errant, and those of the
squire his brother, anything related?
FAIN. Not at all; Witwoud grows by the knight, like a medlar grafted
on a crab. One will melt in your mouth, and t'other set your
teeth on edge; one is all pulp, and the other all core.
MIR. So one will be rotten before he be ripe, and the other will be
rotten without ever being ripe at all.
FAIN. Sir Wilfull is an odd mixture of bashfulness and obstinacy.-
But when he's drunk he's as loving as the monster in the
Tempest, and much after the same manner. To give t'other his
due, he has something of good-nature, and does not always want
wit.
MIR. Not always: but as often as his memory fails him, and his
common-place of comparisons. He is a fool with a good memory,
and some few scraps of other folks' wit. He is one whose
conversation can never be approved, yet it is now and then to
be endured. He has indeed one good quality, he is not
exceptious; for he so passionately affects the reputation of
understanding raillery, that he will construe an affront into a
jest; and call downright rudeness and ill language, satire and
fire.
FAIN. If you have a mind to finish his picture, you have an
opportunity to do it at full length. Behold the original!
-
Enter WITWOUD.
-
WIT. Afford me your compassion, my dears! pity me, Fainall!
Mirabell, pity me!
MIR. I do from my soul.
FAIN. Why, what's the matter?
WIT. No letters for me, Betty?
BET. Did not a messenger bring you one but now, sir?
WIT. Ay, but no other?
BET. No, sir.
WIT. That's hard, that's very hard.- A messenger! a mule, a beast
of burden! he has brought me a letter from the fool my brother,
as heavy as a panegyric in a funeral sermon, or a copy of
commendatory verses from one poet to another: and what's worse,
'tis as sure a forerunner of the author, as an epistle
dedicatory.
MIR. A fool, and your brother, Witwoud!
WIT. Ay, ay, my half brother. My half brother he is, no nearer upon
honour.
MIR. Then 'tis possible he may be but half a fool.
WIT. Good, good, Mirabell, le drole! good, good; hang him, don't
let's talk of him.- Fainall, how does your lady? Gad, I say
anything in the world to get this fellow out of my head. I beg
pardon that I should ask a man of pleasure, and the town, a
question at once so foreign and domestic. But I talk like an old
maid at a marriage; I don't know what I say: but she's the best
woman in the world.
FAIN. 'Tis well you don't know what you say, or else your
commendation would go near to make me either vain or jealous.
WIT. No man in town lives well with a wife but Fainall.- Your
judgment, Mirabell.
MIR. You had better step and ask his wife, if you would be credibly
informed.
WIT. Mirabell?
MIR. Ay.
WIT. My dear, I ask ten thousand pardons;- gad, I have forgot what
I was going to say to you!
MIR. I thank you heartily, heartily.
WIT. No, but prithee excuse me:- my memory is such a memory.
MIR. Have a care of such apologies, Witwoud; for I never knew a fool
but he affected to complain, either of the spleen or his memory.
FAIN. What have you done with Petulant?
WIT. He's reckoning his money- my money it was.- I have no luck
to-day.
FAIN. You may allow him to win of you at play: for you are sure to
be too hard for him at repartee; since you monopolise the wit
that is between you, the fortune must be his of course.
MIR. I don't find that Petulant confesses the superiority of wit to
be your talent, Witwoud.
WIT. Come, come, you are malicious now, and would breed debates.-
Petulant's my friend, and a very honest fellow, and a very
pretty fellow, and has a smattering- faith and troth, a pretty
deal of an odd sort of a small wit: nay, I'll do him justice.
I'm his friend, I won't wrong him neither.- And if he had any
judgment in the world, he would not be altogether contemptible.
Come, come, don't detract from the merits of my friend.
FAIN. You don't take your friend to be over-nicely bred?
WIT. No, no, hang him, the rogue has no manners at all, that I must
own:- no more breeding than a bum-bailiff, that I grant you:-
'tis pity, faith; the fellow has fire and life.
MIR. What, courage?
WIT. Hum, faith I don't know as to that, I can't say as to that-
Yes, faith, in a controversy, he'll contradict anybody.
MIR. Though 'twere a man whom he feared, or a woman whom he loved.
WIT. Well, well, he does not always think before he speaks;- we have
all our failings: you are too hard upon him, you are, faith. Let
me excuse him- I can defend most of his faults, except one or
two: one he has, that's the truth on't; if he were my brother,
I could not acquit him:- that, indeed, I could wish were
otherwise.
MIR. Ay, marry, what's that, Witwoud?
WIT. O pardon me!- expose the infirmities of my friend!- No, my
dear, excuse me there.
FAIN. What, I warrant he's unsincere, or 'tis some such trifle.
WIT. No, no; what if he be? 'tis no matter for that, his wit will
excuse that: a wit should no more be sincere, than a woman
constant; one argues a decay of parts, as t'other of beauty.
MIR. Maybe you think him too positive?
WIT. No, no, his being positive is an incentive to argument, and
keeps up conversation.
FAIN. Too illiterate?
WIT. That! that's his happiness:- his want of learning gives him
the more opportunities to show his natural parts.
MIR. He wants words?
WIT. Ay: but I like him for that now; for his want of words gives me
the pleasure very often to explain his meaning.
FAIN. He's impudent?
WIT. No, that's not it.
MIR. Vain?
WIT. No.
MIR. What! he speaks unseasonable truths sometimes, because be has
not wit enough to invent an evasion?
WIT. Truths! ha! ha! ha! no, no; since you will have it,- I mean, he
never speaks truth at all,- that's all. He will lie like a
chambermaid, or a woman of quality's porter. Now that is a
fault.
-
Enter Coachman.
-
COACH. Is Master Petulant here, mistress?
BET. Yes.
COACH. Three gentlewomen in a coach would speak with him.
FAIN. O brave Petulant! three!
BET. I'll tell him.
COACH. You must bring two dishes of chocolate and a glass of
cinnamon-water. [Exeunt BETTY and Coachman.
WIT. That should be for two fasting strumpets, and a bawd troubled
with the wind. Now you may know what the three are.
MIR. You are very free with your friend's acquaintance.
WIT. Ay, ay, friendship without freedom is as dull as love without
enjoyment, or wine without toasting. But to tell you a secret,
these are trulls whom he allows coach-hire, and something more,
by the week, to call on him once a-day at public places.
MIR. How!
WIT. You shall see he won't go to 'em, because there's no more
company here to take notice of him.- Why this is nothing to what
he used to do:- before he found out this way, I have known him
call for himself.
FAIN. Call for himself! what dost thou mean?
WIT. Mean! why he would slip you out of this chocolate-house, just
when you had been talking to him- as soon as your back was
turned- whip he was gone!- then trip to his lodging, clap on a
hood and scarf, and a mask, slap into a hackney-coach, and drive
hither to the door again in a trice, where he would send in for
himself; that I mean, call for himself, wait for himself; nay,
and what's more, not finding himself, sometimes leave a letter
for himself.
MIR. I confess this is something extraordinary.- I believe he waits
for himself now, he is so long a-coming: Oh! I ask his pardon.
-
Enter PETULANT and BETTY.
-
BET. Sir, the coach stays.
PET. Well, well;- I come.- 'Sbud, a man had as good be a professed
midwife, as a professed whoremaster, at this rate! to be knocked
up and raised at all hours, and in all places. Pox on 'em, I
won't come!- D'ye hear, tell 'em I won't come:- let 'em snivel
and cry their hearts out.
FAIN. You are very cruel, Petulant.
PET. All's one, let it pass:- I have a humour to be cruel.
