EDITOR'S NOTE.

The text has been collated with the original manuscript 
of 1828 and has been presented exactly as Bird wrote it, 
except for obvious errors of carelessness in punctuation 
or spelling.  Stage directions, in which he is not 
consistent, have been normalized to agree with his usual 
practice.

DRAMATIS PERSONAE.

ROSLIN. nephew to HEAD STRONG
RAVIN. a swindling gentleman
RINGFINGER. his brother
RALEIGH. Senior
RALEIGH. Junior, his son
HEADSTRONG, father to DIANA
NATHAN NOBODY, a foundling
BOLT         |
CROSSBAR     |> Bucks
MOSSROSE     |
TOM TAFFRAIL, a sailor
O'SLASH. overseer to RALEIGH. Sr.

DIANA HEADSTRONG
EMMA GALL
MRS. GALL

An old woman; a negress; constables; servants, etc.

SCENE: Philadelphia

TIME: Two evenings and a day. The first two acts happen 
the first evening; the third occupies the next day; and 
the two last happen the second evening.


PROLOGUE TO THE
CITY LOOKING GLASS.

In ancient days, mankind, dissatisfied
With all the gifts that royal glove supplied,
Went on their marrow-bones, and begged permission
His ears to trouble with a new petition.
Whey vowed the presents of the Thunderer King
Were, with his godship's leave, not quite the thing;
One half the world, (he had made 'em so perverse,)
What t'other called a blessing, thought a curse;
(Their sages had this aphorism set eyes on,
That "What is one Man's meat, 's another's poison;")
Wherefore they begged, an' he should hear their call,
Some gift might be agreeable to all.
Jove cogitated: This is hard, quota he;
In what thing will these clamorous knaves agree?
Whatever their necessities required
I gave, yet something more is still desired.
Vain fools!—What! Vanity? Ay, that will pass:—
And prove presented them a Looking Glass!
Most glorious gift of condescending grace!
Where each one saw that pleasant thing, his face!

Oh! that the Looking Glass we show to night,
With the same spell could give the same delight!
And, where some pleasing lineament is shown,
What each might softly whisper, That's my own!
And where an uglier product of our labour,
With the same readiness, say, That's my neighbour!
No portraits here of ego, tu, nor ille:—
Such things, we are told, are criminal and silly:—
So, not to increase our follies and our crimes,
We've only made a 'mirror for the times';
Where ye may look, and see such knaves and asses
As, we hope, can't be seen in your own glasses,
Playing before ye certain tricks and capers,
Such as you look for daily in the papers.

Our ware's domestic; if his only clever,
Uncle Sam and his factories forever!
If not, pray say so:—there is yet a sure hope,
We'll get our wares, as heretofore, of Europe!


ACT ONE.


SCENE 1. A garret in MRS. GALL'S house.

         (Enter RAVIN and RINGFINGER.

RAV. Is the old hag abed?

RING. Ay: don't you hear her snore?

RAV. And Emma? where is she?

RING. Saying her prayers, or crying in a corner.

RAV. Zounds! Jack, your gentility sits as clumsily on 
you as your new clothes Pr'ythee, straighten yourself in 
the shoulders, and keep your hands out of your pockets. 
Only fancy yourself a gentleman, and you are one; for 
the character, like that of a poet, is oftener 
established by conceit than by natural privilege.

RING. Gogs! and I am a gentleman after a sort; but it 
has been so long since I've been in company, that   I've 
almost forgot my manners. And look ye, Ben, Penitentiary 
uniform and stone-cutting will spoil any one's manners.

RAV. I have introduced you to a circle, where, to be as 
genteel as the rest, it is only necessary for you to 
dress well, to drink deeply, to be knowing with the ball 
and pasteboard, and to swear abominably. Follow them in 
their frolics, invite them to the tavern, let them be 
often drunk at your expense, and they will suffer 
themselves to be gulled out of sheer gratitude. You will 
find Bolt, the lawyer, an excellent introduction to all 
the rakes and profligates in town: therefore be tender 
of his purse. Keep up the Doctor; the character is 
respectable, and will be an excuse for want of manners.  
You have one ill habit, however, which you must get rid 
of,—pocket practice, pocket practice!

RING. I must tell you, Ben, that is my forte. I am 
pretty considerable at cutting the copper, tracing 
signatures, and shuffling the pack; but picking pockets 
is my forte, and all New York can't show my equal.

RAV. Drop it, however, or drop me: It is a damned low 
vice, and will ruin you yet.

RING. Yes, if I handle it as clumsily as you do your 
cues and cards. I suppose you've been sucked dry again?

RAV. As dry as a fool's wit, and by a fool's wit too. 
There's an ass of a sailor, in citizen's clothes, that 
gets into all the decent hell-holes in town; and he 
makes as free cargoes of my pockets, as you did of your 
neighbours' before you went to grind marble at Auburn: 
And the fool won't deal in domestics neither; nothing 
but genuine prints or hard coin will serve his purpose. 
And tonight he has plucked and drawn me like a 
partridge.

RING. Well, dammee, here's that'll salve your 
conscience.


RAV. Ha! what the devil's this?

RING. That's a genuine figure. I bought it of an 
engraver's 'prentice. Vignette, margin, firm-signature, 
all complete: was to've been sent to bank tomorrow.

RAV. Proof! the rollers! the inkball! ( Whey open a 
chest, take out the rollers, and strike off an 
impression.) Glorious! glorious! glorious, my boy! Why 
'tis a Twenty! a fair, sweet-faced, virgin Twenty! Why 
Garket! Ringfinger! Jack! brother! what did you give for 
this?

RING. Fifty.

RAV. Genuine.

RING. Counterfeit.

RAV. Ha, ha, ha! Excellent! glorious! Honour among 
thieves! This is a God-send: our old stock was poor in 
the market, advertised as trash in every newspaper. This 
shall buy Diana and all her household; and Emma, 
excellent little virtue! I'll clothe her with gold and 
jewels, I'll—

RING. Pshaw! you'll spend freely, I know that well 
enough. But how comes on affairs with the fifty-
thousander? How's your wound?

RAV. Where? in my heart?

RING. Rot your heart.—Your arm?

RAV. Healed by the first intention, doctor,—ha, ha, ha! 
O. curse you, why didn't you brain the scoundrel that 
rescued her from us? Lord, lord! when you shot me, and I 
jumped, a dead man, on the ground, I had nearly broken 
my back; I was never so awfully bemauled!

RING. Gadswogs! nor I. I was just about to drag her from 
the gig, when the infernal young dog came slapover my 
sconce with his horn-headed bamboo:—smacked his whip, 
cried out to the people approaching, Secure the villain, 
and was out of sight in a twinkling. Now, Ben, I should 
like to know what you meant with this freak; for, 
dammee, if I ever rightly understood it.

RAV. No! Why the jade didn't love me half fast enough; 
and I intended by this contrivance to receive a wound 
while protecting her, (think of that! wounded for her 
sake! ha, ha!) and then, while you were carrying her 
off, I intended to rise up, reanimated, invigorated by a 
sense of her danger, pursue you, beat you horribly, and 
rescue her; and then I intended, while she was dying of 
love and gratitude, to marry her a week after.

RING. Ay, but I hear this chap that knocked me on the 
head, has been cutting thereabouts, while you was 
doctoring your wound.

RAV. Never fear. I intend to be very convalescent, and 
visit them tonight; when I will contrive something will 
blow the impudent fellow to the devil. My wit never 
failed me. There I had my two charmers, Diana and Emma, 
both under one roof; I contrived to separate them, for 
fear they would make confidants of one another: and now 
Diana would as soon fondle a toad as speak to poor Emma. 
Then there was Diana's cousin, Roslin; the young ass was 
falling in love with Emma; I whispered her mother's name 
and occupation, and they turned the poor devil out of 
doors; while Roslin went into the country to hide his 
sorrows and write poetry.

RING. And how did Emma get into such decent company?

RAV. 'Cause she and Diana were schoolmates. Old Gall was 
educating her decently, and paying her expenses by 
proxy; so the poor thing never knew, till I blowed them 
all, what an infamous old hag she had for a mother.

RING. Well, Ben, since you are in a talking humour, tell 
me how it is you have such power over old Gall, as to 
make her do just what you please?

RAV. By knowing a secret would send her to the 
Penitentiary.

RING. Humph! And what do you mean to do with her 
daughter?

RAV. Who? Emma?—Marry her.

RING. I can't see what you want with so many wives. She 
has no money.

RAV. I am laying plans to marry a dozen times for money; 
and I intend to try it once for love.

RING. Women have been the ruination of many an honest 
man—

RAV. Shut up the box!

(Enter MRS. GALL. 

GALL . Mr. Ringfinger—

RAV. Devils! Shut the box! put out the light!

GALL. O Mr. Ravin, is that you? I thought you were sick 
abed.

RAV. No, old woman, it isn't me. I am the devil: get out 
of my way, or I'll tear you.

GALL. Lord! Mr. Ravin, you are a comical to scare a poor 
body so.

RAV. What do you want here? Begone!

GALL. Lord! such a fuss! there's a gentleman wants Mr. 
Ringfinger.

RAV. And how dare you come in here without knocking? Out 
with you, old devil; get you to bed and sleep.

GALL. Old devil! old dev—

RAV. Out with you, beldam!

GALL. Old devil!—Sir, there's a law for slander.

RAV. And another for kidnapping. Get you gone, or I'll 
send you to the Penitentiary.

GALL. For mercy, Mr. Garket!

RAV. Ravin, old woman, Ravin!

GALL. Dear Mr. Ravin, I didn't mean to offend you.

RING. Not she; she daren't: Therefore only hang her.

RAV. All safe? Ha, ha, ha! mother Gall! mother Gall! Why 
I would not send that delightful old bag of bones to 
jail for all the world.

GALL. Indeed, Mr. Ravin, I never thought you could have 
the heart.

RAV. Not I: keep your own secret; mine shall not trouble 
you. Go to bed.—Where's Emma?

GALL. She is below listening to some music in the 
street.

RAV. Come get along with you. Take care of the figure, 
the genuine.
      (Exeunt RAVIN and GALL.

RING. I would I had the wit of that rascal, my elder it 
brother. I am sure he is a greater rogue than myself, 
and yet he has never seen the inside of a penitentiary. 
He is a gentleman too, that's when it suits his humour; 
he can make love and marry who he pleases, the richest 
and handsomest wenches in the land, while I could never 
get a wife worth a dollar. I was always taken in,—they 
made such a fool of me in the solitary cells. (Exit.



SCENE 2. A room in the same.
     (Enter RAVIN and EMMA GALL.

RAV. Indeed, my sweet Emma, I must be angry with you. 
Youth like yours should seek its pillow early; and I 
value those blossoming cheeks too much to allow them to 
be blanched by unnecessary vigilance.

EM. Sir, you are very good;—but I cannot sleep.

RAV. Fy! when a young maiden cannot sleep, the world 
says she is in love.

EM. The world says also, that love makes one happy, does 
it not?

RAV. It does. Love is the only security of happiness in 
this world; and they who are in love, are always happy.

EM. Then I am not in love, for I am not happy.

RAV. Fy, fy! not happy! Did nature give you this 
excellent beauty to become a sacrifice to sorrow?

EM. Sir, you are familiar with my condition. The world 
looks on me with scorn: who can feel themselves 
despised, and yet call themselves happy? They who have 
been my friends desert, and they who are my enemies 
detest me;—and they are justified, for although 
innocence stands my friend, appearances do not.

RAV. And why should the world scorn you?

EM. Because I am closely connected with that which the 
world abhors. You, Sir, who have honest and estimable 
kinsmen, whose condition has placed you beyond 
suspicion, and whose sex has mounted you above insult,—
you cannot feel the unhappiness of my condition.

RAV. Upon my soul, you do me much honour. Condition and 
suspicion! Sex and insult! Humph!—You may be unhappy in 
your connexions; but they who are free from crime, have 
no excuse for being miserable. The world may wrong you, 
but your own heart should not.

EM. And it does not.

RAV. Come, I must make you blush, to make you content. 
The world scorns you, because it admires you.  'Tis a 
paradoxical world, an envious monster, whose  
detestation is its greatest praise. Had you been born 
lame and ugly, detraction had given way to commendation. 
But nature made you fair, gave you eyes that will one 
day set men mad with love, and women mad with jealousy; 
she furnished you with a heavenly face, that it might 
expose devilish hearts;—and were I a woman, I should 
poison you or myself, out of pure envy. Wicked people 
abhor you, because you are yourself good; good people 
hate you, because they fear your power of making them 
bad. You are a tempter, Emma; and all saints that look 
on you must bethink them of their paternosters. You have 
no friends?—You are too fair to have friends.

EM. You speak this to divert me, sir; and I am grateful 
for your kindness, though it come through the medium of 
satire.

RAV. Very true notwithstanding. I tell you, you are 
envied; and you must not blame nature for making you 
fair, nor me for telling you, you are so. Come, cast 
away these unbecoming shadows, and place this jewel 
around a neck ten times more beautiful and precious. Now 
don't be obstinate, and mortify me by a refusal.

EM. These are pearls.

RAV. They are emblems of purity.

EM. When the world will allow my fame to be as spotless, 
I will accept them.—I cannot take them, sir: My mother 
supplies me with all necessary apparel; and indigence 
should not become ridiculous with ornament. (Exit.

RAV. Excellent little morality!—Curse me, but I should 
engage some friend under oath to cut my throat the 
moment I wronged her; but that would be, to make the 
best of it, very foolishly wronging myself. I can't tell 
how it is, but she makes me feel very modest and very 
civil whenever I speak to her. I intended to have made 
love to her, and, faith, I had no sooner looked upon 
her, than I became as Platonic as a potato. I must drink 
wine the next time, and then I shall be as amorous as an 
Irishman. I must have her, one way or other; for I have 
that talismanic knowledge about me, which will make the 
poor, despised, avoided Emma Gall, the mistress of a 
certain Virginia plantation, with its tobacco fields, 
slaves, cornhouses, and other certain messuages to be 
therein specified,—that is, in her father's will.—But my 
wife, my wife! and my Diana, my Diana! The devil take 
Diana, so I take her fortune; and the devil take my 
wife, for he has already got her's. Now will I to my 
adorable Diana, be suddenly a gentleman, a languishing 
lover,—with a scarf round my arm, to admonish her eyes, 
while my tongue persuades her ears, that both heart and 
arm were mutilated in her service, while indeed one is 
as sound as the other.                   (Exit.



