Love urged me on to try all wily arts, [To the Audience. Your hearts to win is now my aim alone; [Exeunt. Dim. Po! po!-no such thing: I tell you, Mr Woodley, you are a mere novice in these affairs. Wood. Nay, but listen to reason, Mrs Dimity: has not your master, Mr Drugget, invited me down to his country seat? has not he promised to give me his daughter Nancy in marriage? and with what pretence can he now break off? Dim. What pretence !--you put a body out of all patience. Go on your own way, sir; my advice is lost upon you. Wood. You do me injustice, Mrs Dimity. Your advice has governed my whole conduct. Have not I fixed an interest in the young lady's heart? Dim. An interest in a fiddlestick!-You ought to have made sure of the father and mother. What, do you think the way to get a wife, at this time of day, is by speaking fine things to the lady you have a fancy for? That was the practice indeed; but things are altered now. You must address the old people, sir; and never trouble your head about your mis tress. Wood. But you know, my dear Dimity, the old couple have received every mark of attention from me. Dim. Attention! to be sure you did not fall asleep in their company; but what then? You should have entered into their characters, played with their humours, and sacrificed to their absurdities. Wood. But if my temper is too frank ? Dim. Frank, indeed! yes, you have been frank enough to ruin yourself. Have not you to do with a rich old shopkeeper, retired from business with an hundred thousand pounds in his pocket, to enjoy the dust of the London road, which he calls living in the country and yet you must find fault with his situation! What if he has made a ridiculous gimcrack of his house and gardens? you know his heart is set upon it and could not you have commended his taste? But you must be too frank! "Those walks and alleys are too regular: those evergreens should not be cut into such fantastic shapes."-And thus you advise a poor old mechanic, who delights in every thing that's monstrous, to follow nature. Oh, you are likely to be a successful lover! Wood. But why should I not save a father-in-law from being a laughing-stock? Dim. Make him your father-in-law first.-And then the mother; how have you played your cards in that quarter? She wants a tinsel man of fashion for her second daughter. "Don't you see," says she, "how happy my eldest girl is made by her match with Sir Charles Rackett? She has been married three entire weeks, and not so much as one angry word has passed between them! Nancy shall have a man of quality too." |