MIR. I hope they are not persons of condition that you use at this
rate.
PET. Condition! condition's a dried fig, if I am not in humour!- By
this hand, if they were your- a- a- your what d'ye-call-'ems
themselves, they must wait or rub off, if I want appetite.
MIR. What d'ye-call-'ems! what are they, Witwoud?
WIT. Empresses, my dear:- by your what-d'ye-call-'ems he means
sultana queens.
PET. Ay, Roxolanas.
MIR. Cry you mercy!
FAIN. Witwoud says they are-
PET. What does he say th'are?
WIT. I? fine ladies, I say.
PET. Pass on, Witwoud.- Hark'ee, by this light his relations:-
two co-heiresses his cousins, and an old aunt, who loves
caterwauling better than a conventicle.
WIT. Ha! ha! ha! I had a mind to see how the rogue would come off.-
Ha! ha! ha! gad, I can't be angry with him, if he had said they
were my mother and my sisters.
MIR. No!
WIT. No; the rogue's wit and readiness of invention charm me. Dear
Petulant.
BET. They are gone, sir, in great anger.
PET. Enough, let 'em trundle. Anger helps complexion, saves paint.
FAIN. This continence is all dissembled; this is in order to have
something to brag of the next time he makes court to Millamant,
and swear he has abandoned the whole sex for her sake.
MIR. Have you not left off your impudent pretensions there yet? I
shall cut your throat some time or other, Petulant, about that
business.
PET. Ay, ay, let that pass- there are other throats to be cut.
MIR. Meaning mine, sir?
PET. Not I- I mean nobody- I know nothing:- but there are uncles and
nephews in the world- and they may be rivals- what then! all's
one for that.
MIR. How! hark'ee, Petulant, come hither:- explain, or I shall call
your interpreter.
PET. Explain! I know nothing.- Why, you have an uncle, have you not,
lately come to town, and lodges by my Lady Wishfort's?
MIR. True.
PET. Why, that's enough- you and he are not friends; and if he
should marry and have a child, you may be disinherited, ha?
MIR. Where hast thou stumbled upon all this truth?
PET. All's one for that, why then say I know something.
MIR. Come, thou art an honest fellow, Petulant, and shalt make love
to my mistress, thou sha't, faith. What hast thou heard of my
uncle?
PET. I? nothing I. If throats are to be cut, let swords clash!
snug's the word, I shrug and am silent.
MIR. Oh, raillery, raillery! Come, I know thou art in the women's
secrets.- What, you're a cabalist; I know you stayed at
Millamant's last night, after I went. Was there any mention made
of my uncle or me? tell me. If thou hadst but good-nature equal
to thy wit, Petulant, Tony Witwoud, who is now thy competitor in
fame, would show as dim by thee as a dead whiting's eye by a
pearl of orient; he would no more be seen by thee, than Mercury
is by the sun. Come, I'm sure thou wo't tell me.
PET. If I do, will you grant me common sense then for the future?
MIR. Faith, I'll do what I can for thee, and I'll pray that Heaven
may grant it thee in the meantime.
PET. Well, hark'ee. [MIRABELL and PETULANT talk apart.
FAIN. Petulant and you both will find Mirabell as warm a rival as a
lover.
WIT. Pshaw! pshaw! that she laughs at Petulant is plain. And for my
part, but that it is almost a fashion to admire her, I should-
hark'ee- to tell you a secret, but let it go no further- between
friends, I shall never break my heart for her.
FAIN. How!
WIT. She's handsome; but she's a sort of an uncertain woman.
FAIN. I thought you had died for her.
WIT. Umh- no-
FAIN. She has wit.
WIT. 'Tis what she will hardly allow anybody else:- now, demme, I
should hate that, if she were as handsome as Cleopatra. Mirabell
is not so sure of her as he thinks for.
FAIN. Why do you think so?
WIT. We stayed pretty late there last night, and heard something of
an uncle to Mirabell, who is lately come to town- and is between
him and the best part of his estate. Mirabell and he are at some
distance, as my Lady Wishfort has been told; and you know she
hates Mirabell worse than a quaker hates a parrot, or than a
fishmonger hates a hard frost. Whether this uncle has seen Mrs.
Millamant or not, I cannot say, but there were items of such a
treaty being in embryo; and if it should come to life, poor
Mirabell would be in some sort unfortunately fobbed, i'faith.
FAIN. 'Tis impossible Millamant should hearken to it.
WIT. Faith, my dear, I can't tell; she's a woman, and a kind of
humourist.
MIR. And this is the sum of what you could collect last night?
PET. The quintessence. Maybe Witwoud knows more, he staid longer:-
besides, they never mind him; they say anything before him.
MIR. I thought you had been the greatest favourite.
PET. Ay, tete-a-tete, but not in public, because I make remarks.
MIR. You do?
PET. Ay, ay; pox, I'm malicious, man! Now he's soft you know; they
are not in awe of him- the fellow's well-bred; he's what you
call a what-d'ye-call-'em, a fine gentleman; but he's silly
withal.
MIR. I thank you, I know as much as my curiosity requires.
Fainall, are you for the Mall?
FAIN. Ay, I'll take a turn before dinner.
WIT. Ay, we'll walk in the Park; the ladies talked of being there.
MIR. I thought you were obliged to watch for your brother Sir
Wilfull's arrival.
WIT. No, no; he comes to his aunt's, my lady Wishfort. Pox on him! I
shall be troubled with him too; what shall I do with the fool?
PET. Beg him for his estate, that I may beg you afterwards: and so
have but one trouble with you both.
WIT. O rare Petulant! thou art as quick as fire in a frosty morning;
thou shalt to the Mall with us, and we'll be very severe.
PET. Enough, I'm in a humour to be severe.
MIR. Are you? pray then walk by yourselves: let not us be accessory
to your putting the ladies out of countenance with your
senseless ribaldry, which you roar out aloud as often as they
pass by you; and when you have made a handsome woman blush, then
you think you have been severe.
PET. What, what! then let 'em either show their innocence by not
understanding what they hear, or else show their discretion by
not hearing what they would not be thought to understand.
MIR. But hast not thou then sense enough to know that thou oughtest
to be most ashamed thyself, when thou hast put another out of
countenance?
PET. Not I, by this hand!- I always take blushing either for a sign
of guilt, or ill-breeding.
MIR. I confess you ought to think so. You are in the right, that you
may plead the error of your judgment in defence of your
practice.
-
Where modesty's ill-manners, 'tis but fit
That impudence and malice pass for wit.
[Exeunt.
ACT THE SECOND
SCENE I
St. James's Park
-
MRS. FAINALL and MRS. MARWOOD.
-
MRS. FAIN. Ay, ay, dear Marwood, if we will be happy, we must find
the means in ourselves, and among ourselves. Men are ever in
extremes; either doating or averse. While they are lovers, if
they have fire and sense, their jealousies are insupportable;
and when they cease to love (we ought to think at least) they
loath; they look upon us with horror and distaste; they meet us
like the ghosts of what we were, and as such, fly from us.
MRS. MAR. True, 'tis an unhappy circumstance of life, that love
should ever die before us; and that the man so often should
outlive the lover. But say what you will, 'tis better to be
left, than never to have been loved. To pass our youth in dull
indifference, to refuse the sweets of life because they once
must leave us, is as preposterous as to wish to have been born
old, because we one day must be old. For my part, my youth may
wear and waste, but it shall never rust in my possesion.
MRS. FAIN. Then it seems you dissemble an aversion to mankind, only
in compliance to my mother's humour?
