Act I
Scene I. Sir John Bevil’s House.
| Enter Sir John Bevil and Humphry. | |
| John Bevil | Have you ordered that I should not be interrupted while I am dressing? |
| Humphry | Yes, sir; I believed you had something of moment to say to me. |
| John Bevil | Let me see, Humphry; I think it is now full forty years since I first took thee to be about myself. |
| Humphry | I thank you, sir, it has been an easy forty years; and I have passed ’em without much sickness, care, or labour. |
| John Bevil | Thou hast a brave constitution; you are a year or two older than I am, sirrah. |
| Humphry | You have ever been of that mind, sir. |
| John Bevil | You knave, you know it; I took thee for thy gravity and sobriety, in my wild years. |
| Humphry | Ah, sir! our manners were formed from our different fortunes, not our different age. Wealth gave a loose to your youth, and poverty put a restraint upon mine. |
| John Bevil | Well, Humphry, you know I have been a kind master to you; I have used you, for the ingenuous nature I observed in you from the beginning, more like an humble friend than a servant. |
| Humphry | I humbly beg you’ll be so tender of me as to explain your commands, sir, without any farther preparation. |
| John Bevil | I’ll tell thee, then: In the first place, this wedding of my son’s in all probability—shut the door—will never be at all. |
| Humphry | How, sir! not be at all? for what reason is it carried on in appearance? |
| John Bevil | Honest Humphry, have patience; and I’ll tell thee all in order. I have, myself, in some part of my life, lived (indeed) with freedom, but, I hope, without reproach. Now, I thought liberty would be as little injurious to my son; therefore, as soon as he grew towards man, I indulged him in living after his own manner. I knew not how, otherwise, to judge of his inclination; for what can be concluded from a behaviour under restraint and fear?15 But what charms me above all expression is, that my son has never, in the least action, the most distant hint or word, valued himself upon that great estate of his mother’s, which, according to our marriage settlement, he has had ever since he came to age. |
| Humphry | No, sir; on the contrary, he seems afraid of appearing to enjoy it, before you or any belonging to you. He is as dependent and resigned to your will as if he had not a farthing but what must come from your immediate bounty. You have ever acted like a good and generous father, and he like an obedient and grateful son. |
| John Bevil | Nay, his carriage is so easy to all with whom he converses, that he is never assuming, never prefers himself to others, nor ever is guilty of that rough sincerity which a man is not called to, and certainly disobliges most of his acquaintance; to be short, Humphry, his reputation was so fair in the world, that old Sealand, the great India merchant, has offered his only daughter, and sole heiress to that vast estate of his, as a wife for him. You may be sure I made no difficulties, the match was agreed on, and this very day named for the wedding. |
| Humphry | What hinders the proceeding? |
| John Bevil | Don’t interrupt me. You know I was last Thursday at the masquerade; my son, you may remember, soon found us out. He knew his grandfather’s habit, which I then wore; and though it was the mode, in the last age, yet the masquers, you know, followed us as if we had been the most monstrous figures in that whole assembly. |
| Humphry | I remember, indeed, a young man of quality in the habit of a clown, that was particularly troublesome. |
| John Bevil | Right; he was too much what he seemed to be. You remember how impertinently he followed and teased us, and would know who we were. |
| Humphry | I know he has a mind to come into that particular. Aside. |
| John Bevil | Ay, he followed us till the gentleman who led the lady in the Indian mantle presented that gay creature to the rustic, and bid him (like Cymon in the fable) grow polite by falling in love, and let that worthy old gentleman alone, meaning me. The clown was not reformed, but rudely persisted, and offered to force off my mask; with that, the gentleman, throwing off his own, appeared to be my son, and in his concern for me, tore off that of the nobleman; at this they seized each other; the company called the guards, and in the surprise the lady swooned away; upon which my son quitted his adversary, and had now no care but of the lady. When raising her in his arms, “Art thou gone,” cried he, “forever?—forbid it, Heaven!” She revived at his known voice, and with the most familiar, though modest, gesture, hangs in safety over his shoulder weeping, but wept as in the arms of one before whom she could give herself a loose, were she not under observation; while she hides her face in his neck, he carefully conveys her from the company. |
| Humphry | I have observed this accident has dwelt upon you very strongly. |
