Buck. So, so, I thought she would come to; but, I confess, not altogether so soon. Eh bien, ma belle, see me ready to receive your commands. Luc. Pray, be seated, sir Charles. I am afraid the natural warmth of my temper might have hurried me into some expressions not altogether so suitable. Buck. Ah, bagatelle. Name it not. Buck. Volontiers. This tea is a pretty innocent kind of beverage; I wonder the French don't take it. I have some thoughts of giving it a fashion next winter. Crab. And this young thing here has been breathing passions and protestations. take care my girl shan't go a beggar to any man's bed. We must have this twenty thousand Luc. That will be very obliging. It is of ex-pound, Lucy. treme service to the ladies this side of the water, you know, Buck. True, it promotes parties, and infuses a kind of spirit into conversation. But what has occasioned me, ma reine, the honour of your message by Mr Crab? Luc. The favours I have received from your family, sir Charles, I thought demanded from me, at my quitting your house, a more decent and ceremonious adieu than our last interview would admit of. Buck. Is that all, ma chere? I thought your flinty heart had at last relented. Well, ma reine, adieu ! Luc. Can you, then, leave me? Luc. Go then, perfidious traitor, be gone! I have this consolation, however, that if I cannot legally possess you, no other woman shall. Buck. Hey, how, what! Luc. And though the pleasure of living with you is denied me, in our deaths, at least, we shall soon be united. Lord John. I regard it not. Let me be happy, and let him be Crab. Pshaw, don't scorch me with thy flames. Reserve your raptures; or, if they must have vent, retire into that room, whilst I go plague the puppy. [Exit CRAB one way, Lucy and LORD JOHN another. SCENE II.-Changes and discovers BUCK, MAC- Sur. This copious phlebotomy will abate the inflammation; and if the six blisters on your head and back rise, why there may be hopes. Buck. Cold comfort. I burn, I burn, I burn! Ah, there is a shoot! And now again, I freeze! Mac. Ay, They are aw symptoms of a strong poison. Buck. Soon be united in death! When, child?aw Luc. The fatal draught's already at my heart. Buck. Well! Luc. I poisoned Buck. The devil! Luc. And as my generous heart would have shared all with you, I gave you half. Buck. Oh, curse your generosity! Buck. Oh, I am on the rack! Mac. Oh, if it be got to the vitals, a fig for antidotes. Enter CRAB. Crab. Where is this miserable devil? What, is he alive still! Mac. In gude troth, and that's aw. Buck. Oh! Crab. So, you have made a pretty piece of work on't, young man! Buck. O, what could provoke me to return from Paris! Crab. Had you never been there, this could Luc. Indulge me in the cold comfort of a last not have happened. embrace. Enter LUCINDA and LORD JOHN. Buck. Hey, why did not she swallow the poison? Crab. No; nor you neither, you blockhead. Buck. Why, did not I leave you in pangs? Luc. Ay, put on. The tea was innocent, upon my honour, sir Charles. But you allow me to be an excellent actrice. Buck. Oh, curse your talents! Crab. This fellow's public renunciation has put your person and fortune in your power; and you were sincere in your declaration of being directed by me, bestow it there. Buck. Name them. Take my estate, my-if save but my life, take all. Crab. First, then, renounce thy right to that lady, whose just resentment has drawn this punishment upon thee, and in which she is an unhappy partaker. Buck. I renounce her from my soul. Crab. To this declaration you are witnesses. Next, your tawdry trappings, your foreign foppery, your washes, paints, pomades, must blaze before your door. Buck. What, all? Crab. All; not a rag shall be reserved. The execution of this part of your sentence shall be assigned to your old friends here. Buck. Well, take them. Crab. And, lastly, I'll have these exotic attendants, these instruments of your luxury, these pandars to your pride, packed in the first cart, and sent post to the place from whence they caine. Buck. Spare me but La Jonquil ! Crab. Not an instant. The importation of these puppies makes a part of the politics of your old friends the French; unable to resist you, whilst you retain your ancient roughness, they have recourse to these minions, who would first, by unmanly means, sap and soften all your native spirit, and then deliver you an casy prey to their employers. Buck. Since, then, it must be so, adieu, La Jonquil!!! [Exeunt Servants. Crab. And now to the remedy. Come forth, Lucinda. Luc. As a proof of my sincerity, my lord, receive it. Lord John. With more transport than sir Charles the news of his safety! Luc. [To Buck.] You are not at present in a condition to take possession of your post. Buck. What? Luc. Oh, you recollect! my lord's private friend; his assistant, you know. Buck. Oh, oh! Mac. But, sir Charles, as I find the affair of the poison was but a joke, had na' ye better withdraw, and tak off your blisters ? Crab. No, let them stick. He wants them.And now concludes my care. But, before we close the scene, receive, young man, this last advice from the old friend of your father: As it is your happiness to be born a Briton, let it be your boast; know, that the blessings of liberty are your birth-right, which, while