MRS. MAR. Certainly. To be free; I have no taste of those insipid
dry discourses, with which our sex of force must entertain
themselves, apart from men. We may affect endearments to each
other, profess eternal friendships, and seem to doat like
lovers; but 'tis not in our natures long to persevere. Love will
resume his empire in our breasts; and every heart, or soon or
late, receive and re-admit him as its lawful tyrant.
MRS. FAIN. Bless me, how have I been deceived! why you profess a
libertine.
MRS. MAR. You see my friendship by my freedom. Come, be sincere,
acknowledge that your sentiments agree with mine.
MRS. FAIN. Never!
MRS. MAR. You hate mankind?
MRS. FAIN. Heartily, inveterately.
MRS. MAR. Your husband?
MRS. FAIN. Most transcendently; ay, though I say it, meritoriously.
MRS. MAR. Give me your hand upon it.
MRS. FAIN. There
MRS. MAR. I join with you; what I have said has been to try you.
MRS. FAIN. Is it possible? dost thou hate those vipers, men?
MRS. MAR. I have done hating 'em, and am now come to despise 'em;
the next thing I have to do, is eternally to forget 'em.
MRS. FAIN. There spoke the spirit of an Amazon, a Penthesilea!
MRS. MAR. And yet I am thinking sometimes to carry my aversion
further.
MRS. FAIN. How?
MRS. MAR. Faith, by marrying; if I could but find one that loved me
very well, and would be thoroughly sensible of ill usage, I
think I should do myself the violence of undergoing the
ceremony.
MRS. FAIN. You would not make him a cuckold?
MRS. MAR. No; but I'd make him believe I did, and that's as bad.
MRS. FAIN. Why, had not you as good do it?
MRS. MAR. Oh! if be should ever discover it, he would then know the
worst, and be out of his pain; but I would have him ever to
continue upon the rack of fear and jealousy.
MRS. FAIN. Ingenious mischief! would thou wert married to Mirabell.
MRS. MAR. Would I were!
MRS. FAIN. You change colour.
MRS. MAR. Because I hate him.
MRS. FAIN. So do I; but I can hear him named. But what reason have
you to hate him in particular?
MRS. MAR. I never loved him; he is, and always was, insufferably
proud.
MRS. FAIN. By the reason you give for your aversion, one would think
it dissembled; for you have laid a fault to his charge, of which
his enemies must acquit him.
MRS. MAR. Oh then, it seems, you are one of his favourable enemies!
Methinks you look a little pale, and now you flush again.
MRS. FAIN. Do I? I think I am a little sick o' the sudden.
MRS. MAR. What ails you?
MRS. FAIN. My husband. Don't you see him? He turned short upon me
unawares, and has almost overcome me.
-
Enter FAINALL and MIRABELL.
-
MRS. MAR. Ha! ha! ha! he comes opportunely for you.
MRS. FAIN. For you, for he has brought Mirabell with him.
FAIN. My dear!
MRS. FAIN. My soul!
FAIN. You don't look well to-day, child.
MRS. FAIN. D'ye think so?
MIR. He is the only man that does, madam.
MRS. FAIN. The only man that would tell me so at least; and the only
man from whom I could hear it without mortification.
FAIN. O my dear, I am satisfied of your tenderness; I know you
cannot resent anything from me; especially what is an effect of
my concern.
MRS. FAIN. Mr. Mirabell, my mother interrupted you in a pleasant
relation last night; I would fain hear it out.
MIR. The persons concerned in that affair have yet a tolerable
reputation.- I am afraid Mr. Fainall will be censorious.
MRS. FAIN. He has a humour more prevailing than his curiosity, and
will willingly dispense with the hearing of one scandalous
story, to avoid giving an occasion to make another by being seen
to walk with his wife. This way, Mr. Mirabell, and I dare
promise you will oblige us both.
[Exeunt Mrs. FAINALL and MIRABELL.
FAIN. Excellent creature! Well, sure if I should live to be rid of
my wife, I should be a miserable man.
MRS. MAR. Ay!
FAIN. For having only that one hope, the accomplishment of it, of
consequence, must put an end to all my hopes; and what a wretch
is he who must survive his hopes! Nothing remains when that day
comes, but to sit down and weep like Alexander, when he wanted
other worlds to conquer.
MRS. MAR. Will you not follow 'em?
FAIN. Faith, I think not.
MRS. MAR. Pray let us; I have a reason.
FAIN. You are not jealous?
MRS. MAR. Of whom?
FAIN. Of Mirabell.
MRS. MAR. If I am, is it inconsistent with my love to you that I am
tender of your honour?
FAIN. You would intimate, then, as if there were a fellow-feeling
between my wife and him.
MRS. MAR. I think she does not hate him to that degree she would be
thought.
FAIN. But he, I fear, is too insensible.
MRS. MAR. It may be you are deceived.
FAIN. It may be so. I do now begin to apprehend it.
MRS. MAR. What?
FAIN. That I have been deceived, madam, and you are false.
MRS. MAR. That I am false! what mean you?
FAIN. To let you know I see through all your little arts.- Come, you
both love him; and both have equally dissembled your aversion.
Your mutual jealousies of one another have made you clash till
you have both struck fire. I have seen the warm confession
reddening on your cheeks, and sparkling from your eyes.
MRS. MAR. You do me wrong.
FAIN. I do not. 'Twas for my ease to oversee and wilfully neglect
the gross advances made him by my wife; that by permitting her
to be engaged, I might continue unsuspected in my pleasures; and
take you oftener to my arms in full security. But could you
think, because the nodding husband would not wake, that e'er the
watchful lover slept?
MRS. MAR. And wherewithal can you reproach me?
FAIN. With infidelity, with loving another, with love of Mirabell.
MRS. MAR. 'Tis false! I challenge you to show an instance that can
confirm your groundless accusation. I hate him.
FAIN. And wherefore do you hate him? he is insensible, and your
resentment follows his neglect. An instance! the injuries you
have done him are a proof: your interposing in his love. What
cause had you to make discoveries of his pretended passion? to
undeceive the credulous aunt, and be the officious obstacle of
his match with Millamant?
MRS. MAR. My obligations to my lady urged me; I had professed a
friendship to her; and could not see her easy nature so abused
by that dissembler.
FAIN. What, was it conscience then? Professed a friendship! O the
pious friendships of the female sex!
MRS. MAR. More tender, more sincere, and more enduring, than all the
vain and empty vows of men, whether professing love to us, or
mutual faith to one another.
FAIN. Ha! ha! ha! you are my wife's friend too.
MRS. MAR. Shame and ingratitude! do you reproach me? you, you
upbraid me? Have I been false to her, through strict fidelity to
you, and sacrificed my friendship to keep my love inviolate? And
have you the baseness to charge me with the guilt, unmindful of
the merit? To you it should be meritorious, that I have been
vicious: and do you reflect that guilt upon me, which should lie
buried in your bosom?
FAIN. You misinterpret my reproof. I meant but to remind you of the
slight account you once could make of strictest ties, when set
in competition with your love to me.
MRS. MAR. 'Tis false, you urged it with deliberate malice! 'twas
spoken in scorn, and I never will forgive it.
FAIN. Your guilt, not your resentment, begets your rage. If yet you
loved, you could forgive a jealousy: but you are stung to find
you are discovered.
MRS. MAR. It shall be all discovered. You too shall be discovered;
be sure you shall. I can but be exposed.- If I do it myself I
shall prevent your baseness.
FAIN. Why, what will you do?
MRS. MAR. Disclose it to your wife; own what has passed between us.
FAIN. Frenzy!
