DOVER THRIFT EDITIONS

GENERAL EDITOR: STANLEY APPELBAUM

EDITOR OF THIS VOLUME: SHANE WELLER
 This Dover edition, first published in 1991, is an
unabridged republication based on the text of the fourth edition (1773)
of She Stoops to Conquer: or, The Mistakes of a Night
Performance (first publication: Francis Newbery, London, 1773).
Manufactured in the United States of America
Dover Publications, Inc.
This Dover Thrift Edition may be used in its entirety, in adaptation or in 31 East 2nd Street
any other way for theatrical productions, professional and amateur, in the Mineola, N.Y. 11501
United States, without fee, permission or acknowledgment. (This may not
apply outside of the United States, as copyright conditions may vary.) Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Goldsmith, Oliver, 1728—1774.

She stoops to conquer / Oliver Goldsmith.
p. cm.—(Dover thrift editions)
9780486112763
I. Title. II. Series.
[PR3488.A1 1991]
822’.6—de20 91-9233
CIP
Note Table of Contents

THE SON of an Anglo-Irish clergyman, Oliver Goldsmith (1728—1774)

established himself, during his brief and flamboyant career, as an essayist, Title Page
poet and dramatist with great comic insight into the social mores of Performance
Georgian England. Arriving virtually destitute in London in 1756, after Copyright Page
having abandoned a medical degree in Edinburgh and traveled widely in Note
Europe, Goldsmith soon became acquainted with Samuel Johnson (1709— TO SAMUEL JOHNSON, LL.D.
1794), the most influential man of letters of the period, and David Garrick Prologue
(1717—1779), the great English actor and manager of Drury Lane Theatre. Dramatis Personae
Act I
Among Goldsmith’s more important works are the novel The Vicar of
Act II
Wakefield (1766), the highly respected longer poems The Traveller (1764)
Act III
and The Deserted Village (1770), and his dramatic triumph She Stoops to
Conquer (1773). This play, in part a comic reflection on the sentimentalism Act IV
that pervaded the theatrical productions of Goldsmith’s contemporaries, was Act V
an immediate success when first performed at Covent Garden Theatre in Epilogue
Epilogue
March 1773, and it remains one of the most revived and popular plays of
the eighteenth century. DOVER · THRIFT · EDITIONS
TO SAMUEL JOHNSON, LL.D. Prologue

DEAR SIR, BY DAVID GARRICK, ESQ. 2

By inscribing this slight performance to you, I do not mean so much to
compliment you as myself. It may do me some honour to inform the public,
that I have lived many years in intimacy with you. It may serve the interests
of mankind also to inform them, that the greatest wit may be found in a
character, without impairing the most unaffected piety. Enter MR. WOODWARD,3 dressed in black, and holding a Hand-
I have, particularly, reason to thank you for your partiality to this kerchief to his Eyes.
performance. The undertaking a comedy, not merely sentimental, was very
dangerous; and Mr. Colman,1 who saw this piece in its various stages,
always thought it so. However, I ventured to trust it to the public; and, EXCUSE me, sirs, I pray—I can’t yet speak—
though it was necessarily delayed till late in the season, I have every reason I’m crying now—and have been all the week!
to be grateful.
‘Tis not alone this mourning suit, good masters;
I’ve that within—for which there are no plasters!
I am, dear sir,
Pray would you know the reason why I’m crying?
Your most sincere friend
And admirer, The Comic muse, long sick, is now a-dying!
And if she goes, my tears will never stop:
OLIVER GOLDSMITH. For as a player, I can’t squeeze out one drop:
I am undone, that’s all—shall lose my bread—
I’d rather, but that’s nothing—lose my head.
When the sweet maid is laid upon the bier,
Shuter4 and I shall be chief mourners here.
To her a mawkish drab of spurious breed,
Who deals in sentimentals will succeed!
 Poor Ned and I are dead to all intents,
We can as soon speak Greek as sentiments!
Both nervous grown, to keep our spirits up, Dramatis Personae
We now and then take down a hearty cup.
What shall we do?—If Comedy forsake us!
They’ll turn us out, and no one else will take us, As originally acted at Covent Garden Theatre, March 15, 1773
But why can’t I be moral?—Let me try—

My heart thus pressing—fix’d my face and eye—

With a sententious look, that nothing means MEN
(Faces are blocks, in sentimental scenes),
Thus I begin—All is not gold that glitters,
Pleasure seems sweet, but proves a glass of bitters. SIR CHARLES MARLOW Mr. Gardner.
When ignorance enters, folly is at hand;
Learning is better far than house and land. YOUNG MARLOW (HIS SON) Mr. Lewes.
Let not your virtue trip, who trips may stumble,
And virtue is not virtue, if she tumble. HARDCASTLE Mr. Shuter.
I give it up—morals won’t do for me;
To make you laugh I must play tragedy. HASTINGS Mr. Dubellamy.
One hope remains—hearing the maid was ill,
TONY LUMPKIN Mr. Quick.
A doctor comes this night to show his skill.
To cheer her heart, and give your muscles motion, DIGGORY Mr. Saunders.
He in five draughts prepar’d, presents a potion:
A kind of magic charm—for be assur’d,
If you will swallow it, the maid is cur’d. WOMEN
But desperate the Doctor, and her case is,
If you reject the dose, and make wry faces!
This truth he boasts, will boast it while he lives, MRS. HARDCASTLE Mrs. Green.
No poisonous drugs are mix’d in what he gives;
Should he succeed, you’ll give him his degree; MISS HARDCASTLE Mrs. Bulkley.
If not, within he will receive no fee!
The college you, must his pretentions back, MISS NEVILLE Mrs. Kniveton.
Pronounce him regular, or dub him quack.
MAID Miss Willems.

Landlords, Servants, &c., &c. Act I

SCENE—A Chamber in an old-fashioned House.

Enter MRS. HARDCASTLE and MR. HARDCASTLE.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. I vow, Mr. Hardcastle, you’re very particular. Is
there a creature in the whole country, but ourselves, that does not take a trip
to town now and then, to rub off the rust a little? There’s the two Miss
Hoggs, and our neighbour, Mrs. Grigsby, go to take a month’s polishing
every winter.
HARDCASTLE. Ay, and bring back vanity and affectation to last them
the whole year. I wonder why London cannot keep its own fools at home. In
my time, the follies of the town crept slowly among us, but now they travel
faster than a stage-coach. Its fopperies come down, not only as inside
passengers, but in the very basket.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Ay, your times were fine times, indeed; you have
been telling us of them for many a long year. Here we live in an old
rumbling mansion, that looks for all the world like an inn, but that we never
see company. Our best visitors are old Mrs. Oddfish, the curate’s wife, and
little Cripplegate, the lame dancing-master: And all our entertainment your
old stories of Prince Eugene and the Duke of Marlborough. I hate such old-
fashioned trumpery.
HARDCASTLE. And I love it. I love everything that’s old: old friends,
old times, old manners, old books, old wine; and, I believe, Dorothy (taking
her hand), you’ll own I have been pretty fond of an old wife.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Lord, Mr. Hardcastle, you’re for ever at your
Dorothys and your old wifes. You may be a Darby, but I’ll be no Joan, I
promise you. I’m not so old as you’d make me, by more than one good
year. Add twenty to twenty, and make money of that.
 HARDCASTLE. Let me see; twenty added to twenty, makes just fifty HARDCASTLE. And truly, so am I; for he sometimes whoops like a
and seven! speaking-trumpet—(TONY hallooing behind the Scenes.)—O, there he
MRS. HARDCASTLE. It’s false, Mr. Hardcastle: I was but twenty when goes.—A very consumptive figure, truly!
I was brought to bed of Tony, that I had by Mr. Lumpkin, my first husband; Enter TONY, crossing the stage.
and he’s not come to years of discretion yet. MRS. HARDCASTLE. Tony, where are you going, my charmer? Won’t
HARDCASTLE. Nor ever will, I dare answer for him. Ay, you have you give papa and I a little of your company, lovey?
taught him finely! TONY. I’m in haste, mother, I cannot stay.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. No matter, Tony Lumpkin has a good fortune. MRS. HARDCASTLE. You shan’t venture out this raw evening, my
My son is not to live by his learning. I don’t think a boy wants much dear: You look most shockingly.
learning to spend fifteen hundred a year.
TONY. I can’t stay, I tell you. The Three Pigeons expects me down every
HARDCASTLE. Learning, quotha! A mere composition of tricks and moment. There’s some fun going forward.
mischief!
HARDCASTLE. Ay; the alehouse, the old place: I thought so.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Humour, my dear: nothing but humour. Come,
Mr. Hardcastle, you must allow the boy a little humour. MRS. HARDCASTLE. A low, paltry set of fellows.
HARDCASTLE. I’d sooner allow him a horse-pond! If burning the TONY. Not so low, neither. There’s Dick Muggins the exciseman, Jack
footmen’s shoes, frightening the maids, and worrying the kittens, be Slang the horse doctor, Little Aminadab that grinds the music-box, and Tom
humour, he has it. It was but yesterday he fastened my wig to the back of Twist that spins the pewter platter.
my chair, and when I went to make a bow, I popped my bald head in Mrs. MRS. HARDCASTLE. Pray, my dear, disappoint them for one night, at
Frizzle’s face! least.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. And am I to blame? The poor boy was always TONY. As for disappointing them, I should not much mind; but I can’t
too sickly to do any good. A school would be his death. When he comes to abide to disappoint myself!
be a little stronger, who knows what a year or two’s Latin may do for him?
MRS. HARDCASTLE (Detaining him). You shan’t go.
HARDCASTLE. Latin for him! A cat and fiddle! No, no, the alehouse
and the stable are the only schools he’ll ever go to! TONY. I will, I tell you.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Well, we must not snub the poor boy now, for I MRS. HARDCASTLE. I say you shan’t.
believe we shan’t have him long among us. Anybody that looks in his face TONY. We’ll see which is strongest, you or I.
may see he’s consumptive.
[Exit hauling her out.
HARDCASTLE. Ay, if growing too fat be one of the symptoms.
HARDCASTLE solus.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. He coughs sometimes.
HARDCASTLE. Ay, there goes a pair that only spoil each other. But is
HARDCASTLE. Yes, when his liquor goes the wrong way. not the whole age in a combination to drive sense and discretion out of
MRS. HARDCASTLE. I’m actually afraid of his lungs. doors? There’s my pretty darling Kate; the fashions of the times have
almost infected her too. By living a year or two in town, she is as fond of MISS HARDCASTLE. I believe I shall like him.
gauze, and French frippery, as the best of them. HARDCASTLE. Young and brave.
MISS HARDCASTLE. I’m sure I shall like him.
Enter MISS HARDCASTLE.
HARDCASTLE. And very handsome.
HARDCASTLE. Blessings on my pretty innocence! Dressed out as MISS HARDCASTLE. My dear papa, say no more (kissing his hand),
usual, my Kate! Goodness! What a quantity of superfluous silk hast thou he’s mine, I’ll have him!
got about thee, girl! I could never teach the fools of this age that the HARDCASTLE. And, to crown all, Kate, he’s one of the most bashful
indigent world could be clothed out of the trimmings of the vain. and reserved young fellows in all the world.
MISS HARDCASTLE. You know our agreement, sir. You allow me the MISS HARDCASTLE. Eh! you have frozen me to death again. That
morning to receive and pay visits, and to dress in my own manner; and in word reserved has undone all the rest of his accomplishments. A reserved
the evening, I put on my housewife’s dress, to please you. lover, it is said, always makes a suspicious husband.
HARDCASTLE. Well, remember, I insist on the terms of our agreement; HARDCASTLE. On the contrary, modesty seldom resides in a breast that
and, by-the-bye, I believe I shall have occasion to try your obedience this is not enriched with nobler virtues. It was the very feature in his character
very evening. that first struck me.
MISS HARDCASTLE. I protest, sir, I don’t comprehend your meaning. MISS HARDCASTLE. He must have more striking features to catch me,
HARDCASTLE. Then to be plain with you, Kate, I expect the young I promise you. However, if he be so young, so handsome, and so
gentleman I have chosen to be your husband from town this very day. I everything, as you mention, I believe he’ll do still. I think I’ll have him.
have his father’s letter, in which he informs me his son is set out, and that HARDCASTLE. Ay, Kate, but there is still an obstacle. It is more than an
he intends to follow himself shortly after. even wager, he may not have you.
MISS HARDCASTLE. Indeed! I wish I had known something of this MISS HARDCASTLE. My dear papa, why will you mortify one so?—
before. Bless me, how shall I behave? It’s a thousand to one I shan’t like Well, if he refuses, instead of breaking my heart at his indifference, I’ll only
him; our meeting will be so formal, and so like a thing of business, that I break my glass for its flattery, set my cap to some newer fashion, and look
shall find no room for friendship or esteem. out for some less difficult admirer.
HARDCASTLE. Depend upon it, child, I’ll never control your choice; HARDCASTLE. Bravely resolved! In the meantime I’ll go prepare the
but Mr. Marlow, whom I have pitched upon, is the son of my old friend, Sir servants for his reception; as we seldom see company, they want as much
Charles Marlow, of whom you have heard me talk so often. The young training as a company of recruits the first day’s muster.
gentleman has been bred a scholar, and is designed for an employment in
the service of his country. I am told he’s a man of an excellent [Exit.
understanding. MISS HARDCASTLE sola.
MISS HARDCASTLE. Is he?
HARDCASTLE. Very generous. MISS HARDCASTLE. 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 MISS NEVILLE. I have just come from one of our agreeable tete-à-têtes.
against him. Yet can’t he be cured of his timidity, by being taught to be She has been saying a hundred tender things, and setting off her pretty
proud of his wife? Yes, and can’t I—But I vow I’m disposing of the monster as the very pink of perfection.
husband before I have secured the lover! MISS HARDCASTLE. And her partiality is such, that she actually thinks
Enter MISS NEVILLE. 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 HARDCASTLE. I’m glad you’re come, Neville, my dear. Tell me,
Constance, how do I look this evening? Is there anything whimsical about MISS NEVILLE. A fortune like mine, which chiefly consists in jewels, is
me? Is it one of my well-looking days, child? Am I in face to-day? no such mighty temptation. But, at any rate, if my dear Hastings be but
MISS NEVILLE. Perfectly, my dear. Yet, now I look again—bless me!— constant, I make no doubt to be too hard for her at last. However, I let her
sure no accident has happened among the canary birds or the goldfishes? suppose that I am in love with her son, and she never once dreams that my
Has your brother or the cat been meddling? Or has the last novel been too affections are fixed upon another.
moving? MISS HARDCASTLE. My good brother holds out stoutly. I could
MISS HARDCASTLE. No; nothing of all this. I have been threatened—I almost love him for hating you so.
can scarce get it out—I have been threatened with a lover! 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
MISS NEVILLE. And his name
rings for our afternoon’s walk through the improvements. Allons. Courage
MISS HARDCASTLE. Is Marlow. is necessary, as our affairs are critical.
MISS NEVILLE. Indeed! MISS HARDCASTLE. Would it were bed-time and all were well.
Miss HARDCASTLE. The son of Sir Charles Marlow. [Exeunt.
MISS NEVILLE. As I live, the most intimate friend of Mr. Hastings, my SCENE—An Alehouse Room. Several shabby fellows, with punch and
admirer. They are never asunder. I believe you must have seen him when tobacco. TONY at the head of the table, a little higher than the rest, a
we lived in town. mallet in his hand.
MISS HARDCASTLE. Never. OMNES. Hurrea, hurrea, hurrea, bravo!
MISS NEVILLE. He’s a very singular character, I assure you. Among FIRST FELLOW. Now, gentlemen, silence for a song. The ’Squire is
women of reputation and virtue, he is the modestest man alive: but his going to knock himself down for a song.
acquaintance give him a very different character among creatures of another
stamp: you understand me? OMNES. Ay, a song, a song.

