Sterl. Well-so do I then.-Nay, no thanks[To LOVEWELL and FANNY, who seem preparing to speak.] there's an end of the matter.

Lord Og. But, Lovewell, what makes you dumb all this while?

Love. Your kindness, my lord-I can scarce believe my own senses-they are all in a tumult of fear, joy, love, expectation, and gratitude; I ever was, and am now more bound in duty to your lordship. For you, Mr Sterling, if every moment of my life, spent gratefully in your service, will in some measure compensate the want of fortune, you perhaps will not repent your goodness to me. And you, ladies, I flatter myself, will not for the future suspect me of artifice and intrigue-I shall be happy to oblige and serve you. -As for you, Sir John

Sir John. No apologies to me, Lovewell, I do

not deserve any. All I have to offer in excuse for what has happened, is my total ignorance of your situation. Had you dealt a little more openly with me, you would have saved me, and yourself, and that lady, (who, I hope, will pardon my behaviour) a great deal of uneasiness. Give me leave, however, to assure you, that light and capricious as I may have appeared, now my infatuation is over, I have sensibility enough to be ashamed of the part I have acted, and honour enough to rejoice at your happiness.

Lov. And now, my dearest Fanny, though we are seemingly the happiest of beings, yet all our joys will be dampt, if his lordship's generosity, and Mr Sterling's forgiveness, should not be succeeded by the indulgence, approbation, and consent of these our best benefactors.

[To the audience. Exeunt omnes.

At the Whist Table.

Ld Min. I hate a playhouse-Trump-It makes me sick.

1st Lady. We're two by honours, maʼam. Ld. Min. And we the odd trick. Pray, do you know the author, Colonel Trill?

Col. T. I know no poets, heaven be praised!— Spadille

1st. Lady. I'll tell you who, my lord.

[Whispers Ld. MIN. Ld. Min. What, he again?

'And dwell such daring souls in little men?” Be whose it will, they down our throats will

cram it.

Col. T. I'm glad you like him, sirthe pool.

-so ends

[They pay, and rise from the Table.

SONG, by the Colonel.

I hate all their nonsense,
Their Shakespears and Jonsons,

Their plays, and their playhouse, and bards:
'Tis singing, not saying;
A fig for all playing,

But playing, as we do, at cards.

I love to see Jonas,

And pleased too with Comus; Each well the spectator rewards. So clever, so neat in

Their tricks and their cheating!

Like them, we would fain deal our cards. Sir Pat. King Lare is touching !—And how fine

to see

Ould Hamlet's Ghost - To be, or not to be.'

What are your op'ras to Othello's roar?
Oh, he's an angel of a Blackamoor!
Ld. Min. What, when he choaks his wife!-
Col. T. And calls her whore?
Sir Pat. King Richard calls his horse-And
then Macbeth,

Whene'er he murders-takes away the breath.
My blood runs cold at every syllable,
To see the dagger that's invisible. [All laugh.
Laugh if you please-a pretty play-

Ld. Min. Is pretty. Sir Pat. And when there's wit in't

Col. T. To be sure 'tis witty. Sir Pat. I love the playhouse now-so light

and gay,

With all those candles-they have ta'en away! [All laugh. For all your game, what makes it so much brighter? Col. T. Put out the lights, and then— Ld. Min. 'Tis so much lighter. Sir Pat. Pray, do you mane, sirs, more than you express?

Col. T. Just as it happens▬▬

Ld. Min. Either more or less. Mrs Qu. An't you ashamed, sir? [To Sir PAT. Sir Pat. Me!-I seldom blush:For little Shakespear, faith, I'd take a push. Ld. Min. News! news!-Here comes Miss Crotchet from the play.

Enter Miss CROTCHET.

Mrs Qu. Well, Crotchet, what's the news? Miss Cro. We've lost the day. Col. T. Tell us, dear miss, all you have heard

and seen.

Miss Cro. I'm tired-a chair-here, take my capuchin.

Ld. Min. And isn't it damn'd, miss?

Miss Cro. No, my lord, not quite.

But we shall damn it.

Col. T. When?

Miss Cro. To-morrow night.

There is a party of us, all of fashion, Resolved to exterminate this vulgar passion: A playhouse! what a place!-I must forswear

it;

A little mischief only makes one bear it. Such crowds of city folks!-so `rude and pressing!

And their horse laughs, so hideously distressing!

Whene'er we hiss'd, they frown'd, and fell a swearing,

Like their own Guildhall giants-fierce and staring!

Col. T. What said the folks of fashion; were they cross?

Ld. Min. The rest have no more judgment than my horse.

Miss Cro. Lord Grimly said, 'twas execrable stuff.

Says one-Why so, my lord?-My lord took snuff.

In the first act Lord George began to doze, And criticised the author through his nose; So loud indeed, that as his lordship snored, The pit turn'd round, and all the brutes encored.

Some lords, indeed, approved the author's

Sir Pat. Upon my soul, a very pretty story!
And quality appears in all its glory.