you preserve, other nations may envy or fear, but never conquer or contemn you. Believe, that French fashions are as ill suited to the genius, as their politics are pernicious to the peace, of your na tive land. A convert to these sacred truths, you'll find mind. SCENE I. GOVERNOR CAPE and ROBIN. Gov. AND he believes mc dead, Robin? Rob. Most certainly. ACT I. Gov. You have given him no intimation that his fortunes might mend? Rob. Not a distant hint. Gov. How did he receive the news? Rob. Calmly enough: when I told him that his hopes from abroad were at an end, that the friend of his deceased father thought he had done enough in putting it in his power to earn his own livelihood, he replied, 'twas no more than he had long expected, charged me with his warmest acknowledgements to his concealed benefactor, thanked me for my care, sighed, and left me. Gov. And how has he lived since? Rob. Poorly, but honestly: to his pen he owes all his subsistence. I am sure my heart bleeds for him: consider, sir, to what temptations you expose him. Gov. The severer his trials, the greater his triumph. Shall the fruits of my honest industry, the purchase of so many perils, be lavished on a lazy, luxurious booby, who has no other merit than being born five-and-twenty years after me? No, no, Robin; him, and a profusion of debts, were all that the extravagance of his mother left me. Rob. You loved her, sir? Gov. Fondly, nay foolishly, or necessity had not compelled me to seek for shelter in another climate. Tis true, fortune has been favourable to my labours; and when George convinces me, that he inherits my spirit, he shall share my property; not else. Rob. Consider, sir, he has not your opportuni ties. Gov: Nor had I his education. Rob. As the world goes, the worst you could have given him. Lack-a-day! Learning, learning, sir, is no commodity for this market: nothing makes money here, sir, but money; or some certain fashionable qualities that you would not wish your son to possess. Devil. What, d'ye think it belongs to the circulating library, or that it is one of your own performances, that you Cape. You shall have a larger-[Exit Devil.] -'Sdeath! a pretty situation I am in! And are these the fruits I am to reap from a long, labori Gov. Learning useless! Impossible! Where are the Oxfords, the Halifaxes, the great protec-ous, and expensive tors and patrons of the liberal arts? Rob. Patron! The world has lost its use; a guinea-subscription at the request of a lady, whose chambermaid is acquainted with the author, may be now and then picked up-Protector! Why, I dare believe there's more money laid out upon Islington turnpike, in a month, than upon all the learned men in Great Britain in seven years. Gov. And yet the press groans with their productions! How do they all exist? Rob. In garrets, sir; as, if you will step to your son's apartment, in the next street, you will see. Gov. But what apology shall we make for the visit? Rob. That you want the aid of his profession; a well-penned address, now, from the subjects of your late government, with your gracious reply, to put into the newspapers. Gov. Ay! is that part of his practice? Well, lead on, Robin. [Exeunt. SCENE II.-Draws, and discovers YOUNG Re-enter Devil. Devil. I had like to have forgot; here's your week's pay for the newspaper, five and fivepence; which, with the two-and-a-penny master passed his word for to Mrs Suds, your washerwoman, makes the three half-crowns. Cape. Lay it on the table. Devil. Here's a man on the stairs wants you; by the sheepishness of his looks, and the shabbiness of his dress, he's either a pick-pocket or a poet-Here, walk in, Mr What-d'ye-call-um, the gentleman's at home. [Surveys the figure, laughs, and exit. Poet. Why, sir, my case, in a word, is this: I, like you, have long been a retainer of the Muses, as you may see by their livery. Cape. They have not discarded you, I hope? Poet. No, sir; but their upper servants, the booksellers, have-I printed a collection of jests upon my own account, and they have ever since refused to employ me; you, sir, I hear, are in their graces: now I have brought you, sir, three imitations of Juvenal in prose; Tully's oration for Milo, in blank verse; two essays on the British herring-fishery, with a large collection of re Devil. Master bid me not come without the proof; he says as how there are two other answers ready for the press; and if yours don't come out a Saturday, 'twont pay for the paper. But you are always so lazy; I have more plague with you- -there's Mr Guzzle, the translator, never keeps me a minute-unless the poor gen-buses; which, if you will dispose of to them, in tleman happens to be fuddled. Cape. Why, you little, sooty, snivelling, diabolical puppy, is it not sufficient to be plagued with the stupidity of your absurd master, but I must be pestered with your impertinence? Devil. Impertinence! Marry come up, I keep as good company as your worship every day in the year there's Mr Clench, in Little Britain, does not think it beneath him to take part of a pot of porter with me, though he has wrote two volumes of Lives in quarto, and has a folio a-coming out in numbers. Cape. Hark'e, sirrah, if you don't quit the room this instant, I'll show you a shorter way into