MRS. MAR. By all my wrongs I'll do't!- I'll publish to the world the
injuries you have done me, both in my fame and fortune! With
both I trusted you, you bankrupt in honour, as indigent of
wealth.
FAIN. Your fame I have preserved: your fortune has been bestowed as
the prodigality of your love would have it, in pleasures which
we both have shared. Yet, had not you been false, I had ere this
repaid it- 'tis true- had you permitted Mirabell with Millamant
to have stolen their marriage, my lady had been incensed beyond
all means of reconcilement: Millamant had forfeited the moiety
of her fortune; which then would have descended to my wife;- and
wherefore did I marry, but to make lawful prize of a rich
widow's wealth, and squander it on love and you?
MRS. MAR. Deceit and frivolous pretence!
FAIN. Death, am I not married? What's pretence? Am I not imprisoned,
fettered? Have I not a wife? nay a wife that was a widow, a
young widow, a handsome widow; and would be again a widow, but
that I have a heart of proof, and something of a constitution to
bustle through the ways of wedlock and this world! Will you yet
be reconciled to truth and me?
MRS. MAR. Impossible. Truth and you are inconsistent: I hate you,
and shall for ever.
FAIN. For loving you?
MRS. MAR. I loathe the name of love after such usage; and next to
the guilt with which you would asperse me, I scorn you most.
Farewell!
FAIN. Nay, we must not part thus.
MRS. MAR. Let me go.
FAIN. Come, I'm sorry.
MRS. MAR. I care not- let me go- break my hands, do- I'd leave 'em
to get loose.
FAIN. I would not hurt you for the world. Have I no other hold to
keep you here?
MRS. MAR. Well, I have deserved it all.
FAIN. You know I love you.
MRS. MAR. Poor dissembling!- O that- well, it is not yet-
FAIN. What? what is it not? what is it not yet? It is not yet too
late-
MRS. MAR. No, it is not yet too late;- I have that comfort.
FAIN. It is, to love another.
MRS. MAR. But not to loathe, detest, abhor mankind, myself, and the
whole treacherous world.
FAIN. Nay, this is extravagance.- Come, I ask your pardon- no tears-
I was to blame, I could not love you and be easy in my doubts.
Pray forbear- I believe you; I'm convinced I've done you wrong;
and any way, every way will make amends. I'll hate my wife yet
more, damn her! I'll part with her, rob her of all she's worth,
and we'll retire somewhere, anywhere, to another world. I'll
marry thee- be pacified.- 'Sdeath, they come, hide your face,
your tears;- you have a mask, wear it a moment. This way, this
way- be persuaded. [Exeunt.
SCENE II
The same
-
MIRABELL and Mrs. FAINALL.
-
MRS. FAIN. They are here yet.
MIR. They are turning into the other walk.
MRS. FAIN. While I only hated my husband, I could bear to see him;
but since I have despised him, he's too offensive.
MIR. O you should hate with prudence.
MRS. FAIN. Yes, for I have loved with indiscretion.
MIR. You should have just so much disgust for your husband, as may
be sufficient to make you relish your lover.
MRS. FAIN. You have been the cause that I have loved without bounds,
and would you set limits to that aversion of which you have been
the occasion? why did you make me marry this man?
MIR. Why do we daily commit disagreeable and dangerous actions? to
save that idol, reputation. If the familiarities of our loves
had produced that consequence of which you were apprehensive,
where could you have fixed a father's name with credit, but on
a husband? I knew Fainall to be a man lavish of his morals, an
interested and professing friend, a false and a designing lover;
yet one whose wit and outward fair behaviour have gained a
reputation with the town enough to make that woman stand excused
who has suffered herself to be won by his addresses. A better
man ought not to have been sacrificed to the occasion; a worse
had not answered to the purpose. When you are weary of him you
know your remedy.
MRS. FAIN. I ought to stand in some degree of credit with you,
Mirabell.
MIR. In justice to you, I have made you privy to my whole design,
and put it in your power to ruin or advance my fortune.
MRS. FAIN. Whom have you instructed to represent your pretended
uncle?
MIR. Waitwell, my servant.
MRS. FAIN. He is an humble servant to Foible my mother's woman, and
may win her to your interest.
MIR. Care is taken for that- she is won and worn by this time. They
were married this morning.
MRS. FAIN. Who?
MIR. Waitwell and Foible. I would not tempt my servant to betray me
by trusting him too far. If your mother, in hopes to ruin me,
should consent to marry my pretended uncle, he might, like Mosca
in the Fox, stand upon terms; so I made him sure beforehand.
MRS. FAIN. So if my poor mother is caught in a contract, you will
discover the imposture betimes; and release her by producing a
certificate of her gallant's former marriage?
MIR. Yes, upon condition that she consent to my marriage with her
niece, and surrender the moiety of her fortune in her
possession.
MRS. FAIN. She talked last night of endeavouring at a match between
Millamant and your uncle.
MIR. That was by Foible's direction, and my instruction, that she
might seem to carry it more privately.
MRS. FAIN. Well, I have an opinion of your success; for I believe my
lady will do anything to get a husband; and when she has this,
which you have provided for her, I suppose she will submit to
anything to get rid of him.
MIR. Yes, I think the good lady would marry anything that resembled
a man, though 'twere no more than what a butler could pinch out
of a napkin.
MRS. FAIN. Female frailty! we must all come to it, if we live to be
old, and feel the craving of a false appetite when the true is
decayed.
MIR. An old woman's appetite is depraved like that of a girl- 'tis
the green sickness of a second childhood; and, like the faint
offer of a latter spring, serves but to usher in the fall, and
withers in an affected bloom.
MRS. FAIN. Here's your mistress.
-
Enter Mrs. MILLAMANT, WITWOUD, and MINCING.
-
MIR. Here she comes, i'faith, full sail, with her fan spread and her
streamers out, and a shoal of fools for tenders; ha, no, I cry
her mercy!
MRS. FAIN. I see but one poor empty sculler; and he tows her woman
after him.
MIR. [To Mrs. MILLAMANT.] You seem to be unattended, madam- you used
to have the beau monde throng after you; and a flock of gay fine
perukes hovering round you.
WIT. Like moths about a candle.- I had like to have lost my
comparison for want of breath.
MRS. MIL. O I have denied myself airs to-day, I have walked as fast
through the crowd.
WIT. As a favourite just disgraced; and with as few followers.
MRS. MIL. Dear Mr. Witwoud, truce with your similitudes; for I'm as
sick of 'em-
WIT. As a physician of a good air.- I cannot help it, madam, though
'tis against myself.
MRS. MIL. Yet, again! Mincing, stand between me and his wit.
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?
MRS. MIL. Long! Lord, 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 similitudes.- No, you met her husband,
and did not ask him for her.
MRS. MIL. By your leave, Witwoud, 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.
MRS. FAIN. You were dressed before I came abroad.
MRS. MIL. Ay, that's true.- O but then I had- Mincing, what had I?
why was I so long?
MIN. O mem, your la'ship stayed to peruse a packet of letters.
MRS. MIL. O ay, letters- I had letters- I am persecuted with
letters- I hate letters- Nobody knows how to write letters, and
yet one has 'em, 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.
MRS. MIL. Only with those in verse, Mr. Witwoud, I never pin up my
hair with prose.- I think I tried once, Mincing.
MIN. O mem, I shall never forget it.
MRS. MIL. 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 anything, and is so pure and so
crips.
WIT. Indeed, so crips?
MIN. You're such a critic, Mr. Witwoud.
MRS. MIL. 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?
MRS. MIL. 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.
MRS. MIL. Oh I ask you 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've 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.
MRS. MIL. 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!- Lord, 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.
