There, Mr Manager, is an end of an act-Every beast upon his hind-legs!-I did intend, that houses and trees (according to the old story) should have joined in the dance; but it would have crouded the stage too much. Pat. Full enough as it is, Mr Glib. Lady Fuz. [Without.] Let me come, let me come, I say! Glib. D'ye hear, d'ye hear? her ladyship's in raptures, I find;-I knew I should touch her. Enter LADY FUZ. Lady Fuz. These are fine doings; fine doings, Mr Glib ! Glib. And a fine effect they will have, my lady; particularly the dancing off of the beasts. Lady Fuz. Yes, yes; they have danced off, but they shall dance back again, take my word for it. [Walks about. Glib. My dear lady, and so they shall; don't be uneasy; they shall dance back again directly ---here, prompter, I intended to have the scene over again; I could see it forever. Lady Fuz, Was this your plot, Mr Glib? Or your contrivance, Mr Manager? Pat. Madam! Glib. No, upon my soul! 'tis all my own contrivance; not a thought stole from ancient, or modern; all my own plot! Lady Fuz. Call my servants! I'll have a postchaise directly; I see your guilt, by your vain endeavours to hide it; this is the most bare-faced impudence! Glib. Impudence!-may I die, if I know an indecent expression in the whole piece! Pat. Your passion, madam, runs away with you; I don't understand you. Glib. What! did Miss Fuz run away without seeing Orpheus? Lady Fuz. Don't say a word more, thou blockhead! Glib. I am dumb, but no blockhead! Enter SIR TOBY, in confusion. Sir Toby. What is all this? what is it all about? Lady Fuz. Why, it is all your fault, sir Toby! had not you been asleep, she could never have been stolen from your side. Sir Toby. How do you know she is stolen? Enquire first, my lady, and be in a passion afterwards. Lady Fuz. I know she's gone; I saw her with a young fellow he was upon his knees, swearing by the moon— -let us have a post-chaise, sir Toby, directly, and follow them! Sir Toby. Let us dine first, my dear, and I'll go wherever you please. Lady Fuz. Dine, dine! Did you ever hear the like? you have no more feeling, sir Toby, than your periwig.--I shall go distracted! the greatest curse of a poor woman is, to have a flighty daughter, and a sleepy husband. [Exit LADY FUz. Sir Toby. And the greatest curse of a poor man is, to have every body flighty in his family but himself. [Exit. Enter PATENT. Pat. 'Tis true, Mr Glib, the young lady is gone off, but with nobody that belongs to us--'tis a dreadful affair! Glib. So it is, faith! to spoil my rehearsal--[ think it was very ungenteel of her, to choose this morning for her pranks. Though she might make free with her father and mother, she should have more manners than to treat me so; I'll tell her as much when I see her. The second act shall be ready for you next week—I depend upon you for a prologue--your genius Pat. You are too polite, Mr Glib---have you an epilogue? Glib. I have a kind of address here, by way of epilogue, to the town--I suppose it to be spoken by myself, as the author--who have you can represent me ?---no easy task, let me tell you-he must be a little sinart, degagee, and not want as surance. Pat. Smart, degagee, and not want assurance? -King is the very man. Glib. Thank, thank you! dear Mr Patent,--the very man-is he in the house? I would read to him. Pat. O no! since the audience received him in Linco, he is practising music, whenever he is not wanted here. Lady Fuz. No, sir! 'tis one of your stage-play-it ers has run away with my daughter; and I'll be revenged on you all !---I'll shut up your house! Pat. This must be inquired into. [Exit PATENT. Glib. I have heard as much; and that he con tinually sets his family's teeth on edge, with scraping upon the fiddle.--Conceit, conceit, Mr Patent, is the ruin of them all. I could wish, when he speaks this address, that he would be more easy in his carriage, and not have that damned jerk in his bow, that he generally treats us with. Pat. I'll hint as much to him. Glib. This is my conception of the matter;-Bow your body gently, turn your head semicircularly, on one side and the other; and, smiling thus, agreeably begin: All fable is fiction-I, your bard, will maintain it; And lest you don't know it, 'tis fit I explain it: The lyre of our Orpheus means your approbation; Which frees the poor poet from care and vexation: Shou'd want make his mistress too keen to dis pute, Your smiles fill his pockets--and madam is mute : Shou'd his wife, that's himself- -for they two are but one Be in hell, that's in debt, and the money all gone; Your favour brings comfort, at once cures the evil, For 'scaping bum bailiffs, is 'scaping the devil; Nay, cerberus-critics their fury will drop, For such barking monsters your smiles are a sop; But how to explain what you most will require, That cows, sheep, and calves, shou'd dance after the lyre? Without your kind favour, how scanty each meal! But with it comes dancing, beef, mutton, and veal; For sing it, or say it, this truth we all see, Your applause will be ever the true beaume de vie. Enter SIR THOMAS MAXWELL and MARGARET. Sir Tho. WHY, the woman is mad! these cursed newspaper patriots have shattered her brains! nothing less than a senator of seven years standing can conceive what she means. Mar. Why, sir Thomas, my conversation is neither deficient in order, precision, or dignity. a servant, you condemn me for so often changing my ministry; and because I lock up my daughter, to prevent her eloping with the paltry clerk of a pitiful trader, it is, forsooth, an invasion of the bill of rights, and a mortal stab to the great charter of liberty! Mar. As Serjeant Second'em said, in the debate on the corn-bill," Then why don't you chuse "better ground, brother, and learn to enlarge Sir Tho. Dignity! and what occasion for dig-" your bottom a little? Consider, you must draw nity in the common concerns of my house? why" the line of liberty somewhere; for if these the deuce can't you converse like the rest of the "rights belong"world? If you want money to pay off my bills, you move me for further supplies; if I turn away Sir Tho. Mercy on us! Mur. But, indeed, my dear brother, you are got quite out of your depth: Woman, I tell you, is a microcosm; and rightly to rule her, requires as great talents, as to govern a state. And what says the aphorism of cardinal Polignac?" If you "would not have a person deceive you, be care"ful not to let him know you mistrust him!" and so of your daughter. Sir Tho. Mrs Margaret Maxwell, bestow your advice where it is wanted! Out of my depth! a likely story indeed, that I, who am fixed here in a national trust, appointed guardian of the English interest at the court of Madrid, should not know how to manage a girl! Mar. And pray, Mr Consul, what information will your station afford you? I don't deny your knowledge in export and import, nor doubt your skill in the difference between wet and dry goods; you may weigh, with exactness, the balance of trade, or explain the true spirit of a treaty of commerce; the surface, the mere skimmings of the political pot! Sir Tho. Mighty well! Mar. But had you, with me, traced things to their original source; had you discovered all social subordination to arise from original compact; had you read Machiavel, Montesquieu, Locke, Bacon, Hobbes, Harrington, Hume; had you studied the political testaments of Alberoni and cardinal Richlieu Sir Tho. Mercy on us! amongst a sage, steady people, who know and revere the natural rights of a parent. Mar. Natural rights! Can a right to tyrannize be founded in nature? Sir Tho. Look'e, Margaret! you are but losing your time; for, unless you can prevail on count Wall, or the president of Castille, to grant you a habeas, why, Harriet shall stay where she is. Mar. Ay, ay, you know where you are; but, if my niece will take my advice, the justice, that is denied to her here, she will instantly seek for elsewhere. Sir Tho. Elsewhere? hark you, sister! is it thus you answer my purpose in bringing you hither? I hoped to have my daughter's principles formed by your prudence; her conduct directed by your experience and wisdom. Mar. The preliminary is categorically true, Sir Tho. Then, why don't you abide by the treaty? Mar. Yes; you have given me powerful motives! Sir. Tho. But another word, madam! as I don't chuse that Harriet should imbibe any more of your romantic republican notions, I shall take it as a great favour, if you would prepare to quit this country with the first opportunity. Mar. You need not have remonstrated; a petition would have answered your purpose: I did intend to withdraw, and without taking leave; nor will I reside on a spot, where the great charter of my sex is hourly invaded! No, sir Thomas; I shall return to the land of liberty! but there expect to have your despotic dealings pro Mar. Had you analyzed the pragmatic sanction, and the family compact; had you toiled