MISS HARDCASTLE. An odd character, indeed! I shall never be able to TONY. Then I’ll sing you, gentlemen, a song I made upon this alehouse,
manage him. What shall I do? Pshaw, think no more of him, but trust to the Three Pigeons.
occurrences for success. But how goes on your own affair, my dear? Has
my mother been courting you for my brother Tony, as usual?
SONG
Let school-masters puzzle their brain, Here’s a health to the Three Jolly Pigeons.
With grammar, and nonsense, and learning; Toroddle, toroddle, toroll!
Good liquor, I stoutly maintain,
Gives genus a better discerning, OMNES. Bravo, bravo!
Let them brag of their Heathenish Gods, FIRST FELLOW. The ’Squire has got spunk in him.
Their Lethes, their Styxes, and Stygians; SECOND FELLOW. I loves to hear him sing, bekeays he never gives us
nothing that’s low.
Their Quis, and their Quæs, and their Quods,
THIRD FELLOW. O damn anything that’s low, I cannot bear it!
They’re all but a parcel of Pigeons.
FOURTH FELLOW. The genteel thing is the genteel thing at any time. If
Toroddle, toroddle, toroll!
so be that a gentleman bees in a concatenation accordingly.
THIRD FELLOW. I like the maxum of it, Master Muggins. What, though
When Methodist preachers come down,
I am obligated to dance a bear, a man may be a gentleman for all that. May
A-preaching that drinking is sinful, this be my poison if my bear ever dances but to the very genteelest of tunes:
I’ll wager the rascals a crown, Water Parted, or the minuet in Ariadne.5

They always preach best with a skinful. 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.
But when you come down with your pence,
TONY. Ecod, and so it would, Master Slang. I’d then show what it was to
For a slice of their scurvy religion, keep choice of company.
I’ll leave it to all men of sense, SECOND FELLOW. O, he takes after his own father for that. To be sure,
But you, my good friend, are the pigeon. 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
Toroddle, toroddle, toroll! never had his fellow. It was a saying in the place, that he kept the best
horses, dogs, and girls in the whole county.
Then come, put the jorum about, TONY. Ecod, and when I’m of age I’ll be no bastard, I promise you. I
And let us be merry and clever, 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.
Our hearts and our liquors are stout,
Well, Stingo, what’s the matter?
Here’s the Three Jolly Pigeons for ever.
Let some cry up woodcock or hare, Enter LANDLORD.
Your bustards, your ducks, and your widgeons:
But of all the birds in the air,
 LANDLORD. There be two gentlemen in a post-chaise at the door. They TONY. Nor the way you came?
have lost their way upo’ the forest; and they are talking something about
HASTINGS. No, sir, but if you can inform us—
Mr. Hardcastle.
TONY. Why, gentlemen, if you know neither the road you are going, nor
TONY. As sure as can be, one of them must be the gentleman that’s
where you are, nor the road you came, the first thing I have to inform is,
coming down to court my sister. Do they seem to be Londoners?
that—you have lost your way.
LANDLORD. I believe they may. They look woundily like Frenchmen.
MARLOW. We wanted no ghost to tell us that.
TONY. Then desire them to step this way, and I’ll set them right in a
TONY. Pray, gentlemen, may I be so bold as to ask the place from
twinkling. (Exit LANDLORD.) Gentlemen, as they mayn’t be good enough
whence you came?
company for you, step down for a moment, and I’ll be with you in the
squeezing of a lemon. MARLOW. That’s not necessary towards directing us where we are to
go.
[Exeunt MOB.
TONY. No offence; but question for question is all fair, you know. Pray,
TONY solus.
gentlemen, is not this same Hardcastle a cross-grained, old-fashioned,
TONY. Father-in-law has been calling me whelp, and hound, this half whimsical fellow with an ugly face, a daughter, and a pretty son?
year. Now, if I pleased, I could be so revenged upon the old grumbletonian. HASTINGS. We have not seen the gentleman, but he has the family you
But then I’m afraid—afraid of what? I shall soon be worth fifteen hundred a mention.
year, and let him frighten me out of that if he can!
TONY. The daughter, a tall, trapesing, trolloping, talkative maypote—
Enter LANDLORD, conducting MARLOW and HASTINGS. The son, a pretty, well-bred, agreeable youth, that everybody is fond of!
MARLOW. What a tedious uncomfortable day have we had of it! We MARLOW. Our information differs in this. The daughter is said to be
were told it was but forty miles across the country, and we have come above well-bred and beautiful; the son, an awkward booby, reared up and spoiled
threescore! at his mother’s apron-string.
HASTINGS. And all, Marlow, from that unaccountable reserve of yours, TONY. He-he-hem—then, gentlemen, all I have to tell you is, that you
that would not let us enquire more frequently on the way. won’t reach Mr. Hardcastle’s house this night, I believe.
MARLOW. I own, Hastings, I am unwilling to lay myself under an HASTINGS. Unfortunate!
obligation to every one I meet; and often stand the chance of an unmannerly
answer. TONY. It’s a damned long, dark, boggy, dirty, dangerous way. Stingo, tell
the gentlemen the way to Mr. Hardcastle’s. (Winking upon the
HASTINGS. At present, however, we are not likely to receive any
LANDLORD.) Mr. Hardcastle’s of Quagmire Marsh, you understand me.
answer.
LANDLORD. Master Hardcastle’s! Lack-a-daisy, my masters, you’re
TONY. No offence, gentlemen. But I’m told you have been enquiring for
come a deadly deal wrong! When you came to the bottom of the hill, you
one Mr. Hardcastle, in these parts. Do you know what part of the country
should have crossed down Squash Lane.
you are in?
MARLOW. Cross down Squash Lane!
HASTINGS. Not in the least, sir, but should thank you for information.
 LANDLORD. Then you were to keep straight forward, until you came to roadside. You’ll see a pair of large horns over the door. That’s the sign.
four roads. Drive up the yard, and call stoutly about you.
MARLOW. Come to where four roads meet! HASTINGS. Sir, we are obliged to you. The servants can’t miss the way?
TONY. Ay, but you must be sure to take only one of them. TONY. No, no: but I tell you though, the landlord is rich, and going to
MARLOW. O, sir, you’re facetious! leave off business; so he wants to be thought a gentleman, saving your
presence, he! he! he! He’ll be for giving you his company, and, ecod, if you
TONY. Then, keeping to the right, you are to go sideways till you come mind him, he’ll persuade you that his mother was an alderman, and his aunt
upon Crack-skull Common: there you must look sharp for the track of the a justice of the peace!
wheel, and go forward, till you come to Farmer Murrain’s barn. Coming to
the farmer’s barn, you are to turn to the right, and then to the left, and then LANDLORD. A troublesome old blade, to be sure; but ’a keeps as good
to the right about again, till you find out the old mill— wines and beds as any in the whole country.
MARLOW. Well, if he supplies us with these, we shall want no further
MARLOW. Zounds, man! we could as soon find out the longitude!
connection. We are to turn to the right, did you say?
HASTINGS. What’s to be done, Marlow?
TONY. No, no; straight forward. I’ll just step myself, and show you a
MARLOW. This house promises but a poor reception, though, perhaps, piece of the way. (To the LANDLORD.) Mum.
the landlord can accommodate us.
LANDLORD. Ah, bless your heart, for a sweet, pleasant—damned
LANDLORD. Alack, master, we have but one spare bed in the whole mischievous son of a whore.
house.
[Exeunt.
TONY. And to my knowledge, that’s taken up by three lodgers already.
(After a pause, in which the rest seem disconcerted.) I have hit it. Don’t you
think, Stingo, our landlady could accommodate the gentlemen by the
fireside, with—three chairs and a bolster?
HASTINGS. I hate sleeping by the fireside.
MARLOW. And I detest your three chairs and a bolster.
TONY. You do, do you?—then let me see—what—if you go on a mile
further, to the Buck’s Head; the old Buck’s Head on the hill, one of the best
inns in the whole country?
HASTINGS. Oh, oh! so we have escaped an adventure for this night,
however.
LANDLORD (Apart to TONY). Sure, you ben’t sending them to your
father’s as an inn, be you?
TONY. Mum, you fool, you. Let them find that out. (To them.) You have
only to keep on straight forward, till you come to a large old house by the
 HARDCASTLE. Blockhead! Is not a bellyful in the kitchen as good as a
bellyful in the parlour? Stay your stomach with that reflection.
DIGGORY. Ecod, I thank your worship, I’ll make a shift to stay my
Act II stomach with a slice of cold beef in the pantry.
HARDCASTLE. Diggory, you are too talkative. Then, if I happen to say
a good thing, or tell a good story at table, you must not all burst out a-
SCENE—An old-fashioned House. laughing, as if you made part of the company.
Enter HARDCASTLE, followed by three or four awkward SERVANTS. DIGGORY. Then, ecod, your worship must not tell the story of Ould
Grouse in the gun-room: I can’t help laughing at that—he! he! he!—for the
HARDCASTLE. Well, I hope you’re perfect in the table exercise I have
soul of me! We have laughed at that these twenty years—ha! ha! ha!
been teaching you these three days. You all know your posts and your
places, and can show that you have been used to good company, without HARDCASTLE. Ha! ha! ha! The story is a good one. Well, honest
ever stirring from home. Diggory, you may laugh at that—but still remember to be attentive.
Suppose one of the company should call for a glass of wine, how will you
OMNES. Ay, ay.
behave? A glass of wine, sir, if you please (to DIGGORY)—Eh, why don’t
HARDCASTLE. When company comes, you are not to pop out and you move?
stare, and then run in again, like frightened rabbits in a warren. DiGGORY. Ecod, your worship, I never have courage till I see the
OMNES. No, no. eatables and drinkables brought upo’ the table, and then I’m as bauld as a
HARDCASTLE. You, Diggory, whom I have taken from the barn, are to lion.
make a show at the side-table; and you, Roger, whom I have advanced from HARDCASTLE. What, will nobody move?
the plough, are to place yourself behind my chair. But you’re not to stand FIRST SERVANT. I’m not to leave this pleace.
so, with your hands in your pockets. Take your hands from your pockets,
Roger; and from your head, you blockhead, you. See how Diggory carries SECOND SERVANT. I’m sure it’s no pleace of mine.
his hands. They’re a little too stiff, indeed, but that’s no great matter. THIRD SERVANT. Nor mine for sartain.
DIGGORY. Ay, mind how I hold them. I learned to hold my hands this DIGGORY. Wauns, and I’m sure it canna be mine.
way, when I was upon drill for the militia. And so being upon drill—
HARDCASTLE. You numskulls! and so while, like your betters, you are
HARDCASTLE. You must not be so talkative, Diggory. You must be all quarrelling for places, the guests must be starved. O, you dunces! I find I
attention to the guests. You must hear us talk, and not think of talking; you must begin all over again.—But don’t I hear a coach drive into the yard? To
must see us drink and not think of drinking; you must see us eat and not your posts, you blockheads! I’ll go in the meantime and give my old
think of eating. friend’s son a hearty reception at the gate.
DIGGORY. By the laws, your worship, that’s parfectly unpossible. [Exit HARDCASTLE.
Whenever Diggory sees yeating going forward, ecod, he’s always wishing
for a mouthful himself. DIGGORY. By the elevens, my pleace is gone quite out of my head!
ROGER. I know that my pleace is to be everywhere!
 FIRST SERVANT. Where the devil is mine? HASTINGS. But in the company of women of reputation I never saw
such an idiot, such a trembler; you look for all the world as if you wanted
SECOND SERVANT. My pleace is to be nowhere at all; and so I’ze go
an opportunity of stealing out of the room.
about my business!
MARLOW. Why, man, that’s because I do want to steal out of the room.
[Exeunt SERVANTS, running about as if frighted, different ways.
Faith, I have often formed a resolution to break the ice, and rattle away at
Enter SERVANTS with Candles, showing in MARLOW and any rate. But I don’t know how, a single glance from a pair of fine eyes has
HASTINGS. totally overset my resolution. An impudent fellow may counterfeit modesty,
SERVANT. Welcome, gentlemen, very welcome. This way. but I’ll be hanged if a modest man can ever counterfeit impudence.
HASTINCS. After the disappointments of the day, welcome once more, HASTINGS. If you could but say half the fine things to them that I have
Charles, to the comforts of a clean room and a good fire. Upon my word, a heard you lavish upon the barmaid of an inn, or even a college bedmaker—
very well-looking house; antique but creditable. MARLOW. Why, George, I can’t say fine things to them. They freeze,
MARLOW. The usual fate of a large mansion. Having first ruined the they petrify me. They may talk of a comet, or a burning mountain, or some
master by good housekeeping, it at last comes to levy contributions as an such bagatelle. But to me, a modest woman, dressed out in all her finery, is
inn. the most tremendous object of the whole creation.
HASTINGS. As you say, we passengers are to be taxed to pay for all HASTINGS. Ha! ha! ha! At this rate, man, how can you ever expect to
these fineries. I have often seen a good sideboard, or a marble chimney- marry!
piece, though not actually put in the bill, inflame a reckoning confoundedly. MARLOW. Never, unless, as among kings and princes, my bride were to
MARLOW. Travellers, George, must pay in all places. The only be courted by proxy. If, indeed, like an Eastern bridegroom, one were to be
difference is, that in good inns, you pay dearly for luxuries; in bad inns, you introduced to a wife he never saw before, it might be endured. But to go
are fleeced and starved. through all the terrors of a formal courtship, together with the episode of
aunts, grandmothers, and cousins, and at last to blurt out the broad staring
HASTINGS. You have lived pretty much among them. In truth, I have question of, Madam, will you marry me? No, no, that’s a strain much above
been often surprised, that you who have seen so much of the world, with me, I assure you!
your natural good sense, and your many opportunities, could never yet
acquire a requisite share of assurance. HASTINGS. I pity you. But how do you intend behaving to the lady you
are come down to visit at the request of your father?
MARLOW. The Englishman’s malady. But tell me, George, where could
I have learned that assurance you talk of? My life has been chiefly spent in MARLOW. As I behave to all other ladies. Bow very low. Answer yes, or
a college, or an inn, in seclusion from that lovely part of the creation that no, to all her demands—But for the rest, I don’t think I shall venture to look
chiefly teaches men confidence. I don’t know that I was ever familiarly in her face, till I see my father’s again.
acquainted with a single modest woman—except my mother—but among HASTINGS. I’m surprised that one who is so warm a friend can be so
females of another class, you know— cool a lover.
HASTINGS. Ay, among them you are impudent enough of all MARLOW. To be explicit, my dear Hastings, my chief inducement down
conscience! was to be instrumental in forwarding your happiness, not my own. Miss
MARLOW. They are of us, you know.
Neville loves you, the family don’t know you, as my friend you are sure of HARDCASTLE. Your talking of a retreat, Mr. Marlow, puts me in mind
a reception, and let honour do the rest. of the Duke of Marlborough, when we went to besiege Denain. He first
HASTINGS. My dear Marlow! But I’ll suppress the emotion. Were I a summoned the garrison—
wretch, meanly seeking to carry off a fortune, you should be the last man in MARLOW. Don’t you think the ventre d’or waistcoat will do with the
the world I would apply to for assistance. But Miss Neville’s person is all I plain brown?
ask, and that is mine, both from her deceased father’s consent and her own HARDCASTLE. He first summoned the garrison, which might consist of
inclination.
about five thousand men—
MARLOW. Happy man! You have talents and art to captivate any
HASTINGS. I think not: brown and yellow mix but very poorly.
woman. I’m doomed to adore the sex, and yet to converse with the only part
of it I despise. This stammer in my address, and this awkward prepossessing HARDCASTLE. I say, gentlemen, as I was telling you, he summoned the
visage of mine, can never permit me to soar above the reach of a milliner’s garrison, which might consist of about five thousand men—
apprentice, or one of the duchesses of Drury Lane. Pshaw! this fellow here MARLOW. The girls like finery.
to interrupt us.
HARDCASTLE. Which might consist of about five thousand men, well
Enter HARDCASTLE. appointed with stores, ammunition, and other implements of war. “Now,”
HARDCASTLE. Gentlemen, once more you are heartily welcome. says the Duke of Marlborough to George Brooks, that stood next to him—
Which is Mr. Marlow? Sir, you’re heartily welcome. It’s not my way, you you must have heard of George Brooks; “I’ll pawn my Dukedom,” says he,
see, to receive my friends with my back to the fire. I like to give them a “but I take that garrison without spilling a drop of blood!” So—
hearty reception in the old style at my gate. I like to see their horses and MARLOW. What, my good friend, if you gave us a glass of punch in the
trunks taken care of. meantime, it would help us to carry on the siege with vigour.
MARLOW (Aside). He has got our names from the servants already. (To HARDCASTLE. Punch, sir!—(Aside.) This is the most unaccountable
him.) We approve your caution and hospitality, sir. (To HASTINGS.) I have kind of modesty I ever met with!
been thinking, George, of changing our travelling dresses in the morning. I
am grown confoundedly ashamed of mine. MARLOW. Yes, sir, punch! A glass of warm punch, after our journey,
will be comfortable. This is Liberty Hall, you know.
HARDCASTLE. I beg, Mr. Marlow, you’ll use no ceremony in this
house. HARDCASTLE. Here’s a cup, sir.
HASTINGS. I fancy, George, you’re right: the first blow is half the MARLOW (Aside). So this fellow, in his Liberty Hall, will only let us
battle. I intend opening the campaign with the white and gold. have just what he pleases.
HARDCASTLE. Mr. Marlow—Mr. Hastings—gentlemen—pray be HARDCASTLE (Taking the cup). I hope you’ll find it to your mind. I
under no constraint in this house. This is Liberty Hall, gentlemen. You may have prepared it with my own hands, and I believe you’ll own the
do just as you please here. ingredients are tolerable. Will you be so good as to pledge me, sir? Here,
Mr. Marlow, here is our better acquaintance!
MARLOW. Yet, George, if we open the campaign too fiercely at first, we
may want ammunition before it is over. I think to reserve the embroidery to [Drinks.
secure a retreat.
 MARLOW (Aside). A very impudent fellow this! but he’s a character, [Drinks.
and I’ll humour him a little. Sir, my service to you.
HARDCASTLE. Good, very good, thank you; ha! ha! Your generalship
[Drinks. puts me in mind of Prince Eugene, when he fought the Turks at the battle of
Belgrade. You shall hear.
HASTINGS (Aside). I see this fellow wants to give us his company, and
forgets that he’s an innkeeper, before he has learned to be a gentleman. MARLOW. Instead of the battle of Belgrade, I believe it’s almost time to
talk about supper. What has your philosophy got in the house for supper?
MARLOW. From the excellence of your cup, my old friend, I suppose
you have a good deal of business in this part of the country. Warm work, HARDCASTLE. For supper, sir!—(Aside.) Was ever such a request to a
now and then, at elections, I suppose? man in his own house!
HARDCASTLE. No, sir, I have long given that work over. Since our MARLOW. Yes, sir, supper, sir; I begin to feel an appetite. I shall make
betters have hit upon the expedient of electing each other, there’s no devilish work to-night in the larder, I promise you.
business for us that sell ale. HARDCASTLE (Aside). Such a brazen dog sure never my eyes beheld.
HASTINGS. So, then you have no turn for politics, I find. (To him.) Why, really, sir, as for supper I can’t well tell. My Dorothy, and
the cook maid, settle these things between them. I leave these kind of things
HARDCASTLE. Not in the least. There was a time, indeed, I fretted
entirely to them.
myself about the mistakes of government, like other people; but finding
myself every day grow more angry, and the government growing no better, MARLOW. You do, do you?
I left it to mend itself. Since that, I no more trouble my head about Heyder HARDCASTLE. Entirely. By-the-bye, I believe they are in actual
Ally or Ally Cawn, than about Ally Croker.6 Sir, my service to you. consultation upon what’s for supper this moment in the kitchen.
HASTINGS. So that, with eating above stairs, and drinking below, with MARLOW. Then I beg they’ll admit me as one of their privy council. It’s
receiving your friends within, and amusing them without, you lead a good a way I have got. When I travel, I always choose to regulate my own
pleasant bustling life of it. supper. Let the cook be called. No offence, I hope, sir.
HARDCASTLE. I do stir about a great deal, that’s certain. Half the HARDCASTLE. O, no, sir, none in the least; yet, I don’t know how: our
differences of the parish are adjusted in this very parlour. Bridget, the cook maid, is not very communicative upon these occasions.
MARLOW (After drinking). And you have an argument in your cup, old Should we send for her, she might scold us all out of the house.
gentleman, better than any in Westminster Hall. HASTINGS. Let’s see your list of the larder, then. I ask it as a favour. I
HARDCASTLE. Ay, young gentleman, that, and a little philosophy. always match my appetite to my bill of fare.
MARLOW (Aside). Well, this is the first time I ever heard of an MARLOW (To HARDCASTLE, who looks at them with surprise). Sir,
innkeeper’s philosophy. he’s very right, and it’s my way, too.
HASTINGS. So then, like an experienced general, you attack them on HARDCASTLE. Sir, you have a right to command here. Here, Roger,
every quarter. If you find their reason manageable, you attack it with your bring us the bill of fare for to-nights supper. I believe it’s drawn out. Your
philosophy; if you find they have no reason, you attack them with this. manner, Mr. Hastings, puts me in mind of my uncle, Colonel Wallop. It was
Here’s your health, my philosopher. a saying of his, that no man was sure of his supper till he had eaten it.
 HASTINGS (Aside). All upon the high ropes! His uncle a colonel! We HARDCASTLE. I entreat you’ll leave all that to me. You shall not stir a
shall soon hear of his mother being a justice of the peace. But let’s hear the step.
bill of fare. MARLOW. Leave that to you! I protest, sir, you must excuse me, I
MARLOW (Perusing). What’s here? For the first course; for the second always look to these things myself.
course; for the dessert. The devil, sir, do you think we have brought down HARDCASTLE. I must insist, sir, you’ll make yourself easy on that
the whole Joiners’ Company, or the Corporation of Bedford, to eat up such head.
a supper? Two or three little things, clean and comfortable, will do.
MARLOW. You see I’m resolved on it.—(Aside.) A very troublesome
HASTINGS. But let’s hear it.
fellow this, as ever I met with.
MARLOW (Reading). For the first course at the top, a pig, and prune HARDCASTLE. Well, sir, I’m resolved at least to attend you.—(Aside.)
sauce. This may be modern modesty, but I never saw anything look so like old-
HASTINGS. Damn your pig, I say! fashioned impudence.
MARLOW. And damn your prune sauce, say I! [Exeunt MARLOW and HARDCASTLE.
HARDCASTLE. And yet, gentlemen, to men that are hungry, pig, with HASTINGS solus.
prune sauce, is very good eating. HASTINGS. So I find this fellow’s civilities begin to grow troublesome.
MARLOW. At the bottom, a calfs tongue and brains. But who can be angry at those assiduities which are meant to please him!
HASTINGS. Let your brains be knocked out, my good sir; I don’t like Miss Neville, by all that’s happy!
them.
MARLOW. Or you may clap them on a plate by themselves, I do. Enter MISS NEVILLE.