MRS. MIL. 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 the two greatest
pleasures of your life.
MRS. MIL. 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.
MRS. MIL. O fiction!- Fainall, let us leave these men.
MIR. Draw off Witwoud. [Aside to Mrs. FAINALL.
MRS. FAIN. Immediately.- I have a word or two for Mr. Witwoud.
[Exeunt Mrs. FAINALL and WITWOUD.
MIR. 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 secret
to you that concerned my love.
MRS. MIL. You saw I was engaged.
MIR. 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.
MRS. MIL. I please myself:- besides, sometimes to converse with
fools is for my health.
MIR. Your health! is there a worse disease than the conversation of
fools?
MRS. MIL. Yes, the vapours; fools are physic for it, next to
assafoetida.
MIR. You are not in a course of fools?
MRS. MIL. 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.
MIR. Not in our physic, it may be.
MRS. MIL. 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?
MIR. I would give something that you did not know I could not help
it.
MRS. MIL. Come, don't look grave then. Well, what do you say to me?
MIR. I say that a man may as soon make a friend by his wit, or a
fortune by his honesty, as win a woman by plain-dealing and
sincerity.
MRS. MIL. 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.
MIR. You are merry, madam, but I would persuade you for a moment to
be serious.
MRS. MIL. 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 watch-light. 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.
MIR. Can you not find in the variety of your disposition one moment-
MRS. MIL. To hear you tell me Foible's married, and your plot like
to speed;- no.
MIR. But how came you to know it?
MRS. MIL. Without the help of the devil, 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. [Exit.
MIR. I have something more.- Gone!- Think of you? to think of a
whirlwind, though't were in a whirlwind, were a case of more
steady contemplation; a very tranquillity of mind and mansion.
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.- Oh, 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
solacing in lawful delights; 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.
MIR. Give you joy, Mrs. Foible.
FOIB. 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.
MIR. That I believe.
FOIB. But 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 show 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.
MIR. Excellent Foible! matrimony has made you eloquent in love.
WAIT. I think she has profited, sir, I think so.
FOIB. You have seen Madam Millamant, sir?
MIR. Yes.
FOIB. I told her, sir, because I did not know that you might find an
opportunity; she had so much company last night.
MIR. Your diligence will merit more- in the mean time-
[Gives money.
FOIB. O dear sir, your humble servant!
WAIT. Spouse.
MIR. Stand off, sir, not a penny!- Go on and prosper, Foible:- the
lease shall be made good, and the farm stocked, if we succeed.
FOIB. 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'y, Waitwell. [Exit.
WAIT. Sir Rowland, if you please.- The jade's so pert upon her
preferment she forgets herself.
MIR. Come, sir, will you endeavour to forget yourself, and transform
into Sir Rowland?
WAIT. Why, sir, it will be impossible I should remember myself.-
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
me, I'm married, and can't be my own man again.
Ay there's my grief; that's the sad change of life,
To lose my title, and yet keep my wife. [Exeunt.
ACT THE THIRD
SCENE I
A Room in LADY WISHFORT'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, sweetheart?- An arrant ash-colour, as
I am 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, idiot- 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. A pox take you both!- fetch me the cherry-brandy then.
[Exit PEG.] I'm as pale and as faint, I look like Mrs.
Qualm-sick, 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?
-
Re-enter PEG with a bottle and china cup.
-
PEG. Madam, I was looking for a 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.- [Knocking at the door].- See who
that is.- Set down the bottle first- here, here, under the
table.- What, wouldst thou go with the bottle in thy hand, like
a tapster? As I am a person, this wench has lived in an inn upon
the road, before she came to me, like Maritornes the Asturian in
Don Quixote!- No Foible yet?
PEG. No, madam; Mrs. Marwood.
LADY WISH. Oh, Marwood; let her come in.- Come in, good Marwood.
-
Enter Mrs. MARWOOD.
-
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 negotiate 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. O 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. Oh, 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 Prynne, and
"The Short View of the Stage," with Bunyan's works, to entertain
you.- [To PEG.]- Go, you thing, and send her in.
[Exeunt Mrs. MARWOOD and PEG.
-
Enter FOIBLE.
-
LADY WISH. O Foible, where hast thou been? what hast thou been
doing?
FOIB. Madam, I have seen the party.
LADY WISH. But what hast thou done?
FOIB. Nay, 'tis your ladyship has done, and are to do; I have only
promised. But a man so enamoured- so transported!- Well, here it
is, all that is left; all that is not kissed away.- 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?
FOIB. [Aside.] So the devil has been beforehand with me. What shall
I say?- [Aloud.]- 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; 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?
FOIB. 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 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. I'll send for Robin from Locket's
immediately.
FOIB. Poison him! poisoning's too good for him. Starve him, madam,
starve him; marry Sir Rowland, and get him disinherited. Oh you
would bless yourself to hear what he said!
LADY WISH. A villain! superannuated!
FOIB. Humph (says he), I hear you are laying designs against me too
(says he), and Mrs. Millamant is to marry my uncle (he does not
suspect a word of your ladyship); but (says he) I'll fit you for
that. I warrant you (says he) I'll hamper you for that (says
he); you and your old frippery too (says he); I'll handle you-
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.
FOIB. The sooner the better, madam.
LADY WISH. Will Sir Rowland be here, sayest thou? when, Foible?
FOIB. 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; Ill reduce him to frippery and rags! a tatterdemalion!
I hope to see him hung with tatters, like a Long-lane
pent-house or a gibbet thief. A slander-mouthed railer! I
warrant the spendthrift prodigal's in debt as much as the
million lottery, or the whole court upon a birthday. I'll spoil
his credit with his tailor. Yes, he shall have my niece with her
fortune, he shall.
FOIB. He! I hope to see him lodge in Ludgate first, and angle into
Blackfriars 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 economy of face. This wretch has
fretted me that I am absolutely decayed. Look, Foible.
FOIB. Your ladyship has frowned a little too rashly, indeed, madam.
There are some cracks discernible in the white varnish.
LADY WISH. Let me see the glass.- Cracks, sayest thou?- why, I am
errantly 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.
FOIB. 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 Sir Rowland will not fail to come? or
will he not fail when he does come? Will he be importunate,
Foible, and push? 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.
FOIB. A little scorn becomes your ladyship.
LADY WISH. Yes, but tenderness becomes me best- a sort of
dyingness- you see that picture has a sort of a- ha, Foible! a
swimmingness in the eye- yes, I'll look so- my niece 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.
FOIB. By storm, madam, Sir Rowland's a brisk man.
LADY WISH. Is he! O then he'll importune, if he's a brisk man. I
shall save decorums if Sir Rowland importunes. I have a mortal
terror at the apprehension of offending against decorums. O I'm
glad he's a brisk man. Let my things be removed, good Foible.
[Exit.
-
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.
FOIB. 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.
FOIB. 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.
FOIB. 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 choose but be grateful. I find
your ladyship has his heart still. Now, madam, I can safely tell
your ladyship our success; Mrs. Marwood had 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
Welsh maidenhead.
MRS. FAIN. O rare Foible!
FOIB. 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 month's mind; but I
know Mr. Mirabell can't abide her.- John!- [Calls.] 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, lest I should meet
her. [Exeunt.
SCENE II
Lady WISHFORT'S Closet
-
Mrs. MARWOOD.
-
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 passe-partout, a very master-key to everybody's
strong-box. My friend Fainall, have you carried it so
swimmingly? I thought there was something in it; but it seems
'tis 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 month's mind, 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 generosity: 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.- Foible!- [Calls.] 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 choose
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 judgment extremely. On my word, I'll propose it.