SCENE 3. The street before the theatre.
     (Enter ROSLIN and NATHAN NOBODY.

NATH. Hilloah there, mister, if you're a gentleman.

ROS. And if I be not a gentleman, what then?

NATH. Why then, Hilloah you-sir—if you've got a fip to 
spare, I'll discount it for you.

ROS. Hang you, young villain, what do you mean?

NATH. Why here, good gentleman, here's one poor copper; 
'tis all I have earned to day. So, if you'll deliver me 
a fip, I'll change it, that's all.

ROS. You are a wonderful impudent beggar.

NATH. A beggar! Not I: I am a discountant, a travailing 
bank. I had rather be a thief than a beggar any day.

ROS. So it seems. Who taught you this effrontery?

NATH. My mother.

ROS. And who was she?

NATH. A willow basket. Sir, I was brought forth not of a 
woman, but of a willow basket; I was gotten, if not 
begotten, in the gutter, for there the watchman found 
me.

ROS. You are a merry rogue.

NATH. And like many an other merry rogue, must, for lack 
of sixpence, whistle for my supper.—I am half starved 
already.

ROS. Take it, poor fellow.

NATH. I thank you, sir, and hope you will sup to night 
as heartily as myself.

ROS. Stay, lad;—I pity you.

NATH. Six and a quarter cents.

ROS. Truly that is but poor pity. Here's half a dollar 
for you. Could I think you were not a worthless 
vagabond, I might do something for you.

NATH. Try me.

ROS. Who will recommend you?

NATH. Nobody.

ROS. That's a recommendation nobody will take.

NATH. Sir, when I say Nobody, I mean somebody; for I am 
called Nobody myself, that is, Nathan Nobody, at your 
service: And nobody will say, Nathan Nobody here is not 
Nathan Somebody.

ROS. Why boy, who was your father?

NATH. Nobody; no one claimed me: and therefore, though 
the Guardians called me Nathan Basket,(which was wrong, 
to call any one after his mother;) and though some 
people called me Nathan Smith, (which was equal to 
Nathan Nobody, and after all was a name I had no title 
to;) I thought the best way to save trouble, would be to 
take my father's name, or, what's the same thing, 
nobody's name: and therefore I am called Nathan Nobody.

ROS. Nathan Nobody! Ha, ha, ha! You are a wag.

NATH. SO people say. I make a half starved living by it: 
but wagging one's wit, does not always enable one to wag 
one's tongue or teeth; and smelling out a joke is not 
always the way of smelling out a dinner. The business of 
a wit is the starvingest profession in the country.

ROS. Ay; and the people won't always laugh neither.

NATH. That would not vex me. When people won't laugh at 
my jokes, I suppose they are too stupid to understand 
them. The best service my name does me, is, that, like 
charity, it covers a multitude of faults: for, do what 
mischief I may, that mischief is always done by Nobody.

ROS. Ha, ha, ha!—Are you honest?

NATH. Why do you ask?

ROS. I'll give you food and shelter, make a great man of 
you, if you be.

NATH. Why then I am.

ROS. Will you be my servant, my squire, my page?

NATH. With all my heart, if you are not aristocratical.

ROS. And why not, if I am aristocratical?

NATH. Because I hate an American aristocrat as much as I 
hate an English travailing lord, or a French travelling 
count. They brag, talk of their ancestors, and show 
their coats of arms; which gives an honest man reason to 
suppose, that they have formerly had in the family more 
arms than ears; that their titles were registered in a 
jail book; that their family house was a dunghill, and 
their tree of genealogy a gallows.

ROS. A very republican spirit! Your observation should 
have shewn you that, in this land, no one inveighs 
against aristocracy, unless he is poor. Give him a 
fortune, and he finds no rank above him to rail at.
Properly understood, aristocracy means wealth, and
republicanism poverty; and there is always a natural
enmity between the poor and the rich.—Can you do
any thing besides joking and railing?

NATH. I can thresh your jacket, and dust your coat; I 
can ring your bell, say your prayers, and write your 
love-letters.

ROS. Indeed!

NATH. I can dun your debtors, lie to your creditors, 
speak evil of your enemies, and slander you with much 
praise.

ROS. Your wisdom is beyond your years and condition. —
What wages will you have?

NATH. A new suit when my old one decays, which may be 
monthly; pocket money when I want it, which must be 
daily; and a theatre ticket when I like it, which shall 
be nightly.

ROS. A theatre ticket! What would you do at the theatre?

NATH. Learn wisdom. Sir, I have learned much at the 
theatre; I have learned several speeches, which I can 
put you to sleep with; several songs, which I can keep 
you awake with; and above all, I have learned how a wise 
fellow can climb on the shoulders of fools. One of the 
actors, a good sort of a soul when the audience didn't 
hiss him, taught me a doleful ditty that I sometimes 
chant to such people as will give a dollar to hear a 
French concert, but will recommend a beggar to the 
workhouse. (Sings)

       Sad and lone, the foundling boy
         Treads the path misfortune gives,
       Seeking, still unfound, the joy
         In a parent's arms that lives.
       Cast upon the world's wide sea,
         Rudely tost by wind and wave,
       Where's the haven waits for thee?
         Foundling boy, 'tis in the grave!

       Few but meet a parent's love,
         Smiles of kinsmen kind and good,
       Hearts to shelter and approve,
         Bound by ties of love and blood.
       Parents, kinsmen, where are they?
         Sighs the roving foundling son:
       Dry thy tears, and haste away,
         Weary foundling, thou hast none!

It is too melancholic, but it suits some.

ROS. Follow me then—

     (Enter RALEIGH, JR.

RAL.JR. Sir, what do you mean? You have trod on my toe.

NATH. Sir, are you gouty?

RAL.JR. Sir, I ask you again, what do you mean?

ROS. I mean to say, How d'ye do, old playmate?

RAL.JR. Roslin!—My most excellent friend, and memento of 
college fancies!—Faith, I was near boxing your ears!

NATH. You could not do it as effectually as the Grand  
Turk; he boxes them by thousands, as one boxes codfish, 
packs them in Greece, and—there the pun ends —unless one 
might say, he eats them in Turkey.

RAL.JR. Who is this impudent little raggamuffin at your 
heels?

ROS. My page, Mr. Raleigh, my errant page. This is a 
heaven-send, a dewdrop, a sprig of nettle—a stinging 
thing—that grew in the gutter, and was born of a willow 
basket.

RAL.JR. And is that his livery?

ROS. I shall equip him like a lord,—a republican lord. —
At present though, my Southern madcap, what are you 
doing in Philadelphia?

RAL.JR. Making love.

ROS. What! to one of our bonny young quakers? our anti-
slavery moralists? She will ruin you.

RAL.JR. By manumitting my bondsmen, or stiff- starching 
my children? Fear me not. I am heterodox in my passion, 
but orthodox in my damsel. I tell you, Roslin, you may 
have your pages and your squires; but I am the genuine 
knight, the gallant errant, the succourer of distressed 
ladies.

ROS. Indeed, Raleigh, I never doubted it. I have seen 
you mortified for your errantry, and beaten for your 
gallantry.


RAL.JR. Pr'ythee be not cynical. I am the luckiest dog 
in the world: I have relieved a woman from bondage, and 
ordained her to captivity; I have taken her from the 
springes, to load her with chains.

ROS. Honourable ones, Raleigh?

RAL.JR. Listen to me, and laugh not, for I speak 
matrimonially. A few days ago, as I was sauntering on, 
or rather about, the Ridge Road, I surprised a villain 
who had attacked a gig, shot the gentleman, and was 
laying his accursed paws on the lady, when I—merely 
thus—went across his caput with a trusty bamboo, knocked 
him senseless, left him and the gentleman to some people 
collecting,—sprang into the gig, and being told by the 
half crazed damsel that her father was before in his 
carriage, drove away with her in triumph. Ever since 
which it has been remarked that we are desperately in 
love with one another.

ROS. Excellently done. What became of the gentleman?

RAL.JR. Who?

ROS. He that was shot.

RAL.JR. Why I had hoped they had buried him. But it 
seems he was only scratched or scared.

ROS. Is he a rival?

RAL.JR. Yes.

ROS. What will you do with him?

RAL.JR. Refer him elsewhere. If that don't satisfy him, 
I'll horsewhip him; and if he is still refractory, I'll 
shoot him.


ROS. That will be despatching him with a vengeance. Now, 
what is the lady's name?

RAL.JR . Miss Diana Headstrong.

ROS. Zounds! she is my own cousin!

RAL.JR. I wish with all my heart she were your sister;  
or, what's the same thing, I wish I had a sister to give  
you. I had one once, but she was drowned while an  
infant. But, apropos, how fares the little angel you  
wrote about, some six months ago? the mysterious tragedy 
queen, you made so much fuss about? how fares she?

ROS. Heaven knows!

RAL.JR. And don't you? You are as gloomy on the sudden 
as an autumn day!

ROS. Never lay faith in the human face, Raleigh. That 
girl, whom I imagined the offspring of something 
superhuman; that gentle, beautiful and melancholy girl, 
whose veins, I fancied, contained the blood of queens!—

RAL.JR. Ay, that's the way you wrote about her.

ROS. The mystery was revealed, and she was suddenly 
metamorphosed into the daughter of—a public bawd!

RAL.JR. By Jupiter! that was a metamorphosis! Curse her 
impudence, how did she get into decent society? I hope 
they tarred and feathered her! What has become of her?

ROS. I know not; I have not seen nor heard of her since.  
But to leave a disagreeable subject: the wounded 
gentleman, whom you so civilly left to take care of 
himself, must have been Mr. Ravin, a wealthy Yankee, 
who, as I am informed, is a man of fine address and 
talents, and a great favourite with my uncle and Diana. 
I have been several months in the country waiting upon 
an invalid mother; but even there the rumour reached me, 
that there was to be a match struck between them.

RAL. That was a lying rumour, Roslin.

ROS. I am glad to hear it.—Come along with me. I have 
but this day arrived in town, and shall keep bachelor's 
hall for a week or two. Come along.

RAL.JR. Why Diana is not there?

ROS. No indeed.

RAL.JR. And how the devil could I go anywhere, where 
Diana is not? Good night. I'll call on you tomorrow. 
(Exit.

ROS. Boy, did you observe that gentleman?

NATH. Yes sir: he is in love.

ROS. Can you tell me what love is?

NATH. No sir, but I can tell you what it is like and
-it  matrimony too.

ROS. So.

NATH. Love is like a fever and ague, being a thing of 
chills and heats, hot and cold; and is only to be cured 
by the sweat, jealousy, or the vomit, matrimony: and 
matrimony itself is like a brass pot with a hole in the 
bottom, filled with water, and set to boil upon the 
embers of love, which it soon puts out. Love is, like a 
doctor, a breeder of diseases; and, like a lawyer, a 
provoker of damages. It is the foe of strong heads, and 
the friend of strong liquors; for the one it runs from, 
and the other it sets running: strong heads as naturally 
abhorring love, as weak ones do strong drink.  Love is 
like a caterpillar, which changes to the butterfly 
matrimony, and then flies from the shell that warmed it. 
Love is like water, which a short season freezes into 
the ice, matrimony: when boiling into love, it is a 
scalding draught; when frozen into matrimony, let him 
that would slide thereon, look to his heels, for 'tis a 
slippery foundation. Love is a mirror where men appear 
like angels; matrimony is a great looking glass<?> 
wherein men are changed to monsters; some appearing 
oxen, and others apes; and those that look most like 
men, are commonly chained like galley slaves or hoppered 
like horses; for to be in love is to be in captivity; 
and for a man to be in love matrimonial, is to be tied 
to a bed post with a garter, or to a beam with a halter.

ROS. Hang you, imp, did you learn this of the theatre 
too?

NATH. No, sir, I learned that of the newspapers, where 
it may be seen every day under the heads, Conjugal 
Felicity, Elopements Extraordinary, Suits for Breach of 
Promise, and trials for Crim. Con. In the mean time,


sir, as you have made me your squire,—(I'd rather be 
called that than servant) and are therefore bound to 
take care of me, I must inform you that necessity is not 
only a whetter of wit, but a whetter of appetite also.

ROS. Come along then. you shall be fed and clothed; and 
it will be your own fault, if you are not a great man 
one day.

NATH. Yes, I shall be a newspaper editor or a play actor 
no doubt.

                        (Exeunt.



SCENE 4. A parlour in HEADSTRONG'S house.
       (Enter HEADSTRONG, DIANA, and RALEIGH, JR.

HEAD. And so, Mr. Raleigh, you don't know Mr. Ravin?

RAL.JR. I have not that honour, Mr. Headstrong

HEAD. Why then, my excellent dear boy, you shall have 
that honour to night.

DIAN. Tonight! Bless me, pa, I thought Mr. Ravin was  
secure for another week.

HEAD. How! secured for another week! Secured! Is this 
your gratitude? Is it thus you express your thanks to 
the man whose blood was shed in your defence?

DIAN. My dear father, I am the most grateful woman 
alive; and it is my very tender regard for Mr. Ravin's 
health, that makes me dissatisfied with his premature 
visits.—I beg Mr. Raleigh's pardon for appearing to 
neglect his. I should certainly have expressed a similar 
anxiety; but—


HEAD. (Aside.) Good. I fear he grows particular. I like 
the boy well, but discourage him.

DIAN. Fear me not, dear sir.

HEAD. we are pledged in honour to Mr. Ravin. Be civil, 
but distant—
                       (Exit.

DIAN. I will, sir.—Mr. Raleigh, my father was saying, I 
was rude in not expressing my anxiety for your health.

RAL.JR. Be not uneasy. The indifference which keeps me 
at your side, is more agreeable than the solicitude that 
drives me away.

DIAN. A false construction and a vain one.

RAL.JR. Pr'ythee now, be not coquettish, or I shall be 
tantalizing. I know you are terribly fond of me.

DIAN. we are told that knowledge is vanity and vexation; 
and we know that vanity is always vexatious.

RAL.JR. Fy! while your father is ever eager to impress 
me with a sense of the high value you set on this Ravin, 
are you not always busy to persuade me you care not a 
copper for him?