HARDCASTLE (Aside). Their impudence confounds me. (To them.)

MISS NEVILLE. My dear Hastings! To what unexpected good fortune?
Gentlemen, you are my guests, make what alterations you please. Is there
anything else you wish to retrench or alter, gentlemen? to what accident am I to ascribe this happy meeting?

MARLOW. Item. A pork pie, a boiled rabbit and sausages, a florentine, a HASTINGS. Rather let me ask the same question, as I could never have
shaking pudding, and a dish of tiff—taff—taffety cream! hoped to meet my dearest Constance at an inn.

HASTINGS. Confound your made dishes, I shall be as much at a loss in MISS NEVILLE. An inn! sure you mistake! my aunt, my guardian, lives
this house as at a green and yellow dinner at the French ambassador’s table. here. What could induce you to think this house an inn?
I’m for plain eating. HASTINGS. My friend, Mr. Marlow, with whom I came down, and I,
HARDCASTLE. I’m sorry, gentlemen, that I have nothing you like, but have been sent here as to an inn, I assure you. A young fellow whom we
accidentally met at a house hard by directed us hither.
if there be anything you have a particular fancy to
MISS NEVILLE. Certainly it must be one of my hopeful cousin’s tricks,
MARLOW. Why, really, sir, your bill of fare is so exquisite, that any one
of whom you have heard me talk so often, ha! ha! ha! ha!
part of it is full as good as another. Send us what you please. So much for
supper. And now to see that our beds are aired, and properly taken care of.
 HASTINGS. He whom your aunt intends for you? He of whom I have HASTINGS. My dear Charles! Let me congratulate you!—The most
such just apprehensions? fortunate accident!—Who do you think is just alighted?
MISS NEVILLE. You have nothing to fear from him, I assure you. You’d MARLOW. Cannot guess.
adore him if you knew how heartily he despises me. My aunt knows it too,
HASTINGS. Our mistresses, boy, Miss Hardcastle and Miss Neville.
and has undertaken to court me for him, and actually begins to think she has
Give me leave to introduce Miss Constance Neville to your acquaintance.
made a conquest. Happening to dine in the neighbourhood, they called, on their return to take
HASTINGS. Thou dear dissembler! You must know, my Constance, I fresh horses, here. Miss Hardcastle has just stept into the next room, and
have just seized this happy opportunity of my friend’s visit here to get will be back in an instant. Wasn’t it lucky? eh!
admittance into the family. The horses that carried us down are now
MARLOW (Aside). I have just been mortified enough of all conscience,
fatigued with their journey, but they’ll soon be refreshed; and then if my
and here comes something to complete my embarrassment.
dearest girl will trust in her faithful Hastings, we shall soon be landed in
France, where even among slaves the laws of marriage are respected. HASTINGS. Well! but wasn’t it the most fortunate thing in the world?
MISS NEVILLE. I have often told you, that though ready to obey you, I MARLOW. Oh! yes. Very fortunate—a most joyful encounter——But
yet should leave my little fortune behind with reluctance. The greatest part our dresses, George, you know, are in disorder——What if we should
of it was left me by my uncle, the India Director, and chiefly consists in postpone the happiness till to-morrow?——To-morrow at her own house
jewels. I have been for some time persuading my aunt to let me wear them. ——It will be every bit as convenient——And rather more respectful—To-
I fancy I’m very near succeeding. The instant they are put into my morrow let it be.
possession you shall find me ready to make them and myself yours. [Offering to go.
HASTINGS. Perish the baubles! Your person is all I desire. In the MISS NEVILLE. By no means, sir. Your ceremony will displease her.
meantime, my friend Marlow must not be let into his mistake. I know the The disorder of your dress will shew the ardour of your impatience.
strange reserve of his temper is such, that if abruptly informed of it, he Besides, she knows you are in the house, and will permit you to see her.
would instantly quit the house before our plan was ripe for execution.
MARLOW. O! the devil! how shall I support it? Hem! hem! Hastings,
MISS NEVILLE. But how shall we keep him in the deception? Miss you must not go. You are to assist me, you know. I shall be confoundedly
Hardcastle is just returned from walking; what if we still continue to ridiculous. Yet, hang it! I’ll take courage. Hem!
deceive him?—This, this way
HASTINGS. Pshaw, man! it’s but the first plunge, and all’s over. She’s
[They confer. but a woman, you know.
Enter MARLOW. MARLOW. And of all women, she that I dread most to encounter!
MARLOW. The assiduities of these good people tease me beyond Enter MISS HARDCASTLE, as returned from walking, a Bonnet, &c.
bearing. My host seems to think it ill manners to leave me alone, and so he
claps not only himself, but his old-fashioned wife on my back. They talk of HASTINGS (Introducing them). Miss Hardcastle, Mr. Marlow, I’m proud
coming to sup with us, too; and then, I suppose, we are to run the gauntlet of bringing two persons of such merit together, that only want to know, to
through all the rest of the family—What have we got here?— esteem each other.
 MISS HARDCASTLE (Aside). Now, for meeting my modest gentleman HASTINGS. Our presence will but spoil conversation, so we’ll retire to
with a demure face, and quite in his own manner. (After a pause, in which the next room. (To him.) You don’t consider, man, that we are to manage a
he appears very uneasy and disconcerted.) I’m glad of your safe arrival, sir little tête-à-tête of our own.
——I’m told you had some accidents by the way. [Exeunt.
MARLOW. Only a few, madam. Yes, we had some. Yes, madam, a good MISS HARDCASTLE (After a pause). But you have not been wholly an
many accidents, but should be sorry—madam—or rather glad of any observer, I presume, sir. The ladies, I should hope, have employed some
accidents—that are so agreeably concluded. Hem!
part of your addresses.
HASTINGS (To him). You never spoke better in your whole life. Keep it
MARLOW (Relapsing into timidity). Pardon me, madam, I—I—I—as
up, and I’ll insure you the victory.
yet have studied—only—to—deserve them.
MISS HARDCASTLE. I’m afraid you flatter, sir. You that have seen so
MISS HARDCASTLE. And that some say is the very worst way to
much of the finest company can find little entertainment in an obscure
obtain them.
corner of the country.
MARLOW. Perhaps so, madam. But I love to converse only with the
MARLOW (Gathering courage). I have lived, indeed, in the world,
more grave and sensible part of the sex.—But I’m afraid I grow tiresome.
madam; but I have kept very little company. I have been but an observer
upon life, madam, while others were enjoying it. MISS HARDCASTLE. Not at all, sir; there is nothing I like so much as
grave conversation myself: I could hear it for ever. Indeed, I have often
Miss NEVILLE. But that, I am told, is the way to enjoy it at last.
been surprised how a man of sentiment could ever admire those light airy
HASTINGS (To him). Cicero never spoke better. Once more, and you are pleasures, where nothing reaches the heart.
confirmed in assurance for ever. MARLOW. It’s—a disease—of the mind, madam. In the variety of tastes
MARLOW (To him). Hem! Stand by me, then, and when I’m down, there must be some who, wanting a relish for—um-a-um.
throw in a word or two to set me up again. MISS HARDCASTLE. I understand you, sir. There must be some, who,
Miss HARDCASTLE. An observer, like you, upon life, were, I fear, wanting a relish for refined pleasures, pretend to despise what they are
disagreeably employed, since you must have had much more to censure incapable of tasting.
than to approve. MARLOW. My meaning, madam, but infinitely better expressed. And I
MARLOW. Pardon me, madam. I was always willing to be amused. The can’t help observing—a——
folly of most people is rather an object of mirth than uneasiness. MISS HARDCASTLE (Aside). Who could ever suppose this fellow
HASTINGS (To him). Bravo, bravo. Never spoke so well in your whole impudent upon some occasions? (To him.) You were going to observe, sir
life. Well, Miss Hardcastle, I see that you and Mr. Marlow are going to be ——
very good company. I believe our being here will but embarrass the
MARLOW. I was observing, madam——I protest, madam, I forget what
interview.
I was going to observe.
MARLOW. Not in the least, Mr. Hastings. We like your company of all
MISS HARDCASTLE (Aside). I vow and so do I. (To him.) You were
things. (To him.) Zounds! George, sure you won’t go? How can you leave
observing, sir, that in this age of hypocrisy—something about hypocrisy, sir.
us?
 MARLOW. Yes, madam. In this age of hypocrisy, there are few who MISS HARDCASTLE. Ha! ha! ha! Was there ever such a sober
upon strict enquiry do not—a—a—a—— sentimental interview? I’m certain he scarce looked in my face the whole
MISS HARDCASTLE. I understand you perfectly, sir. time. Yet the fellow, but for his unaccountable bashfulness, is pretty well,
too. He has good sense, but then so buried in his fears, that it fatigues one
MARLOW (Aside). Egad! and that’s more than I do myself! more than ignorance. If I could teach him a little confidence, it would be
MISS HARDCASTLE. You mean that in this hypocritical age there are doing somebody that I know of a piece of service. But who is that
few that do not condemn in public what they practise in private, and think somebody?—that, faith, is a question I can scarce answer.
they pay every debt to virtue when they praise it. [Exit.
MARLOW. True, madam; those who have most virtue in their mouths, Enter TONY and MISS NEVILLE, followed by MRS. HARDCASTLE
have least of it in their bosoms. But I’m sure I tire you, madam. and HASTINGS.
MISS HARDCASTLE. Not in the least, sir; there’s something so TONY. What do you follow me for, cousin Con? I wonder you’re not
agreeable and spirited in your manner, such life and force——pray, sir, go ashamed to be so very engaging.
on.
Miss NEVILLE. I hope, cousin, one may speak to one’s own relations,
MARLOW. Yes, madam. I was saying——that there are some occasions and not be to blame.
——when a total want of courage, madam, destroys all the——and puts us
TONY. Ay, but I know what sort of a relation you want to make me,
——upon a——a——a——
though; but it won’t do. I tell you, cousin Con, it won’t do, so I beg you’ll
MISS HARDCASTLE. I agree with you entirely, a want of courage upon keep your distance, I want no nearer relationship.
some occasions assumes the appearance of ignorance, and betrays us when
[She follows coquetting him to the back scene.
we most want to excel. I beg you’ll proceed.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Well! I vow, Mr. Hastings, you are very
MARLOW. Yes, Madam. Morally speaking, madam——but I see Miss
entertaining. There’s nothing in the world I love to talk of so much as
Neville expecting us in the next room. I would not intrude for the world.
London, and the fashions, though I was never there myself.
MISS HARDCASTLE. I protest, sir, I never was more agreeably
HASTINGS. Never there! You amaze me! From your air and manner, I
entertained in all my life. Pray go on.
concluded you had been bred all your life either at Ranelagh, St. James’s, or
MARLOW. Yes, Madam. I was——But she beckons us to join her. Tower Wharf.
Madam, shall I do myself the honour to attend you?
MRS. HARDCASTLE. O! sir, you’re only pleased to say so. We country
MISS HARDCASTLE. Well then, I’ll follow. persons can have no manner at all. I’m in love with the town, and that
MARLOW (Aside). This pretty smooth dialogue has done for me. serves to raise me above some of our neighbouring rustics; but who can
have a manner, that has never seen the Pantheon, the Grotto Gardens, the
[Exit. Borough, and such places where the nobility chiefly resort? All I can do is
to enjoy London at second-hand. I take care to know every tête-à-tête 7
MISS HARDCASTLE sola. from the Scandalous Magazine, and have all the fashions as they come out,
in a letter from the two Miss Rickets of Crooked Lane. Pray how do you
like this head, Mr. Hastings?
 HASTINGS. Extremely elegant and degagée, upon my word, madam. MRS. HARDCASTLE. And yet Mrs. Niece thinks herself as much a
Your friseur is a Frenchman, I suppose? woman, and is as fond of jewels as the oldest of us all.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. I protest, I dressed it myself from a print in the HASTINGS. Your niece, is she? And that young gentleman, a brother of