-
Enter FOIBLE.
-
LADY WISH. Come, come, Foible- I had forgot my nephew will be here
before dinner:- I must make haste.
FOIB. Mr. Witwoud and Mr. Petulant are come to dine with your
ladyship.
LADY WISH. O dear, I can't appear till I'm dressed.- Dear Marwood,
shall I be free with you again, and beg you to entertain 'em?
I'll make all imaginable haste. Dear friend, excuse me.
[Exeunt.
SCENE III
A Room in Lady WISHFORT'S House
-
Mrs. MARWOOD, Mrs. MILLAMANT, and MINCING.
-
MRS. MIL. Sure never anything was so unbred as that odious man!-
Marwood, your servant.
MRS. MAR. You have a colour; what's the matter?
MRS. MIL. That horrid fellow, Petulant, has provoked me into a
flame:- I have broken my fan.- Mincing, lend me yours; is not
all the powder out of my hair?
MRS. MAR. No. What has he done?
MRS. MIL. Nay, he has done nothing; he has only talked- nay, he has
said nothing neither; but he has contradicted everything that
has been said. For my part, I thought Witwoud and he would have
quarrelled.
MIN. I vow, mem, I thought once they would have fit.
MRS. MIL. Well, 'tis a lamentable thing, I swear, that one has not
the liberty of choosing one's acquaintance as one does one's
clothes.
MRS. MAR. If we had that liberty, we should be as weary of one set
of acquaintance, though never so good, as we are of one suit
though never so fine. A fool and a doily stuff would now and
then find days of grace, and be worn for variety.
MRS. MIL. I could consent to wear 'em, if they would wear alike; but
fools never wear out- they are such drap de Berri things!
without one could give 'em to one's chambermaid after a day or
two.
MRS. MAR. 'Twere better so indeed. Or what think you of the
playhouse? A fine gay glossy fool should be given there, like a
new masking habit, after the masquerade is over, and we have
done with the disguise. For a fool's visit is always a disguise;
and never admitted by a woman of wit, but to blind her affair
with a lover of sense. If you would but appear bare-faced now,
and own Mirabell, you might as easily put off Petulant and
Witwoud as your hood and scarf. And indeed, 'tis time, for the
town has found it; the secret is grown too big for the pretence.
'Tis like Mrs. Primly's great belly; she may lace it down
before, but it burnishes on her hips. Indeed, Millamant, you can
no more conceal it, than my Lady Strammel can her face; that
goodly face, which in defiance of her Rhenish wine tea, will not
be comprehended in a mask.
MRS. MIL. I'll take my death, Marwood, you are more censorious than
a decayed beauty, or a discarded toast.- Mincing, tell the men
they may come up.- My aunt is not dressing here; their folly is
less provoking than your malice. [Exit MINCING.] The town has
found it! what has it found? That Mirabell loves me is no more
a secret, than it is a secret that you discovered it to my aunt,
or than the reason why you discovered it is a secret.
MRS. MAR. You are nettled.
MRS. MIL. You're mistaken. Ridiculous!
MRS. MAR. Indeed, my dear, you'll tear another fan, if you don't
mitigate those violent airs.
MRS. MIL. O silly! ha! ha! ha! I could laugh immoderately. Poor
Mirabell! his constancy to me has quite destroyed his
complaisance for all the world beside. I swear, I never enjoined
it him to be so coy- If I had the vanity to think he would obey
me, I would command him to show more gallantry- 'tis hardly
well-bred to be so particular on one hand, and so insensible on
the other. But I despair to prevail, and so let him follow his
own way. Ha! ha! ha! pardon me, dear creature, I must laugh, ha!
ha! ha! though I grant you 'tis a little barbarous, ha! ha! ha!
MRS. MAR. What pity 'tis so much fine raillery, and delivered with
so significant gesture, should be so unhappily directed to
miscarry!
MRS. MIL. Ha! dear creature, I ask your pardon- I swear I did not
mind you.
MRS. MAR. Mr. Mirabell and you both may think it a thing impossible,
when I shall tell him by telling you-
MRS. MIL. O dear, what? for it is the same thing if I hear it- ha!
ha! ha!
MRS. MAR. That I detest him, hate him, madam.
MRS. MIL. O madam, why so do I- and yet the creature loves me, ha!
ha! ha! how can one forbear laughing to think of it.- I am a
sibyl if I am not amazed to think what he can see in me. I'll
take my death, I think you are handsomer- and within a year or
two as young- if you could but stay for me, I should overtake
you- but that cannot be.- Well, that thought makes me
melancholic.- Now, I'll be sad.
MRS. MAR. Your merry note may be changed sooner than you think.
MRS. MIL. D'ye say so? Then I'm resolved I'll have a song to keep up
my spirits.
-
Re-enter MINCING.
-
MIN. The gentlemen stay but to comb, madam, and will wait on you.
MRS. MIL. Desire Mrs.- that is in the next room to sing the song I
would have learned yesterday.- You shall hear it, madam- not
that there's any great matter in it- but 'tis agreeable to my
humour.
-
SONG
-
Love's but the frailty of the mind,
When 'tis not with ambition joined;
A sickly flame, which, if not fed, expires,
And feeding, wastes in self-consuming fires.
-
'Tis not to wound a wanton boy
Or amorous youth, that gives the joy;
But 'tis the glory to have pierced a swain,
For whom inferior beauties sighed in vain.
-
Then I alone the conquest prize,
When I insult a rival's eyes:
If there's delight in love, 'tis when I see
That heart, which others bleed for, bleed for me.
-
Enter PETULANT and WlTWOUD.
-
MRS. MIL. Is your animosity composed, gentlemen?
WIT. Raillery, raillery, madam; we have no animosity- we hit off a
little wit now and then, but no animosity.- The falling-out of
wits is like the falling out of lovers:- we agree in the main,
like treble and bass.- Ha, Petulant?
PET. Ay, in the main- but when I have a humour to contradict-
WIT. Ay, when he has a humour to contradict, then I contradict too.
What, I know my cue. Then we contradict one another like two
battledores; for contradictions beget one another like Jews.
PET. If he says black's black- if I have a humour to say 'tis blue-
let that pass- all's one for that. If I have a humour to prove
it, it must be granted.
WIT. Not positively must- but it may- it may.
PET. Yes, it positively must, upon proof positive.
WIT. Ay, upon proof positive it must; but upon proof presumptive it
only may.- That's a logical distinction now, madam.
MRS. MAR. I perceive your debates are of importance, and very
learnedly handled.
PET. Importance is one thing, and learning's another, but a debate's
a debate, that I assert.
WIT. Petulant's an enemy to learning; he relies altogether on his
parts.
PET. No, I'm no enemy to learning; it hurts not me.
MRS. MAR. That's a sign indeed it's no enemy to you.
PET. No, no, it's no enemy to anybody but them that have it.
MRS. MIL. Well, an illiterate man's my aversion: I wonder at the
impudence of any illiterate man to offer to make love.
WIT. That I confess I wonder at too.
MRS. MIL. Ah! to marry an ignorant that can hardly read or write!
PET. Why should a man be any further from being married, though he
can't read, than he is from being hanged? The ordinary's paid
for setting the psalm, and the parish-priest for reading the
ceremony. And for the rest which is to follow in both cases, a
man may do it without book- so all's one for that.
MRS. MIL. D'ye hear the creature?- Lord, here's company, I'll be
gone. [Exit.
-
Enter Sir WILFULL WITWOUD in a riding dress,
followed by Footman.
-
WIT. In the name of Bartlemew and his fair, what have we here?