| John Bevil | Her uncommon air, her noble modesty, the dignity of her person, and the occasion itself, drew the whole assembly together; and I soon heard it buzzed about she was the adopted daughter of a famous sea-officer who had served in France. Now this unexpected and public discovery of my son’s so deep concern for her— |
| Humphry | Was what, I suppose, alarmed Mr. Sealand, in behalf of his daughter, to break off the match? |
| John Bevil | You are right. He came to me yesterday and said he thought himself disengaged from the bargain; being credibly informed my son was already married, or worse, to the lady at the masquerade. I palliated matters, and insisted on our agreement; but we parted with little less than a direct breach between us.16 |
| Humphry | Well, sir; and what notice have you taken of all this to my young master? |
| John Bevil | That’s what I wanted to debate with you. I have said nothing to him yet—but look you, Humphry, if there is so much in this amour of his, that he denies upon my summons to marry, I have cause enough to be offended; and then by my insisting upon his marrying today, I shall know how far he is engaged to this lady in masquerade, and from thence only shall be able to take my measures. In the meantime I would have you find out how far that rogue, his man, is let into his secret. He, I know, will play tricks as much to cross me, as to serve his master. |
| Humphry | Why do you think so of him, sir? I believe he is no worse than I was for you, at your son’s age. |
| John Bevil | I see it in the rascal’s looks. But I have dwelt on these things too long; I’ll go to my son immediately, and while I’m gone, your part is to convince his rogue, Tom, that I am in earnest.—I’ll leave him to you. |
| Exit Sir John Bevil. | |
| Humphry | Well, though this father and son live as well together as possible, yet their fear of giving each other pain is attended with constant mutual uneasiness. I’m sure I have enough to do to be honest, and yet keep well with them both. But they know I love ’em, and that makes the task less painful however. Oh, here’s the prince of poor coxcombs, the representative of all the better fed than taught. Ho! ho! Tom, whither so gay and so airy this morning? |
| Enter Tom, singing. | |
| Tom | Sir, we servants of single gentlemen are another kind of people than you domestic ordinary drudges that do business; we are raised above you. The pleasures of board-wages, tavern dinners, and many a clear gain; vails, alas! you never heard or dreamt of. |
| Humphry | Thou hast follies and vices enough for a man of ten thousand a year, though ’tis but as t’other day that I sent for you to town to put you into Mr. Sealand’s family, that you might learn a little before I put you to my young master, who is too gentle for training such a rude thing as you were into proper obedience. You then pulled off your hat to everyone you met in the street, like a bashful great awkward cub as you were. But your great oaken cudgel, when you were a booby, became you much better than that dangling stick at your button, now you are a fop. That’s fit for nothing, except it hangs there to be ready for your master’s hand when you are impertinent. |
| Tom | Uncle Humphry, you know my master scorns to strike his servants. You talk as if the world was now just as it was when my old master and you were in your youth; when you went to dinner because it was so much o’clock, when the great blow was given in the hall at the pantry door, and all the family came out of their holes in such strange dresses and formal faces as you see in the pictures in our long gallery in the country. |
| Humphry | Why, you wild rogue! |
| Tom | You could not fall to your dinner till a formal fellow in a black gown said something over the meat, as if the cook had not made it ready enough. |
| Humphry | Sirrah, who do you prate after? Despising men of sacred characters! I hope you never heard my good young master talk so like a profligate. |
| Tom | Sir, I say you put upon me, when I first came to town, about being orderly, and the doctrine of wearing shams to make linen last clean a fortnight, keeping my clothes fresh, and wearing a frock within doors. |
| Humphry | Sirrah, I gave you those lessons because I supposed at that time your master and you might have dined at home every day, and cost you nothing; then you might have made a good family servant. But the gang you have frequented since at chocolate houses and taverns, in a continual round of noise and extravagance— |
| Tom | I don’t know what you heavy inmates call noise and extravagance; but we gentlemen, who are well fed, and cut a figure, sir, think it a fine life, and that we must be very pretty fellows who are kept only to be looked at. |
| Humphry | Very well, sir, I hope the fashion of being lewd and extravagant, despising of decency and order, is almost at an end, since it has arrived at persons of your quality. |
