Tattle. Pooh! pox! you must not say yes already; I shan't care a farthing for you then in a twinkling.

Prue. What must I say then?

Tattle. Why, you must say no, or you believe not, or you can't tell.
Prue. Why, must I tell a lie then?

Tattle. Yes, if you'd be well-bred; all well-bred persons lie; besides, you are a woman, you must never speak what you think: your words must contradict your thoughts; but your actions may contradict your words. So, when I ask you, if you can love me, you must say no, but you must love me too. If I tell you you are handsome, you must deny it and say I flatter you. But you must think yourself more charming than I speak you: and like me for the beauty which I say you have, as much as if I had it myself. If I ask you to kiss me you must be angry, but you must not refuse me.

Prue. O Lord, I swear this is pure! I like it better than our old-fashioned country way of speaking one's mind; and must not you lie too?

Tattle. Hum! Yes; but you must believe I speak truth.

Prue. O Gemini! well, I always had a great mind to tell lies; but they frighted me and said it was a sin.

Tattle. Well, my pretty creature; will you make me happy by giving me a kiss? Prue. No, indeed; I'm angry at you. [Runs and kisses him. Tattle. Hold, hold, that's pretty well; but you should not have given it me, but have suffered me to have taken it.

Prue. Well, we'll do't again.

Tattle. With all my heart. Now then my little angel!

Prue. Pish!

Tattle. That's right—again, my charmer!
Prue. O fy nay, now I can't abide you.

[Kisses her.

[Kisses again.

Tattle. Admirable! that was as well as if you had been born and bred in Coventgarden.'

These are the natural instincts of the town. If we would see them transformed into systematic vices, we must look to the Way of the World, the mirror of fine artificial society. The heroes are accomplished scoundrels, the heroines are unchecked gossips, who, in their most amiable aspects, veil the animal under genteel airs. Fainall, who has been lavish of his morals, is asked how he is 'affected' towards his wife, and answers:

"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.'

She, whose youth has not rusted in her possession, hates him; complains to Mirabell, a trained expert, who appeases her, and gives her advice:

'You should have just so much disgust for your husband, as may be sufficient to make you relish your lover.'

Lady Wishfort, expecting Sir Rowland, speaks in the style of high life:

'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 impor

tunate, 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 cóy, neither. I won't give him despair-but a little disdain is not amiss; a little scorn is alluring."

Foible. A little scorn becomes your ladyship.

Lady Wish. Yes, but tenderness become 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.'

But the perfect model of the brilliant world is Mrs. Millamant, haughty and wanton, witty and scornful, with nothing to hope or to fear, superior to all circumstances, caprice her only law:

Mrs. Fainall. You were dressed before I came abroad.

Mrs. Mil'amant. Ay, that's true. O but then I had; Mincing, what had I? why was I so long?

Mincing. O mem, your laship 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.'

Lovers are her creatures, and conquests give her no surprise:

'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.'

Her airs give way at last to tenderness (?), and she enters into matrimony, on conditions:

...

'I'll never marry, unless I am first made sure of my will and pleasure. . . . My dear liberty, shall I leave thee! my faithful solitude, my darling contemplation, must I bid you then adieu? Ay-h adieu; my morning thoughts, agreeable wakings, indolent slumbers, all ye douceurs, ye sommeils du matin, adieu?; I can't do 't, 'tis more than impossible; positively, Mirabell, I'll lie abed in a morning as long as I please.

Mir. Then I'll get up in a morning as early as I please.

Mil. Ah! idle creature, get up when you will; and d'ye hear, I won't be called names after I'm married; positively I won't be called names.

Mir. Names!

Mil. Ay, as wife, spouse, my dear, joy, jewel, love, sweetheart, and the rest of that nauseous cant, in which men and their wives are so fulsomely familiar; I shall never bear that; good Mirabell, don't let us be familiar or fond, nor kiss before folks, like my lady Fadler, and Sir Francis; nor go to Hyde-park together the first Sunday in a new chariot, to provoke eyes and whispers, and then never to be seen together again; as if we were proud of one another the first week, and ashamed of one another ever after. Let us never visit together, nor go to a play together; but let us be very strange and wellbred: let us be as strange as if we had been married a great while; and as well-bred as if we were not married at all.'