There was some merit in the piece, no doubt? Miss Cro. O to be sure!-if one could find it out. Col. T. But tell us, miss, the subject of the play. Miss Cro. Why 'twas a marriage-yes-a marriage-stay

A lord, an aunt, two sisters, and a mer-
chant-

A baronet, ten lawyers, a fat serjeant,
Are all produced-to talk with one another
And about something make a mighty pother!
They all go in and out, and to and fro,
And talk and quarrel-as they come and
go-

Then go to bed-and then get up-and thenScream, faint, scold, kiss-and go to bed again. {All laugh. Such is the play-Your judgment-never sham it :Col. T. Oh, damn it!

Mrs Qu. Damn it!

1st Lady. Damn it!
Miss Cro. Damn it!

Ld. Min. Damn it!

THE

BY

PREST by the load of life, the weary mind
Surveys the general toil of human kind;
With cool submission joins the labouring train,
And social sorrow loses half its pain:
Our anxious Bard, without complaint, may share
This bustling season's epidemic care.
Like Cæsar's pilot, dignify'd by fate,
Tost in one common storm with all the great;
Distrest alike, the statesman and the wit,
When one a borough courts, and one the pit.
The busy candidates for power and fame,
Have hopes, and fears, and wishes, just the same;
Disabled both to combat, or to fly,
Must hear all taunts, and hear without reply.
Uncheck'd on both, loud rabbles vent their rage,

As mongrels bay the lion in a cage. Th' offended burgess hoards his angry tale, For that blest year when all that vote may rail Their schemes of spite the poet's foes disiniss, | Till that glad night, when all that hate may hiss. This day the powder'd curls and golden coat, Says swelling Crispin, begg❜d a cobler's vote. This night, our wit, the pert apprentice cries, Lies at my feet, I hiss him, and he dies. The great,, 'tis true, can charm th' electing tribe; The bard may supplicate, but cannot bribe. Yet judged by those, whose voices ne'er were sold, He feels no want of all-persuading gold; But confident of praise, if praise be due, Trusts without fear, to merit, and to you,

Sir Wil. And upon that I proceed, as my last

WOOD'S House.

Enter Sir WILLIAM HONEYWOOD and JARVIS, Sir Wil. Good Jarvis, make no apologies for this honest bluntness. Fidelity, like yours, is the best excuse for every freedom.

Jar. I cann't help being blunt, and being very angry too, when I hear you talk of disinheriting so good, so worthy a young gentleman as yournephew, my master. All the world loves him.

him. That very fellow has just absconded, and I have taken up the security. Now, my intention is to involve him in fictitious distress, before he has plunged himself into real calamity. To arrest him for that very debt, to clap an officer upon him, and then let him see which of his friends will come to his relief.

Sir Wil. Say rather, that he loves all the world; that is his fault.

Sir Wil. What signifies his affection to me, or how can I be proud of a place in a heart where every sharper and coxcomb find an easy entrance? Jar. I grant you that he's rather too good-natured; that he's too much every man's man; that he laughs this minute with one, and cries the next with another; but whose instructions may he thank for all this?

Sir Wil. Not mine, sure. My letters to him during my employment in Italy, taught him only that philosophy which might prevent, not defend,

his errors.

Jar. Faith, begging your honour's pardon, I'm sorry they taught him any philosophy at all; it has only served to spoil him. This same philosophy is a good horse in the stable, but an arrant jade on a journey. For my own part, whenever I hear him mention the name on't, I'm always sure he's going to play the fool.

Sir Wil. Don't let us ascribe his faults to his philosophy, I entreat you. No, Jarvis, his good nature arises rather from his fears of offending the importunate, than his desire of making the deserving happy.

Jar. What it arises from, I don't know. But, to be sure, every body has it that asks it.

Sir Wil. Ay, or that does not ask it. I have been now for some time a concealed spectator of his follies, and find them as boundless as his dissipation.

Jar. And yet, faith, he has some fine name or other for them all. He calls his extravagance, generosity; and his trusting every body, universal benevolence. It was but last week he went security for a fellow whose face he scarce knew, and that he called an act of exalted mu-mumunificence; ay, that was the name he gave it.

Sir Wil. We must try him once more, however, and I'll go this instant to put my scheme into execution; and I don't despair of succeeding, as, by your means, I can have frequent opportunities of being about him, without being known. What a pity it is, Jarvis, that any man's good-will to others should produce so much neglect of himself, as to require correction! Yet we must touch his weaknesses with a delicate hand. There are some faults so nearly allied to excellence, that we can scarce weed out the vice without eradicating the virtue. [Erit.

Jar. Well, go thy ways, Sir William Honeywood. It is not without reason that the world allows thee to be the best of men. But here comes his hopeful nephew; the strange good-natured, foolish, open-hearted-And yet, all his faults are such, that one loves him still the better for them.

Enter HONEYWOOD.

Hon. Well, Jarvis, what messages from my friends this morning?

Jar. You have no friends.

Hou. Well; from my acquaintance then? Jar. [Pulling out bills.] A few of our usual cards of compliment, that's all. This bill from your tailor; this from your mercer; and this from the little broker in Crooked-lane. He says he has been at a great deal of trouble to get back the money you borrowed.

Hon. That I don't know; but I'm sure we were at a great deal of trouble in getting him to lend it. Jar. He has lost all patience.

Hon. Then he has lost a very good thing. Jar. There's that ten guineas you were sending to the poor gentleman and his children in the Fleet. I believe that would stop his mouth, for a while at least.

Hon. Ay, Jarvis, but what will fill their mouths