| Tom | Master Humphry, ha! ha! you were an unhappy lad to be sent up to town in such queer days as you were. Why, now, sir, the lackeys are the men of pleasure of the age, the top gamesters; and many a laced coat about town have had their education in our parti-coloured regiment. We are false lovers; have a taste of music, poetry, billet-doux, dress, politics; ruin damsels; and when we are tired of this lewd town, and have a mind to take up, whip into our masters’ wigs and linen, and marry fortunes. |
| Humphry | Hey-day! |
| Tom | Nay, sir, our order is carried up to the highest dignities and distinctions; step but into the Painted Chamber,17 and by our titles you’d take us all for men of quality. Then, again, come down to the Court of Requests, and you see us all laying our broken heads together for the good of the nation; and though we never carry a question nemine contradicente, yet this I can say, with a safe conscience (and I wish every gentleman of our cloth could lay his hand upon his heart and say the same), that I never took so much as a single mug of beer for my vote in all my life. |
| Humphry | Sirrah, there is no enduring your extravagance; I’ll hear you prate no longer. I wanted to see you to enquire how things go with your master, as far as you understand them; I suppose he knows he is to be married today. |
| Tom | Ay, sir, he knows it, and is dressed as gay as the sun; but, between you and I, my dear, he has a very heavy heart under all that gaiety. As soon as he was dressed I retired, but overheard him sigh in the most heavy manner. He walked thoughtfully to and fro in the room, then went into his closet; when he came out he gave me this for his mistress, whose maid, you know— |
| Humphry | Is passionately fond of your fine person. |
| Tom | The poor fool is so tender, and loves to hear me talk of the world, and the plays, operas, and ridottos18 for the winter, the parks and Belsize19 for our summer diversions; and “Lard!” says she, “you are so wild, but you have a world of humour.” |
| Humphry | Coxcomb! Well, but why don’t you run with your master’s letter to Mrs. Lucinda, as he ordered you? |
| Tom | Because Mrs. Lucinda is not so easily come at as you think for. |
| Humphry | Not easily come at? Why, sirrah, are not her father and my old master agreed that she and Mr. Bevil are to be one flesh before tomorrow morning? |
| Tom | It’s no matter for that; her mother, it seems, Mrs. Sealand, has not agreed to it; and you must know, Mr. Humphry, that in that family the grey mare is the better horse. |
| Humphry | What dost thou mean? |
| Tom | In one word, Mrs. Sealand pretends to have a will of her own, and has provided a relation of hers, a stiff, starched philosopher, and a wise fool, for her daughter; for which reason, for these ten days past, she has suffered no message nor letter from my master to come near her. |
| Humphry | And where had you this intelligence? |
| Tom | From a foolish fond soul that can keep nothing from me; one that will deliver this letter too, if she is rightly managed. |
| Humphry | What! her pretty handmaid, Mrs. Phillis? |
| Tom | Even she, sir; this is the very hour, you know, she usually comes hither, under a pretence of a visit to your housekeeper, forsooth, but in reality to have a glance at— |
| Humphry | Your sweet face, I warrant you. |
| Tom | Nothing else in nature; you must know, I love to fret and play with the little wanton. |
| Humphry | Play with the little wanton! What will this world come to! |
| Tom | I met her this morning in a new manteau and petticoat, not a bit the worse for her lady’s wearing; and she has always new thoughts and new airs with new clothes—then she never fails to steal some glance or gesture from every visitant at their house; and is, indeed, the whole town of coquets at secondhand. But here she comes; in one motion she speaks and describes herself better than all the words in the world can. |
| Humphry | Then I hope, dear sir, when your own affair is over, you will be so good as to mind your master’s with her. |
| Tom | Dear Humphry, you know my master is my friend, and those are people I never forget. |
| Humphry | Sauciness itself! but I’ll leave you to do your best for him. |
| Exit. | |
| Enter Phillis.20 | |
| Phillis | Oh, Mr. Thomas, is Mrs. Sugar-key at home? Lard, one is almost ashamed to pass along the streets! The town is quite empty, and nobody of fashion left in it; and the ordinary people do so stare to see anything, dressed like a woman of condition, as it were on the same floor with them, pass by. Alas! alas! it is a sad thing to walk. O fortune! fortune! |
| Tom | What! a sad thing to walk? Why, Madam Phillis, do you wish yourself lame? |
