MISS HARDCASTLE sola

Miss Hard. Lud, this news of papa's puts me all in a flutter. Young, handsome; these he put last; but I put them foremost. Sensible, good-natur'd; I like all that. But then reserved, and sheepish, that's much against him. Yet can't he be cured of his timidity, by being taught to be proud of his wife. Yes, and can't I- But I vow I'm disposing of the husband before I have secured the lover!

Enter Miss NEVILLE

Miss Hard. I'm glad you're come, Neville, my dear. Tell me, Constance, how do I look this evening? Is there anything whimsical about me? Is it one of my well-looking days, child? Am I in face to-day?

Miss Neville. Perfectly, my dear. Yet, now I look again-bless me !-sure no accident has happened among the canary birds or the goldfishes? Has your brother or the cat been meddling? Or has the last novel been too moving?

Miss Hard. No; nothing of all this. I have been threatened-I can scarce get it out-I have been threatened with a lover!

Miss Neville. And his name

Miss Hard. Is Marlow.

Miss Neville. Indeed!

Miss Hard. The son of Sir Charles Marlow.

Miss Neville. As I live, the most intimate friend of Mr. Hastings, my admirer. They are never asunder. I believe you must have seen him when we lived in

town.

Miss Hard. Never.

Miss Neville. He's a very singular character, I assure you. Among women of reputation and virtue, he is the modestest man alive: but his acquaintance give him a very different character among creatures of another stamp: you understand me? Miss Hard. An odd character, indeed! I shall never be able to manage him. What shall I do? Pshaw,

think no more of him, but trust to occurrences for success. But how goes on your own affair, my dear? Has my mother been courting you for my brother Tony, as usual?

Miss Neville. I have just come from one of our agreeable tête-à-têtes. She has been saying a hundred tender things, and setting off her pretty monster as the very pink of perfection.

Miss Hard. And her partiality is such, that she actually thinks him so. A fortune like yours is no small temptation. Besides, as she has the sole management of it, I'm not surprised to see her unwilling to let it go out of the family.

Miss Neville. A fortune like mine, which chiefly consists in jewels, is no such mighty temptation. But, at any rate, if my dear Hastings be but constant, I make no doubt to be too hard for her at last. However, I let her suppose that I am in love with her son, and she never once dreams that my affections are fixed upon another.

Miss Hard. My good brother holds out stoutly. I could almost love him for hating you so.

Miss Neville. It is a good-natur'd creature at bottom, and I'm sure would wish to see me married to anybody but himself. But my aunt's bell rings for our afternoon's walk through the improvements. Allons. Courage is necessary, as our affairs are critical.

Miss Hard. Would it were bed-time and all were well.1 [Exeunt.

SCENE-An Alehouse Room. Several shabby fellows, with punch and tobacco. TONY at the head of the table, a little higher than the rest: a mallet in his hand.

Omnes. Hurrea, hurrea, hurrea, bravo!

First Fellow. Now, gentlemen, silence for a song The 'Squire is going to knock himself down for a song. Omnes. Ay, a song, a song.

[1 Henry IV. Act v. Sc. 1.]

Tony. Then I'll sing you, gentlemen, a song I made

on this ale-house, the Three Pigeons.

SONG

Let school-masters puzzle their brain,

With grammar, and nonsense, and learning;
Good liquor, I stoutly maintain,

Gives genus a better discerning,

Let them brag of their Heathenish Gods,
Their Lethes, their Styxes, and Stygians;
Their Quis, and their Quæs, and their Quods,
They're all but a parcel of Pigeons.

Toroddle, toroddle, toroll!

When Methodist preachers come down,
A-preaching that drinking is sinful,
I'll wager the rascals a crown,

They always preach best with a skinful.
But when you come down with your pence,
For a slice of their scurvy religion,

I'll leave it to all men of sense,

But you, my good friend, are the pigeon.

Toroddle, toroddle, toroll!

Then come, put the jorum about,

And let us be merry and clever,

Our hearts and our liquors are stout,

Here's the Three Jolly Pigeons for ever.