Ladies’ Memorandum-book for the last year. yours, I should presume?
HASTINGS. Indeed. Such a head in a side-box, at the Play-house, would MRS. HARDCASTLE. My son, sir. They are contracted to each other.
draw as many gazers as my Lady Mayoress at a City Ball. Observe their little sports. They fall in and out ten times a day, as if they
MRS. HARDCASTLE. I vow, since inoculation began, there is no such were man and wife already. (To them.) Well, Tony, child, what soft things
thing to be seen as a plain woman; so one must dress a little particular or are you saying to your cousin Constance, this evening?
one may escape in the crowd. TONY. I have been saying no soft things; but that it’s very hard to be
HASTINGS. But that can never be your case, madam, in any dress! followed about so. Ecod! I’ve not a place in the house now that’s left to
myself but the stable.
(Bowing.)
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Never mind him, Con, my dear. He’s in another
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Yet, what signifies my dressing when I have such
story behind your back.
a piece of antiquity by my side as Mr. Hardcastle? All I can say will never
argue down a single button from his clothes. I have often wanted him to MISS NEVILLE. There’s something generous in my cousin’s manner. He
throw off his great flaxen wig, and where he was bald, to plaster it over like falls out before faces to be forgiven in private.
my Lord Pately, with powder. TONY. That’s a damned confounded——crack.
HASTINGS. You are right, madam; for, as among the ladies there are
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Ah! he’s a sly one. Don’t you think they’re like
none ugly, so among the men there are none old.
each other about the mouth, Mr. Hastings? The Blenkinsop mouth to a T
MRS. HARDCASTLE. But what do you think his answer was? Why, They’re of a size, too. Back to back, my pretties, that Mr. Hastings may see
with his usual Gothic vivacity, he said I only wanted him to throw off his you. Come, Tony.
wig to convert it into a tête for my own wearing! TONY. You had as good not make me, I tell you.
HASTINGS. Intolerable! At your age you may wear what you please, [Measuring.
and it must become you.
MISS NEVILLE,. O lud! he has almost cracked my head.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Pray, Mr. Hastings, what do you take to be the
most fashionable age about town? MRS. HARDCASTLE. O, the monster! For shame, Tony. You a man,
and behave so!
HASTINGS. Some time ago forty was all the mode; but I’m told the
ladies intend to bring up fifty for the ensuing winter. TONY. If I’m a man, let me have my fortin. Ecod! I’ll not be made a fool
of no longer.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Seriously. Then I shall be too young for the
fashion! MRS. HARDCASTLE. Is this, ungrateful boy, all that I’m to get for the
pains I have taken in your education? I that have rocked you in your cradle,
HASTINGS. No lady begins now to put on jewels till she’s past forty. and fed that pretty mouth with a spoon! Did not I work that waistcoat to
For instance, Miss there, in a polite circle, would be considered as a child,
as a mere maker of samplers.
make you genteel? Did not I prescribe for you every day, and weep while TONY. That’s as I find ’um.
the receipt was operating?
HASTINGS. Not to her of your mother’s choosing, I dare answer! And
TONY. Ecod! you had reason to weep, for you have been dosing me ever yet she appears to me a pretty, well-tempered girl.
since I was born. I have gone through every receipt in the complete
TONY. That’s because you don’t know her as well as I. Ecod! I know
housewife ten times over; and you have thoughts of coursing me through
every inch about her; and there’s not a more bitter cantankerous toad in all
Quincy8 next spring. But, ecod! I tell you, I’ll not be made a fool of no Christendom!
longer.
HASTINGS (Aside). Pretty encouragement, this, for a lover.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Wasn’t it all for your good, viper? Wasn’t it all
for your good? TONY. I have seen her since the height of that. She has as many tricks as
a hare in a thicket, or a colt the first day’s breaking.
TONY. I wish you’d let me and my good alone, then. Snubbing this way
when I’m in spirits. If I’m to have any good, let it come of itself; not to HASTINGS. To me she appears sensible and silent!
keep dinging it, dinging it into one so. TONY. Ay, before company. But when she’s with her playmates she’s as
MRS. HARDCASTLE. That’s false; I never see you when you’re in loud as a hog in a gate.
spirits. No, Tony, you then go to the alehouse or kennel. I’m never to be HASTINGS. But there is a meek modesty about her that charms me.
delighted with your agreeable, wild notes, unfeeling monster!
TONY. Yes, but curb her never so little, she kicks up, and you’re flung in
TONY. Ecod! Mamma, your own notes are the wildest of the two. a ditch.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Was ever the like? But I see he wants to break HASTINGS. Well, but you must allow her a little beauty.—Yes, you
my heart, I see he does. must allow her some beauty.
HASTINGS. Dear Madam, permit me to lecture the young gentleman a TONY. Bandbox! She’s all a made up thing, mun. Ah! could you but see
little. I’m certain I can persuade him to his duty. Bet Bouncer of these parts, you might then talk of beauty. Ecod, she has
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Well! I must retire. Come, Constance, my love. two eyes as black as sloes, and cheeks as broad and red as a pulpit cushion.
You see, Mr. Hastings, the wretchedness of my situation. Was ever poor She’d make two of she.
woman so plagued with a dear, sweet, pretty, provoking, undutiful boy ? HASTINGS. Well, what say you to a friend that would take this bitter
[Exeunt MRS. HARDCASTLE and MISS NEVILLE. bargain off your hands?
HASTINGS, TONY. TONY. Anon.
HASTINGS. Would you thank him that would take Miss Neville, and
TONY (Singing). There was a young man riding by, and fain would have leave you to happiness and your dear Betsy?
his will. Rang do didlo dee. Don’t mind her. Let her cry. It’s the comfort of TONY. Ay; but where is there such a friend, for who would take her?
her heart. I have seen her and sister cry over a book for an hour together,
and they said, they liked the book the better the more it made them cry. HASTINGS. I am he. If you but assist me, I’ll engage to whip her off to
France, and you shall never hear more of her.
HASTINGS. Then you’re no friend to the ladies, I find, my pretty young
gentleman?
 TONY. Assist you! Ecod, I will, to the last drop of my blood. I’ll clap a
pair of horses to your chaise that shall trundle you off in a twinkling, and
may be get you a part of her fortin besides, in jewels, that you little dream
of. Act III
HASTINGS. My dear ’Squire, this looks like a lad of spirit.
TONY. Come along then, and you shall see more of my spirit before you
have done with me. Enter HARDCASTLE solus.
[Singing.
HARDCASTLE. What could my old friend Sir Charles mean by
recommending his son as the modestest young man in town? To me he
We are the boys appears the most impudent piece of brass that ever spoke with a tongue. He
That fears no noise has taken possession of the easy chair by the fireside already. He took off
Where the thundering cannons roar. his boots in the parlour, and desired me to see them taken care of. I’m
desirous to know how his impudence affects my daughter.—She will
certainly be shocked at it.
[Exeunt.
Enter MISS HARDCASTLE plainly dressed.
HARDCASTLE. Well, my Kate, I see you have changed your dress as I
bid you; and yet, I believe, there was no great occasion.
MISS HARDCASTLE. I find such a pleasure, sir, in obeying your
commands, that I take care to observe them without ever debating their
propriety.
HARDCASTLE. And yet, Kate, I sometimes give you some cause,
particularly when I recommended my modest gentleman to you as a lover
to-day.
MISS HARDCASTLE. You taught me to expect something
extraordinary, and I find the original exceeds the description!
HARDCASTLE. I was never so surprised in my life! He has quite
confounded all my faculties!
MISS HARDCASTLE. I never saw anything like it: and a man of the
world, too!
HARDCASTLE. Ay, he learned it all abroad,—what a fool was I, to think
a young man could learn modesty by travelling. He might as soon learn wit
at a masquerade. HARDCASTLE. If he be what he has shown himself, I’m determined he
shall never have my consent.
MISS HARDCASTLE. It seems all natural to him.
MISS HARDCASTLE. And if he be the sullen thing I take him, he shall
HARDCASTLE. A good deal assisted by bad company and a French
never have mine.
dancing-master.
HARDCASTLE. In one thing then we are agreed—to reject him.
MISS HARDCASTLE. Sure, you mistake, papa! a French dancing-
master could never have taught him that timid look,—that awkward MISS HARDCASTLE. Yes. But upon conditions. For if you should find
address,—that bashful manner—— him less impudent, and I more presuming; if you find him more respectful,
HARDCASTLE. Whose look? whose manner? child! and I more importunate—I don’t know—the fellow is well enough for a
man—Certainly we don’t meet many such at a horse race in the country.
MISS HARDCASTLE. Mr. Marlow’s: his mauvaise honte, his timidity
HARDCASTLE. If we should find him so——But that’s impossible. The
struck me at the first sight.
first appearance has done my business. I’m seldom deceived in that.
HARDCASTLE. Then your first sight deceived you; for I think him one
MISS HARDCASTLE. And yet there may be many good qualities under
of the most brazen first sights that ever astonished my senses!
that first appearance.
MISS HARDCASTLE. Sure, sir, you rally! I never saw anyone so
HARDCASTLE. Ay, when a girl finds a fellow’s outside to her taste, she
modest.
then sets about guessing the rest of his furniture. With her, a smooth face
HARDCASTLE. And can you be serious! I never saw such a bouncing stands for good sense, and a genteel figure for every virtue.
swaggering puppy since I was born. Bully Dawson was but a fool to him.
MISS HARDCASTLE. I hope, sir, a conversation begun with a
MISS HARDCASTLE. Surprising! He met me with a respectful bow, a compliment to my good sense won’t end with a sneer at my understanding?
stammering voice, and a look fixed on the ground.
HARDCASTLE. Pardon me, Kate. But if young Mr. Brazen can find the
HARDCASTLE. He met me with a loud voice, a lordly air, and a art of reconciling contradictions, he may please us both, perhaps.
familiarity that made my blood freeze again.
MISS HARDCASTLE,. And as one of us must be mistaken, what if we
MISS HARDCASTLE. He treated me with diffidence and respect; go to make further discoveries?
censured the manners of the age; admired the prudence of girls that never
laughed; tired me with apologies for being tiresome; then left the room with HARDCASTLE. Agreed. But depend on’t I’m in the right.
a bow, and, Madam, I would not for the world detain you. MISS HARDCASTLE. And depend on’t I’m not much in the wrong.
HARDCASTLE. He spoke to me as if he knew me all his life before. [Exeunt.
Asked twenty questions, and never waited for an answer. Interrupted my
best remarks with some silly pun, and when I was in my best story of the Enter TONY running in with a casket.
Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene, he asked if I had not a good hand
at making punch. Yes, Kate, he asked your father if he was a maker of TONY. Ecod! I have got them. Here they are. My cousin Con’s
punch! necklaces, bobs and all. My mother shan’t cheat the poor souls out of their
fortin neither. O! my genus, is that you?
MISS HARDCASTLE. One of us must certainly be mistaken.
Enter HASTINGS.
 MRS. HARDCASTLE. Yours, my dear, can admit of none. That natural
HASTINGS. My dear friend, how have you managed with your mother? blush is beyond a thousand ornaments. Besides, child, jewels are quite out
at present. Don’t you see half the ladies of our acquaintance, my Lady Kill-
I hope you have amused her with pretending love for your cousin, and that
you are willing to be reconciled at last? Our horses will be refreshed in a daylight, and Mrs. Crump, and the rest of them, carry their jewels to town,
short time, and we shall soon be ready to set off. and bring nothing but paste and marcasites back?