MRS. MAR. 'Tis your brother, I fancy. Don't you know him?
WIT. Not I.- Yes, I think it is he- I've almost forgot him; I have
not seen him since the Revolution.
FOOT. [To Sir WILFULL.] Sir, my lady's dressing. Here's company; if
you please to walk in, in the mean time.
SIR WIL. Dressing! what, it's but morning here, I warrant, with you
in London; we should count it towards afternoon in our parts,
down in Shropshire.- Why then, belike, my aunt han't dined yet,
ha, friend?
FOOT. Your aunt, sir?
SIR WIL. My aunt, sir! yes, my aunt, sir, and your lady, sir; your
lady is my aunt, sir.- Why, what dost thou not know me, friend?
why then send somebody hither that does. How long hast thou
lived with thy lady, fellow, ha?
FOOT. A week, sir; longer than anybody in the house, except my
lady's woman.
SIR WIL. Why then belike thou dost not know thy lady, if thou seest
her, ha, friend?
FOOT. Why, truly, sir, I cannot safely swear to her face in a
morning, before she is dressed. 'Tis like I may give a shrewd
guess at her by this time.
SIR WIL. Well, prithee try what thou canst do; if thou canst not
guess, inquire her out, dost hear, fellow? and tell her, her
nephew, Sir Wilfull Witwoud, is in the house.
FOOT. I shall, sir.
SIR WIL. Hold ye, hear me, friend; a word with you in your ear;
prithee who are these gallants?
FOOT. Really, sir, I can't tell; here come so many here, 'tis hard
to know 'em all. [Exit.
SIR WIL. Oons, this fellow knows less than a starling; I don't
think a' knows his own name.
MRS. MAR. Mr. Witwoud, your brother is not behindhand in
forgetfulness- I fancy he has forgot you too.
WIT. I hope so- the devil take him that remembers first, I say.
SIR WIL. Save you, gentlemen and lady!
MRS. MAR. For shame, Mr. Witwoud; why don't you speak to him?- And
you, sir.
WIT. Petulant, speak.
PET. And you, sir.
SIR WIL. No offence, I hope. [Salutes MRS. MARWOOD.
MRS. MAR. No sure, sir.
WIT. This is a vile dog, I see that already. No offence! ha! ha! ha!
To him; to him, Petulant, smoke him.
PET. It seems as if you had come a journey, sir; hem, hem.
[Surveying him round.
SIR WIL. Very likely, sir, that it may seem so.
PET. No offence, I hope, sir.
WIT. Smoke the boots, the boots; Petulant, the boots: ha! ha! ha!
SIR WIL. May be not, sir; thereafter, as 'tis meant, sir.
PET. Sir, I presume upon the information of your boots.
SIR WIL. Why, 'tis like you may, sir: if you are not satisfied with
the information of my boots, sir, if you will step to the
stable, you may inquire further of my horse, sir.
PET. Your horse, sir! your horse is an ass, sir!
SIR WIL. Do you speak by way of offence, sir?
MRS. MAR. The gentleman's merry, that's all sir.- [Aside.] S'life,
we shall have a quarrel betwixt an horse and an ass before they
find one another out.- [Aloud.] You must not take anything amiss
from your friends, sir. You are among your friends here, though
it may be you don't know it.- If I am not mistaken, you are Sir
Wilfull Witwoud.
SIR WIL. Right, lady; I am Sir Wilfull Witwoud, so I write myself;
no offence to anybody, I hope; and nephew to the Lady Wishfort
of this mansion.
MRS. MAR. Don't you know this gentleman, sir?
SIR WIL. Hum! what, sure 'tis not- yea by'r Lady, but 'tis- s'heart,
I know not whether 'tis or no- yea, but 'tis, by the Wrekin.
Brother Anthony! what Tony, i'faith! what, dost thou not know
me? By'r Lady, nor I thee, thou art so becravated, and so
beperiwigged.- S'heart, why dost not speak? art thou overjoyed?
WIT. Odso, brother, is it you? your servant, brother.
SIR WIL. Your servant! why yours, sir. Your servant again- s'heart,
and your friend and servant to that- and a- and a- flap-dragon
for your service, sir! and a hare's foot and a hare's scut for
your service, sir! an you be so cold and so courtly.
WIT. No offence, I hope, brother.
SIR WIL. S'heart, sir, but there is, and much offence!- A pox, is
this your inns o' court breeding, not to know your friends and
your relations, your elders and your betters?
WIT. Why, brother Wilfull of Salop, you may be as short as a
Shrewsbury-cake, if you please. But I tell you 'tis not modish
to know relations in town: you think you're in the country,
where great lubberly brothers slabber and kiss one another when
they meet, like a call of serjeants- 'tis not the fashion here;
'tis not indeed, dear brother.
SIR WIL. The fashion's a fool; and you're a fop, dear brother.
S'heart, I've suspected this- by'r Lady, I conjectured you were
a fop, since you began to change the style of your letters, and
write on a scrap of paper gilt round the edges, no bigger than a
subpoena. I might expect this when you left off, "Honoured
brother;" and "hoping you are in good health," and so forth- to
begin with a "Rat me, knight, I'm so sick of a last night's
debauch"- 'ods heart, and then tell a familiar tale of a cock
and a bull, and a whore and a bottle, and so conclude.- You
could write news before you were out of your time, when you
lived with honest Pimple Nose the attorney of Furnival's Inn-
you could entreat to be remembered then to your friends round
the Wrekin. We could have gazettes, then, and Dawks's Letter,
and the Weekly Bill, till of late days.
PET. S'life, Witwoud, were you ever an attorney's clerk? of the
family of the Furnival? Ha! ha! ha!
WIT. Ay, ay, but that was but for a while: not long, not long.
Pshaw! I was not in my own power then;- an orphan, and this
fellow was my guardian; ay, ay, I was glad to consent to that,
man, to come to London: he had the disposal of me then. If I had
not agreed to that, I might have been bound 'prentice to a
felt-maker in Shrewsbury; this fellow would have bound me to a
maker of fells.
SIR WIL. S'heart, and better than to be bound to a maker of fops;
where, I suppose, you have served your time; and now you may set
up for yourself.
MRS. MAR. You intend to travel, sir, as I'm informed.
SIR WIL. Belike I may, madam. I may chance to sail upon the salt
seas, if my mind hold.
PET. And the wind serve.
SIR WIL. Serve or not serve, I shan't ask licence of you, sir; nor
the weathercock your companion: I direct my discourse to the
lady, sir.- 'Tis like my aunt may have told you, madam- yes, I
have settled my concerns, I may say now, and am minded to see
foreign parts. If an how that the peace holds, whereby that is,
taxes abate.
MRS. MAR. I thought you had designed for France at all adventures.
SIR WIL. I can't tell that; 'tis like I may, and 'tis like I may
not. I am somewhat dainty in making a resolution- because when
I make it I keep it. I don't stand shill I, shall I, then; if I
say't, I'll do't; but I have thoughts to tarry a small matter in
town, to learn somewhat of your lingo first, before I cross the
seas. I'd gladly have a spice of your French as they say,
whereby to hold discourse in foreign countries.
MRS. MAR. Here's an academy in town for that use.
SIR WIL. There is? 'Tis like there may.
MRS. MAR. No doubt you will return very much improved.
WIT. Yes, refined, like a Dutch skipper from a whale fishing.
-
Enter Lady WISHFORT and FAINALL.
-
LADY WISH. Nephew, you are welcome.
SIR WIL. Aunt, your servant.
FAIN. Sir Wilfull, your most faithful servant.