| Phillis | No, Mr. Tom, but I wish I were generally carried in a coach or chair, and of a fortune neither to stand nor go, but to totter, or slide, to be shortsighted, or stare, to fleer in the face, to look distant, to observe, to overlook, yet all become me; and, if I was rich, I could twire21 and loll as well as the best of them. Oh, Tom! Tom! is it not a pity that you should be so great a coxcomb, and I so great a coquet, and yet be such poor devils as we are? |
| Tom | Mrs. Phillis, I am your humble servant for that— |
| Phillis | Yes, Mr. Thomas, I know how much you are my humble servant, and know what you said to Mrs. Judy, upon seeing her in one of her lady’s cast manteaus: That anyone would have thought her the lady, and that she had ordered the other to wear it till it sat easy; for now only it was becoming. To my lady it was only a covering, to Mrs. Judy it was a habit. This you said, after somebody or other. Oh, Tom! Tom! thou art as false and as base as the best gentleman of them all; but, you wretch, talk to me no more on the old odious subject—don’t, I say. |
| Tom | I know not how to resist your commands, madam. In a submissive tone, retiring. |
| Phillis | Commands about parting are grown mighty easy to you of late. |
| Tom | Oh, I have her; I have nettled and put her into the right temper to be wrought upon and set a-prating. Aside.—Why, truly, to be plain with you, Mrs. Phillis, I can take little comfort of late in frequenting your house. |
| Phillis | Pray, Mr. Thomas, what is it all of a sudden offends your nicety at our house? |
| Tom | I don’t care to speak particulars, but I dislike the whole. |
| Phillis | I thank you, sir, I am a part of that whole. |
| Tom | Mistake me not, good Phillis. |
| Phillis | Good Phillis! Saucy enough. But however— |
| Tom | I say, it is that thou art a part, which gives me pain for the disposition of the whole. You must know, madam, to be serious, I am a man, at the bottom, of prodigious nice honour. You are too much exposed to company at your house. To be plain, I don’t like so many, that would be your mistress’s lovers, whispering to you. |
| Phillis | Don’t think to put that upon me. You say this, because I wrung you to the heart when I touched your guilty conscience about Judy. |
| Tom | Ah, Phillis! Phillis! if you but knew my heart! |
| Phillis | I know too much on’t. |
| Tom | Nay, then, poor Crispo’s22 fate and mine are one. Therefore give me leave to say, or sing at least, as he does upon the same occasion—“Se vedette,” etc. Sings. |
| Phillis | What, do you think I’m to be fobbed off with a song? I don’t question but you have sung the same to Mrs. Judy too. |
| Tom | Don’t disparage your charms, good Phillis, with jealousy of so worthless an object; besides, she is a poor hussy, and if you doubt the sincerity of my love, you will allow me true to my interest. You are a fortune, Phillis. |
| Phillis | What would the fop be at now? In good time, indeed, you shall be setting up for a fortune! |
| Tom | Dear Mrs. Phillis, you have such a spirit that we shall never be dull in marriage when we come together. But I tell you, you are a fortune, and you have an estate in my hands. He pulls out a purse, she eyes it. |
| Phillis | What pretence have I to what is in your hands, Mr. Tom? |
| Tom | As thus: there are hours, you know, when a lady is neither pleased or displeased; neither sick or well; when she lolls or loiters; when she’s without desires—from having more of everything than she knows what to do with. |
| Phillis | Well, what then? |
| Tom | When she has not life enough to keep her bright eyes quite open, to look at her own dear image in the glass. |
| Phillis | Explain thyself, and don’t be so fond of thy own prating. |
| Tom | There are also prosperous and good-natured moments: as when a knot or a patch is happily fixed; when the complexion particularly flourishes. |
| Phillis | Well, what then? I have not patience! |
| Tom | Why, then—or on the like occasions—we servants who have skill to know how to time business, see when such a pretty folded thing as this shows a letter may be presented, laid, or dropped, as best suits the present humour. And, madam, because it is a long wearisome journey to run through all the several stages of a lady’s temper, my master, who is the most reasonable man in the world, presents you this to bear your charges on the road. Gives her the purse. |
| Phillis | Now you think me a corrupt hussy. |
| Tom | O fie, I only think you’ll take the letter. |
| Phillis | Nay, I know you do, but I know my own innocence; I take it for my mistress’s sake. |
| Tom | I know it, my pretty one, I know it. |
| Phillis | Yes, I say I do it, because I would not have my mistress deluded by one who gives no proof of his passion; but I’ll talk more of tips as you see me on my way home. No, Tom, I assure thee, I take this trash of thy master’s, not for the value of the thing, but as it convinces me he has a true respect for my mistress. I remember a verse to the purpose— |
|
|
| Exeunt. |
Scene II. Bevil Jr.’s Lodgings.