DIAN. You do not seem willing to understand the relation 
in which Mr. Ravin stands to my father and myself.

RAL.JR. Perfectly. Your father was anxious to make him 
your husband; and as you did not happen to know your own 
mind, or mine, some time since, you found nothing odious 
enough in his addresses to make you entirely reject 
them. But now, enter myself upon the arena, and things 
are changed. I tell you, you hate, despise and abhor 
him, and find my little finger more amiable than his 
whole body. Be honest and confess it.

DIAN. Sir, are you in love with me?

RAL.JR. Immeasurably.

DIAN. And is this the Virginia mode of wooing?

RAL.JR. It is my own. I could kneel, sigh, poetize, and 
serenade with the best of 'em, if I would; could talk 
softly, lie lovingly, and even weep upon occasion; yea, 
o I could sing too, if I were so minded, verses of my  
own manufacture, as regularly cut and set as the teeth 
of a saw, and with a voice as soul-searching as the file  
with which the saw is set: I could do this, like other  
people; but it is ridiculous: and the only wholesome way 
of wooing, as of betraying, is with a kiss—thus.

     (Enter HEADSTRONG and RAVIN.

HEAD. |
      |>Humph!
RAV.  |

DIAN. The impudent wretch! I'll never forgive him.

RAV. My dear Miss Headstrong, has your memory paid me 
the ill compliment—

DIAN. Mr. Ravin! I beg your pardon. I am excessively 
glad to see you. How is your arm?—You are pale, very 
pale: I declare you look very ill. you must have lost 
much blood. I am afraid you were incautious, to expose 
yourself so soon. you are very weak.

RAV. Every word of solicitude you express is an 
invigorating medicine to me.—Damn her solicitude.—A 
kiss!—I have fooled her off my hands with a vengeance.

HEAD. Mr. Ravin, let me have the pleasure of introducing 
you to Mr. Raleigh.

RAV. Mr., mister who?

HEAD. Mr. Raleigh.—Sir, you are ill! Do you feel fainty?

RAV. Mr. Raleigh!—Not a whit, not a whit. My wound often 
affects me thus.—Mr. Raleigh? of what state?

HEAD. Virginia. Son of Washington Raleigh of Richmond.

RAV. So!—The devil is walking abroad at last; and Ravin 
must take care of Garket.—If I could but make this old 
fool suspicious.—Hum.—Introduce me, sir, if you please.

HEAD. Mr. Raleigh, I have the pleasure of making you 
acquainted with Mr. Ravin, of New Hampshire.

RAV. Sir, I am happy in the acquaintance of a gentleman 
so instrumental in the salvation of this lady.

RAL.JR. Very much at your service, sir.

RAV. Sir, may I take the liberty of asking if you are 
not related to a certain Mr. Benjamin Garket of—

RAL.JR. Hark you, sir, if you mean to be impertinent, 
six steps after me will bring you to a more convenient 
place.
                             (Exit.

DIAN. Mr. Raleigh! Francis! Heavens! what an insolent 
madcap!
                       (Exit.

RAV. So!

HEAD. Zounds, sir, what's the meaning of all this?

RAV. Sir,—Mr. Headstrong,—do you know who that man is?

HEAD. Who he is? Why, Mr. Raleigh, son of Washington 
Raleigh—Why do you shake your head?

RAV. Did you ever hear the name of Garket?

HEAD. Garket, Garket? Wasn't that the man that robbed 
the bank in Virginia?

RAV. Benjamin Garket, Esq., take him for all in all, was 
the completest rascal ever Virginia produced; and that 
is saying something for him. He was an officer in a 
certain bank in that state, which he was wont to 
embezzle of many sums of money,—very often forging 
draughts, which were offered by men in his employ, and 
accepted by himself; till at last his treachery was 
discovered, and he fled. He was a man of genteel birth, 
and was married to the niece of Washington Raleigh, 
Esq.,—to this young man's cousin, if he be Washington 
Raleigh's son.

HEAD. If he be Washington Raleigh's son! Why who the 
devil is he, if he is not Washington Raleigh's son?

RAV. I mistrust him. Have an eye to him.

HEAD. Who is he, I say?

RAV. Did you observe his rage, when I mentioned Garket's 
name to him? I mistrust him mightily. Beware of him.

HEAD. Devils! Who is he? Is he an impostor?

RAV. I fear so: Garket was an impostor.

HEAD. Heaven and Earth! Do you think it is Garket?

RAV. Ay—But I may be wrong, I may mistake.

HEAD. Indeed you do. Garket must be an older man.

RAV. I was told by one who had known him, that he was a 
very youthful, quite a boyish looking fellow, under 
thirty.—Did you observe how he started, how he coloured, 
how he pretended to be insulted, and decamped, when I 
pronounced his name?

HEAD. I did. By the lord, I'll cane him for his 
impudence. I'll have him committed, the rascal, the 
frontless villain! I'll send for the constable.

RAV. Be not precipitate. Recollect we have no proof. 
Rest awhile, till I can write to Virginia for means of 
identifying him.

HEAD. He'll escape.

RAV. Not he: he is the boldest dog in the world. Bold 
did I say? He must have more impudence than a 
Philadelphia negro, or a New York pickpocket, to come 
into your house, and make love to your daughter.

HEAD. Make love to my daughter! The infernal wretch! 
I'll shoot him!—But he saved her from ruffians.

RAV. A stratagem. Garket is a horrible libertine, and 
has married several rich women, whom he deceived, 
robbed, and forsook.

HEAD. The outrageous villain!

RAV. I doubt this was a scheme of his, to introduce 
himself, and look heroical. How easily might he not have 
stationed one of his gang in the hedge, and then have 
saved her from him?

HEAD. Indeed he might, the prodigious villain!

RAV I believe this arm of mine must witness against him.

HEAD. Horrible! I suspect him strongly. Let's commit 
him.

RAV. No; let us have proof, proof, sir.—Do you not fear 
your daughter has withdrawn her affection from me to 
place it upon him?

HEAD. Lord, lord! I would cut my throat first.

RAV. Yet she suffered his odious kisses. Did you mark as 
we entered?

HEAD. Damnable! I'll hang, stab, poison, murder, 
assassinate him. you shall have her, Mr. Ravin; she 
shall marry you to morrow; if she refuse, I will make 
over all I am worth in the world to the different 
charities, die the next day, and leave her a beggar.

RAV. Indeed sir, I fear I am supplanted in her 
affections.—

HEAD. Love a felon, a rascal, a bank-robber, a bigamist, 
polygamist, a goat, a bear, an ass! You shall have her, 
I say. Come along—O Damnable! horrible!
                              (Exit.

RAV. This is the most combustible piece of tinder, this 
old fool, that I ever set eyes on. He catches fire like 
a saltpetre rag, and trains as fast and as furiously as 
gunpowder. I have seen many credulous fishes; but he 
bites as readily at a lie, as a shark at a roasted 
brick; and ten to one, he will presently find the bait 
both too hot and too hard for digestion. Let Diana 
inherit but half her father's credulity, his 
gullability, she will to morrow or next day be Mrs. 
Diana Ravin at my service, and a week after, Miss Diana 
Headstrong again, at any body's service. And then for 
Emma, lovely little fool,—plying myself with brandy that 
I may the better ply her with love.—Hum—a bold man might 
marry her, assume another name, cultivate his whiskers, 
march off to Virginia, claim her portion, and then march 
off to the devil. 'S death, if I succeed fairly with 
both these wenches, I shall have cause to remember 
Philadelphia with gratitude for ever. I have commenced 
in its streets an odd comedy, the chief ingredients of 
which are love and counterfeit money; and while the 
ladies are willing to receive the former, I am sure the 
gentlemen will not boggle at the latter.      (Exit.



ACT TWO.



SCENE 1. A room in ROSLIN'S house.

      (Enter ROSLIN and RALEIGH.

ROS. If this be love, Frank, it is an unsociable 
monster. Come, I am dull,—you must drink with me.

RAL.JR. Don't tempt me. Love is a water-drinker.

ROS. I have known you an admirer of the flagon; and I 
have heard you say that a wench without wine was as 
ridiculous as a purse without money.

RAL.JR. That was in my college days, when my chamber was 
a conventicle, my light a bright eye, my candlestick a 
wine bottle, and my book of prayers a pack of cards; 
when a college chum at night made a washer woman's 
daughter in the morning; and when a friend's cloak often 
concealed an enemy's petticoat. Pr'ythee do not tempt me 
with the recollection of past follies; for wisdom and I 
have but lately shaken hands, and are not yet fast 
friends. Don't tempt me.

ROS. Not from your true allegiance, not from Diana, I 
hope.

RAL.JR. Humph.—Now you remind me of other affairs. Pray 
tell me, do you know among your friends a certain 
scoundrel, called Robert Ravin of New Hampshire?

ROS. My acquaintance is limited among scoundrels.

RAL.JR. Say not so. you are a man of worldly knowledge; 
and to know the world is to be familiar with
scoundrels. Men's hearts are like oysters; you may
open a thousand, before you find one containing the
pearl, honesty.—But of this Robert Ravin.

ROS. He is your rival.

RAL.JR. Yes; and I have a double cause for shooting him; 
for as I am a sinner, the villain had the insolence to 
remind me of my connexion with Benjamin Garket, (as 
arrant a swindler as ever lived) who by marrying my 
cousin, has drawn my father's family into some share of 
his infamy. The dog went into Virginia after I was sent 
to the North to be schooled, so that I never got sight 
of his ugly face; and, in fact, he was so quick a knave, 
that in a very few years, he had fobbed my father, who 
treated him to a very worthy and wealthy wife, and 
indeed every body else that had more money than wisdom; 
robbed a bank; deserted a wife; and set sail for 
England, where, I hope, he has been hanged a year ago. 
Sir, knavery runs in that man's blood: I am told he had 
a brother, as great a rogue as himself, who is at 
present in the New York State Prison, or who has been 
there.

ROS. Perhaps Mr. Ravin meant you no insult.

RAL.JR. Then he must be afoot; for to remind a gentleman 
of his poor or dishonest relations, is an indication of 
either impertinence or fatuity.—I invited the saucy 
knave to follow me; when, by the lord, though I meant 
him the civility to pull his nose, he followed me not.  
I called at his hotel, but he was invisible.—But after 
all, he is a comical dog, a lad of some mettle, given to 
fleshly frailties, like a certain person, that shall be 
nameless, in his college days; and after I have beaten 
him, and had one more look at his mistress, I may 
forgive him.

ROS. His mistress!

RAL.JR. Ay: Think of it: a man with a mistress rivalling 
a man without one! He has some mettle, that's clear.

ROS. Where did you see her?

RAL.JR. I was passing by her quarters, just as Ravin 
came from the door. I recollected the rascal the moment 
I met him again at Headstrong's, and felt strongly 
tempted to kick him down stairs. He is convalescing too, 
and passes for an invalid. He has some taste though. The 
wench looked from the window as I passed: 'twas just 
sunset. I caught a view of her visage; it was devilish 
pretty, ay, amazingly handsome,—so that I was struck 
dumb, and stood before the window like an ass, and 
absolutely for three quarters of a minute, forgot there 
was such a being in the world as Diana! Then I turned to 
a cobbler, and asked him, who dwelt there; A bitter 
woman, said he, for her name is Gall.

ROS. Ha! Gall? He was a foul-mouthed liar!

RAL.JR. Whose cat's broke her leg now?

ROS. You must show me the house.

RAL.JR. No poaching.

ROS. Fear not. I have another object in view.

RAL.JR. What's that ?

ROS. Why should you ask? Does not the man make 
pretensions to my cousin's hand? and should not I 
examine into those pretensions? I will but satisfy my 
suspicion; and therefore—

RAL.JR. Therefore—Humph!

ROS. Come, show me the place.

RAL.JR. I can t.

ROS. I beseech you, show me.

RAL.JR. I've changed my mind.

ROS. Sir, you must.

RAL.JR. I won't.

ROS. Are you serious?

RAL.JR. This fellow, sir, is my rival, perhaps my enemy; 
but he shall be treated honourably, and conquered by no 
tale-bearing: And therefore you may look for this damsel 
yourself, for dammee if I tell you a word more about 
her.
                     (Exit.

ROS. Should this be true, what a miserable fool am I F 
Why should I care or think about her? Was not the 
torture of the first discovery,—of her base origin 
enough? Oh heaven! but she was innocent then, and her 
only crime was her vile birth, and viler mother. And 
now,—but it is false! it cannot be; I will prove it 
false: She may be wretched and slandered; she cannot be 
so lost and depraved.
             (Exit.


SCENE 2. A room in HEADSTRONG'S house.

      (Enter HEADSTRONG and DIANA.

HEAD. Now, daughter, what do you think of him?

DIAN. He is a villain.

HEAD. Think of it! This is the second time within the 
last half year, we have been so deceived. Once by that 
girl, that Emma Gall, whom you took so much notice of: 
and she to turn out the daughter of a—a very bad woman! 
and so near catching our cousin Roslin: I believe he was 
half in love with her. The wickedness of this world!

DIAN. Yes sir, and it may appear hereafter that one has 
been as much slandered as the other.

HEAD . Slandered!—His consummate impudence!

DIAN. His unparall[el]ed cowardice!

HEAD. Eh! cowardice! Yes, yes, truly; for he blustered 
much, and that is a sign of cowardice.

DIAN. His meanness!

HEAD. His devilish impudence, girl! He would have robbed 
me of my daughter, and fifty thousand dollars.

DIAN. Well, sir, and is your strong box opened yet?

HEAD. No, zounds, no.

DIAN. Then you have yet lost nothing?

HEAD. Nothing.

DIAN. I am glad of it. I thought he had robbed you of 
something better than fifty thousand dollars; I thought 
he had robbed you of a friend!

HEAD. Eh!

DIAN. Yes, sir. Is not he, who by base detraction, robs 
one of a friend, more criminal than he who rids you of a 
little sordid pelf?

HEAD. How now? Are you mad?

DIAN. Mr. Ravin told you this! Mr. Ravin! and who is Mr. 
Ravin, that he should coin these unmanly, improbable, 
preposterous falsehoods?—O my father, I do not so much 
lament his depravity as your credulity.

HEAD. My credulity, girl? Take care of disobedience and 
irreverence.

