MASK. Your zeal, I grant, was ardent, but misplaced; there was revenge in view; that woman's idol had defiled the temple of the G.o.d, and love was made a mock-worship. A son and heir would have edged young Mellefont upon the brink of ruin, and left him none but you to catch at for prevention.

LADY TOUCH. Again provoke me! Do you wind me like a larum, only to rouse my own stilled soul for your diversion? Confusion!

MASK. Nay, madam, I'm gone, if you relapse. What needs this? I say nothing but what you yourself, in open hours of love, have told me. Why should you deny it? Nay, how can you? Is not all this present heat owing to the same fire? Do you not love him still? How have I this day offended you, but in not breaking off his match with Cynthia? which, ere to-morrow, shall be done, had you but patience.

LADY TOUCH. How, what said you, Maskwell? Another caprice to unwind my temper?

MASK. By heav'n, no; I am your slave, the slave of all your pleasures; and will not rest till I have given you peace, would you suffer me.

LADY TOUCH. O Maskwell! in vain I do disguise me from thee, thou know'st me, knowest the very inmost windings and recesses of my soul. O Mellefont! I burn; married to morrow! Despair strikes me. Yet my soul knows I hate him too: let him but once be mine, and next immediate ruin seize him.

MASK. Compose yourself, you shall possess and ruin him too,--will that please you?

LADY TOUCH. How, how? Thou dear, thou precious villain, how?

MASK. You have already been tampering with my Lady Plyant.

LADY TOUCH. I have: she is ready for any impression I think fit.

MASK. She must be throughly persuaded that Mellefont loves her.

LADY TOUCH. She is so credulous that way naturally, and likes him so well, that she will believe it faster than I can persuade her. But I don't see what you can propose from such a trifling design, for her first conversing with Mellefont will convince her of the contrary.

MASK. I know it. I don't depend upon it. But it will prepare something else, and gain us leisure to lay a stronger plot. If I gain a little time, I shall not want contrivance.

One minute gives invention to destroy,

What to rebuild will a whole age employ.

ACT II.

SCENE I.

LADY FROTH _and_ CYNTHIA.

CYNT. Indeed, madam! Is it possible your ladyship could have been so much in love?

LADY FROTH. I could not sleep; I did not sleep one wink for three weeks together.

CYNT. Prodigious! I wonder want of sleep, and so much love and so much wit as your ladyship has, did not turn your brain.

LADY FROTH. Oh, my dear Cynthia, you must not rally your friend. But really, as you say, I wonder too. But then I had a way. For, between you and I, I had whimsies and vapours, but I gave them vent.

CYNT. How, pray, madam?

LADY FROTH. Oh, I writ, writ abundantly. Do you never write?

CYNT. Write what?

LADY FROTH. Songs, elegies, satires, encomiums, panegyrics, lampoons, plays, or heroic poems?

CYNT. O Lord, not I, madam; I'm content to be a courteous reader.

LADY FROTH. Oh, inconsistent! In love and not write! If my lord and I had been both of your temper, we had never come together. Oh, bless me!

What a sad thing would that have been, if my lord and I should never have met!

CYNT. Then neither my lord nor you would ever have met with your match, on my conscience.

LADY FROTH. O' my conscience, no more we should; thou say'st right. For sure my Lord Froth is as fine a gentleman and as much a man of quality!

Ah! nothing at all of the common air. I think I may say he wants nothing but a blue ribbon and a star to make him shine, the very phosphorus of our hemisphere. Do you understand those two hard words? If you don't, I'll explain 'em to you.

CYNT. Yes, yes, madam, I'm not so ignorant.--At least I won't own it, to be troubled with your instructions. [_Aside_.]

LADY FROTH. Nay, I beg your pardon; but being derived from the Greek, I thought you might have escaped the etymology. But I'm the more amazed to find you a woman of letters and not write! Bless me! how can Mellefont believe you love him?

CYNT. Why, faith, madam, he that won't take my word shall never have it under my hand.

LADY FROTH. I vow Mellefont's a pretty gentleman, but methinks he wants a manner.

CYNT. A manner! What's that, madam?

LADY FROTH. Some distinguishing quality, as, for example, the _bel air_ or _brillant_ of Mr. Brisk; the solemnity, yet complaisance of my lord, or something of his own that should look a little _Je-ne-sais-quoish_; he is too much a mediocrity, in my mind.

CYNT. He does not indeed affect either pertness or formality; for which I like him. Here he comes.

LADY FROTH. And my lord with him. Pray observe the difference.

SCENE II.

[_To them_] LORD FROTH, MELLEFONT, _and_ BRISK.

CYNT. Impertinent creature! I could almost be angry with her now.

[_Aside_.]

LADY FROTH. My lord, I have been telling Cynthia how much I have been in love with you; I swear I have; I'm not ashamed to own it now. Ah! it makes my heart leap, I vow I sigh when I think on't. My dear lord! Ha, ha, ha, do you remember, my lord? [_Squeezes him by the hand_, _looks kindly on him_, _sighs_, _and then laughs out_.]

LORD FROTH. Pleasant creature! perfectly well, ah! that look, ay, there it is; who could resist? 'twas so my heart was made a captive first, and ever since t'has been in love with happy slavery.

LADY FROTH. Oh, that tongue, that dear deceitful tongue! that charming softness in your mien and your expression, and then your bow! Good my lord, bow as you did when I gave you my picture; here, suppose this my picture. [_Gives him a pocket-gla.s.s_.] Pray mind, my lord; ah! he bows charmingly; nay, my lord, you shan't kiss it so much; I shall grow jealous, I vow now. [_He bows profoundly low_, _then kisses the gla.s.s_.]

LORD FROTH. I saw myself there, and kissed it for your sake.