These demands are reasonable- in fact, trifling, compared with others:

'To write and receive letters without interrogatories. . . . Come to dinner when I please; dine in my dressing room. . . without giving a reason; . . . to be sole empress

of my tea-table, which you must never presume to approach without first asking leave. And lastly, wherever I am, you shall always knock at the door before you come in. These articles subscribed, if I continue to endure you a little longer, I may by degrees dwindle into a wife.'

This is the carnival of fashion-its finery, its chatter, its charming repartee, its foolish affectation, the drapery of the world. You are amused, but what thought do you carry away? Yet sensible and striking passages are not wanting, some of which have become proverbial, and whose origin is unknown to many who quote them:

'Music hath charms to soothe a savage breast,
To soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak.'
'Heaven has no rage, like love to hatred turn'd,
Nor hell a fury, like a woman scorned."

'For blessings ever wait on virtuous deeds;
And though a late, a sure reward succeeds.'

'If there's delight in love, 'tis when I see
That heart, which others bleed for, bleed for me.'

Reason, the power

To guess at right and wrong, the twinkling lamp
Of wandering life, that winks and wakes by turns,
Fooling the follower, betwixt shade and shining.'

Vanbrugh is cheerful, confident, robust, easy, natural, various, and, of course, plain-spoken-an impudent dog. Sottishness is still respectable, rakes still scour the streets, ladies are still 'carried off swooning with love from ante-chambers.' Squire Sullen, in Provoked Wife, gets drunk, rolls about the room, like a sick passenger in a storm, howls out, 'Damn morality! and damn the watch! and let the constable be married!' Sir John Brute declares there is but one thing he loathes on earth beyond his wife, that's fighting.' She would please him, but is tauntingly told that is not her talent. She reflects:

'Perhaps a good part of what I suffer from my husband may be a judgment upon me for my cruelty to my lover. Lord, with what pleasure could I indulge that thought, were there but a possibility of finding arguments to make it good! And how do I know but there may? Let me see. What opposes? My matrimonial vow. Why, what did I vow? I think I promised to be true to my husband. Well; and he promised to be kind to me. But he han't kept his word. Why, then, I am absolved from mine.'

The argument proceeds, but we have to stop. Listen to Lord Toppington in Relapse. He is a newly-created pillar of state:

'My life, madam, is a perpetual stream of pleasure, that glides through such a variety of entertainments, I believe the wisest of our ancestors never had the least conception of any of 'em. I rise, madam, about ten a-clack. I don't rise sooner, because it is the worst thing in the world for the complexion; nat that I pretend to be a beau; but a man

must endeavor to looke wholesome, lest he make so nauseous a figure in the side-bax, the ladies should be compelled to turn their eyes upon the play. So at ten a-clack, I say, rise. Naw, if I find it a good day, I resalve to take a turn in the park, and see the fine women; so huddle on my clothes, and get dressed by one. If it be nasty weather, I take a turn in the chocolate-hause: where as you walk, madam, you have the prettiest prospect in the world; you have looking-glasses all round you.'

He is to be married to a country heiress, 'a plump partridge,' who has never seen him. His brother, simulating him, arrives instead. Miss Hoyden is overjoyed:

'Nurse. Oh, but you must have a care of being too fond; for men now-a-days hate a woman that loves 'em.

Hoyd. Love him! why do you think I love him, nurse? ecod I would not care if he were hanged, so I were but once married to him! No; that which pleases me, is to think what work I'll make when I get to London; for when I am a wife and a lady both, nurse, ecod I'll flaunt it with the best of 'em.

The true lord comes in at the critical moment, as they think, the imposture is discovered, and her father apologizes:

'My lord, I'm struck dumb, I can only beg pardon by signs; but if a sacrifice will appease you, you shall have it. Here, pursue this Tartar, bring him back. Away, I say! A dog! Oons, I'll cut off his cars and his tail, I'll draw out all his teeth, pull his skin over his head-and- and what shall I do more?'