TONY. And here’s something to bear your charges by the way. (Giving MISS NEVILLE. But who knows, madam, but somebody that shall be
nameless would like me best with all my little finery about me?
the casket.) Your sweetheart’s jewels. Keep them, and hang those, I say, that
would rob you of one of them! MRS. HARDCASTLE. Consult your glass, my dear, and then see, if with
such a pair of eyes, you want any better sparklers. What do you think, Tony,
HASTINGS. But how have you procured them from your mother?
my dear, does your cousin Con want any jewels, in your eyes, to set off her
TONY. Ask me no questions, and I’ll tell you no fibs. I procured them by beauty?
the rule of thumb. If I had not a key to every drawer in mother’s bureau,
TONY. That’s as thereafter may be.
how could I go to the alehouse so often as I do? An honest man may rob
himself of his own at any time. MISS NEVILLE. My dear aunt, if you knew how it would oblige me.
HASTINGS. Thousands do it every day. But to be plain with you; Miss MRS. HARDCASTLE. A parcel of old-fashioned rose and table-cut
Neville is endeavouring to procure them from her aunt this very instant. If things. They would make you look like the court of King Solomon at a
she succeeds, it will be the most delicate way at least of obtaining them. puppet-show. Besides, I believe I can’t readily come at them. They may be
TONY. Well, keep them, till you know how it will be. But I know how it missing, for aught I know to the contrary.
will be well enough, she’d as soon part with the only sound tooth in her TONY (Apart to MRS. HARDCASTLE). Then why don’t you tell her so
head! at once, as she’s so longing for them? Tell her they’re lost. It’s the only way
HASTINGS. But I dread the effects of her resentment, when she finds to quiet her. Say they’re lost, and call me to bear witness.
she has lost them. MRS. HARDCASTLE (Apart to TONY). You know, my dear, I’m only
TONY. Never you mind her resentment, leave me to manage that. I don’t keeping them for you. So if I say they’re gone, you’ll bear me witness, will
you? He! he! he!
value her resentment the bounce of a cracker. Zounds! here they are!
Morrice! Prance! TONY. Never fear me. Ecod! I’ll say I saw them taken out with my own
eyes.
[Exit HASTINGS.
MISS NEVILLE. I desire them but for a day, madam. Just to be
TONY, MRS. HARDCASTLE, MISS NEVILLE.
permitted to show them as relics, and then they may be locked up again.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Indeed, Constance, you amaze me. Such a girl as
MRS. HARDCASTLE. To be plain with you, my dear Constance, if I
you want jewels? It will be time enough for jewels, my dear, twenty years
could find them, you should have them. They’re missing, I assure you. Lost,
hence, when your beauty begins to want repairs.
for aught I know; but we must have patience wherever they are.
MISS NEVILLE. But what will repair beauty at forty, will certainly
MISS NEVILLE. I’ll not believe it; this is but a shallow pretence to deny
improve it at twenty, madam.
me. I know they’re too valuable to be so slightly kept, and as you are to
answer for the loss. MRS. HARDCASTLE. Confusion! thieves! robbers! We are cheated,
plundered, broke open, undone!
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Don’t be alarmed, Constance. If they be lost, I
must restore an equivalent. But my son knows they are missing, and not to TONY. What’s the matter, what’s the matter, mamma? I hope nothing has
be found. happened to any of the good family!
TONY. That I can bear witness to. They are missing, and not to be found, MRS. HARDCASTLE. We are robbed. My bureau has been broke open,
I’ll take my oath on’t! the jewels taken out, and I’m undone!
MRS. HARDCASTLE. You must learn resignation, my dear; for though TONY. Oh! is that all? Ha! ha! ha! By the laws, I never saw it better
we lose our fortune, yet we should not lose our patience. See me, how calm acted in my life. Ecod, I thought you was ruined in earnest, ha, ha, ha!
I am! MRS. HARDCASTLE. Why, boy, I am ruined in earnest. My bureau has
MISS NEVILLE. Ay, people are generally calm at the misfortunes of been broke open, and all taken away.
others. TONY. Stick to that; ha, ha, ha! stick to that. I’ll bear witness, you know,
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Now, I wonder a girl of your good sense should call me to bear witness.
waste a thought upon such trumpery. We shall soon find them; and, in the MRS. HARDCASTLE. I tell you, Tony, by all that’s precious, the jewels
meantime, you shall make use of my garnets till your jewels be found. are gone, and I shall be ruined for ever.
MISS NEVILLE. I detest garnets! TONY. Sure I know they’re gone, and I am to say so.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. The most becoming things in the world to set off MRS. HARDCASTLE. My dearest Tony, but hear me. They’re gone, I
a clear complexion. You have often seen how well they look upon me. You say.
shall have them.
TONY. By the laws, mamma, you make me for to laugh, ha! ha! I know
[Exit. who took them well enough, ha! ha! ha!
MISS NEVILLE. I dislike them of all things. You shan’t stir.—Was ever MRS. HARDCASTLE. Was there ever such a blockhead, that can’t tell
anything so provoking to mislay my own jewels, and force me to wear her the difference between jest and earnest! I tell you I’m not in jest, booby!
trumpery.
TONY. That’s right, that’s right! You must be in a bitter passion, and then
TONY. Don’t be a fool. If she gives you the garnets, take what you can nobody will suspect either of us. I’ll bear witness that they are gone.
get. The jewels are your own already. I have stolen them out of her bureau,
and she does not know it. Fly to your spark, he’ll tell you more of the MRS. HARDCASTLE. Was there ever such a cross-grained brute, that
matter. Leave me to manage her. won’t hear me! Can you bear witness that you’re no better than a fool? Was
ever poor woman so beset with fools on one hand, and thieves on the other?
MISS NEVILLE. My dear cousin!
TONY. I can bear witness to that.
TONY. Vanish. She’s here, and has missed them already. Zounds! how
she fidgets and spits about like a Catherine wheel! MRS. HARDCASTLE. Bear witness again, you blockhead, you, and I’ll
turn you out of the room directly. My poor niece, what will become of her?
Enter MRS. HARDCASTLE.
Do you laugh, you unfeeling brute, as if you enjoyed my distress?
TONY. I can bear witness to that.
 MRS. HARDCASTLE. Do you insult me, monster? I’ll teach you to vex MAID. But you are sure you can act your part, and disguise your voice,
your mother, I will! so that he may mistake that, as he has already mistaken your person?
TONY. I can bear witness to that. MISS HARDCASTLE. Never fear me. I think I have got the true bar
cant.—Did your honour call?——Attend the Lion there.——Pipes and
[He runs off, she follows him.
tobacco for the Angel.—The Lamb has been outrageous this half hour!
Enter MISS HARDCASTLE and MAID.
MAID. It will do, madam. But he’s here.
[Exit MAID.
Miss HARDCASTLE. What an unaccountable creature is that brother of
mine, to send them to the house as an inn, ha! ha! I don’t wonder at his Enter MARLOW.
impudence.
MAID. But what is more, madam, the young gentleman as you passed by MARLOW. What a bawling in every part of the house; I have scarce a
in your present dress, asked me if you were the barmaid? He mistook you moment’s repose. If I go to the best room, there I find my host and his story.
for the barmaid, madam! If I fly to the gallery, there we have my hostess with her curtsey down to the
MISS HARDCASTLE. Did he? Then as I live I’m resolved to keep up ground. I have at last got a moment to myself, and now for recollection.
the delusion. Tell me, Pimple, how do you like my present dress? Don’t you [Walks and muses.
think I look something like Cherry in the Beaux’ Stratagem?9 MISS HARDCASTLE. Did you call, sir? did your honour call?
MAID. It’s the dress, madam, that every lady wears in the country, but MARLOW (Musing). As for Miss Hardcastle, she’s too grave and
when she visits or receives company. sentimental for me.
MISS HARDCASTLE. And are you sure he does not remember my face MISS HARDCASTLE. Did your honour call?
or person?
[She still places herself before him, he turning away.
MAID. Certain of it!
MARLOW. No, child! (Musing.) Besides, from the glimpse I had of her,
MISS HARDCASTLE. I vow, I thought so; for though we spoke for I think she squints.
some time together, yet his fears were such, that he never once looked up
during the interview. Indeed, if he had, my bonnet would have kept him Miss HARDCASTLE. I’m sure, sir, I heard the bell ring.
from seeing me. MARLOW. No! no! (Musing.) I have pleased my father, however, by
MAID. But what do you hope from keeping him in his mistake? coming down, and I’ll to-morrow please myself by returning.
Miss HARDCASTLE. In the first place, I shall be seen, and that is no [Taking out his tablets, and perusing.
small advantage to a girl who brings her face to market. Then I shall MISS HARDCASTLE. Perhaps the other gentleman called, sir?
perhaps make an acquaintance, and that’s no small victory gained over one
who never addresses any but the wildest of her sex. But my chief aim is to MARLOW. I tell you, no.
take my gentleman off his guard, and like an invisible champion of romance MISS HARDCASTLE. I should be glad to know; sir. We have such a
examine the giant’s force before I offer to combat. parcel of servants.
 MARLOW. No, no, I tell you. (Looks full in her face.) Yes, child, I think MARLOW (Aside). Egad! she has hit it, sure enough. (To her.) In awe of
I did call. I wanted——I wanted——I vow, child, you are vastly handsome! her, child? Ha! ha! ha! A mere awkward, squinting thing, no, no! I find you
MISS HARDCASTLE. O la, sir, you’ll make one ashamed. don’t know me. I laughed, and rallied her a little; but I was unwilling to be
too severe. No, I could not be too severe, curse me!
MARLOW. Never saw a more sprightly malicious eye. Yes, yes, my dear,
MISS HARDCASTLE. O! then, sir, you are a favourite, I find, among
I did call. Have you got any of your—a—what d’ye call it in the house?
the ladies?
MISS HARDCASTLE. No, sir, we have been out of that these ten days.
MARLOW. Yes, my dear, a great favourite. And yet, hang me, I don’t see
MARLOW. One may call in this house, I find, to very little purpose. what they find in me to follow. At the Ladies’ Club in town I’m called their
Suppose I should call for a taste, just by way of trial, of the nectar of your agreeable Rattle. Rattle, child, is not my real name, but one I’m known by.
lips; perhaps I might be disappointed in that, too! My name is Solomons. Mr. Solomons, my dear, at your service. (Offering to
MISS HARDCASTLE. Nectar! nectar! that’s a liquor there’s no call for salute her.)
in these parts. French, I suppose. We keep no French wines here, sir. MISS HARDCASTLE. Hold, sir; you were introducing me to your club,
MARLOW. Of true English growth, I assure you. not to yourself. And you’re so great a favourite there, you say?
MISS HARDCASTLE. Then it’s odd I should not know it. We brew all MARLOW. Yes, my dear. There’s Mrs. Mantrap, Lady Betty Blackleg,
sorts of wines in this house, and I have lived here these eighteen years. the Countess of Sligo, Mrs. Longhorns, old Miss Biddy Buckskin, and your
humble servant, keep up the spirit of the place.
MARLOW. Eighteen years! Why one would think, child, you kept the
bar before you were born. How old are you? MISS HARDCASTLE. Then it’s a very merry place, I suppose.

MISS HARDCASTLE. O! sir, I must not tell my age. They say women MARLOW. Yes, as merry as cards, suppers, wine, and old women can
and music should never be dated. make us.

MARLOW. To guess at this distance, you can’t be much above forty. MISS HARDCASTLE. And their agreeable Rattle, ha! ha! ha!
(Approaching.) Yet nearer I don’t think so much. (Approaching.) By coming MARLOW (Aside). Egad! I don’t quite like this chit. She looks knowing,
close to some women they look younger still; but when we come very close methinks. You laugh, child!
indeed—(Attempting to kiss her.)
MISS HARDCASTLE. I can’t but laugh to think what time they all have
MISS HARDCASTLE. Pray, sir, keep your distance. One would think for minding their work or their family.
you wanted to know one’s age as they do horses, by mark of mouth.
MARLOW (Aside). All’s well, she don’t laugh at me. (To her.) Do you
MARLOW. I protest, child, you use me extremely ill. If you keep me at ever work, child?
this distance, how is it possible you and I can be ever acquainted?
MISS HARDCASTLE. Ay, sure. There’s not a screen or a quilt in the
MISS HARDCASTLE. And who wants to be acquainted with you? I whole house but what can bear witness to that.
want no such acquaintance, not I. I’m sure you did not treat Miss Hardcastle
MARLOW. Odso! Then you must show me your embroidery. I
that was here awhile ago in this obstropalous manner. I’ll warrant me,
before her you looked dashed, and kept bowing to the ground, and talked, embroider and draw patterns myself a little. If you want a judge of your
for all the world, as if you was before a justice of the peace. work you must apply to me.
 [Seizing her hand. HARDCASTLE. Well, an hour let it be then. But I’ll have no trifling
with your father. All fair and open, do you mind me?
MISS HARDCASTLE. Ay, but the colours don’t look well by
candlelight. You shall see all in the morning. MISS HARDCASTLE. I hope, sir, you have ever found that I considered
your commands as my pride; for your kindness is such, that my duty as yet
[Struggling.
has been inclination.
MARLOW. And why not now, my angel? Such beauty fires beyond the
[Exeunt.
power of resistance.—Pshaw! the father here! My old luck: I never nicked
seven that I did not throw ames-ace three times following. 10
[Exit MARLOW.
Enter HARDCASTLE, who stands in surprise.
HARDCASTLE. So, madam! So I find this is your modest lover. This is
your humble admirer that kept his eyes fixed on the ground, and only
adored at a humble distance. Kate, Kate, art thou not ashamed to deceive
your father so?
MISS HARDCASTLE. Never trust me, dear papa, but he’s still the
modest man I first took him for, you’ll be convinced of it as well as I.
HARDCASTLE. By the hand of my body, I believe his impudence is
infectious! Didn’t I see him seize your hand? Didn’t I see him haul you
about like a milkmaid? and now you talk of his respect and his modesty,
forsooth!
MISS HARDCASTLE. But if I shortly convince you of his modesty, that
he has only the faults that will pass off with time, and the virtues that will
improve with age, I hope you’ll forgive him.
HARDCASTLE. The girl would actually make one run mad! I tell you
I’ll not be convinced. I am convinced. He has scarcely been three hours in
the house, and he has already encroached on all my prerogatives. You may
like his impudence, and call it modesty. But my son-in-law, madam, must
have very different qualifications.
Miss HARDCASTLE. Sir, I ask but this night to convince you.
HARDCASTLE. You shall not have half the time, for I have thoughts of
turning him out this very hour.
MISS HARDCASTLE. Give me that hour then, and I hope to satisfy you.
 SERVANT. Yes, your honour.
MARLOW. She said she’d keep it safe, did she?
Act IV SERVANT. Yes, she said she’d keep it safe enough; she asked me how I
came by it? and she said she had a great mind to make me give an account
of myself.
[Exit SERVANT.
Enter HASTINGS and MISS NEVILLE.
MARLOW. Ha! ha! ha! They’re safe, however. What an unaccountable
set of beings have we got amongst! This little barmaid though runs in my
HASTINGS. You surprise me! Sir Charles Marlow expected here this head most strangely, and drives out the absurdities of all the rest of the
night? Where have you had your information? family. She’s mine, she must be mine, or I’m greatly mistaken!
MISS NEVILLE. You may depend upon it. I just saw his letter to Mr. Enter HASTINGS.
Hardcastle, in which he tells him he intends setting out a few hours after his
son.
HASTINGS. Bless me! I quite forgot to tell her that I intended to prepare
HASTINGS. Then, my Constance, all must be completed before he at the bottom of the garden. Marlow here, and in spirits too!
arrives. He knows me; and should he find me here, would discover my
name, and perhaps my designs, to the rest of the family. MARLOW. Give me joy, George! Crown me, shadow me with laurels!
Well, George, after all, we modest fellows don’t want for success among the
MISS NEVILLE. The jewels, I hope, are safe. women.
HASTINGS. Yes, yes. I have sent them to Marlow, who keeps the keys HASTINGS. Some women, you mean. But what success has your
of our baggage. In the meantime, I’ll go to prepare matters for our honour’s modesty been crowned with now, that it grows so insolent upon
elopement. I have had the ’Squire’s promise of a fresh pair of horses; and, if us?
I should not see him again, will write him further directions.
MARLOW. Didn’t you see the tempting, brisk, lovely little thing that
[Exit. runs about the house with a bunch of keys to its girdle?
MISS NEVILLE. Well! success attend you. In the meantime, I’ll go HASTINGS. Well! and what then?
amuse my aunt with the old pretence of a violent passion for my cousin.
MARLOW. She’s mine, you rogue, you. Such fire, such motion, such
[Exit. eyes, such lips—but egad! she would not let me kiss them though.
Enter MARLOW, followed by a SERVANT. HASTINGS. But are you sure, so very sure of her?
MARLOW. I wonder what Hastings could mean by sending me so MARLOW. Why, man, she talked of showing me her work above-stairs,
valuable a thing as a casket to keep for him, when he knows the only place I and I am to improve the pattern.
have is the seat of a post-coach at an inn door. Have you deposited the
casket with the landlady, as I ordered you? Have you put it into her own HASTINGS. But how can you, Charles, go about to rob a woman of her
hands? honour?
 MARLOW. Pshaw! pshaw! we all know the honour of the barmaid of an HASTINGS. He! he! he! They’re safe, however.
inn. I don’t intend to rob her, take my word for it, there’s nothing in this MARLOW. As a guinea in a miser’s purse.
house, I shan’t honestly pay for!
HASTINGS (Aside). So now all hopes of fortune are at an end, and we
HASTINGS. I believe the girl has virtue. must set off without it. (To him.) Well, Charles, I’ll leave you to your
MARLOW. And if she has, I should be the last man in the world that meditations on the pretty barmaid, and, he! he! he! may you be as
would attempt to corrupt it. successful for yourself as you have been for me.
HASTINGS. You have taken care, I hope, of the casket I sent you to lock [Exit.
up? It’s in safety? MARLOW. Thank ye, George! I ask no more. Ha! ha! ha!
MARLOW. Yes, yes. It’s safe enough. I have taken care of it. But how Enter HARDCASTLE.
could you think the seat of a post-coach at an inn door a place of safety?
Ah! numskull! I have taken better precautions for you than you did for
yourself.—I have—— HARDCASTLE. I no longer know my own house. It’s turned all topsy-
turvy. His servants have got drunk already. I’ll bear it no longer, and yet,
HASTINGS. What! from my respect for his father, I’ll be calm. (To him.) Mr. Marlow, your
MARLOW. I have sent it to the landlady to keep for you. servant. I’m your very humble servant.
HASTINGS. To the landlady! [Bowing low.
MARLOW. The landlady. MARLOW. Sir, your humble servant. (Aside.) What’s to be the wonder
HASTINGS. You did! now?
HARDCASTLE. I believe, sir, you must be sensible, sir, that no man
MARLOW. I did. She’s to be answerable for its forthcoming, you know.
alive ought to be more welcome than your father’s son, sir. I hope you think
HASTINGS. Yes, she’ll bring it forth with a witness. so?
MARLOW. Wasn’t I right? I believe you’ll allow that I acted prudently MARLOW. I do, from my soul, sir. I don’t want much entreaty. I
upon this occasion? generally make my father’s son welcome wherever he goes.
HASTINGS (Aside). He must not see my uneasiness. HARDCASTLE. I believe you do, from my soul, sir. But though I say
MARLOW. You seem a little disconcerted, though, methinks. Sure nothing to your own conduct, that of your servants is insufferable. Their
nothing has happened? manner of drinking is setting a very bad example in this house, I assure you.
HASTINGS. No, nothing. Never was I in better spirits in all my life. And MARLOW. I protest, my very good sir, that’s no fault of mine. If they
so you left it with the landlady, who, no doubt, very readily undertook the don’t drink as they ought they are to blame. I ordered them not to spare the
charge? cellar, I did, I assure you. (To the side scene.) Here, let one of my servants
come up. (To him.) My positive directions were, that as I did not drink
MARLOW. Rather too readily. For she not only kept the casket, but, myself, they should make up for my deficiencies below.
through her great precaution, was going to keep the messenger too. Ha! ha!
ha!
 HARDCASTLE. Then they had your orders for what they do! I’m house. Mine, while I choose to stay. What right have you to bid me leave
satisfied! this house, sir? I never met with such impudence, curse me, never in my
MARLOW. They had, I assure you. You shall hear from one of whole life before!
themselves. HARDCASTLE. Nor I, confound me if ever I did! To come to my house,
Enter SERVANT, drunk. to call for what he likes, to turn me out of my own chair, to insult the
family, to order his servants to get drunk, and then to tell me This house is
MARLOW. You, Jeremy! Come forward, sirrah! What were my orders? mine, sir. By all that’s impudent, it makes me laugh. Ha! ha! ha! Pray, sir,
Were you not told to drink freely, and call for what you thought fit, for the (bantering) as you take the house, what think you of taking the rest of the
good of the house? furniture? There’s a pair of silver candlesticks, and there’s a fire-screen, and
HARDCASTLE (Aside). I begin to lose my patience. here’s a pair of brazen-nosed bellows, perhaps you may take a fancy to
them?
JEREMY. Please your honour, liberty and Fleet Street for ever! Though
I’m but a servant, I’m as good as another man. I’ll drink for no man before MARLOW. Bring me your bill, sir, bring me your bill, and let’s make no
supper, sir, dammy! Good liquor will sit upon a good supper, but a good more words about it.
supper will not sit upon—hiccup—upon my conscience, sir. HARDCASTLE. There are a set of prints, too. What think you of the
MARLOW. You see, my old friend, the fellow is as drunk as he can Rake’s Progress11 for your own apartment?
possibly be. I don’t know what you’d have more, unless you’d have the MARLOW. Bring me your bill, I say; and I’ll leave you and your infernal
poor devil soused in a beer-barrel. house directly.
HARDCASTLE. Zounds! He’ll drive me distracted if I contain myself HARDCASTLE. Then there’s a mahogany table, that you may see your
any longer. Mr. Marlow, sir; I have submitted to your insolence for more own face in.
than four hours, and I see no likelihood of its coming to an end. I’m now
resolved to be master here, sir, and I desire that you and your drunken pack MARLOW. My bill, I say.
may leave my house directly. HARDCASTLE. I had forgot the great chair, for your own particular
MARLOW. Leave your house!—Sure, you jest, my good friend! What, slumbers, after a hearty meal.
when I’m doing what I can to please you! MARLOW. Zounds! bring me my bill, I say, and let’s hear no more on’t.
HARDCASTLE. I tell you, sir, you don’t please me; so I desire you’ll HARDCASTLE. Young man, young man, from your father’s letter to me,
leave my house. I was taught to expect a well-bred modest man, as a visitor here, but now I
MARLOW. Sure, you cannot be serious! At this time of night, and such a find him no better than a coxcomb and a bully; but he will be down here
night! You only mean to banter me! presently, and shall hear more of it.