through the laborious page of the Vinerian professor, or estimated the prevailing manners with the vicar of Newcastle; in a word, had you read Amicus upon Taxation, and Inimicus upon Re-perly and publicly handled. presentation, you would have known Sir Tho. What! Sir Tho. What, you design to turn author? Mar. There's no occasion for that; liberty has Mar. That, in spite of the frippery French already a champion in one of my sex: The same Salique laws, woman is a free agent, a noun sub-pen, that has dared to scourge the arbitrary acstantive entity, and, when treated with confidence tions of some of our monarchs, shall do equal justice to the oppressive power of parents. Sir Tho. With all my heart! Mar. 1 may, perhaps, be too late to get you into the historical text; but, I promise you, you shall be soundly swinged in the marginal notes. Enter a Servant, who whispers SIR THOMAS, Sir Tho. What, now? Ser. This instant. Sir Tho. How did he get in? Ser. By a ladder of ropes, dropped, I suppose, by Miss Harrict, from the balcony. Sir Tho. That way, I reckon, he thinks to retreat; but I shall prevent him. Here, Dick, do you and Ralph run into the street, and front the house with a couple of carbines; bid James bring my toledo; and let the rest of the fellows follow my steps. Mar. Iley-day! what can be the meaning of this civil commotion? Sir Tho. Nothing extraordinary; only the natural consequence of some of your salutary suggestions. Mar. Mine, sir Thomas? Sir Tho. Yes, yours, sister Margaret! Sir Tho. Oh, nothing but Harriet making use of her great natural charter of liberty, by letting young Invoice, Abraham Indigo's clerk, by the means of a ladder of ropes, into her chamber. Mar. I am not surprised. Sir Tho. Nor I, neither. Mar. The instant your suspicions gave her a guard, I told her the act was tantamount to an open declaration of war, and sanctified every stratagem. Sir Tho. You did? mighty well, madam! I hope, then, for once, you will approve my proceedings; the law of nations shall be strictly observed; you shall see how a spy ought to be treated, who is caught in the enemy's camp! Enter Servant, with the toledo. Oh, here's my trusty toledo! Come, follow your leader! [Exit with servants. Mar. Oh, sir, I shall pursue, and reconnoitre your motions; and, though no cartel is settled between you, take care how you infringe the jus gentium. [Exit. SCENE II.-Another Chamber. HARRIET and INVOICE discovered. Har. Are you sure you were not observed? Har. Well, Mr Invoice, you can, I think, now no longer doubt of my kindness; though, let me tell you, you are a good deal indebted for this early proof of it to my father's severity. In. I am sorry, madam, au event, so happy for me, should proceed from so unlucky a cause: But are there no hopes that sir Thomas may be softened in time? Har. None: he is, both from nature and habit, inflexibly obstinate. This, too, is his favourite foible; no German baron was ever more attached to the genealogical laws of alliance than he: Marry his daughter to a person in trade? No! Put his present favourite out of the question, he can never be brought to submit to it. In. Dear Miss Harriet, then why will you hesitate? there can be no other alternative; you must either submit to marry the count, or, by flight, escape from the Har. No, Mr Invoice, not till the last necescity drives me. Besides, where can we go? how subsist? who will receive us? In. The world is all before us where to chuse; and, as we fly from oppression, 'Providence our guide.' Sir Tho. Come, madam, open your doors! Har. The balcony! quick, Mr Invoice! the balcony! Sir Tho. Unlock, Mrs Minx! your minion is discovered! In. A couple of fellows stand below, with their pieces pointed directly against it. Sir Tho. What, then, you will compel us to batter ? Har. The whole house is surrounded! how can you escape? In. Where will this window conduct us? Har. To the leads that join our house to the chemist's. In. To the leads? it is but a step; there is no danger. Har. Then instantly fly! you have every thing to fear from my father. Sir Tho. John, fetch the mattock and crow! fate. In. No, madam, that I will never do; I'll dare your father's utmost resentment. Sir Tho. Where is that rascal a-loitering? In. Would my Harriet accompany my flight- In. do, I do; my dearest angel, I do! By all that's sacred, your honour shall be as secure with me as in the cell of a saint! Har. But character, decency, prudence— |