| Bevil Jr., reading. | |
| Bevil Jr. | These moral writers practise virtue after death. This charming vision of Mirza!23 Such an author consulted in a morning sets the spirit for the vicissitudes of the day better than the glass does a man’s person. But what a day have I to go through! to put on an easy look with an aching heart! If this lady my father urges me to marry should not refuse me, my dilemma is insupportable. But why should I fear it? Is not she in equal distress with me? Has not the letter I have sent her this morning confessed my inclination to another? Nay, have I not moral assurances of her engagements, too, to my friend Myrtle? It’s impossible but she must give in to it; for, sure, to be denied is a favour any man may pretend to. It must be so—Well, then, with the assurance of being rejected, I think I may confidently say to my father, I am ready to marry her. Then let me resolve upon, what I am not very good at, though it is an honest dissimulation. |
| Enter Tom. | |
| Tom | Sir John Bevil, sir, is in the next room. |
| Bevil Jr. | Dunce! Why did not you bring him in? |
| Tom | I told him, sir, you were in your closet. |
| Bevil Jr. | I thought you had known, sir, it was my duty to see my father anywhere. Going himself to the door. |
| Tom | The devil’s in my master! he has always more wit than I have. Aside. |
| Bevil Jr., introducing Sir John. | |
| Bevil Jr. | Sir, you are the most gallant, the most complaisant of all parents. Sure, ’tis not a compliment to say these lodgings are yours. Why would you not walk in, sir? |
| John Bevil | I was loth to interrupt you unseasonably on your wedding-day. |
| Bevil Jr. | One to whom I am beholden for my birthday might have used less ceremony. |
| John Bevil | Well, son, I have intelligence you have writ to your mistress this morning. It would please my curiosity to know the contents of a wedding-day letter; for courtship must then be over. |
| Bevil Jr. | I assure you, sir, there was no insolence in it upon the prospect of such a vast fortune’s being added to our family; but much acknowledgment of the lady’s greater desert. |
| John Bevil | But, dear Jack, are you in earnest in all this? And will you really marry her? |
| Bevil Jr. | Did I ever disobey any command of yours, sir? nay, any inclination that I saw you bent upon? |
| John Bevil | Why, I can’t say you have, son; but methinks in this whole business, you have not been so warm as I could have wished you. You have visited her, it’s true, but you have not been particular. Everyone knows you can say and do as handsome things as any man; but you have done nothing but lived in the general—been complaisant only. |
| Bevil Jr. | As I am ever prepared to marry if you bid me, so I am ready to let it alone if you will have me. |
| Humphry enters, unobserved. | |
| John Bevil | Look you there now! why, what am I to think of this so absolute and so indifferent a resignation? |
| Bevil Jr. | Think? that I am still your son, sir. Sir, you have been married, and I have not. And you have, sir, found the inconvenience there is when a man weds with too much love in his head. I have been told, sir, that at the time you married, you made a mighty bustle on the occasion. There was challenging and fighting, scaling walls, locking up the lady, and the gallant under an arrest for fear of killing all his rivals. Now, sir, I suppose you having found the ill consequences of these strong passions and prejudices, in preference of one woman to another, in case of a man’s becoming a widower— |
| John Bevil | How is this? |
| Bevil Jr. | I say, sir, experience has made you wiser in your care of me; for, sir, since you lost my dear mother, your time has been so heavy, so lonely, and so tasteless, that you are so good as to guard me against the like unhappiness, by marrying me prudentially by way of bargain and sale. For, as you well judge, a woman that is espoused for a fortune, is yet a better bargain if she dies; for then a man still enjoys what he did marry, the money, and is disencumbered of what he did not marry, the woman. |
| John Bevil | But pray, sir, do you think Lucinda, then, a woman of such little merit? |
| Bevil Jr. | Pardon me, sir, I don’t carry it so far neither; I am rather afraid I shall like her too well; she has, for one of her fortune, a great many needless and superfluous good qualities. |
| John Bevil | I am afraid, son, there’s something I don’t see yet, something that’s smothered under all this raillery. |
| Bevil Jr. | Not in the least, sir. If the lady is dressed and ready, you see I am. I suppose the lawyers are ready too. |
| Humphry | This may grow warm if I don’t interpose. Aside.—Sir, Mr. Sealand is at the coffeehouse, and has sent to speak with you. |
| John Bevil | Oh! that’s well! Then I warrant the lawyers are ready. Son, you’ll be in the way, you say. |