HARDCASTLE. I tell you, sir, I’m serious; and, now that my passions [Exit.
are roused, I say this house is mine, sir; this house is mine, and I command MARLOW. How’s this! Sure, I have not mistaken the house? Everything
you to leave it directly. looks like an inn. The servants cry “coming.” The attendance is awkward ;
MARLOW. Ha! ha! ha! A puddle in a storm. I shan’t stir a step, I assure the barmaid, too, to attend us. But she’s here, and will further inform me.
you. (In a serious tone.) This your house, fellow! It’s my house. This is my Whither so fast, child? A word with you.
 Enter MISS HARDCASTLE. MISS HARDCASTLE. I hope, sir, I have done nothing to disoblige you.
I’m sure I should be sorry to affront any gentleman who has been so polite,
MISS HARDCASTLE. Let it be short, then. I’m in a hurry.—(Aside.) I
and said so many civil things to me. I’m sure I should be sorry (pretending
believe he begins to find out his mistake, but it’s too soon quite to
undeceive him. to cry) if he left the family upon my account. I’m sure I should be sorry
people said anything amiss, since I have no fortune but my character.
MARLOW. Pray, child, answer me one question. What are you, and what
may your business in this house be? MARLOW (Aside). By heaven, she weeps. This is the first mark of
tenderness I ever had from a modest woman, and it touches me. (To her.)
MISS HARDCASTLE. A relation of the family, sir. Excuse me, my lovely girl, you are the only part of the family I leave with
MARLOW. What? A poor relation? reluctance. But to be plain with you, the difference of our birth, fortune and
education makes an honourable connexion impossible; and I can never
MISS HARDCASTLE. Yes, sir. A poor relation appointed to keep the harbour a thought of seducing simplicity that trusted in my honour, or
keys, and to see that the guests want nothing in my power to give them. bringing ruin upon one whose only fault was being too lovely.
MARLOW. That is, you act as the barmaid of this inn. MISS HARDCASTLE (Aside). Generous man! I now begin to admire
MISS HARDCASTLE. Inn! O law!—What brought that in your head? him. (To him.) But I’m sure my family is as good as Miss Hardcastle’s, and
One of the best families in the county keep an inn! Ha, ha, ha, old Mr. though I’m poor, that’s no great misfortune to a contented mind, and, until
Hardcastle’s house an inn! this moment, I never thought that it was bad to want fortune.
MARLOW. Mr. Hardcastle’s house! Is this house Mr. Hardcastle’s house, MARLOW. And why now, my pretty simplicity?
child? MISS HARDCASTLE. Because it puts me at a distance from one, that if
MISS HARDCASTLE. Ay, sure. Whose else should it be? I had a thousand pound I would give it all to.
MARLOW. So then all’s out, and I have been damnably imposed on. O, MARLOW (Aside). This simplicity bewitches me, so that if I stay I’m
confound my stupid head, I shall be laughed at over the whole town. I shall undone. I must make one bold effort, and leave her. (To her.) Your partiality
be stuck up in caricature in all the print-shops. The Dullissimo Macaroni. 12 in my favour, my dear, touches me most sensibly, and were I to live for
To mistake this house of all others for an inn, and my father’s old friend for myself alone, I could easily fix my choice. But I owe too much to the
an innkeeper! What a swaggering puppy must he take me for. What a silly opinion of the world, too much to the authority of a father, so that—I can
puppy do I find myself. There again, may I be hanged, my dear, but I scarcely speak it—it affects me! Farewell!
mistook you for the barmaid! [Exit.
MISS HARDCASTLE. Dear me! dear me! I’m sure there’s nothing in MISS HARDCASTLE. I never knew half his merit till now. He shall not
my behaviour to put me upon a level with one of that stamp. go, if I have power or art to detain him. I’ll still preserve the character in
MARLOW. Nothing, my dear, nothing. But I was in for a list of blunders, which I stooped to conquer, but will undeceive my papa, who, perhaps, may
and could not help making you a subscriber. My stupidity saw everything laugh him out of his resolution.
the wrong way. I mistook your assiduity for assurance, and your simplicity [Exit.
for allurement. But it’s over—this house I no more show my face in!
Enter TONY, MISS NEVILLE.
 MISS NEVILLE. Agreeable cousin! Who can help admiring that natural
TONY. Ay, you may steal for yourselves the next time. I have done my humour, that pleasant, broad, red, thoughtless (patting his cheek), ah! it’s a
bold face.
duty. She has got the jewels again, that’s a sure thing; but she believes it
was all a mistake of the servants. MRS. HARDCASTLE. Pretty innocence!
MISS NEVILLE. But, my dear cousin, sure, you won’t forsake us in this TONY. I’m sure I always loved cousin Con’s hazel eyes, and her pretty
distress. If she in the least suspects that I am going off, I shall certainly be long fingers, that she twists this way and that, over the haspicholls, 14 like a
locked up, or sent to my aunt Pedigree’s, which is ten times worse. parcel of bobbins.
TONY. To be sure, aunts of all kinds are damned bad things. But what MRS. HARDCASTLE. Ah, he would charm the bird from the tree. I was
can I do? I have got you a pair of horses that will fly like Whistlejacket, 13 never so happy before. My boy takes after his father, poor Mr. Lumpkin,
and I’m sure you can’t say but I have courted you nicely before her face. exactly. The jewels, my dear Con, shall be yours incontinently. You shall
Here she comes, we must court a bit or two more, for fear she should have them. Isn’t he a sweet boy, my dear? You shall be married to-morrow,
suspect us. and we’ll put off the rest of his education, like Dr. Drowsy’s sermons, to a
fitter opportunity.
[They retire, and seem to fondle.
Enter DIGGORY.
Enter MRS. HARDCASTLE.
DIGGORY. Where’s the ’Squire? I have got a letter for your worship.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Well, I was greatly fluttered, to be sure. But my TONY. Give it to my mamma. She reads all my letters first.
son tells me it was all a mistake of the servants. I shan’t be easy, however, DIGGORY. I had orders to deliver it into your own hands.
till they are fairly married, and then let her keep her own fortune. But what
do I see! Fondling together, as I’m alive! I never saw Tony so sprightly TONY. Who does it come from?
before. Ah! have I caught you, my pretty doves! What, billing, exchanging DIGGORY. Your worship mun ask that of the letter itself.
stolen glances, and broken murmurs! Ah!
TONY. I could wish to know, though. (Turning the letter, and gazing on
TONY. As for murmurs, mother, we grumble a little now and then, to be it.)
sure. But there’s no love lost between us.
MISS NEVILLE (Aside). Undone, undone! A letter to him from
MRS. HARDCASTLE. A mere sprinkling, Tony, upon the flame, only to Hastings. I know the hand. If my aunt sees it we are ruined for ever. I’ll
make it burn brighter. keep her employed a little if I can. (To MRS. HARDCASTLE.) But I have
MISS NEVILLE. Cousin Tony promises to give us more of his company not told you, madam, of my cousin’s smart answer just now to Mr. Marlow.
at home. Indeed, he shan’t leave us any more. It won’t leave us, cousin We so laughed—you must know, madam—this way a little, for he must not
Tony, will it? hear us. (They confer.)
TONY. O! it’s a pretty creature. No, I’d sooner leave my horse in a TONY (Still gazing). A damned cramp piece of penmanship, as ever I
pound, than leave you when you smile upon one so. Your laugh makes you saw in my life. I can read your print-hand very well. But here there are such
so becoming. handles, and shanks, and dashes, that one can scarce tell the head from the
tail. To Anthony Lumpkin, Esquire. It’s very odd, I can read the outside of
my letters, where my own name is, well enough. But when I come to open you’ll assist us with a pair of fresh horses, as you promised. Dispatch is
it, it’s all—buzz. That’s hard, very hard; for the inside of the letter is always necessary, as the hag (ay, the hag) your mother, will otherwise suspect us.
the cream of the correspondence. Yours, Hastings. Grant me patience. I shall run distracted! My rage chokes
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Ha! ha! ha! Very well, very well. And so my son me.
was too hard for the philosopher! MISS NEVILLE. I hope, madam, you’ll suspend your resentment for a
MISS NEVILLE. Yes, madam; but you must hear the rest, madam. A few moments, and not impute to me any impertinence, or sinister design
that belongs to another.
little more this way, or he may hear us. You’ll hear how he puzzled him
again. MRS. HARDCASTLE (Curtseying very low). Fine spoken, madam, you
are most miraculously polite and engaging, and quite the very pink of
MRS. HARDCASTLE. He seems strangely puzzled now himself,
courtesy and circumspection, madam. (Changing her tone.) And you, you
methinks.
great ill-fashioned oaf, with scarce sense enough to keep your mouth shut.
TONY (Still gazing). A damned up-and-down hand, as if it was disguised Were you too joined against me? But I’ll defeat all your plots in a moment.
in liquor. (Reading. ) Dear Sir. Ay, that’s that. Then there’s an M, and a T, As for you, madam, since you have got a pair of fresh horses ready, it
and an S, but whether the next be an izzard or an R, confound me, I cannot would be cruel to disappoint them. So, if you please, instead of running
tell! away with your spark, prepare, this very moment, to run off with me. Your
MRS. HARDCASTLE. What’s that, my dear? Can I give you any old aunt Pedigree will keep you secure, I’ll warrant me. You too, sir, may
assistance? mount your horse, and guard us upon the way. Here, Thomas, Roger,
Diggory, I’ll show you that I wish you better than you do yourselves.
MISS NEVILLE. Pray, aunt, let me read it. Nobody reads a cramp hand
better than I. (Twitching the letter from her.) Do you know who it is from? [Exit.