DIAN. I will, I do. But I cannot restrain myself, when I 
hear a malignant slanderer venting his hints, his 
doubts, his regrets, his suspicions behind the back of 
his victim.

HEAD. Nor can I restrain myself, when I find a villain 
that should house in a jail, making free with my 
parlour, and my daughter, and my money.

DIAN. This villain has deluded you.

HEAD. This villain was shot in defending you.

DIAN. But I was saved by Mr. Raleigh, when Mr. Ravin 
could defend me no more.

HEAD. Fudge, fudge! a plan, a plot, a stratagem! A 
contrivance to appear heroical; one of the villain's 
commonest tricks.

DIAN. Just heaven! is it come to this! Sir, I have but 
one more word to say: Send for Mr. Raleigh, confront him 
with the slanderer, and let him know of what he
is suspected.

HEAD. And have bloodshed between them! or, by apprizing 
him of our suspicions, allow him opportunity to escape! 
Not so, girl. Let us have but the proof, the proof, and 
then—

DIAN. I conjure you, father, to send for him, or write 
to him, or go to him.

HEAD. To satisfy you at once—I will neither go to him, 
nor send for him, nor write to him; but I have written 
to Mr. Washington Raleigh about him, and shortly he will 
have such a storm raised about his ears as will confound 
him. I have already forbidden him the house; and 'tis 
not an hour since he had the door shut in his face. 
Daughter, if you will avoid the eternal disgrace of 
having it said you loved a common swindler, now is the 
time to give the world the lie by receiving the 
addresses of a gentleman.

DIAN. of a knave, you mean, sir.What, the back-biter, 
Ravin? From the bottom of my soul do I loathe and 
despise him.

HEAD. Hark you, minx; don't talk this way. I give you to 
know, you shall love any body I please, and marry any 
body I please. What, you jade?—I will cast you off, I 
will build a church with my money, and leave you to pray 
in the street, you graceless rebel, I will. I ] 

DIAN. O, my Father!

HEAD. Father me no more, unless you return to your duty. 
you are no more daughter of mine, unless you receive Mr. 
Ravin henceforth as your avowed and accepted lover. 
Think of it, and repent of your disobedience.
                          (Exit.

DIAN. As my avowed and detested enemy! He will not 
acquaint Mr. Raleigh of his slanderous nonsense; but I 
will, and that presently. I have heard him say his only 
acquaintance in town was my cousin Roslin Oh! why did I 
not think of him? He could clear him. He returned to 
day. I will away to him, to his house —and he shall 
apprize Raleigh,—or I may see Raleigh with him. They may 
call this step boldness; but here it is generous to be 
bold.
               (Exit.



SCENE 3. A street with a lighted lamp.
(Enter BOLT, RING FINGER, MOSSROSE, end CROSSBAR.

BOLT. We're all very good fellows, and good fellows 
should go the crony: therefore, doctor Ringfinger, let 
me introduce you to my friends. This is Mr. Mossrose, 
the poet, a sonnetteering quill-driver, lapdog to the 
ladies, and hackhorse to the newspapers. His friends say 
he IS an excellent writer; but in my private opinion, he 
is better at making a pen, than using it.

RING. Golly! Mr. Bolt is satirical.

MOSS. Sir, in your ear, I assure you, Mr. Bolt, though a 
clever fellow, has no taste in matters of poetry. Be not 
guided in such matters by his judgement—His taste is 
very morbid.

BOLT. This is Mr. Crossbar, my good friend,—and he is a 
dandy;—more troubled with sour stomach than sweet 
breath, and as much afflicted with a thin leg as a thick 
wit. He is both well-bred and quarrelsome, and is 
considered to make the worst bow, and the best apology 
of any man in town. He is in great favour with the 
ladies when his leg is well stuffed, and with the 
gentlemen when his pocket is well furnished: otherwise 
he is a great bore, for dyspepsia prevents his drinking, 
and ill humour stops his laughing.

CROSS. Mr. Bolt, if you mean that for an insinuation—

BOLT. No it isn't; 'tis a plain speech.

CROSS. Well if it isn't an insinuation, I say nothing 
about it; though I must confess you speak freely.—

BOLT. Pshaw! I did but go over your characters, to save 
the doctor the trouble of finding them out; and you are 
both welcome to do the same for me.

MOSS. Are we? Then Mr. Bolt is one, who, being too 
stupid to learn, prides himself on being an ignoramus.

CROSS. He has a big leg, but it is devilish crooked, and 
fit for nothing but kicking.

MOSS. And having no genius of his own, he always decries 
it in others.

CROSS. And because he is naturally very impertinent, he 
has learned to box, in order that he may beat those who 
resent his insults.

MOSS. He is studying the laws,—

CROSS. And always breaking them.

MOSS. He is drunk three times a week.

CROSS. And is only sober when the taverns won't trust 
and his friends won't treat him.

MOSS. And when they do, out of his gratitude, he bilks 
the tavern and beats his friends.—Every word gospel.

BOLT. Well, now our characters are drawn, let's draw 
aside, and speak to the ladies as they pass.

MOSS. It is rude, and also unlawful.

BOLT. There's no law in the land against speaking, 
unless it be in slander, menace, blasphemy, or contempt 
of court; of all which the last has the heaviest 
punishment.

MOSS. Not above slander.

BOLT. Slander should be excepted; for slanderers are 
punished, not because the crime is more heinous than the 
others, but because there is more folly in it; For if a 
man will spend but twenty four hours in making himself 
master of Actionable words, he can say what mischief he 
likes, and that safely.—I will give you an example how 
to accost ladies in the street. If they walk alone after 
nightfall, they are fair game. Stand aside: here comes 
one. (Enter an ugly old woman.) Good evening, Miss Rosa 
Angelina—a fine evening.

O.WOM. Did you speak to me, sir? (She turns her face to 
him in the light of the lamp.)

BOLT. No, mother Skin-and-bones. (Exit old woman.

OMNES. Ha, ha, ha!

BOLT. We must expect a horrification sometimes: but here 
comes another, of a younger and modester carriage, for 
she bends her head and walks fast. (Enter a negress.) 
Bon soir, ma belle enfant. Shall I have the pleasure of 
giving you my arm?

NEG. I am much obliged, sir. (Shows her face in the 
lamplight.)

BOLT. Out! you imp of pitch and charcoal!
  (Exit negress.

OMNES. Ha, ha, ha!

BOLT. Gentlemen, you may laugh; but it is always well, 
when the black skin admonishes us of a black heart, 
which is not always to be detected under a white one. 
The third, however, is said to be the charm, and here 
comes one that has a very charming appearance.
  (Enter DIANA.

MOSS. Don't speak to her; she looks like a lady.

BOLT. Nevertheless—My dear madam, I thought you would 
never have come. A delightful, pleasant evening.

DIAN. Sir, sir!

BOLT. Yes, very pleasant indeed; and if you will take my 
arm, we will soon find a better place to enjoy it in; r 
for upon honour you have a ravishing face, and I—

DIAN. Sir, you insult me.

BOLT. That's because I haven't kissed you. 'Tis very 
insulting to a lady to compliment her lips, and not kiss 
them. So, my dear—

DIAN. Ruffian!

BOLT. That's right; I like a little resistance: it makes 
one look innocent.
          (Enter TOM TAFFRAIL.

TOM. Avast there, my hearty, or I shall draw my forepaw 
athwart your hawse. Cast off your fast, and let that 
'ere tender go.
          (Exit DIANA.

BOLT. Now, fellow, I will break your bones.

TOM. Ready, lubber! Stand by for a bend, my hearts; and 
now, my cock-chicken, for a rough gaff or a smooth heel. 
(They scuffle; the others menace TOM; he knocks BOLT 
down, and chases CROSSBAR out.

MOSS. He's killed.

RING. Desperately mauled: the fellow's fist ran over his 
face like a carriage and six horses over a turnpike; I 
saw the fire flash at every knock.—He is in a dead 
swoon, pulse thick, breathing stertorous, and nose 
bloody;—I believe his neck is broken. Go, call a hack, 
Mr. Mossrose: we must take him to a tavern, where I'll 
bleed him; (Exit MOSS ROS E,) but first I might bleed 
him here, for a well filled pocket is not to be found 
every day in the year; and yet I won't, for Ben says it 
is a low vice,—No, I won't. (Picks his pocket.) How 
natural it comes! How natural it is to empty this pocket 
book, and cast it into the gutter! how natural to 
separate this loose change, throwing the copper upon the 
pavement, and the silver into my own pocket! how natural 
to tear open this fob in the scuffle, and put the patent 
lever into my own, for fear it should be trodden on. 
Beelzebub, thy name is Temptation! and Frailty, thy name 
is Ringfinger! Would that I knew a dozen such fools: I 
would have them in a broil or a debauch once a week, and 
then when they were drunk or beaten dumb, temptation 
would persuade, and I, frail that I am! I would pick 
their pockets.—Mr. Bolt, how d'ye do? Silent as a 
tombstone, or a dead woman. Well, silence becomes a 
fool, and gravity a philosopher; to which may be added, 
picking pockets becomes myself.
          (Enter MOSS ROSE and a hack-driver.

MOSS. How is he now.

RING. Much better; though he will feel the worse for it, 
when he comes to.—Gingerly, Mr. Whip; handle him as you 
would handle so much glass, for if he falls, he breaks; 
and indeed I am afraid he will find his fall has already 
broke him.
          (Exeunt.

SCENE 4. Another street.
          (Enter RALEIGH, JR.

RAL. By heavens, 'tis inexplicable! Denied admission, 
told saucily by the rascal at the door, that his master 
g was at home, but did not choose to see me! and desired 
g me not to call again! There must be some damnable 
delusion or witchcraft prevailing in this city, and 
especially in Headstrong's house. I suppose my honest 
friend, the Yankee, is at the bottom of all this. Curse 
him, if I find him—(Enter DIANA.) Am I awake? Diana! 
alone, and at night!

DIAN. Oh, Mr. Raleigh, this is lucky! I am scared half 
out of my wits—If you have your bamboo with you, I 
beseech you, beat the first man you meet in the streets; 
and then beat the second, and then the third —and then—

RAL. This is very strange, madam!

DIAN. Oh, sir, they all deserve it. This a polite, this 
a well bred, this a civil city! Odd's my life! I never 
saw such impudent villains! I have travelled twenty 
yards, met twenty men in the street, and of these, 
nineteen were impertinent. That's breeding for you!

RAL.JR. . And why have you exposed yourself to 
impertinence, madam, by walking unguarded through the 
streets?

DIAN. Because I didn't know guards were necessary in a 
time of peace, to protect a woman. But you are very 
ungrateful to ask such a sulky question: I came entirely 
on your account.

RAL.JR. On my account!

DIAN. Yes. I had no way of seeing you since my father 
has denied you the house; and I thought I might hear of 
you at my cousin Roslin's. So, now I have found you, 
promise me you won't fight, and I will tell you why my 
father has been rude.

RAL.JR. . I can make no promise, Diana, that, as a 
gentleman, I may afterwards repent.

DIAN. But you must though. Sir, you have been slandered; 
and my father is made to believe you are that bad man, 
that Mr. Garket, whose name so confounded you when you 
were introduced to Mr. Ravin.

RAL.JR. 'Sdeath! your father is an old—

DIAN. Hush! You mean Mr. Ravin; 'twas he that possessed 
my father.

RAL.JR. Humph! If I don't—

DIAN. Canehim:—yes, you may do that; you may beat him as 
much as you will; but don't fight him with pistols, or 
swords, or daggers;—he might kill you.

RAL.JR. Ha, ha, ha! but he might take the cane out of my 
hand, and beat me!

DIAN. O. then you can get some stout fellow, for three 
or four dollars, to beat him for you; and bid him lay on 
well. I do so hate the manse if I was strong enough I 
would beat him myself.

RAL.JR. Pr'ythee, don't talk that way; it frightens 
matrimony out of my mind. Come, I must take you home.

DIAN. And I hope you will beat some of these impudent 
wretches along the way. But you must not enter.  

RAL.JR. I will not. I have some doubts whether I shall 
ever enter your father's doors again; and certainly 
should not, but for his Diana's sake.   

DIAN. Come to morrow, and bring my cousin Roslin with 
you. He knows you, and he can convince my father of the 
folly of his suspicions.

RAL.JR. I will not do my pride such insult. Let him seek 
me, and do me right; I ask it not of him; nor will I 
trouble myself about explanation, where I have not 
injured.

DIAN. That's a magnanimous goose! But come along, and 
make ready to beat somebody.

RAL.JR. Beat somebody! for being good-natured<?> to you? 
Isn't this called the City of Brotherly Love?

DIAN. Yes.

RAL.JR. Then I won't beat the impertinent knaves; for 
these were only so many specimens of brotherly love!
     (Exeunt.

SCENE 5. A room in MRS. GALL'S house.
(Enter MRS. GALL and RINGFINGER.

RING. Come now old lady; this is contrary to my notion 
of things: if she a'an't your daughter, whose
daughter is she?

GALL. Your brother would kill me.

RING. Never fear. Whenever any body is disposed to kill 
you, cry Penitentiery! and he's off in a hurry. It is 
your interest to tell. If she be a rich man's daughter, 
why then, with your help, I'll marry her, and share her 
fortune with you.

GALL. I should like that very well; but your brother—

RING. My brother, by reason of more mischief and good 
looks than I possess, is already, to my certain 
knowledge master of one lawful wife, and for aught I 
know, may have a dozen more. I am a bachelor.

GALL. But then the girl herself,—does she like you?

RING. I reckon not. I wanted to kiss her t'other day; 
but she cried and promised to tell Benjamin. So I 
conclude she don't fancy much after me:—But that's 
nothing.

GALL . Then I can't tell you her name. If she don't like 
you, you'll never get her; and I believe Benjamin 
wouldn't consent to it. yet there is one way by which 
you may obtain her.

RING. Mention it.

GALL. Kill your brother.

RING. I believe, old woman, you are mad. I have resolved 
never to kill any body in a state where they build 
Penitentiaries; and even if it only ended in hanging, I 
shouldn't kill my brother, not I.