Toppington marries her, learns that he has married his brother's wife, but covers his aching heart with a serene countenance:

'Now, for my part, I think the wisest thing a man can do with an aching heart is to put on a serene countenance; for a philosophical air is the most becoming thing in the world to the face of a person of quality. I will therefore bear my disgrace like a great man, and let the people see I am above an affront. [Aloud] Dear Tain, since things are thus fallen aut, prithee give me leave to wish thee jay; I do it de bon cœur, strike me dumb! You have married a woman beautiful in her person, charming in her airs, prudent in her canduct, canstant in her inclinations, and of a nice marality, split my windpipe!'

Farquhar is an artist in stage effect, an Irishman, with the Irish sportiveness, and an agreeable diversity. His best comedy is the Beaux' Stratagem. Boniface is still a favorite, one of the extinct race of landlords. The London coach suddenly appears: 'Chamberlain ! maid! Cherry! daughter Cherry!` all asleep? all dead?’—‘Here, here! why d'ye bawl so, father? d'ye think we have no ears?' She deserves to have none, he thinks, but she redeems herself by a cheering welcome to the guests who are shown to their chambers. Thereupon enter Aimwell and Archer, gentlemen of broken fortunes, travelling, the one as master, the other as servant:

'Bon. This way, this way gentlemen!

Aim. [To Archer.] Set down the things; go to the stable, and see my horses well rubbed.

Arh. I shall, sir.

Aim. You're my landlord, I suppose?

Bon. Yes, sir, I'm old Will Boniface, pretty well known upon this road, as the saying is.

Aim. O Mr. Boniface, your servant!

Bon. O sir! What will your honour please to drink, as the saying is?

Aim. I have heard your town of Litchfield much famed for ale; I think I'll taste that. Bon. Sir, I have now in my cellar ten tun of the best ale in Staffordshire; 'tis smooth as oil, sweet as milk, clear as amber, and strong as brandy; and will be just fourteen year old the fifth day of next March, old style.

Aim. You're very exact, I find, in the age of your ale.

Bon. As punctual, sir, as I am in the age of my children. I'll show you such ale! Here, tapster, broach number 1706, as the saying is. Sir, you shall taste my Anno Domini. I have lived in Litchfield, man and boy, above eight-and-fifty years, and, I believe, have not consumed eight-and-fifty ounces of meat.

Aim.

At a meal, you mean, if one may guess your sense by your bulk.

Bon. Not in my life, sir; I have fed purely upon ale, I have eat my alc, drunk my ale, and I always sleep upon ale.

Enter Tapster with a bottle and glass, and exit.

Now, sir, you shall see!

[Pours out a glass.] Your worship's health! Ha! delicious, delicious! fancy it Burgundy, only fancy it, and 'tis worth ten shillings a quart. Aim. [Drinks.] 'Tis confounded strong!

Bon. Strong! it must be so, or how should we be so that drink it?

Aim. And have you lived so long upon this ale, landlord?

Bon. Eight-and-fifty years, upon my credit, sir; but it killed my wife, poɔr woman, as the saying is.

Aim. How came that to pass?

the

Bon. I don't know how, sir; she would not let the ale take its natural course, sir; she was for qualifying it every now and then with a dram, as the saying is; . . . fourth carried her off. But she's happy, and I'm contented, as the saying is.'

One or two higher spirits reach the passions of the other age,Dryden in tragedy; and by his side a younger contemporary, Otway, in whose Venice Preserved we encounter the sombre imagination of Webster, Ford, and Shakespeare. Jaffier, a youth of merit and promise, but the sport of chance, rescues from a watery grave a senator's daughter, a genuine woman, who from that hour loves him; three years have passed since their vows were plighted; she is his wife, against the wishes of her proud sire; misfortune comes; he has just now left the presence of the offended aristocrat with his curse and his heart is heavy between love and ruin:

'O Belvidera! Oh! she is my wife

And we will bear our wayward fate together,

But ne'er know comfort more.'

She who has been his dependent and ornament in happier hours, proves his stay and solace in calamity:

'My lord, my love, my refuge!
Happy my eyes when they behold thy face!
My heavy heart will leave its doleful beating
At sight of thee, and bound with sprightly joys.
Oh, smile as when our loves were in their spring,
And cheer my fainting soul!