the street, than the stairs. Devil. I shall save you the trouble; give me the French book that you took the story from for the last journal. your own name, we'll divide the profits. Cape. I am really, sir, sorry for your distress; but I have a larger cargo of my own manufac turing, than they choose to engage in. Poet. That's pity; you have nothing in the compiling or index way, that you would entrust to the care of another? Cape. Nothing. Poet. I'll do it at half price. Cape. I'm concerned it is not in my power, at present, to be useful to you; but if this triflePoet. Sir, your servant. Shall I leave you any of my Cape. By no means. Poet. Your very obedient [Exit POET. Spright. A sketch can never convey him. His peculiarities require infinite labour, and high fi Cape. Give me the outlines. Cape. Poor fellow! And how far am I removed from his condition? Virgil had his Pollio; Horace his Mæcenas; Martial his Pliny. Mynishing. protectors are, Title-page the publisher, Vamp the bookseller, and Index the printer. A most noble triumvirate! and the rascals are as proscriptive and arbitrary as the famous Roman one, into the bargain. Enter SPRIGHTLY. Spright. What! in soliloquy, George? reciting some of the pleasantries, I suppose, in your new piece? Cape. My disposition has at present very little of the vis comica. Spright. What's the matter? Cape. Survey that mass of wealth upon the table; all my own, and earned in little inore than a week. Spright. Why, 'tis an inexhaustible mine! Cape. Ay; and delivered to me, too, with all the soft civility of Billingsgate, by a printer's prime minister, called a devil. Spright. I met the imp upon the stairs. But I thought these midwives to the muses were the idolizers of you, their favourite sons. Cape. Our tyrants, Tom! Had I indeed a posthumous piece of infidelity, or an amorous novel, decorated with luscious copper-plates, the slaves would be civil enough. Spright. Why don't you publish your own works? Cape. What! And paper my room with them? No, no, that will never do; there are secrets in all trades: ours is one great mystery; but the explanation would be too tedious at present. Spright. Then why don't you divert your attention to some other object? Cape. That subject was employing my thoughts. Spright. How have you resolved? Spright. He is a compound of contrarieties; pride and meanness, folly and archness: at the same time that he would take the wall of a prince of the blood, he would not scruple eating a fried sausage at the Mews-gate. There is a minuteness, now and then, in his descriptions, and some whimsical, unaccountable turns in his conversation, that are entertaining enough; but the extravagance and oddity of his manner, and the boast of his birth, complete his character. Cape. But how will a person of his pride and pedigree, relish the humility of this apartment? Spright. Oh, he's prepared-you are, George, though prodigiously learned and ingenious, an abstracted being, odd and whimsical; the case with all your great geniuses: you love the snug, the chimney-corner of life; and retire to this obscure nook, merely to avoid the importunity of the great. Cupe. Your servant- But what attraction can a character of this kind have for Mr Cadwallader? Spright. Infinite! next to a peer, he honours a poet; and modestly imputes his not making a figure in the learned world himself, to the negiect of his education-Hush! he's on the stairs -On with your cap, and open your book. Remember great dignity and absence. Enter VAMP. Cape. Oh, no; 'tis Mr Vamp. Your commands, good sir? Vamp. I have a word, Mr Cape, for your pri rate ear. Cape. You may communicate; this gentleman is a friend. Vamp. An author? Cape. Voluminous. Vamp. In what way? Cape. Universal. Cape. I have, I think, at present, two strings to my bow if my comedy succeeds, it buys me a commission; if my mistress, my Laura, proves kind, I am settled for life; but if both my cords Vamp. Bless me! he's very young, and exceedsnap-adieu to the quill, and welcome the musingly well rigged; what, a good subscription, I ket. Spright. Heroically determined! But, a-propos, how proceeds your honourable passion? Cape. But slowly; I believe I have a friend in her heart, but a most potent enemy in her head: you know I am poor, and she is prudent. With regard to her fortune, too, I believe her brother's consent is essentially necessary-But you promised to make me acquainted with him. Spright. I expect him here every instant. He may, George, be useful to you in more than one capacity; if your comedy is not crowded, he is a character, I can tell you, that will make no contemptible figure in it. Cape. His sister gave me a sketch of him last summer. VOL. III. reckon? Cape. Not a month from Leyden; an admirable theologist! he studied it in Germany; if you should want such a thing, now, as ten or a dozen manuscript sermons, by a deceased clergyman, I believe he can supply you. Vamp. Warranted originals? Vamp. No, no; I don't deal in the sermonway, now; I lost money by the last I printed, for all 'twas wrote by a methodist; but I believe, sir, if they ben't long, and have a good deal of 'Latin in them, I can get you a chap. Spright. For what, sir? Vamp. The manuscript sermons you have wrote, and want to dispose of. 2 C |