GALL. Then you can never have Emma. I tell you, if you 
put him out of the way, you shall make your fortune. He 
stands in your way, he stands in mine. I stole that girl 
to obtain my own ends, and he thwarts me. I have bred 
her from childhood, I have wasted money on her, I have 
schooled her like a lady; because I had an end in it, 
though I hated her. I would have made her a touchstone, 
to bring me gold, and a miserable tool to bring me 
revenge; and when her charms had become valueless, would 
have sold her with the secret, which would make her 
husband rich: and yet he comes athwart me, and orders me 
to keep her as well as myself at his disposal; and I am 
forced to obey him.

RING. And how the devil has he such power over you? not 
from love?

GALL. From love! No, I hate him, and would do him a 
mischief,—but that I fear him. He has my secret, which, 
if he told it, would condemn me to prison or hanging for 
aught I know. I stole the girl for revenge, and he 
plucks revenge out of my hands.

RING. . Mother Gall, you appear to have a blood-thirsty 
disposition, a spice of the devil in you!

GALL. Have I not reason? That girl's father made me the 
dupe of his villa[i]ny; (I was young then, and no 
haggard as I am now;) made me promises, and laughed me 
to scorn when I reminded him of them, for I was poor and 
lowly; and instead of making me the mother, made me the 
slave of his brats.

RING. Why didn't you sue him for breach of promise?

GALL . Because I had a spice of the devil in me, as you 
say; and I coveted his blood more than his money. His 
blood?—no, not that, but something that would hurt him 
more. I swore to be revenged, and revenged in a manner 
that would satisfy me best, and injure him most. I 
slaved patiently in his house among his negroes; I 
watched, endured all patiently, patiently! till his wife 
bore him a daughter, and then—

RING. Go on: this sounds like a gallow's confession.

GALL . And then I stole her away, taking care to possess 
myself of such articles as would serve to prove her 
birth hereafter, her mother's picture and necklace; and 
pricked a mark on her arm, which her father has seen, 
and will be obliged to acknowledge.

RING. And so you revenged yourself upon the naughty man 
by taking his daughter from him?

GALL. I meant to have revenged myself by restoring her 
to him.

RING. A very Christian-like resolution.

GALL. But I would have restored her to him as vile and 
as infamous,—ay, ten times more so than he made me. I 
should have sent him a harlot for his daughter.

RING. Zounds! that was a plot for a woman! No man would 
have thought of such a thing.

GALL. And your brother, by recognizing me, has taken her 
into his own hands. I dare not scold her, but he 
threatens me. Therefore I hate him, and if you will kill 
him, you shall make your fortune. Or if you have the 
spirit, you can aid my vengeance by—Do you understand?—
she is alone.

RING. you are a damnable old devil, mother Gall, and I 
suppose you are expounding concerning a rape. But I tell 
you again, I shall never do a fault that would send me 
for life to the Penitentiary; and besides, brother Ben 
has as much of the devil in him as you; and such a 
freedom with his own game might lead to a fracas.

GALL. I wish your brother were rotting at the bottom of 
the Delaware, and you, for a prating coward, be side 
him! I will not bear his tyranny any longer. If he has a 
secret of mine, I have one of his; and I don't know why 
I shouldn't as well threaten him, as he me. I will be 
his slave no longer.
          (Enter RAVIN, drunk.

RING. Speak out then. I long to see any one that can  
talk big to Ben, for dammee if I ever could.

RAV. Mother Sanctity, are you drunk?

GALL. Lord bless you, Mr. Garket!

RAV. Dame Kidnapper, if you call me Garket again, I'll 
report you to the mayor of this goodly city as a 
nuisance,—a nuisance, old beldam, a nuisance: They allow 
no nuisances here, except negro class-meetings, dogs, 
and church-bells. And so get you to bed, or I'll have a 
constable on you in the cutting of a pack, or the 
emptying of a bottle.

RING. Speak out, old lady.—Why where's your spunk?
          (Exit GALL.

RAV. Well Jack, what's the news?

RING. That old hag has been telling me all about Emma.

RAV. She lies. she is afraid to tell, without indeed she 
were drunk; for drunken people can keep no secrets.

RING. Then I hope, Ben, to hear yours directly.

RAV. You lie; I a'n't drunk; I am only terribly good 
humoured. I met the adversary, and scared him off. He 
making love to Diana too! He may have her, after I've 
done with her.—But where's Emma?

RING. Emma who? Come Ben, she has told me everything but 
her real name.

RAV. I can't tell you that, Jack; but I'll tell you 
where you may find it.

RING. Where?

RAV. In the family bible. So you see, I am very 
communicative.

RING. Humph . Let s go to work. you must fill up some 
notes, or practise some of these signatures.

RAV. I won't; I'd rather make love.

RING. Eat a pickled cucumber, and get sober.
          (Exit RINGFINGER.

RAV. (Sitting.) Love! omnipotent devil! how devilish  
omnipotent art thou! especially over a bottle, or after 
one. Your lover of a woman is always your friend of a 
bottle; except it be empty, and then love is but an 
empty passion: I love Diana exceedingly, and so I do 
Emma, and so I do my wife. But my wife is like bad wine 
and has turned sour on my stomach; Diana is like malt 
liquor, damned stupifying, and apt to Jay grow stale; 
whereas Emma is like your true cogniac, t'' the very 
smell of which sets one's heart and head at loggerheads.
           (Enter EMMA.

EM. Miserable that I am! Oh, that a mother should thus 
tyrannize over her child.

RAV. Cogniac is a great mover of spirits, so is Emma; 
cogniac is a great provocative of love, so is Emma: I 
will now see whether Emma be as easily gotten as 
cogniac, for cogniac makes me monstrous loving. Basta, 
damosella! hast thou been at the flagon too that thine 
eyes are thus running over?

EM. Sir, I was, I was—

RAV. Thou wert coming to me, my pomegranate blossom, to 
wrap thy dainty little fingers round my neck, and 
discourse most agreeably of the falsehood of lovers. 
Come sit thee down, and prattle lovingly, for thou and I 
shall be married.

EM. You are merry, sir. I must wish you a good night.

RAV. I tell thee, thou apple of my two eyes, we shall be 
married. Odds boddikins! sweetheart, why do you cry?

EM. Sir, my mother has occasion for me.

RAV. And so have I, thou water-eyed Niobe. Come and kiss 
me.

EM. He is certainly intoxicated.—Good night, sir

RAV. Pr'ythee sit down and kiss me; for I must say sweet 
things to thee.—Fy on thee! thou hast no Demogorgon 
making love to thee.

EM. My mother demands my, presence, sir.

RAV. Thy mother be damned! Now thou hast not love enough 
for the old hag, to be vexed at me, for all of thy 
startings, thy dignified startings. Thou hatest her 
horribly now?

EM. Sir, if you will let me pass.

RAV. Come, I will kiss thee numerically, by arithmetic: 
I will skip from addition to the Rule of Three till we 
be in full Practice; thence from Simple to Double 
Position; and thence to Promiscuous—

EM. Release me, sir, or I will call my mother.

RAV. Thy mother be damned, as I said before. For what is 
thy mother, but a devil sent from below into earthly 
exile, and called Kidnapper by courtesy. Swear to me 
that thou dost mortally hate thy mother.

EM. Unhand me, Mr. Ravin.

RAV. Come, wench, thou hast the most admirable eyes; and 
then for thy lips, I will taste them.

EM. Ruffian! are you a man, a gentleman, Can thus 
oppress the weak and innocent? Away! go blush for your 
unmanliness: Let me go weep.

RAV. Yet for all this will I kiss thee; and then, thou 
excellent little obstinacy—

EM. Help! mother, mother! help!

RAV. Pish! she can't hear; or if she does, she knows 
better than to break in upon one's courtship.

EM. Be she more cruel and unnatural
Than crocodiles with their young, she will not 
suffer
A slave, a ruffian to oppress her child.

RAV. Child! ha, ha, ha! Thou art a wonderful child, for 
thou hast more than one mother; and though a child with 
two parents is no such uncommon sight, yet a child with 
two mothers is rather an oddity.

EM. Two mothers! what mean you?

RAV. Thou wilt fall into a fit, if thou starest thy 
little eyes so out of their sockets, with thy mouth open 

EM. Two mothers! two mothers!

RAV. Nay, you have but one natural mother to be sure.

EM. O sir, you are more cruel than before,
  Thus to make sport out of my misery,
  And raising, for your mirth, a wild strange hope,
  Which, for your mirth again, you mock from me.

RAV. Thou art the sweetest mouse! Kiss me, and tell me 
you hate this old kidnapper.

EM. This old kidnapper! Trifle not with me, sir.
  She is my mother, and I cannot hate my mother.

RAV. She hates you.

EM. You wrong her, sir. It has been my misfortune
  Never to meet a cherishing love in her:
  But yet she does not hate me.

RAV. Most orthodoxly; and you would give one of your 
eyes to learn you would be no sinner in paying her back 
in her own coin.

EM. Sir!

RAV. Will you kiss me pleasantly, yea amorously, if I 
tell you something of your birth and your mother?

EM. Something of my birth and my mother!
Is she not—? Speak! I know that mystery
As well as infamy was on my birth.

RAV. If I should tell thee, Mother Gall was not thy 
mother?

EM. I would bless you,
  Pray for you, serve you like a slave, although
  I knew you mocked me; I would—O heaven forgive me!
  This is unnatural!

RAV. Kiss me your thanks, and have it so; for she is not 
thy mother.

EM. Not my mother!
  Mock me not, lest I curse you: do not make me
  Grow mad with disappointment; be it rather
  Mad with delusion: say it once again,
  Say Not my mother; swear it, Not my mother!

RAV. Be loving then, for, by the lord, she is no more 
your mother than I am; and that no one in his sober 
senses—

EM. Heaven, I thank thee!
  Be misery my lot, not infamy!

RAV. Now for rewarding the good news.

EM. Tell me who is my mother?

RAV. Thy mother be damned! Come, let us kiss like two 
doves of a summer's day.

EM. Who was my mother?
  O take me to her; let me leave this house;
  Take me to her: If she be poor and needy,
  I am young and strong: O take me to my mother,—
  If she resemble not this wretched woman.
  I'll leave this house.

RAV. Upon my honour, you sha'n't; for here you shall 
stay, and be my most excellent—

EM. Off, slave!

RAV. If thou wert more ungrateful than the devil, and 
more angry than his enemies, I'll tell thee I am thy 
master, and love thee.—You have been paid for, and shall 
not prove a bad bargain. Understand me: you are 
handsome, and I am drunk, drunk with love and brandy 
together; and mixtures are always more powerful than 
plain stimulants. I am particularly loving tonight, and 
tonight I mean thou shalt be so too. So no qualms of 
conscience, nor nonsensical strugglings—

EM. Brute! I defy thee! For thy strange confession,
Which drunkenness, not kindness, forced from thee,
I thank thee: But I will not be thy slave.
Follow me not—I shall go hence.
          (Exit.

RAV. I am mad-drunk; but ye shall not escape me.
          (Exit, pursuing her.



SCENE 6. She street before MRS. GALL'S house.

          (Enter ROSLIN.

ROS. I have been told, that oft of nights this 
Ravin,
  Muffled and cloaked up to the eyes, is seen
  Stealing through this deserted quarter of the 
city;
  Nay, in this house is sometimes seen to creep
  On his illicit errands.—Here he saw her—
  (Who else but her, here in her mother's house? )
  Blighted, and sadly gazing on the sun,
  Like a fall'n angel on the glorious orb
  From which her sins had cast her: and there is
  In a fall'n woman the sad and fading semblance
  Of a lost seraph, one on whom our tears
  Much oftener should be shed than our sharp 
sarcasms.
  Could she thus fall? she, whose sweet lips seemed 
ever
  To breathe a heart out in their melodies;—
  A heart that was so delicate and gentle,
  Methought a rude word would have broken it;
  And so forlorn, it leapt at friendly voices
  In a submissive gratitude and joy.
  Could she fall?—Hist! by heavens, it was a shriek!
  A woman's scream! Are there no watchmen here?—
  Voices and struggling!

EMMA (Within.) Spare me, sir, for pity.

ROS. With your leave, bolt! if I have weight enough.
          (Bursts the door; enter EMMA, struggling 
with
          RAVIN.

EM. O save me! Take me to my mother.

ROS. (Striking RAVIN back.) Villain! stand back, or I 
will tear your heart out!—Courage, poor unfortunate. —
She swoons!

RAV. Dog! give her back.

ROS. Thou worse than dog! thou beast,
  Without a name to express thy lust or fury!
  I know ye!

RAV. Ye shall. Be wise, and begone.

ROS. Slave! take ye that; (gives his card) and if ye 
have a grain
  Of manhood in ye, ask of me tomorrow
  The chastisement brutality deserves.
  Nay, follow not: If you advance a step,
  'Tis but a call will bring the watch upon you,
  With all the infamy you've won to night.
               (Exit, bearing EMMA.

RAV. Fiends! furies! devils!
  This is it to be drunk! Up, ye old hag!
  Ye kidnapper! ye gall-bag! up, I say.
     (Enter GALL, with a light. He reads the card.)
  Roslin! ha, ha! This is it to be drunk!
  Drunk, drunk and mad! Lost, ruined, blown, and 
ruined
  Game gone,—Diana, Emma, lost! both lost!—
  This cursed Roslin!—Out, ye hag, and get her;
  Fetch her again, or I will wring your neck;
  Fetch her: begone. (Exit GALL, terrified.) But you 
shall rue it well,
  Meddlesome boy! if there's in steel or lead
  A medicine will help me to revenge!
          (Exit.


ACT THREE.

SCENE 1. A room in ROSLIN'S house.
 (Enter ROSLIN and NATHAN.

ROS. Has the—'Sdeath! am I grown shame-faced before my 
own boy?—Boy, have there been any calls to day?

NATH. There came a tailor with a bill a yard long; but 
seeing you were melancholy, I told him his present suit 
didn't fit: and so he took a back-stitch, and measured 
the street towards his cabbage garden. Then came a 
cobbler, a son of wax, with a bill like a Canada 
petition, having but one end, which was the beginning; 
his items were, like mocasin leathers, put on without 
soul, and no man while looking over 'em, could tell 
where was the last of 'em. As for him—.

ROS. Has she shown herself this morning?

NATH. She!

ROS. She, simpleton? Your wits were not used to be so 
dull.