TONY. Can’t tell, except from Dick Ginger the feeder. MISS NEVILLE. So now I’m completely ruined.
MISS NEVILLE. Ay, so it is. (Pretending to read.) Dear ’Squire, Hoping TONY. Ay, that’s a sure thing.
that you’re in health, as I am at this present. The gentlemen of the Shakebag MISS NEVILLE. What better could be expected from being connected
club has cut the gentlemen of Goose-green quite out of feather. The odds— with such a stupid fool, and after all the nods and signs I made him?
um—odd battle—um—long fighting—um, here, here, it’s all about cocks,
TONY. By the laws, miss, it was your own cleverness, and not my
and fighting; it’s of no consequence, here, put it up, put it up.
stupidity, that did your business. You were so nice and so busy with your
[Thrusting the crumpled letter upon him. Shakebags and Goose-greens, that I thought you could never be making
TONY. But I tell you, miss, it’s of all the consequence in the world! I believe.
would not lose the rest of it for a guinea! Here, mother, do you make it out?
Of no consequence! Enter HASTINGS.
[Giving MRS. HARDCASTLE the letter.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. How’s this! (Reads.) Dear ’Squire, I’m now HASTINGS. So, sir, I find by my servant, that you have shown my letter,
waiting for Miss Neville, with a post-chaise and pair, at the bottom of the and betrayed us. Was this well done, young gentleman?
garden, but I find my horses yet unable to perform the journey I expect
 TONY. Here’s another. Ask miss there who betrayed you. Ecod, it was SERVANT. My mistress desires you’ll get ready immediately, madam.
her doing, not mine. The horses are putting to. Your hat and things are in the next room. We are
to go thirty miles before morning.
Enter MARLOW. [Exit SERVANT.
MISS NEVILLE. Well, well; I’ll come presently
MARLOW. So I have been finely used here among you. Rendered
MARLOW (To HASTINGS). Was it well done, sir, to assist in rendering
contemptible, driven into ill manners, despised, insulted, laughed at. me ridiculous? To hang me out for the scorn of all my acquaintance?
TONY. Here’s another. We shall have old Bedlam broke loose presently. Depend upon it, sir, I shall expect an explanation.
MISS NEVILLE. And there, sir, is the gentleman to whom we all owe HASTINGS. Was it well done, sir, if you’re upon that subject, to deliver
every obligation. what I entrusted to yourself, to the care of another, sir?
MARLOW. What can I say to him, a mere boy, an idiot, whose ignorance MISS NEVILLE. Mr. Hastings. Mr. Marlow Why will you increase my
and age are a protection? distress by this groundless dispute? I implore, I entreat you—
HASTINGS. A poor contemptible booby, that would but disgrace
correction. Enter SERVANT.
MISS NEVILLE. Yet with cunning and malice enough to make himself
merry with all our embarrassments. SERVANT. Your cloak, madam. My mistress is impatient.
HASTINGS. An insensible cub. MISS NEVILLE. I come. Pray be pacified. If I leave you thus, I shall die
MARLOW. Replete with tricks and mischief. with apprehension!

TONY. Baw! damme, but I’ll fight you both one after the other, with
Enter SERVANT.
baskets.
MARLOW. As for him, he’s below resentment. But your conduct, Mr.
SERVANT. Your fan, muff, and gloves, madam. The horses are waiting.
Hastings, requires an explanation. You knew of my mistakes, yet would not
undeceive me. MISS NEVILLE. O, Mr. Marlow! if you knew what a scene of constraint
HASTINGS. Tortured as I am with my own disappointments, is this a and ill-nature lies before me, I’m sure it would convert your resentment into
time for explanations? It is not friendly, Mr. Marlow. pity.

MARLOW. But, sir— MARLOW. I’m so distracted with a variety of passions, that I don’t
know what I do. Forgive me, madam. George, forgive me. You know my
MISS NEVILLE. Mr. Marlow, we never kept on your mistake, till it was hasty temper, and should not exasperate it.
too late to undeceive you. Be pacified.
HASTINGS. The torture of my situation is my only excuse.

Enter SERVANT. MISS NEVILLE. Well, my dear Hastings, if you have that esteem for me
that I think, that I am sure you have, your constancy for three years will but
increase the happiness of our future connection. If—
MRS. HARDCASTLE (Within). Miss Neville. Constance, why,
Constance, I say.
MISS NEVILLE. I’m coming. Well, constancy. Remember, constancy is
Act V
the word.
[Exit.
SCENE—Continues.
HASTINGS. My heart! How can I support this! To be so near happiness,
and such happiness!
Enter HASTINGS and SERVANT.
MARLOW (To TONY). You see now, young gentleman, the effects of
your folly. What might be amusement to you, is here disappointment, and
even distress. HASTINGS. You saw the old lady and Miss Neville drive off, you say?
TONY (From a reverie). Ecod, I have hit it. It’s here. Your hands. Yours SERVANT. Yes, your honour. They went off in a post-coach, and the
and yours, my poor Sulky. My boots there, ho! Meet me two hours hence at young ’Squire went on horseback. They’re thirty miles off by this time.
the bottom of the garden; and if you don’t find Tony Lumpkin a more good- HASTINGS. Then all my hopes are over.
natur’d fellow than you thought for, I’ll give you leave to take my best
SERVANT. Yes, sir. Old Sir Charles is arrived. He and the old gentleman
horse, and Bet Bouncer into the bargain! Come along. My boots, ho!
of the house have been laughing at Mr. Marlow’s mistake this half hour.
[Exeunt. They are coming this way.
HASTINGS. Then I must not be seen. So now to my fruitless
appointment at the bottom of the garden. This is about the time.
[Exit.
Enter SIR CHARLES and HARDCASTLE.

HARDCASTLE. Ha! ha! ha! The peremptory tone in which he sent forth
his sublime commands.
SIR CHARLES. And the reserve with which I suppose he treated all your
advances.
HARDCASTLE. And yet he might have seen something in me above a
common innkeeper, too.
SIR CHARLES. Yes, Dick, but he mistook you for an uncommon
innkeeper, ha! ha! ha!
 HARDCASTLE. Well, I’m in too good spirits to think of anything but HARDCASTLE. Impudence! No, I don’t say that—Not quite impudence
joy. Yes, my dear friend, this union of our families will make our personal —Though girls like to be played with, and rumpled a little too, sometimes.
friendships hereditary: and though my daughter’s fortune is but small But she has told no tales, I assure you.
SIR CHARLES. Why, Dick, will you talk of fortune to me? My son is MARLOW. I never gave her the slightest cause.
possessed of more than a competence already, and can want nothing but a HARDCASTLE. Well, well, I like modesty in its place well enough. But
good and virtuous girl to share his happiness and increase it. If they like this is over-acting, young gentleman. You may be open. Your father and I
each other, as you say they do—
will like you the better for it.
HARDCASTLE. If, man! I tell you they do like each other. My daughter
MARLOW. May I die, sir, if I ever—
as good as told me so.
HARDCASTLE. I tell you, she don’t dislike you; and as I’m sure you
SIR CHARLES. But girls are apt to flatter themselves, you know.
like her—
HARDCASTLE. I saw him grasp her hand in the warmest manner MARLOW. Dear sir—I protest, sir—
myself; and here he comes to put you out of your ifs, I warrant him.
HARDCASTLE. I see no reason why you should not be joined as fast as
the parson can tie you.
Enter MARLOW.
MARLOW. But hear me, sir—
MARLOW. I come, sir, once more, to ask pardon for my strange conduct. HARDCASTLE. Your father approves the match, I admire it, every
I can scarce reflect on my insolence without confusion. moment’s delay will be doing mischief, so—
HARDCASTLE. Tut, boy, a trifle. You take it too gravely. An hour or MARLOW. But why won’t you hear me? By all that’s just and true, I
two’s laughing with my daughter will set all to rights again. She’ll never never gave Miss Hardcastle the slightest mark of my attachment, or even
like you the worse for it. the most distant hint to suspect me of affection. We had but one interview,
and that was formal, modest, and uninteresting.
MARLOW. Sir, I shall be always proud of her approbation.
HARDCASTLE (Aside). This fellow’s formal modest impudence is
HARDCASTLE. Approbation is but a cold word, Mr. Marlow; if I am
beyond bearing.
not deceived, you have something more than approbation thereabouts. You
take me? SIR CHARLES. And you never grasped her hand, or made any
protestations!
MARLOW. Really, sir, I have not that happiness.
MARLOW. As heaven is my witness, I came down in obedience to your
HARDCASTLE. Come, boy, I’m an old fellow, and know what’s what,
commands. I saw the lady without emotion, and parted without reluctance. I
as well as you that are younger. I know what has passed between you; but
hope you’ll exact no further proofs of my duty, nor prevent me from leaving
mum. a house in which I suffer so many mortifications.
MARLOW. Sure, sir, nothing has passed between us but the most [Exit.
profound respect on my side, and the most distant reserve on hers. You
don’t think, sir, that my impudence has been passed upon all the rest of the SIR CHARLES. I’m astonished at the air of sincerity with which he
family? parted.
 HARDCASTLE. And I’m astonished at the deliberate intrepidity of his SIR CHARLES. Now I’m perfectly convinced, indeed. I know his
assurance. conversation among women to be modest and submissive. This forward,
SIR CHARLES. I dare pledge my life and honour upon his truth. canting, ranting manner by no means describes him, and I am confident he
never sat for the picture.
HARDCASTLE. Here comes my daughter, and I would stake my
Miss HARDCASTLE. Then what, sir, if I should convince you to your
happiness upon her veracity.
face of my sincerity? If you and my papa, in about half-an-hour, will place
Enter MISS HARDCASTLE. yourselves behind that screen, you shall hear him declare his passion to me
in person.
HARDCASTLE. Kate, come hither, child. Answer us sincerely, and SIR CHARLES. Agreed. And if I find him what you describe, all my
without reserve; has Mr. Marlow made you any professions of love and happiness in him must have an end.
affection?
[Exit.
MISS HARDCASTLE. The question is very abrupt, sir! But since you
MISS HARDCASTLE. And if you don’t find him what I describe—I fear
require unreserved sincerity, I think he has.
my happiness must never have a beginning.
HARDCASTLE (To SIR CHARLES). You see.
[Exeunt.
SIR CHARLES. And pray, madam, have you and my son had more than
one interview?
SCENE—Changes to the back of the Garden.
MISS HARDCASTLE. Yes, sir, several.
HARDCASTLE (To SIR CHARLES). You see. Enter HASTINGS.
SIR CHARLES. But did he profess any attachment?
MISS HARDCASTLE. A lasting one. HASTINGS. What an idiot am I, to wait here for a fellow, who probably
takes a delight in mortifying me. He never intended to be punctual, and I’ll
SIR CHARLES. Did he talk of love? wait no longer. What do I see? It is he, and perhaps with news of my
MISS HARDCASTLE. Much, sir. Constance.
SIR CHARLES. Amazing! And all this formally?
Enter TONY, booted and spattered.
MISS HARDCASTLE. Formally.
HASTINGS. My honest ’Squire! I now find you a man of your word.
HARDCASTLE. Now, my friend, I hope you are satisfied. This looks like friendship.
SIR CHARLES. And how did he behave, madam? TONY. Ay, I’m your friend, and the best friend you have in the world, if
MISS HARDCASTLE. As most professed admirers do. Said some civil you knew but all. This riding by night, by-the-bye, is cursedly tiresome. It
things of my face, talked much of his want of merit, and the greatness of has shook me worse than the basket of a stage-coach.
mine; mentioned his heart, gave a short tragedy speech, and ended with HASTINGS. But how? Where did you leave your fellow-travellers? Are
pretended rapture. they in safety? Are they housed?
 TONY. Five and twenty miles in two hours and a half is no such bad HASTINGS. The rebuke is just. But I must hasten to relieve Miss
driving. The poor beasts have smoked for it: rabbit me, but I’d rather ride Neville; if you keep the old lady employed, I promise to take care of the
forty miles after a fox, than ten with such varmint. young one.
HASTINGS. Well, but where have you left the ladies? I die with [Exit HASTINGS.
impatience. TONY. Never fear me. Here she comes. Vanish. She’s got from the pond,
TONY. Left them? Why, where should I leave them, but where I found and draggled up to the waist like a mermaid.
them? Enter MRS. HARDCASTLE.
HASTINGS. This is a riddle.
TONY. Riddle me this, then. What’s that goes round the house, and round MRS. HARDCASTLE. Oh, Tony, I’m killed. Shook. Battered to death. I
the house, and never touches the house? shall never survive it. That last jolt that laid us against the quickset hedge
HASTINGS. I’m still astray. has done my business.

TONY. Why, that’s it, mon. I have led them astray. By jingo, there’s not a TONY. Alack, mamma, it was all your own fault. You would be for
pond or slough within five miles of the place but they can tell the taste of. running away by night, without knowing one inch of the way.