Let some cry up woodcock or hare,

Your bustards, your ducks, and your widgeons:

But of all the birds in the air,

Here's a health to the Three Jolly Pigeons.

Omnes. Bravo, bravo!

Toroddle, toroddle, toroll!

First Fellow. The 'Squire has got spunk in him. Second Fellow. I loves to hear him sing, bekeays he ver gives us nothing that's low.1

Goldsmith, Fielding, and other contemporary humorists much jected to this particular form of depreciation on the part of the ntimentalists. In the whole of this discussion, the author, no ubt, had in mind the rejection of the Bailiff scene in The Good-Natur'd Man (cf. p. 131, "Preface").

Third Fellow. O damn anything that's low, I cannot bear it!

Fourth Fellow. The genteel thing is the genteel thing at any time. If so be that a gentleman bees in a concatenation accordingly.

Third Fellow. I like the maxum of it, Master Muggins. What, though I am obligated to dance a bear, a man may be a gentleman for all that. May this be my poison if my bear ever dances but to the very genteelest of tunes. Water Parted,1 or the minuet in Ariadne.2

Second Fellow. What a pity it is the 'Squire is not come to his own. It would be well for all the publicans within ten miles round of him.

Tony. Ecod, and so it would, Master Slang. I'd then show what it was to keep choice of company.

Second Fellow. O, he takes after his own father for that. To be sure, old 'Squire Lumpkin was the finest gentleman I ever set my eyes on." For winding the straight horn, or beating a thicket for a hare, or a wench, he never had his fellow. It was a saying in the place, that he kept the best horses, dogs, and girls in the whole county.

Tony. Ecod, and when I'm of age I'll be no bastard, I promise you. I have been thinking of Bet Bouncer and the miller's grey mare to begin with. But come, my boys, drink about and be merry, for you pay no reckoning. Well, Stingo, what's the matter?

Enter LANDLORD

Landlord. There be two gentlemen in a post-chaise at the door. They have lost their way upo' the forest; and they are talking something about Mr. Hardcastle.

Do

Tony. As sure as can be, one of them must be the gentleman that's coming down to court my sister. they seem to be Londoners?

Landlord. I believe they may. They look woundily like Frenchmen.

[The song of Arbaces in Arne's Artaxerxes, 1762.]

[2 By Handel. The minuet came at the end of the overture, and is said to have been the best thing in the opera.]

I

Tony. Then desire them to step this way, and I'll set them right in a twinkling. (Exit Landlord.) Gentlemen, as they mayn't be good enough company for you, step down for a moment, and I'll be with you in the squeezing of a lemon. [Exeunt Mob.

TONY Solus

Tony. Father-in-law has been calling me whelp, and hound, this half year. Now, if I pleased, I could be so revenged upon the old grumbletonian. But then I'm afraid-afraid of what? I shall soon be worth fifteen hundred a year, and let him frighten me out of that if he can!

Enter LANDLORD, conducting MARLOW and HASTINGS

Marlow. What a tedious uncomfortable day have we had of it! We were told it was but forty miles across the country, and we have come above threescore !

Hastings. And all, Marlow, from that unaccountable reserve of yours, that would not let us enquire more frequently on the way.

Marlow. I own, Hastings, I am unwilling to lay myself under an obligation to every one I meet; and often stand the chance of an unmannerly answer.

Hastings. At present, however, we are not likely to receive any answer.

Tony. No offence, gentlemen. But I'm told you have been enquiring for one Mr. Hardcastle, in these parts. Do you know what part of the country you are in?

Hastings. Not in the least, sir, but should thank you for information.

Tony. Nor the way you came?

Hastings. No, sir, but if you can inform us

Tony. Why, gentlemen, if you know neither the road you are going, nor where you are, nor the road you came, the first thing I have to inform is, that-you have lost your way.

Marlow. We wanted no ghost to tell us that.1

[1 Hamlet, Act I., Sc. 5.]