NATH. Indeed they must be stupid now; for I have been 
worrying my brains an hour, and never a laugh for 
reward: and one can't be witty long, unless one can 
raise a roar. Now sir—Odds my life! I think he has been 
guzzling porter, for he is as stupid as a brewer.

ROS. If it has come to this, the conclusion is but a 
throat-cutting or a hanging in one's garters, both of
them sovereign remedies for ill advised love. Love!
foolery and madness! What, a mistress! a—a—perhaps a—O 
heaven! that such a face of beauty and
innocence should be the mark of a soul befouled with
passion and pollution! Curse her hypocritical looks!
Why did I bring her here?

NATH. Now is he seized with a mad fit, for he is 
gritting his teeth like an alligator or a ground hog.

ROS. She can swoon, she faints admirably; that is easily 
learned: and she can weep,—so naturally as to give one 
the heartache; but I have heard how that may be learned 
too: 'Tis but a stretching of one's eyeballs, with a 
little forcing of passion; and out they come, the watery 
hypocrites! Death! what care I? Let me be but rid of 
her, and put her in some honest situation, and then 
forget her.—Well, Nathan!

NATH. Sir, I was going to tell you of a comical dream I 
had last night; it beat Nick Bottom's hollow. Methought 
I had fallen in love with an oyster, an overgrown 
oyster; and in this dream—

ROS. A dream! And I have had mine too. This girl! 
methought she had wings, and was an angel; but her wings 
were broken, and she wept over them—

NATH. And this oyster—

ROS. One that was driven from paradise. not for a sin, 
but because—

NATH. And this oyster, this overgrown oyster—

ROS. Ha! this what?

NATH. This loving oyster that I dreamt of.

ROS. Ha, ha, ha! have you been dreaming of oysters?

NATH. Yes, sir; I was in love with an oyster: but that 
part of the vision I do not wonder at, because, like 
ancient Pistol, the world is mine oyster, and the world 
I love very well: but the strangeness of it was, that 
the oyster changed to—to—that—that—

ROS. To what, sir? Why do you pause?

NATH. Nay, if I had known her name, you should have 
heard it afore this:—to that pretty damsel that you 
brought here last night.

ROS. Let me see your discretion shown, in not speaking 
of this pretty damsel to any living soul but myself; nor 
even to me until I invite you.

NATH. Umph! Now comes on the fit again; and no  more 
talk of my oyster.
(Enter RALEIGH, JR.

RAL.JR. Morrow, morrow.

NATH. Gently, sir. If you have any thing witty to say, 
pray call on some of the neighbors. Wit has a poor 
purchase here to day.

RAL.JR. Trust me, young Ganymede, I will neither afflict 
thee nor thy master with anything more current than 
dulness. So let thy wisdom take itself away, while I 
convince him there are more serious asses in the world 
than he wots of. (Exit NATHAN.) When you have finished 
your meditations, school-mate, I shall be at your 
service. Humph! the man has met with a misfortune, and 
has suddenly grown deaf, dumb, and blind. Such a one 
would make an excellent lover; too blind to find faults, 
too deaf to hear of them, and too dumb to jeopard his 
soul with excessive lying, which is the chief excellence 
of a lover. Taste, touch and smell for his money; and 
all he could look for in a woman would be a sweet 
breath, a smooth skin, and a  ; I delicate lip. Surely 
the man is in love, and—Zounds! if that isn't a 
petticoat, there's no dimity in the land!

ROS. Stay!

RAL.JR. There now, she is vanished! Thunder and 
lightning! what ails you, man? Are you sick, or in love?

ROS. Neither. I was trying to remember when it was the 
last honest woman appeared in this world.

RAL.JR. Was that dishonesty I caught a glance of just 
now?

ROS. If it was woman. But pass that.—How go matters with 
you and my cousin?

RAL.JR. Well, and badly. Well, for I have had all 
reasonable encouragement; and badly, for I have been 
turned out of doors.

ROS. Do you call that reasonable encouragement?

RAL.JR. No—but, Roslin, look very attentively at me, and 
tell me if I look much like a rascal ?

ROS. I observe no strong resemblance.

RAL.JR. A coward ?

ROS. More like a cut-throat.

RAL.JR. But, by Jupiter, I am both rascal and coward; If 
and I should have taken no offense if every ambling I55; 
booby in Chestnut Street had pulled my nose as I g 
passed along: for I have been grievously insulted, and 
have borne all as tamely as a starved dog.

ROS. Impossible!

RAL.JR. You have an uncle called Headstrong, an old man.

ROS. Yes.

RAL.JR. And an impertinent old ass.

ROS. At your service.

RAL.JR. Do I look like a felon? a swindler? a 
bankrobber?

ROS. Are you serious?

RAL.JR. I have been taken by your honest old uncle, for 
Benjamin Garket, Esquire, my cousin the knave; and on 
the strength of this fancy, I have been denied his 
house.

ROS. I am lost in amazement! What could have put this 
ridiculous folly into his head?

RAL.JR. Robert Ravin, Esquire, of New Hampshire.

ROS. Humph!

RAL.JR. It is Diana's particular desire that I sha'n't 
fight him; and therefore I desire your advice as to the 
eligibility of pistolling or horsewhipping him; which 
last Diana fancies most; and I am inclined to her 
opinion.

ROS. He is beneath your notice.

RAL.JR. Why then the horsewhip.

ROS. You are forestalled. To my certain knowledge, he is 
now under obligation to fight another man; and your 
resentment must be deferred until after the adjustment 
of this affair.

RAL.JR. Is he so quarrelsome? Who is the man that fights 
him?

ROS. You shall hear presently—Well, sir, what is the 
matter now?
          (Enter NATHAN.

NATH. A gentleman with a black-eye, to speak with you. 
He calls himself Bolt, and looks as savage as a singed 
cat: I was going to bolt him out, but he bolted right 
in.

ROS. Show him up.

RAL.JR. And who is Mr. Bolt?

          (Exit NATHAN.

ROS. A representative of a Philadelphia buck; one that 
with the opportunities of becoming a gentleman, amends 
his gentility by the addition of certain accomplishments 
peculiar to the vulgar: that is, he has been half 
educated at college and half bred at home; is seen 
sometimes in a lawyer's office with the last new Jest 
Book in one hand, and the last old Blackstone in the 
other; more frequently in the tavern with a terra-pin 
under his nose, and a wine bottle at his elbow: he 
fiddles a little and boxes to admiration; wears a costly 
coat; keeps a mistress, and sometimes a dog; above all, 
he can brag of having shot one grouse on the Jersey 
colings, and one man on the Delaware lines.

RAL.JR. If you have business with him, I will take my 
leave

ROS. By no means. I shall need your assistance. Here he 
comes. (Enter BOLT.) Your servant, Mr. Bolt. This is my 
friend, Mr. Raleigh.

BOLT. Your servant, sir; and yours. I had some private 
communications—

ROS. Mr. Raleigh is my friend, sir; and if I understand 
the object of your business rightly, any communications 
to me may be properly made in his presence.

BOLT. Then with your leave, sir,—From Mr. Ravin. 
(Delivers a challenge.

ROS. As I expected.

RAL. How, Roslin! Are you the man that appears in this 
business?

ROS. The same. I accept the invitation, sir; and refer 
you to Mr. Raleigh for arrangements.

RAL.JR. Hum—this is a devilish strange piece of 
business! That was a challenge, sir, if I mistake not?

BOLT. The very same, sir; and as it appears we are 
appointed mareschals do camp, I must beg to be in-formed 
when and where we shall meet to arrange matters?

RAL.JR. In an hour's time, sir, I will attend you at the 
United States'.

BOLT. I will be there, sir. Gentlemen, your servant.
          (Exit.

ROS. Yours, sir.

RAL.JR. If you happen to be killed, Roslin, it may be of 
some satisfaction to my conscience and some service to 
your memory, to know what you are to fight about.

ROS. A woman.

RAL.JR. Hum—very satisfactory.

ROS. You may recollect having seen and described a 
handsome girl to me as Ravin's—

RAL.JR. 'Sdeath! have you been poaching?

ROS. I happened to rescue this unfortunate creature from 
his drunken brutality, and put her out of the reach of 
his violence. This is the cause of the quarrel.

RAL.JR. What have you done with her?

ROS. She is in this house.—Do not start: you have been 
deceived in her character.

RAL.JR. I should have thought any asylum had been 
preferable to your mother's house.

ROS. Do not mistake her. she is innocent. She is that 
strangely unhappy girl I wrote you about, as having seen 
in—

RAL.JR. What, the bawd's daughter! and innocent! Lord, 
lord! worse and worse! Why the vengeance did you bring 
her here?

ROS. What else could I do with her? What decent lodgings 
would receive a young woman at night with no other 
recommendation than that of a young man? Do not suppose 
if I had thought her base, I should have brought her 
here.

RAL.JR. Thought her fiddlesticks! Zounds! must you peril 
life or limb, go out to mortal combat, in upholding the 
reputation of a bawd's daughter? and must you eternally 
disgrace your own by sheltering her under your mother's 
roof?

ROS. You do her injustice.

RAL.JR. And another man's bona-roba too! If you had told 
me this before, I could have prevented this rencontre.

ROS. If you are dissatisfied with your part in it, I can 
release you from your engagement, and look elsewhere 
for assistance.

RAL.JR. You shall not need to do that, sir. I can lament 
nothing in this affair more than your causeless 
displeasure.

ROS. Forgive me. I have a weight on my mind that makes 
me neglectful of what I say.

RAL.JR. Farewell then. Come to my lodgings this evening, 
and I will read you the rules of combat. Till then, keep 
the unhappy cause of this unhappy affray out of your 
sight.
          (Exit.

ROS. All men grow wise and prudent, while I am settling 
into folly and infatuation. I have seen the day that I 
could give Raleigh the counsel he has been giving me. He 
was used to be thoughtless and hotbrained, but not so 
obstinately bent on ruin as myself. —Yet she has not the 
look of an abandoned one; no hypocrite could assume her 
face or voice, her simplicity, dignity, or gratefulness. 
But her mother!—She comes—
          (Enter EMMA.

EM. Sir, I have been very anxiously awaiting an 
opportunity to thank you again and again for your 
generosity in protecting the honour of a helpless and 
distressed girl.

ROS. I did not think, when I saw you last in my Uncle's 
house, to have ever found you in need of such 
protection. I should not have supposed you needed it in 
your mother's house.

EM. My mother's! Oh sir, you have been much deceived. 
That wicked woman is not my mother.

ROS. Not your mother!

EM. No, sir; and if I may tax your kindness once more, 
send to her house, and beseech of her who are my 
parents?

ROS. Heavens! do you not know them?

EM. If I did,—if I had, sir, think you I would have 
remained with her, my hard oppressor, to meet her daily 
cruelty and insults?

ROS. She not your mother! Be sure you are not deceived.

EM. Never. Nature belied her pretensions, for I hated 
her. Oh, I knew this would please you, for you were used 
to take an interest in my welfare.

ROS. Please me! Indeed it does. But why should she— how 
dare she call herself your parent?

EM. I know not. From my earliest years I was brought up 
at school, where she came privately twice a year to ask 
about me, and provide for me. Those were happy times for 
I had friends then. But when some one whispered scornful 
tales about her, they all shunned me, and forbade me 
their houses. You know that. Then she took me away, and 
kept me close at home, where, as I learnt by his own 
boasts, she sold me to that villain, from whose 
brutality your kindness saved me, —that man who before 
had never been rude to me, till in his drunkenness he 
forgot himself, boldly avowed that he had bought me, 
bought me! of that bad woman; and then to gain my 
gratitude, said she was not my mother! Then I fled from 
them; he followed me; and you, you saved me from him.

ROS. And therein have conferred more happiness on myself 
than I know how to express.—oh heaven! There is an 
innocent soul speaks in her every word! no vice could 
look thus.—You have been unhappy: There is a mystery 
about your origin, which I will use my best means to 
unravel; and I will associate my best friend, my mother, 
in the search. Meanwhile, be at rest; consider yourself 
mistress of this house. My mother will be here at 
farthest in a few days, and will then give you 
protection and friendship. Till then, I myself will feel 
honoured in defending you from the insults of your 
friends and the machinations of your enemies.
          (Exeunt.



SCENE 2. A room in MRS. GALL'S house.

          (Enter GALL and RINGFINGER.

RING. Now, old lady,what d'ye think of matters? Didn't 
you dream all last night of penitentiaries? or was you 
fancying all the while that Benwas cutting your throat?

GALL. Vex me not, rogue; I am ruined.

RING. And what's that to Ben? He is ruined himself, he 
says. Gadswogs! to take on so after a scornful little 
wench, that's too cunning for deviltry, though a devil, 
mother Gall, was her teacher! A little piece of bread 
and butter! a gingerbread! I never thought him such a 
fool. I could pick him a dozen as handsome, and ten 
times more loving out of any state prison.

GALL. He threatens me too; and he knows 'twas all his 
own fault. He told her, I was not her mother; that's my 
fault too, I suppose; and 'twas my fault that he was so 
beastly drunk.

RING. . Old lady, that's another weakness of Benjamin's; 
he will be sewed up at times. Now, for all of his wit, I 
have more wisdom: He that would be a successful rascal, 
should meddle neither with women nor strong drink, for 
they sooner or later, one or the other, betray
him to the gallows or the penitentiary.—Who's that?  t-
(Enter RAVIN.

RAV. Well, beldam, have you got her yet?

RING. 'Swags! don't scare the old fool. You'll have her 
in a fit, if you look so wickedly on her. you know she 
hasn't got her; and as it isn't likely that you will 
ever see her again, I'll advise you think no more about 
her, but attend a little more to the domestics; the 
manufactory suffers.

RAV. If she does not put her in my power again, I will 
have her hanged; and you, if you will not lose my 
assistance and countenance forever, you must aid her.

RING. As for your assistance, I could do pretty well 
without it; and as for your countenance, if it is no 
sweeter than at present, I would rather be smiled on by 
a crab-apple. But as I am naturally disposed to 
kindness, and a moderate degree of mischief, so there is 
be nothing penitentiarical in it, have at you with all  
my heart.

RAV. Roslin will be from home this evening; all the 
servants are in the country with his mother, except a 
little knave of a boy, who is said to be desperate 
cunning.

RING. Then it's no great matter after all.

