Stand. I'll engage you shall remember me this

month, rascal.

[Beats him off; and exit.

Enter LUREWELL and PARLY.

Lure. Fort-bon, fort-bon, fort.bon! This is better than I expected; but fortune still helps the industrious.

Enter CLINCHER Senior.

Clin. sen. Ah! the devil take all intriguing, say I, and him who first invented canes. -That cursed colonel has got such a knack of beating his men, that he has left the mark of a collar of bandileers about my shoulders.

Lure. Oh, my poor gentleman! and was it beaten ? Clin. sen. Yes, I have been beaten. But where's my clothes? my clothes?

Lure. What, you won't leave me so soon, my dear, will ye?

Clin. sen. Will ye!—If ever I peep into a colonel's tent again, may I be forced to run the gauntlet. But my clothes, madam.

Lure. I sent the porter down stairs with them: did not you meet him?

Clin. sen. Meet him? No, not I.

Par. No!-He went out at the back-door, and is run clear away, I'm afraid.

Clin. sen. Gone, say you, and with my clothes, my fine Jubilee clothes?-Oh, the rogue, the thief!-I'll

have him hang'd for murder-But how shall I get home in this pickle ?

Par. I'm afraid, sir, the colonel will be back presently, for he dines at home.

Clin. sen. Oh, then I must sneak off.

Was ever such an unfortunate beau,

To have his coat well thrash'd, and lose his coat also?

[Exit.

Lure. Thus the noble poet spoke truth : Nothing suits worse with vice than want of sense: Fools are still wicked at their own expence.

Par. Methinks, madam, thé injuries you have suffered by men must be very great, to raise such heavý resentments against the whole sex.

Lure. The greatest injury that woman could sustain: they robbed me of that jewel, which preserved, exalts our sex almost to angels: but destroyed, debases us below the worst of brutes, mankind.

Par. But I think, madam, your anger should be only confined to the author of your wrongs.

Lure. The author! Alas, I know him not, "which "makes my wrongs the greater."

Par. Not know him? 'Tis odd, madam, that a man should rob you of that same jewel you mentioned, and you not know him.

Lure. Leave trifling: 'tis a subject that always sours my temper: but since, by thy faithful service, I have some reason to confide in your secresy, hear the strange relation.-Some twelve years ago, I lived at my fa

ther's house in Oxfordshire, blest with innocence, the ornamental, but weak guard of blooming beauty: I was then just fifteen," an age fatal to the female "sex." Our youth is tempting, our innocence credulous, romances moving, love powerful, and men are-villains. Then it happened, that three young gentlemen from the university coming into the country, and being benighted, and strangers, called at my father's: he was very glad of their company, and offered them the entertainment of his house.

Par. Which they accepted, no doubt. Oh, these strolling collegians are never abroad, but upon some mischief.

Lure. They had some private frolic or design in their heads, as appeared by their not naming one another, which my father perceiving, out of civility, made no enquiry into their affairs; two of them had a heavy, pedantic, university air; a sort of disagreeable scholastic boorishness in their behaviour; but the third

Par. Ah, the third, madam-the third of all things, they say, is very critical.

Lure. He was-but in short, nature cut him out for my undoing; he seemed to be about eighteen.

Par. A fit match for your fifteen as could be.

Lure. He had a genteel sweetness in his face, a graceful comeliness in his person, and his tongue was fit to sooth soft innocence into ruin. His very looks were witty, and his expressive eyes spoke softer, prettier things, than words could frame.

Par. There will be mischief by and by; I never heard a woman talk so much of eyes, but there were tears presently after.

Lure. His discourse was directed to my father, but his looks to me. After supper I went to my chamber, and read Cassandra, then went to bed, and dreamed of him all night, "rose in the morning, and made "6 verses," so fell desperately in love.-My father was so well pleased with his conversation, that he begged their company next day; they consented, and next night, Parly-————

Par. Ah, next night, madam—next night (I'm afraid) was a night indeed.

Lure. He bribed my maid, with his gold, out of her honesty; and me, with his rhetoric, out of my honour-She admitted him into my chamber, and there he vowed, and swore, and wept, and sighed—and conquered.

Par. A-lack-a-day, poor fifteen.

[Weeps. [Weeps.

Lure. He swore that he would come down from Oxford in a fortnight, and marry me.

Par. The old bait, the old bait-I was cheated just so myself. [Aside.]—But had not you the wit to know his name all this while?

Lure. Alas, what wit had innocence like mine? He told me, that he was under an obligation to his companions of concealing himself then, but that he would write to me in two days, and let me know his name and quality. After all the binding oaths of constancy, "joining hands, exchanging hearts," I gave

him a ring with this motto: Love and honour:'then we parted, and I never saw the dear deceiver

more.

Par. No, nor never will, I warrant you.

Lure. I need not tell my griefs, which my father's death made a fair pretence for; he left me sole heiress and executrix to three thousand pounds a year: at last, my love for this single dissembler turned to a hatred of the whole sex; and, resolving to divert my melancholy, and make my large fortune subservient to my pleasure and revenge, I went to travel, where, in most courts of Europe, I have done some execution. Here I will play my last scene; then retire to my country-house, live solitary, and die a pe

nitent.

Par. But don't you still love this dear dissembler ? Lure. Most certainly. 'Tis love of him that keeps my anger warm, representing the baseness of mankind full in view; and makes my resentments workWe shall have that old impotent lecher, Smuggler, here to night; I have a plot to swinge him, and his precise nephew, Vizard.

Par. I think, madam, you manage every body that comes in your way.

Lure. No, Parly; those men, whose pretensions I found just and honourable, I fairly dismissed, by leting them know my firm resolutions never to marry. But those villains that would attempt my honour, I've eldem failed to manage.