| Bevil Jr. | If you please, sir, I’ll take a chair, and go to Mr. Sealand’s, where the young lady and I will wait your leisure. |
| John Bevil | By no means. The old fellow will be so vain if he sees— |
| Bevil Jr. | Ay; but the young lady, sir, will think me so indifferent. |
| Humphry | Ay, there you are right; press your readiness to go to the bride—he won’t let you. Aside to Bevil Jr. |
| Bevil Jr. | Are you sure of that? Aside to Humphry. |
| Humphry | How he likes being prevented. Aside. |
| John Bevil | No, no. You are an hour or two too early. Looking on his watch. |
| Bevil Jr. | You’ll allow me, sir, to think it too late to visit a beautiful, virtuous young woman, in the pride and bloom of life, ready to give herself to my arms; and to place her happiness or misery, for the future, in being agreeable or displeasing to me, is a—Call a chair. |
| John Bevil | No, no, no, dear Jack; this Sealand is a moody old fellow. There’s no dealing with some people but by managing with indifference. We must leave to him the conduct of this day. It is the last of his commanding his daughter. |
| Bevil Jr. | Sir, he can’t take it ill, that I am impatient to be hers. |
| John Bevil | Pray let me govern in this matter; you can’t tell how humorsome old fellows are. There’s no offering reason to some of ’em, especially when they are rich.—If my son should see him before I’ve brought old Sealand into better temper, the match would be impracticable. Aside. |
| Humphry | Pray, sir, let me beg you to let Mr. Bevil go.—See whether he will or not. Aside to Sir John.—Then to Bevil Jr. Pray, sir, command yourself; since you see my master is positive, it is better you should not go. |
| Bevil Jr. | My father commands me, as to the object of my affections; but I hope he will not, as to the warmth and height of them. |
| John Bevil | So! I must even leave things as I found them; and in the meantime, at least, keep old Sealand out of his sight—Well, son, I’ll go myself and take orders in your affair. You’ll be in the way, I suppose, if I send to you. I’ll leave your old friend with you—Humphry, don’t let him stir, d’ye hear?—Your servant, your servant. |
| Exit Sir John. | |
| Humphry | I have a sad time on’t, sir, between you and my master. I see you are unwilling, and I know his violent inclinations for the match.—I must betray neither, and yet deceive you both, for your common good. Heaven grant a good end of this matter.—But there is a lady, sir, that gives your father much trouble and sorrow.—You’ll pardon me. |
| Bevil Jr. | Humphry, I know thou art a friend to both, and in that confidence I dare tell thee, that lady is a woman of honour and virtue. You may assure yourself I never will marry without my father’s consent. But give me leave to say, too, this declaration does not come up to a promise that I will take whomsoever he pleases. |
| Humphry | Come, sir, I wholly understand you. You would engage my services to free you from this woman whom my master intends you, to make way, in time, for the woman you have really a mind to. |
| Bevil Jr. | Honest Humphry, you have always been a useful friend to my father and myself; I beg you continue your good offices, and don’t let us come to the necessity of a dispute; for, if we should dispute, I must either part with more than life, or lose the best of fathers. |
| Humphry | My dear master, were I but worthy to know this secret, that so near concerns you, my life, my all should be engaged to serve you. This, sir, I dare promise, that I am sure I will and can be secret: your trust, at worst, but leaves you where you were; and if I cannot serve you, I will at once be plain and tell you so. |
| Bevil Jr. | That’s all I ask. Thou hast made it now my interest to trust thee. Be patient, then, and hear the story of my heart. |
| Humphry | I am all attention, sir. |
| Bevil Jr. | You may remember, Humphry, that in my last travels my father grew uneasy at my making so long a stay at Toulon. |
| Humphry | I remember it; he was apprehensive some woman had laid hold of you. |
| Bevil Jr. | His fears were just; for there I first saw this lady. She is of English birth: her father’s name was Danvers—a younger brother of an ancient family, and originally an eminent merchant of Bristol, who, upon repeated misfortunes, was reduced to go privately to the Indies. In this retreat, Providence again grew favourable to his industry, and, in six years’ time, restored him to his former fortunes. On this he sent directions over that his wife and little family should follow him to the Indies. His wife, impatient to obey such welcome orders, would not wait the leisure of a convoy, but took the first occasion of a single ship, and, with her husband’s sister only, and this daughter, then scarce seven years old, undertook the fatal voyage—for here, poor creature, she lost her liberty and life. She and her family, with all they had, were, unfortunately, taken by a privateer from Toulon. Being thus made a prisoner, though as such not ill-treated, yet the fright, the shock, and cruel disappointment, seized with such violence upon her unhealthy frame, she sickened, pined, and died at sea. |