RAV. Get her for me, and you will both be the better for 
it as long as you live. Be prudent, and successful.
          (Exeunt.



SCENE 3. She street before ROSLIN'S door.
(Enter from the house, ROSLIN and NATHAN.

NATH. And so I am to be housekeeper? I think any old 
woman would do better. And to keep watch over the pretty 
young lady? I think any old woman would do that better 
too.

ROS. You shall have an old woman to take the labour off 
your hands tomorrow,—tonight, if one can be obtained. 
Admit no one till I return.     (Exit.

NATH. I suppose he is gone to see if he can find some 
other pretty damsel to bring home with him; he seems 
fond of them—so am I; and for all of his grum talk about 
oysters, and his oyster-like face, I will walk up 
stairs, and see whether this handsome stranger be fond 
of laughing or not    (Exit, and

          (Enter immediately GALL, and RINGFINGER 
disguised.

RING. Halt, you old fool. you are in the public streets; 
and Wisdom says, Be wise in the streets, if you are a 
fool in your chamber.—If there be any one stirring, be 
as quiet as a mouse; but when everything else is as 
quiet as a mouse, be you stirring.  The coast is clear: 
ring.

GALL. Stand aside, and be ready. Gag him with your 
handkerchief.

RING. Be sure you ask whether Roslin be at home: It 
would be but a scurvy job to walk into the parlour, — 
and find him eating his supper.

GALL. I warrant you. Be ready. (Re-enter NATHAN.)  Is 
Mr. Roslin at home? 

NATH. No, old lady. 

GALL. I want to see him on business of importance. When 
will he return?

NATH. Sometime betwixt this and doomsday. Call to- 
morrow. Night's no time for an old woman to call on a 
young man: 'twill spoil her character.

RING. By your leave, monkey, business must be settled  
tonight.

NATH. Let go of me, you ugly raggamuffin. Help! spur—

RING. Push in, old damsel. We must lock up this 
paroquet. It goes prosperously. (Exeunt.
        (Enter TOM TAFFRAIL.

TOM. Shiver my timbers! but this here town is as dull as 
a watch under moorings. And I never sail into a dull 
harbour, but I think of a dull song, which is about as 
good for a serenade as any that these caterwauling 
dandies sing under their sweethearts' windows.
   (Sings.)
       Oh Kitty Kid,
         Hilloa ho!
       Poor soul, she's dead,
         Hilloa ho!
    Have ever ye heern the tale or no?
    If not, give ear, hilloa ho!  


    Sweet Kitty Kid, she was beloved
      By cruel Bobby Bullet,
    Who one day pulled his jackknife out,
      And stuck it in her gullet.
    And then he took her body up,
      And hove her in the river,
    The nasty mud to be her bed,
      The noisy wave her kiver.
         Poor Kitty Kid, Etc.

    One night as he sat in the chains,
      The waves they made a clatter,
    A grim white ghost raised up her head,
      And walked upon the water.
    Says she, I once was Kitty Kid,
      Now Kitty Kid's ghost am I;
    I loved you once, you cruel man,
      But now I'll drown you, dammee.
         Poor Kitty Kid, Etc.

    Have mercy, Kitty Kid, said he,
      For your death I am sorry.
    You killed me, wretch! said Kitty Kid,
      When I implored to marry.
    And you shall marry me yet, said she;
      To marry is your doom, man:
    The salt sea wave shall be your bed,
      The whale shall be your groomsman.
        Poor Kitty Kid, Etc.


    Hold fast, my merry mates all, said he;
      Heave ahead, you fool! said Kitty.
    She means to murder me, said Bob;
      Said they, the more's the pity.
    She twisted her fingers round his neck,
      And overboard him she carried,
    And as they sank, cried, Sailors all,
      Bear witness, I am married!
         Poor Kitty Kid, Etc.

NATHAN. (At a window.) Hist there!

TOM. Hilloa ho!

NATH. Catch me.

TOM. Come down then. I've no harpoon to fetch you out of 
a window.

NATH. Catch me in your arms, if you have any; if not, 
catch me on your legs, shoulders, head, or some part of 
your body, that I mayn't crush like a squash on the 
pavement.

TOM. Let go your fast, and take care not to poke any of 
your spider legs into my eyes.

NATH. Catch me—now! (He springs down, and TOM catches 
him in his arms.) Are you honest?

TOM. Ask the captain; he's got all down in the logbook. 
Now, flying fish, what was the 'casion of that 'ere 
dive?

NATH. There's robbers in the house, and nobody at home 
but a woman. They locked me up, but the fools


forgot the windows. Will you go up, and take 'em?

TOM. How many strong do they muster?

NATH. Two,—a man and a woman.

TOM. Do they carry popguns or small-arms? or it's no 
matter: if they carry small arms, I carry big ones, and 
here's for action.

NATH. They've locked the door. I'll carry you in
through the garden. Follow—softly.  (Exeunt.


SCENE 4. A room in ROSLIN'S house
     (Enter RINGFINGER and GALL.

RING. Bravely done! but tread softly, and despatch.

GALL. Hist! that is her voice: she is singing. 'Twas my 
money taught her that; and I am likely to be repaid with 
a workhouse.

RING. Hold your tongue, and think how Ben will pay you, 
if you miss this chance.—Hush!

EMMA. (Within.) Who is there?

RING. There now! Beware, and despatch. I'll stand here 
ready.
(Enter EMMA.

EM. I surely heard voices—. Who is this? Oh heaven!
  What do you here?

GALL.           Be silent—. oh my daughter!
  I will not harm you.

EM.               Keep from me, thou wretch!
  I am not thy daughter, I thank heaven I am not.


GALL. You are, you are. What madness thus deludes 
you?
You are my child, my only child, my own.
Why did you leave me, and thus throw yourself
Upon the mercy of strangers?

EM. And why did you, that call yourself my mother,
Expose and sell me to that beast, that Ravin?
Begone, begone!

GALL.        'Tis false; I did not sell you.
'Twas but the prating of a drunken man.
'Twas wine that made him rude,—a drunken madness—

EM.    And wine it was
That forced the blessed story from his lips
That you were not my mother, but a wretch,
Perhaps, that stole me from my honest parents
For wicked ends. Woman, who are my parents?
Tell me, and I'll forgive your former cruelty,
Your sinful practices against my honour:
They shall not punish you: If they be rich,
They will reward you with their gold; if poor,
With a large recompense of prayers and blessings.

GALL. She is mad, stark mad! Oh that it should come to 
this!

EM. I am not mad; but often I have thought
That madness had been bliss, since it had kept me
From knowledge of the wretch I deemed my mother.

GALL. I have been hard with you, I own with shame;
  But 'twas the common peevishness of age.
  Come back with me, and fear my wrath no more.

EM. I will not; no. Why should I? I've no claim
  Upon your kindness; (I meet kindness here:)
  And if I had, I fear your treachery.
  Here I am safe.

GALL.        Wilful and froward girl!
  The world will find your stay another cause:
  A brave, fine youth, a sweet-lipped libertine,
  A friend, a keeper! Think of that, poor girl.

EM. Your slanders cannot shake my confidence;
  And if I leave this house, I seek not yours.

GALL . Obstinate fool! Will you be dragged from 
hence?
  You are my child, and my authority,
  Sanctioned by law, shall make you mine again.

EM. And there is law for my protection too;
  Law, since you speak of it, that will enforce
  The secret of my birth from you, and punish
  Your practices upon me.

GALL. You speak well
  And boldly, fool. Here is my law at present:
  Seize her.

EM.      Help! help.

GALL. The bandage on her mouth.
          (Enter NATHAN and TOM TAFFRAIL.

RING. I'd rather put my lips there, for it is a damned 
pretty one.

TOM. And yours is a damned ugly one, thief!

NATH- Knock him down—Hurra!

RING. Oh lord!

TOM. Peace, you porpoise, while I belay your elbows 
abaft with this here bit of logline.

RING. O gadswogs! am I caught at last!

TOM. Gadswogs! That's a word never came from a Christian 
dictionary.—Stop the old damsel there.

NATH. Stop, you old thief! She is as strong as a 
bulldog. Hurra! here comes relief!
(Enter ROSLIN.

ROS. How now! what's this? who are these?

EM. Oh sir, that is the woman calls me daughter. She, 
with that villain, would have forced me off; But this 
brave man, (I know not who he is,) And this good boy—.

TOM. Lie still, you gadswogs fool! till I finish the 
job, and consider yourself under arrest.

ROS. A thousand thanks, my brave and honest friend.

TOM. If you be the captain of the watch, or the landlord 
of this here house, I can certify this knave to be a 
pirate; for he has run a black paint over his phys'nomy, 
like an unlawful cruiser: and it's my notion that he be 
sopped in the nearest horsepond, which will wash his 
face, and show a body what name he sails under.

ROS. Will you help secure them?—I wish to keep them in 
this house awhile. Nathan, show the way. Separate them.

NATH. Humph! I suppose I am to be made jailor too! —Get 
along, you sneaking rapscallion! Who's gagged now, you 
rascal? I am half minded to kick you.

(Exeunt NATHAN, TOM, GALL, and RING.

EM. Sir, I can never sufficiently show my gratitude for 
your kindness and protection. But, if you would bind me 
more than ever, now, while that unhappy woman is in your 
power, oblige her to tell me of my parents.

ROS. Be assured of my endeavours. Did you know her 
accomplice?

EM. I did; I knew his voice. I have seen him a thousand 
times, and have reason to think him a brother, or some 
near connection of Mr. Ravin.

ROS. Ha! then the scheme is evident. If I should take 
advantage of the villain, it would be laid to cowardice.  
He must escape. But the woman?

EM. Sir!—

ROS. Be assured I will omit nothing that may be 
serviceable. But it may not be long in my power to 
befriend
you. I must shortly leave the city: my return is 
uncertain.

EM. Leave the city!

ROS. It is unavoidable. I may not be able to unravel the 
secret of your birth before I go.—(Aside.) It shall be 
told me by that villain, Ravin, or I shall not live to 
hear it from another.

EM. Return uncertain!

ROS. I would not leave you friendless to the world, and 
exposed to the machinations of ruffians. I shall depute 
some proper persons to befriend you: but lest they 
should not be as zealous as myself,—take these bills.  
They will secure you advice and assistance of lawyers; 
they will buy you friends; they will secure you from 
want.

EM. That I am friendless and unfortunate,
  Exposed to danger and to contumely,
  It is heaven's will, and I should not repine.
  My grief is deeper than misfortune brings:
  I bear an odious and suspected name;
  Which gives to calumny the show of truth,,
  Excuses those who hate me, and constrains
  The kinder to desert me and forget me.
  I did delude myself (for I am yet
  Foolish and ignorant) that all would not
  Misdoubt me, or, like many, misinterpret
  My wrongs and sorrows to make crimes of them:
  I was deceived.—I thank you, much I thank you
  For that you have done, for that you would have 
done.
  Your gold I need not.

ROS.              By my soul, you wrong me.
  I think, I know, ye innocent and blameless.
  Fair fountains bubble from the foullest fens;
  And though the source ye come from be most foul,
  The offspring is most pure: if it be not,
  There is more shrewd hypocrisy upon
  Your face, your accents, and within your eyes,
  Than ever decked Iscariot's countenance.
  Shrink not from me: If this discourse be strange,
  Make it not, by mistaking it, offensive.
  There was a time,—your friends were many then;
  You held me such:—and when detraction turned
  Their love to scorn, I grieved, but could not hate.

EM. I am sure
  You would not mock me; but these words do not
  Become your kindness.

ROS.               Let me show my kindness:
  It may be for the last time I shall see you.
  Take these and be removed from danger.

EM. You shall not need to leave your dwelling, sir;
  I will not trouble you more.

ROS.                   Mistaken again.
  It is your presence makes the house a heaven.
  Hear it; hear me confess myself.
  Foolish or mad. Unknown, mysterious,
  Slandered, suspected though ye be, I love ye;
  If ye be innocent, as I swear ye are,
  Will marry you; if not, I had rather I
  Had ta'en a viper to my heart, than e'er
  Have seen you.

EM.          Shame not a shining reputation
  By words like these. Think of me as I am,
  Base, lowly, needy.

ROS.         Lowly and needy be it, but not base.
  Think of ye as ye are? I do, I do;
  Ye are a gem, drawn from a worthless soil,
  Which your rich lustre makes invaluable;
  An ingot of heaven's pure ore, innocence,
  Tried in the furnace of men's evil thoughts,
  And still most pure and heavenly: Were ye not,
  'Tis not the enchantment of external charms
  Could move me to this wildness.

EM. This is a folly, sir, unworthy of you.
  If for your mirth you speak thus, 'tis not well
  Nor generous; if serious, I must weep
  That I'm the unhappy cause. Sir, drive me forth
  From this asylum. There may some be found
To shelter me, and rid you of a burden. (Exit.

ROS. I have heard
  Of witchcraft that has rational things transformed
  To beasts and reptiles; of charms that make men 
love,
  And clothe some horrible deformity
  In angel's shape, which they fall down and 
worship.
  I have lost the reason which once guided me,
  The pride that made me delicate of honour;
  And, like the fool, that, moved with its bright 
colours,
  Drew forth a venomous serpent from its den,
  And laid the glittering monster on his breast,
  Would take this strange sweet creature to my 
bosom,
  Perhaps to sting, to torture, and destroy me. (Exit.


SCENE 1. A room in a tavern.

(Enter RALEIGH, SR. and O'SLASH.

RAL.SR. We are now, O'Slash, in the very town that
witnesses the young rake-hell's extravagance; we shall
be eye-witnesses, incog., of his vagabond tricks. I
warrant me, he leaves sore noses and heavy pockets
wherever he goes; for the boy is as free with his 
fingers
as his money.

O'SL. Faith, your honour, but I think the child is a
man, and considers himself as well qualified to take
care of himself as another, though that other be his
father.

RAL. SR. He is a fool, and you are another. Ever since
his little sister was drowned, rest her soul! I have 
resolved that Ned, my only child sha'n't be lost for 
want
of overlooking. Look you, O'Slash, he played the very
devil at college, for all 'twas in a Yankee land. The
wenches went mad for him.

O'SL. Then he did but follow after the steps of his
father; and I have heard the wenches went mad for
him.

RAL.SR. Fy! thou naturalized ass! Count not to me the
sins of my youth.