HASTINGS. Ha, ha, ha, I understand; you took them in a round, while MRS. HARDCASTLE. I wish we were at home again. I never met so
they supposed themselves going forward. And so you have at last brought many accidents in so short a journey. Drenched in the mud, overturned in a
them home again. ditch, stuck fast in a slough, jolted to a jelly and at last to lose our way!
Whereabouts do you think we are, Tony?
TONY. You shall hear. I first took them down Feather-bed Lane, where
TONY. By my guess we should be upon Crack-skull Common, about
we stuck fast in the mud. I then rattled them crack over the stones of Up-
forty miles from home.
and-down Hill—I then introduced them to the gibbet on Heavy-tree Heath,
and from that, with a circumbendibus, I fairly lodged them in the horse- MRS. HARDCASTLE. O lud! O lud! the most notorious spot in all the
pond at the bottom of the garden. country. We only want a robbery to make a complete night on’t.
HASTINGS. But no accident, I hope. TONY. Don’t be afraid, mamma, don’t be afraid. Two of the five that
kept here are hanged, and the other three may not find us. Don’t be afraid.
TONY. No, no. Only mother is confoundedly frightened. She thinks
Is that a man that’s galloping behind us? No; it’s only a tree. Don’t be
herself forty miles off. She’s sick of the journey, and the cattle can scarce
crawl. So, if your own horses be ready, you may whip off with cousin, and afraid.
I’ll be bound that no soul here can budge a foot to follow you. MRS. HARDCASTLE. The fright will certainly kill me.
HASTINGS. My dear friend, how can I be grateful? TONY. Do you see anything like a black hat moving behind the thicket?
TONY. Ay, now it’s dear friend, noble ’Squire. Just now, it was all idiot, MRS. HARDCASTLE. O death!
cub, and run me through the guts. Damn your way of fighting, I say. After TONY. No, it’s only a cow. Don’t be afraid, mamma, don’t be afraid.
we take a knock in this part of the country, we kiss and be friends. But if
you had run me through the guts, then I should be dead, and you might go MRS. HARDCASTLE. As I’m alive, Tony, I see a man coming towards
kiss the hangman. us. Ah! I’m sure on’t. If he perceives us, we are undone.
 TONY (Aside). Father-in-law, by all that’s unlucky, come to take one of MRS. HARDCASTLE (From behind). Oh! he’s coming to find me out.
his night walks. (To her.) Ah, it’s a highwayman, with pistols as long as my Oh!
arm. A damned ill-looking fellow. TONY. What need you go, sir, if I tell you? Hem. I’ll lay down my life
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Good heaven defend us! He approaches. for the truth—hem—I’ll tell you all, sir.
TONY. Do you hide yourself in that thicket, and leave me to manage [Detaining him.
him. If there be any danger I’ll cough and cry hem. When I cough be sure to
HARDCASTLE. I tell you I will not be detained. I insist on seeing. It’s in
keep close. vain to expect I’ll believe you.
[MRS. HARDCASTLE hides behind a tree in the back scene. MRS. HARDCASTLE (Running forward from behind). O lud, he’ll
murder my poor boy, my darling. Here, good gentleman, whet your rage
Enter HARDCASTLE. upon me. Take my money, my life, but spare that young gentleman, spare
my child, if you have any mercy.
HARDCASTLE. I’m mistaken, or I heard voices of people in want of HARDCASTLE. My wife! as I’m a Christian. From whence can she
help. Oh, Tony, is that you? I did not expect you so soon back. Are your come, or what does she mean?
mother and her charge in safety? MRS. HARDCASTLE (Kneeling). Take compassion on us, good Mr.
TONY. Very safe, sir, at my aunt Pedigree’s. Hem. Highwayman. Take our money, our watches, all we have, but spare our
MRS. HARDCASTLE (From behind). Ah! I find there’s danger. lives. We will never bring you to justice, indeed we won’t, good Mr.
Highwayman.
HARDCASTLE. Forty miles in three hours; sure, that’s too much, my
HARDCASTLE. I believe the woman’s out of her senses. What, Dorothy,
youngster.
don’t you know me?
TONY. Stout horses and willing minds make short journeys, as they say.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Mr. Hardcastle, as I’m alive! My fears blinded
Hem.
me. But who, my dear, could have expected to meet you here, in this
MRS. HARDCASTLE (From behind). Sure he’ll do the dear boy no frightful place, so far from home? What has brought you to follow us?
harm.
HARDCASTLE. Sure, Dorothy, you have not lost your wits! So far from
HARDCASTLE. But I heard a voice here; I should be glad to know from home, when you are within forty yards of your own door! (To him.) This is
whence it came. one of your old tricks, you graceless rogue, you! (To her.) Don’t you know
TONY. It was I, sir, talking to myself, sir. I was saying that forty miles in the gate, and the mulberry-tree; and don’t you remember the horse-pond,
four hours was very good going. Hem. As to be sure it was. Hem. I have got my dear?
a sort of cold by being out in the air. We’ll go in if you please. Hem. MRS. HARDCASTLE. Yes, I shall remember the horse-pond as long as I
HARDCASTLE. But if you talked to yourself, you did not answer live; I have caught my death in it. (To TONY.) And is it to you, you
yourself. I am certain I heard two voices, and am resolved (raising his graceless varlet, I owe all this? I’ll teach you to abuse your mother, I will.
voice) to find the other out. TONY. Ecod, mother, all the parish says you have spoiled me, and so you
may take the fruits on’t.
 MRS. HARDCASTLE. I’ll spoil you, I will. Enter SIR CHARLES and MISS HARDCASTLE.
[Follows him off the stage. Exit.
SIR CHARLES. What a situation am I in! If what you say appears, I shall
HARDCASTLE. There’s morality, however, in his reply.
then find a guilty son. If what he says be true, I shall then lose one that, of
[Exit. all others, I most wished for a daughter.
MISS HARDCASTLE. I am proud of your approbation; and, to show I
Enter HASTINGS and MISS NEVILLE. merit it, if you place yourselves as I directed, you shall hear his explicit
declaration. But he comes.
HASTINGS. My dear Constance, why will you deliberate thus? If we SIR CHARLES. I’ll to your father, and keep him to the appointment.
delay a moment, all is lost for ever. Pluck up a little resolution, and we shall
[Exit SIR CHARLES.
soon be out of the reach of her malignity.
MISS NEVILLE. I find it impossible. My spirits are so sunk with the
Enter MARLOW.
agitations I have suffered, that I am unable to face any new danger. Two or
three years’ patience will at last crown us with happiness.
HASTINGS. Such a tedious delay is worse than inconstancy. Let us fly, MARLOW. Though prepared for setting out, I come once more to take
my charmer. Let us date our happiness from this very moment. Perish leave, nor did I, till this moment, know the pain I feel in the separation.
fortune. Love and content will increase what we possess beyond a MISS HARDCASTLE (In her own natural manner). I believe these
monarch’s revenue. Let me prevail. sufferings cannot be very great, sir, which you can so easily remove. A day
MISS NEVILLE. No, Mr. Hastings, no. Prudence once more comes to or two longer, perhaps, might lessen your uneasiness, by showing the little
value of what you think proper to regret.
my relief, and I will obey its dictates. In the moment of passion, fortune
may be despised, but it ever produces a lasting repentance. I’m resolved to MARLOW (Aside). This girl every moment improves upon me. (To her.)
apply to Mr. Hardcastle’s compassion and justice for redress. It must not be, madam. I have already trifled too long with my heart. My
HASTINGS. But though he had the will, he has not the power to relieve very pride begins to submit to my passion. The disparity of education and
you. fortune, the anger of a parent, and the contempt of my equals begin to lose
their weight; and nothing can restore me to myself but this painful effort of
MISS NEVILLE. But he has influence, and upon that I am resolved to resolution.
rely.
MISS HARDCASTLE. Then go, sir. I’ll urge nothing more to detain you.
HASTINGS. I have no hopes. But since you persist, I must reluctantly Though my family be as good as hers you came down to visit, and my
obey you. education, I hope, not inferior, what are these advantages without equal
[Exeunt. affluence? I must remain contented with the slight approbation of imputed
merit; I must have only the mockery of your addresses, while all your
serious aims are fixed on fortune.
SCENE—Changes.
Enter HARDCASTLE and SIR CHARLES from behind.
 MARLOW (Kneeling). Does this look like security? Does this look like
SIR CHARLES. Here, behind this screen. confidence? No, madam, every moment that shows me your merit, only
serves to increase my diffidence and confusion. Here let me continue
HARDCASTLE. Ay ay, make no noise. I’ll engage my Kate covers him
SIR CHARLES. I can hold it no longer. Charles, Charles, how hast thou
with confusion at last.
deceived me! Is this your indifference, your uninteresting conversation!
MARLOW. By heavens, madam, fortune was ever my smallest
HARDCASTLE. Your cold contempt! your formal interview! What have
consideration. Your beauty at first caught my eye; for who could see that
you to say now?
without emotion? But every moment that I converse with you, steals in
some new grace, heightens the picture, and gives it stronger expression. MARLOW. That I’m all amazement! What can it mean?
What at first seemed rustic plainness, now appears refined simplicity. What HARDCASTLE. It means that you can say and unsay things at pleasure.
seemed forward assurance, now strikes me as the result of courageous That you can address a lady in private, and deny it in public; that you have
innocence, and conscious virtue.
one story for us, and another for my daughter!
SIR CHARLES. What can it mean? He amazes me! MARLOW. Daughter!—this lady your daughter!
HARDCASTLE. I told you how it would be. Hush!
HARDCASTLE. Yes, sir, my only daughter. My Kate, whose else should
MARLOW. I am now determined to stay, madam, and I have too good an she be?
opinion of my father’s discernment, when he sees you, to doubt his MARLOW. Oh, the devil.
approbation.
Miss HARDCASTLE. Yes, sir, that very identical tall, squinting lady you
Miss HARDCASTLE. No, Mr. Marlow, I will not, cannot detain you. Do
were pleased to take me for. (Curtseying.) She that you addressed as the
you think I could suffer a connection, in which there is the smallest room
mild, modest, sentimental man of gravity, and the bold, forward, agreeable
for repentance? Do you think I would take the mean advantage of a
Rattle of the Ladies’ Club: ha, ha, ha!
transient passion, to load you with confusion? Do you think I could ever
relish that happiness, which was acquired by lessening yours? MARLOW. Zounds, there’s no bearing this; it’s worse than death!
MARLOW. By all that’s good, I can have no happiness but what’s in Miss HARDCASTLE. In which of your characters, sir, will you give us
your power to grant me. Nor shall I ever feel repentance, but in not having leave to address you? As the faltering gentleman, with looks on the ground,
seen your merits before. I will stay, even contrary to your wishes; and that speaks just to be heard, and hates hypocrisy: or the loud, confident
though you should persist to shun me, I will make my respectful assiduities creature, that keeps it up with Mrs. Mantrap, and old Miss Biddy Buckskin,
atone for the levity of my past conduct. till three in the morning; ha, ha, ha!
Miss HARDCASTLE. Sir, I must entreat you’ll desist. As our MARLOW. Oh, curse on my noisy head. I never attempted to be
acquaintance began, so let it end, in indifference. I might have given an impudent yet, that I was not taken down. I must be gone.
hour or two to levity; but, seriously, Mr. Marlow, do you think I could ever HARDCASTLE. By the hand of my body, but you shall not. I see it was
submit to a connection, where I must appear mercenary, and you all a mistake, and I am rejoiced to find it. You shall not, sir, I tell you. I
imprudent? Do you think I could ever catch at the confident addresses of a know she’ll forgive you. Won’t you forgive him, Kate? We’ll all forgive
secure admirer? you. Take courage, man.
 [They retire, she tormenting him, to the back scene. delusion, and hope from your tenderness what is denied me from a nearer
connection.
Enter MRS. HARDCASTLE, TONY.
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Pshaw, pshaw! this is all but the whining end of a
MRS. HARDCASTLE. So, so, they’re gone off. Let them go, I care not.
modern novel.
HARDCASTLE. Who gone?
HARDCASTLE. Be it what it will, I’m glad they’re come back to
MRS. HARDCASTLE. My dutiful niece and her gentleman, Mr. reclaim their due. Come hither, Tony, boy. Do you refuse this lady’s hand
Hastings, from town. He who came down with our modest visitor, here. whom I now offer you?
SIR CHARLES. Who, my honest George Hastings? As worthy a fellow TONY. What signifies my refusing? You know I can’t refuse her till I’m
as lives, and the girl could not have made a more prudent choice. of age, father.
HARDCASTLE. Then, by the hand of my body, I’m proud of the HARDCASTLE. While I thought concealing your age, boy, was likely to
connection. conduce to your improvement, I concurred with your mother’s desire to
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Well, if he has taken away the lady, he has not keep it secret. But since I find she turns it to a wrong use, I must now
taken her fortune, that remains in this family to console us for her loss. declare, you have been of age these three months.

HARDCASTLE. Sure, Dorothy, you would not be so mercenary? TONY. Of age! Am I of age, father?
MRS. HARDCASTLE. Ay, that’s my affair, not yours. But you know, if HARDCASTLE. Above three months.
your son when of age, refuses to marry his cousin, her whole fortune is then TONY. Then you’ll see the first use I’ll make of my liberty. (Taking Miss
at her own disposal. NEVILLE’S hand.) Witness all men by these presents, that I, Anthony
HARDCASTLE. Ay, but he’s not of age, and she has not thought proper Lumpkin, Esquire, of BLANK place, refuse you, Constantia Neville,
to wait for his refusal. spinster, of no place at all, for my true and lawful wife. So Constance
Neville may marry whom she pleases, and Tony Lumpkin is his own man
again!
Enter HASTINGS and Miss NEVILLE.
SIR CHARLES. O brave ’Squire!
MRS. HARDCASTLE (Aside). What! returned so soon? I begin not to HASTINGS. My worthy friend!
like it. MRS. HARDCASTLE. My undutiful offspring!
HASTINGS (To HARDCASTLE). For my late attempt to fly off with MARLOW. Joy, my dear George, I give you joy sincerely. And could I
your niece, let my present confusion be my punishment. We are now come prevail upon my little tyrant here to be less arbitrary, I should be the
back, to appeal from your justice to your humanity. By her father’s consent, happiest man alive, if you would return me the favour.
I first paid her my addresses, and our passions were first founded in duty.
HASTINGS (To Miss HARDCASTLE). Come, madam, you are now
Miss NEVILLE. Since his death, I have been obliged to stoop to driven to the very last scene of all your contrivances. I know you like him,
dissimulation to avoid oppression. In an hour of levity, I was ready even to I’m sure he loves you, and you must and shall have him.
give up my fortune to secure my choice. But I’m now recovered from the
 HARDCASTLE (Joining their hands). And I say so, too. And Mr.
Marlow, if she makes as good a wife as she has a daughter, I don’t believe
you’ll ever repent your bargain. So now to supper, to-morrow we shall
gather all the poor of the parish about us, and the Mistakes of the Night Epilogue
shall be crowned with a merry morning; so, boy, take her; as you have been
mistaken in the mistress, my wish is, that you may never be mistaken in the
wife.
BY DR. GOLDSMITH

WELL, having stooped to conquer with success,

And gained a husband without aid from dress,
Still as a Barmaid, I could wish it too,
As I have conquered him to conquer you:
And let me say, for all your resolution,
That pretty Barmaids have done execution.
Our life is all a play, composed to please,
“We have our exits and our entrances.”
The first act shows the simple country maid,
Harmless and young, of everything afraid;
Blushes when hired, and with unmeaning action,
I hopes as how to give you satisfaction.
Her second act displays a livelier scene,—
Th’ unblushing Barmaid of a country inn.
Who whisks about the house, at market caters,
Talks loud, coquets the guests, and scolds the waiters.
Next the scene shifts to town, and there she soars,
The chop-house toast of ogling connoisseurs.
On ’Squires and Cits she there displays her arts,
And on the gridiron broils her lovers’ hearts—
And as she smiles, her triumphs to complete,
Even Common Councilmen forget to eat.
The fourth act shows her wedded to the ’Squire,
And madam now begins to hold it higher;
Pretends to taste, at Operas cries caro,
And quits her Nancy Dawson, for Che Faro. 15
Dotes upon dancing, and in all her pride,
Swims round the room, the Heinel16 of Cheapside: Epilogue 19
Ogles and leers with artificial skill,
Till having lost in age the power to kill,
She sits all night at cards, and ogles at spadille. 17
Such, through our lives, the eventful history— BY J. CRADOCK, ESQ. 20
The fifth and last act still remains for me. To be spoke in the character of TONY LUMPKIN
The Barmaid now for your protection prays,
Turns female Barrister, and pleads for Bayes. 18

WELL—now all’s ended—and my comrades gone,

Pray what becomes of mother’s nonly son?
A hopeful blade!—in town I’ll fix my station,
And try to make a bluster in the nation.
As for my cousin Neville, I renounce her,
Off—in a crack—I’ll carry big Bet Bouncer.
Why should not I in the great world appear?
I soon shall have a thousand pounds a year;
No matter what a man may here inherit,
In London—‘gad, they’ve some regard for spirit.
I see the horses prancing up the streets,
And big Bet Bouncer bobs to all she meets;
Then hoicks to jigs and pastimes ev’ry night—
Not to the plays—they say it a‘n’t polite,
To Sadlers-Wells perhaps, or Operas go,
And once by chance, to the roratorio.
Thus here and there, for ever up and down,
We’ll set the fashions too, to half the town;
And then at auctions—money ne’er regard,
Buy pictures like the great, ten pounds a yard:
Zounds, we shall make these London gentry say,
We know what’s damned genteel, as well as they.
 ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA, William Shakespeare. 128pp. 0-486-40062-
X
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publishes more than 500 books each year on science, elementary and 1 Georgie Colman the elder (1732—1794), the play’s first producer.
advanced mathematics, biology, music, art, literary history, social sciences,
and other areas. 2 The celebrated English actor.

3 An actor who had refused the part of Tony Lumpkin in the original
production of Goldsmith’s play.

4 Edward (“Ned”) Shuter (1728?—1776), the actor who played Mr.

Hardeastle in the original production.

5 Water Parted: from Thomas Arne’s opera Artaxerxes (1762); Ariadne:

George Frideric Handel’s opera Arianna in Crete, first performed in London
in 1734.

6 Heyder Ally: Haidar Ali (1722—1782), a governor of Mysore (present-

day Karnataka, on the west coast of India); Ally Cawn: Ali Vardi Khan (d.
1756), a governor of Bengal; Ally Croker: an Irish song.

7 A portrait or sketch published with a satirical biography in society

magazines.

8 Dr. John Quincy (d. 1722), author of the popular Complete English
Dispensatory (1721), which listed home medications.

9 A play by the Irish-born dramatist George Farquhar (1678—1707), in

which Cherry is the landlord’s daughter.

10 Die-casting terms. Seven is a winning opening throw unless followed

by “ames-ace” (two aces).

11 A series of satirical engravings by the English artist William Hogarth

(1697—1764).

12 Younger and more extravagant socialites who affected foreign manners

were satirized in engravings with titles modeled on the name of the Italian
dish made famous in eighteenth-century England by the “Macaroni Club.”

13 A famous racehorse of the period, painted by the English artist George

Stubbs (1724—1806).
14 A corruption of the word “harpsichord.”

15 Che faro senza Euridice, an aria from Christoph Gluck’s opera Orfeo
ed Euridice (1762).

16 Anna-Frederica Heinel, a Prussian dancer.

17 The ace of spades in ombre, a popular eighteenth-century card game.

18 A character modeled on the poet and dramatist John Dryden in George

Villiers, Second Duke of Buckingham’s play The Rehearsal (1671).

19 “This came too late to be spoken.” (Goldsmith’s note)

20 The actor and dramatist Joseph Cradock (1742-1826).