| Humphry | Poor soul! O the helpless infant! |
| Bevil Jr. | Her sister yet survived, and had the care of her. The captain, too, proved to have humanity, and became a father to her; for having himself married an English woman, and being childless, he brought home into Toulon this her little countrywoman, presenting her, with all her dead mother’s movables of value, to his wife, to be educated as his own adopted daughter. |
| Humphry | Fortune here seemed again to smile on her. |
| Bevil Jr. | Only to make her frowns more terrible; for, in his height of fortune, this captain, too, her benefactor, unfortunately was killed at sea; and dying intestate, his estate fell wholly to an advocate, his brother, who, coming soon to take possession, there found (among his other riches) this blooming virgin at his mercy. |
| Humphry | He durst not, sure, abuse his power? |
| Bevil Jr. | No wonder if his pampered blood was fired at the sight of her—in short, he loved; but when all arts and gentle means had failed to move, he offered, too, his menaces in vain, denouncing vengeance on her cruelty, demanding her to account for all her maintenance from her childhood; seized on her little fortune as his own inheritance, and was dragging her by violence to prison, when Providence at the instant interposed, and sent me, by miracle, to relieve her.24 |
| Humphry | ’Twas Providence, indeed. But pray, sir, after all this trouble, how came this lady at last to England? |
| Bevil Jr. | The disappointed advocate, finding she had so unexpected a support, on cooler thoughts, descended to a composition, which I, without her knowledge, secretly discharged. |
| Humphry | That generous concealment made the obligation double. |
| Bevil Jr. | Having thus obtained her liberty, I prevailed, not without some difficulty, to see her safe to England; where, no sooner arrived, but my father, jealous of my being imprudently engaged, immediately proposed this other fatal match that hangs upon my quiet. |
| Humphry | I find, sir, you are irrecoverably fixed upon this lady. |
| Bevil Jr. | As my vital life dwells in my heart—and yet you see what I do to please my father: walk in this pageantry of dress, this splendid covering of sorrow—But, Humphry, you have your lesson. |
| Humphry | Now, sir, I have but one material question— |
| Bevil Jr. | Ask it freely. |
| Humphry | Is it, then, your own passion for this secret lady, or hers for you, that gives you this aversion to the match your father has proposed you? |
| Bevil Jr. | I shall appear, Humphry, more romantic in my answer than in all the rest of my story; for though I dote on her to death, and have no little reason to believe she has the same thoughts for me, yet in all my acquaintance and utmost privacies with her, I never once directly told her that I loved. |
| Humphry | How was it possible to avoid it? |
| Bevil Jr. | My tender obligations to my father have laid so inviolable a restraint upon my conduct that, till I have his consent to speak, I am determined, on that subject, to be dumb forever. |
| Humphry | Well, sir, to your praise be it spoken, you are certainly the most unfashionable lover in Great Britain. |
| Enter Tom. | |
| Tom | Sir, Mr. Myrtle’s at the next door, and, if you are at leisure, will be glad to wait on you. |
| Bevil Jr. | Whenever he pleases—hold, Tom! did you receive no answer to my letter? |
| Tom | Sir, I was desired to call again; for I was told her mother would not let her be out of her sight; but about an hour hence, Mrs. Lettice said, I should certainly have one. |
| Bevil Jr. | Very well. |
| Exit Tom. | |
| Humphry | Sir, I will take another opportunity. In the meantime, I only think it proper to tell you that, from a secret I know, you may appear to your father as forward as you please, to marry Lucinda without the least hazard of its coming to a conclusion—Sir, your most obedient servant. |
| Bevil Jr. | Honest Humphry, continue but my friend in this exigence, and you shall always find me yours. |
| Exit Humphry. | |
| —I long to hear how my letter has succeeded with Lucinda—but I think it cannot fail; for, at worst, were it possible she could take it ill, her resentment of my indifference may as probably occasion a delay as her taking it right. Poor Myrtle, what terrors must he be in all this while? Since he knows she is offered to me, and refused to him, there is no conversing or taking any measures with him for his own service.—But I ought to bear with my friend, and use him as one in adversity— | |
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| Exit. |