SIR WIL. Cousin Fainall, give me your hand.
LADY WISH. Cousin Witwoud, your servant; Mr. Petulant, your
servant- nephew, you are welcome again. Will you drink anything
after your journey, nephew; before you eat? dinner's almost
ready.
SIR WIL. I'm very well, I thank you, aunt- however, I thank you for
your courteous offer. S'heart I was afraid you would have been
in the fashion too, and have remembered to have forgot your
relations. Here's your cousin Tony, belike, I mayn't call him
brother for fear of offence.
LADY WISH. O, he's a railleur, nephew- my cousin's a wit: and your
great wits always rally their best friends to choose. When you
have been abroad, nephew, you'll understand raillery better.
[FAINALL and Mrs. MARWOOD talk apart.
SIR WIL. Why then let him hold his tongue in the mean time; and rail
when that day comes.
-
Enter MINCING.
-
MIN. Mem, I am come to acquaint your la'ship that dinner is
impatient.
SIR WIL. Impatient! why then belike it won't stay till I pull off my
boots.- Sweetheart, can you help me to a pair of slippers?- My
man's with his horses, I warrant.
LADY WISH. Fy, fy, nephew! you would not pull off your boots here?-
Go down into the hall- dinner shall stay for you.- My nephew's a
little unbred, you'll pardon him, madam.- Gentlemen, will you
walk?- Marwood-
MRS. MAR. I'll follow you, madam- before Sir Wilfull is ready.
[Exeunt all but Mrs. MARWOOD and FAINALL.
FAIN. Why then, Foible's a bawd, an arrant, rank, matchmaking bawd:
and I, it seems, am a husband, a rank husband; and my wife a
very arrant, rank wife- all in the way of the world. 'Sdeath, to
be a cuckold by anticipation, a cuckold in embryo! sure I was
born with budding antlers, like a young satyr, or a citizen's
child. 'Sdeath! to be out-witted- to be out-jilted-
out-matrimony'd!- If I had kept my speed like a stag, 'twere
somewhat,- but to crawl after, with my horns, like a snail, and
be outstripped by my wife- 'tis scurvy wedlock.
MRS. MAR. Then shake it off you have often wished for an opportunity
to part- and now you have it. But first prevent their plot- the
half of Millamant's fortune is too considerable to be parted
with, to a foe, to Mirabell.
FAIN. Damn him! that had been mine- had you not made that fond
discovery- that had been forfeited, had they been married. My
wife had added lustre to my horns by that increase of fortune;
I could have worn 'em tipped with gold, though my forehead had
been furnished like a deputy-lieutenant's hall.
MRS. MAR. They may prove a cap of maintenance to you still, if you
can away with your wife. And she's no worse than when you had
her- I dare swear she had given up her game before she was
married.
FAIN. Hum! that may be.
MRS. MAR. You married her to keep you; and if you can contrive to
have her keep you better than you expected, why should you not
keep her longer than you intended.
FAIN. The means, the means.
MRS. MAR. Discover to my lady your wife's conduct; threaten to part
with her!- my lady loves her, and will come to any composition
to save her reputation. Take the opportunity of breaking it,
just upon the discovery of this imposture. My lady will be
enraged beyond bounds, and sacrifice niece, and fortune, and
all, at that conjuncture. And let me alone to keep her warm; if
she should flag in her part, I will not fail to prompt her.
FAIN. Faith, this has an appearance.
MRS. MAR. I'm sorry I hinted to my lady to endeavour a match between
Millamant and Sir Wilfull: that may be an obstacle.
FAIN. Oh, for that matter, leave me to manage him: I'll disable him
for that; he will drink like a Dane; after dinner, I'll set his
hand in.
MRS. MAR. Well, how do you stand affected towards your lady?
FAIN. Why, faith, I'm thinking of it.- Let me see- I am married
already, so that's over:- my wife has played the jade with me-
well, that's over too:- I never loved her, or if I had, why that
would have been over too by this time:- jealous of her I cannot
be, for I am certain; so there's an end of jealousy:- weary of
her I am, and shall be- no, there's no end of that- no, no, that
were too much to hope. Thus far concerning my repose; now for my
reputation. As to my own, I married not for it, so that's out of
the question;- and as to my part in my wife's- why, she had
parted with her's before; so bringing none to me, she can take
none from me; 'tis against all rule of play, that I should lose
to one who has not wherewithal to stake.
MRS. MAR. Besides, you forget, marriage is honourable.
FAIN. Hum, faith, and that's well thought on; marriage is honourable
as you say; and if so, wherefore should cuckoldom be a
discredit, being derived from so honourable a root?
MRS. MAR. Nay, I know not; if the root be honourable, why not the
branches?
FAIN. So, so, why this point's clear- well, how do we proceed?
MRS. MAR. I will contrive a letter which shall be delivered to my
lady at the time when that rascal who is to act Sir Rowland is
with her. It shall come as from an unknown hand- for the less I
appear to know of the truth, the better I can play the
incendiary. Besides, I would not have Foible provoked if I could
help it- because you know she knows some passages- nay, I expect
all will come out- but let the mine be sprung first, and then I
care not if I am discovered.
FAIN. If the worst come to the worst- I'll turn my wife to grass- I
have already a deed of settlement of the best part of her
estate; which I wheedled out of her; and that you shall partake
at least.
MRS. MAR. I hope you are convinced that I hate Mirabell now; you'll
be no more jealous?
FAIN. Jealous! no- by this kiss- let husbands be jealous; but let
the lover still believe; or if he doubt, let it be only to
endear his pleasure, and prepare the joy that follows, when he
proves his mistress true. But let husbands' doubts convert to
endless jealousy; or if they have belief, let it corrupt to
superstition and blind credulity. I am single, and will herd no
more with 'em. True, I wear the badge, but I'll disown the
order. And since I take my leave of 'em I care not if I leave
'em a common motto to their common crest:-
-
All husbands must or pain or shame endure;
The wise too jealous are, fools too secure.
[Exeunt.
ACT THE FOURTH
SCENE I
A Room in Lady WISHFORT'S House
-
Lady WISHFORT and FOIBLE.
-
LADY WISH. Is Sir Rowland coming, sayest thou, Foible? and are
things in order?
FOIB. Yes, madam, I have put wax lights in the sconces, and placed
the footmen in a row in the hall, in their best liveries, with
the coachman and postillion to fill up the equipage.
LADY WISH. Have you pulvilled the coachman and postillion, that they
may not stink of the stable when Sir Rowland comes by?
FOIB. Yes, madam.
LADY WISH. And are the dancers and the music ready, that he may be
entertained in all points with correspondence to his passion?
FOIB. All is ready, madam.
LADY WISH. And- well- and how do I look, Foible?
FOIB. Most killing well, madam.
LADY WISH. Well, and how shall I receive him? in what figure shall I
give his heart the first impression? there is a great deal in
the first impression. Shall I sit?- no, I won't sit- I'll walk-
ay, I'll walk from the door upon his entrance: and then turn
full upon him- no, that will be too sudden. I'll lie- ay, I'll
lie down- I'll receive him in my little dressing-room, there's
a couch- yes, yes, I'll give the first impression on a couch.-
I won't lie neither, but loll and lean upon one elbow: with one
foot a little dangling off, jogging in a thoughtful way- yes-
and then as soon as he appears, start, ay, start and be
surprised, and rise to meet him in a pretty disorder- yes- O,
nothing is more alluring than a levee from a couch, in some
confusion:- it shows the foot to advantage, and furnishes with
blushes, and recomposing airs beyond comparison. Hark! there's
a coach.
FOIB. 'Tis |
|