O'SL. Had your honour but bestowed half this 
watchfulness upon Mr. Benjamin Garket, the beast!


RAL.SR. If I had, O'Slash, I should before this have
had the satisfaction of seeing him hanged on the
highest tree in Virginia. I live in hopes of him yet;
for a more presumptuous, impudent, extravagant and
ungrateful rascal I have never set eyes on. Well, what
do you want, young man?
(Enter a waiter.

WAIT. Letters for you, sir, if you are Mr. Raleigh of
Virginia.                          (Exit.

RAL.SR. Who told him that?

O'SL. The nagurs doubtless.

RAL.SR. I desired to travel incog., sirrah.

O'SL. With sax nagurs in black and red uniform, dear?
That was to vain-glory over the p'aceable quakers,
and the 'mancipation societies.

RAL.SR. Humph. My friend—postmaster—hearing from
your servant—in town—doing a service—honour of calling.
Very much obliged. A letter enclosed.—Don't know
the hand—humph. (Reads.) Dear Sir: A person whom 1
have great reason to suspect is—The devil!

O'SL. He doesn't say so, honey? the devil?

RAL.SR. Benjamin Garket!—

O'SL. Och! only his oldest son. News of him, honey?

RAL.SR. Has been at my house; where he had the insolence
to assume your name—oh Lord! and make pretensions to
my daughter. A suitable messenger by calling at my house
will receive directions where to find him. Jonathan 
Headstrong. What do you think of that?


O'SL. Luck! luck! Didn't I say it? didn't I swear it? I
knew he never crossed the seas. Come away, honey,
and let's take him.

RAL.SR. A vulgar saw says, Never count your chickens
before they are hatched.—Caution, caution.

O'SL. That for caution, jewel. He's no chicken, but a
full fledged fox; and your cautions, and traps, and
t'other things are no more to him nor bread and butter
and praties. Take him by vi et arms and legs; and
when we've catched him,—

RAL.SR. We'll hang him.

(Exeunt.

SCENE 2. A room in GALL'S house.
(Enter RAVIN.

RAV. They are not yet returned. If they should fail, if
they should be detected my ruin is sure. Neither of
them can I trust. The old beldam hates me, and would
as gladly see me hanged as the girl violated; and my
brother is faithful, not from love, but necessity: make 
it
his interest, and he would as soon barter away my life
as a dog's.—Relationship in villany makes men forgetful 
of relationship in blood.—Ha! who comes there?
(Enter RINGFINGER.

RING. A fox, but without a scent; or if the hounds
follow, they give no cry. Come, leg-bail's the word,
and damn all penitentiaries.

RAV. Where's the hag? where's Emma? Have ye no—


RING. No: spare your breath,—you'll want it for running. 
All's blown; old Gall's a prisoner, locked up in
Roslin's house till tomorrow, when they'll have her
before a squire. They locked me too, but I cut their
acquaintance, for I disliked it damnably. Come, douse
kitt, and run. We'll have the bull-dogs here in a 
twinkling, head ratcatchers and all. Come, why don't you
stir?

RAV. Why look ye, Jack, I have some designs to 
accomplish; and I am so bent upon them, that if the
very devil, with a halter in one hand and a branding-
iron in the other, stood in my way, I would not move.
I have never before taken leave of a friend without
giving him some reason to lament my departure; and,
though fortune frowns on me, I will not do it now. I
loved that girl, Jack,—better, better than my own
soul; and if it had been my fortune to have known
her sooner, I might not have been the knave and outcast 
I am. I never thought I was bloodthirsty before;
but men do not know themselves till they have gone
a course through all the passions and watched the
effect of each upon their souls.

RING. You don't mean to stay and fight Roslin?

RAV. Don't I? Damn him.—He has snatched from me
an angel, that was breathing compunction and virtue
over my heart. I knew not her value, when I thought
her completely in my power; I thought I prized her
for her wealth: I deceived myself. I will stay. To-


morrow the meeting takes place; and tomorrow I will
be revenged.

RING. You will be blown before tomorrow. Decamp's
the word.

RAV. I am easy; I fear nothing,—neither should you.
Gall, for her own sake, will be silent; and she knows
nothing of the Domestics. I will impart to you the
secret of the girl's birth. If I am killed, or 
imprisoned,
you may sell the secret; her father will pay well for 
it.
But now, Jack, do you honestly think I may take you
to the field as my surgeon? have you skill enough to
lug a bullet out of a man's flesh?

RING. Why not? You know I was to be made a doctor. I
have heard professors talk learnedly in a lecture room
a whole winter through, have caricatured them on the
wall, and lampooned them in my note-book, and am
therefore as well prepared to look on death as doctors
in general. But I am afraid to stay; I am afraid of
this young Raleigh.

RAV. Fear nothing. If you do, keep close till the 
morning, and look over my pistols.

RING. Where are you going to night?

RAV. To Headstrong's. Don't shake your head. I want
amusement, action! I have roused an adventurous
devil in me, and must put myself in the way of mischief.

RING. You have no hopes there; and if you had, matrimony 
takes time. Diana—


RAV. Damn Diana. I always hated her extremely; and
ever since she fell in love with young Raleigh, I abhor
her. I must be even with the bitter fool, and laugh at
her. And I must be even with her cousin too:—Come,
let's look over my pistols.             (Exeunt.

SCENE 3. A room in ROSLIN'S house.
(Enter ROSLIN and EMMA.

EM. Sir, cannot the law make her speak?

ROS. The law! She still obstinately persists that you 
are
her child; and you have no counter evidence, except
that of a natural abhorrence not apt to exist in a child
against a parent; and, I fear me, the law would consider 
that so slight an argument, as that you should
be put into her hands again.

EM. Never, sir. Mr. Ravin,—can he not—

ROS. Mr. Ravin is interested in her claims; and can
readily excuse any apparent hints he may have thrown
out, under the plea of intoxication. Much evil might
result from carrying her before a magistrate. I will
detain her till the morrow, and then put the 
investigation into other hands; for tomorrow I—I leave
town. I have in my hand a communication to my beloved 
mother, which will secure you her assistance
and protection.

EM. I have no power to thank you. I hope you will soon
return.


ROS. That is doubtful; it rests with yourself.

EM. With me!

ROS. With you. It rests with yourself whether you will
secure a friend more zealous and serviceable than 
another can be. I am rich, and as powerful as wealth can
make a man. I love you, and by honourable marriage,
would afford you honourable protection.

EM. And I am poor, without either friends or interest;
and yet I would not for the world take advantage of
the delusion, the mistaken generosity of any one. I
am proud too, and will not give occasion to say that I
suffered a suspected name to be matched with honour,
or sought to bury my disgrace in an ambitious connexion.

(Exit.

ROS. Noble-hearted girl! Every word she says makes
me more her slave; and the more I love her, the more
I hate the villain that would have wronged her.
(Enter HEADSTRONG.

HEAD. Good evening, nephew.

ROS. My dear uncle, I am glad to see you, very glad.
How does my fair cousin? I hear she is as much
besieged with lovers, as a vacant sheriffship with 
candidates. How is it?

HEAD. Truly there is no lack of admirers, when a
woman's pocket is as well furnished as her face. But
tell me, nephew: there is one, a prepossesing, impudent 
rogue, that calls himself Edward Raleigh of
Virginia, whom I have reason to suppose an impostor.


ROS. And you come to me for his character? Poor Ned!
Sir, be he impostor or not, he is my very particular
friend, was my chum at Hartford, comes to see me
everyday, and has told me all about the affair of your
suspicions from beginning to end.

HEAD. He told you? Why how did he know?

ROS. By witchcraft, I suppose. Come, uncle, you have
been grossly gulled, to say the least of it.

HEAD. I begin to feel I have. Yet what could make Mr.
Ravin suspicious?

ROS. Honesty, sir, honesty—a desire to do you a service, 
even at the peril of his own neck; for I promise
you, Raleigh is a hot-headed fellow.

HEAD. I perceive we were both very foolish; and I—
I have written to his father hinting that Garket may
be found in Philadelphia,—and I suppose we shall
have the old gentleman come roaring up here like a
hurricane! What an ass I shall appear in his eyes!

ROS. I hope the old gentleman may come, and conclude 
matters at once; for, to speak seriously, uncle,
I know no one I would sooner select as a husband for
Diana than Ned Raleigh.

HEAD. And I know no one whose recommendation
I would have sooner taken, a month ago, than my
sister's son's.

ROS. A month ago! What, uncle, won't my word wear
a month?

HEAD. As we never heed a thief's recommendation of



an honest man, so we never value a libertine's praise
of a lover.

ROS. A libertine! Faith, uncle, I believe some one has
been as free with my character as with Raleigh's.

HEAD. I am not apt to be meddlesome in the frolics of
young men; but, as the brother of your mother, young
man, I must say, I think it exceedingly improper in
you to bring a mistress into your mother's house.

ROS. Furies! old man, you know not what you say. A
mistress! ha, ha! You are merry, uncle.

HEAD. I am serious, sir.

ROS. Then, sir, seriously let me advise you to beware
how you repeat all the lying slanders you hear of
people you don't know.

HEAD. I hope it is slander with all my heart.

ROS. Sir, it is; you shall soon be convinced of it. Do
me the favour to take charge of these papers. They
have reference to the object of your suspicions.—I go
out of town tomorrow. If I should not return before
my mother arrives, give her this, and read the other,
which is meant for yourself, in her presence. They will
serve, among other purposes, to convince her as well
as every one else, that this mistress is as pure in body
and soul as your own daughter.

HEAD. I am obliged to you for the comparison, and
hope, for your sake, as well as my daughter's, that
the object of my suspicions may turn out to be some
travelling angel.             (Exit.


ROS. And this is the lot which I have chosen for myself, 
to adore that which every one else thinks worthy
to be despised! But it does not weaken my passion.
Slanders upon those we love may grieve our souls,
but they cannot lessen our affection.     (Exit.


SCENE 4. A room in GALL'S house.

     (Enter RAVIN and RINGFINGER.

RING. Old Gall, you say, a Yankee?

RAV. Ay; she was a strapping serving lass at the 
boarding-school where I was educated, from which she was
dismissed for loose behaviour. She went South, 
ingratiated herself with the old fellow, and was in his
employ when she and the infant suddenly vanished.
—These rags are not half greased.

RING. Well, and what then?

RAV. It was supposed they were drowned, some of their
garments being found on the river. Six months ago
I recognized the redoubtable devil in the person of a
modest matron, who kept a house for the entertainment of 
loving strangers. I terrified her into compliance with 
my plans; made her withdraw Emma from
the boarding-school where she had been bred, and
retire with her to this house; where she has remained
ever since, the humblest though not the faithfullest
of slaves.

RING. The old devil! and do you know why she stole
the girl, and why she was educating her?


ROS. Perfectly well. I thwarted her in that, for which
I deserve to be praised; but I thwarted myself in my
own designs, for which I deserve to be hanged.

RING. 'Twas all of brandy, Ben, I have told you a
hundred times, professors of our calling should beware
of strong drink and women. They always betray us:
a man in love will make a confidant of his mistress;
and a man in liquor will make a confidant of any body.

RAV. Damn your aphorisms. Here, put these bullets
away. I will hit the fellow on the forehead, and try
whether his brain's as easily fuddled as my own. And
now for Diana.                      (Exit.

RING. If he wasn't so susceptible to the tender passion,
he would make the most perfect man of business in
the world. This week he has done nothing, and the
business suffers,—a business too that's as profitable
as the building of Greek frigates, and quite as honest.
Well, I'll try my luck with some of the New Twenties.
People catch at 'em, and the fools haven't even 
advertised the plate.

(Exit.

SCENE 5. A room in ROSLIN'S house.
     (Enter NATHAN.

NATH. I can't stand it much longer. They won't laugh;
their faces grow two or three inches longer every day;
and if this kind of growing goes on much longer, we
shall soon see their chins trailing on the ground, and


their toes peeping out where their teeth ought to be.
     (Enter RALEIGH, JR.

RAL.JR. Where's your master, boy?

NATH. In my pocket. I was just asking him what fortune
wits made in this world; and he answered, Poverty
and enemies. There's his word for it.

RAL.JR. "Plays by Wm. Congreve." Sirrah, I asked you
for your master.

NATH. And Wm. Congreve is the only master I own in
the world. People say Shakespeare is the great master,
because he rouses the feelings. Now one who has been
kicked into and through the world as carelessly as
myself, has no feelings at all.—Sir, if you mean my
patron (I hate the word, for it signifies a charitable
ass that gives money to a man of genius for the 
privilege to ride straddle of his back down to 
posterity;)
if you mean Mr. Roslin, he is at home.

RAL.JR. Where?

NATH. Talking with—Bah! it like to have been out.

RAL.JR. Out with it. Talking with his—his dear friend,
the pretty damsel.

NATH. You may say that; and I can't help telling you it
is very foolish to be in love. I can see no pleasure in 
it
but the kissing; and if one is fond of that, it is 
better to
go to a looking glass, and kiss one's own face, for 
every
body likes his own face better than any body else's.

RAL.JR. Ha, ha! that's an idea! Well, does Mr. Roslin
love this girl heartily?


NATH. Sir, she has ruined him.

RAL.JR. Ruined him! How ?

NATH. She has taken away his spirits to that degree,
that the drollest thing one can say is as much lost on
him as a fine song on a Quaker, or a tailor's bill on
a dandy. When he does laugh, it sounds like a funeral
anthem sung under a tombstone; he smiles on one
side of the mouth, and grins on the other; and when
he wants to look in a good humour, he makes as many
wry faces as a crab on a gridiron, or a young lady
taking assafedity. Oh, he is so stupid! and so is Miss
Emma. They do nothing but sigh; and I hate sighing. I 
wish he would marry her, and—
(Enter ROSLIN.

RAL.JR. Marry her! ha, ha, ha! So, brother melancholy. 
This little oracle has been making free with
you, and advising what you should do with this—
this—faith, I meant this beautiful flower, this mushroom 
that has so suddenly grown out of your heart,
and being one day turned into a puffball, will, at the
slightest touch, vanish into dust and ashes.

ROS. Peace, sir; and you, sirrah, I have cautioned you
against speaking on this subject.

RAL.JR. Pr'ythee, don't scold my little Solomon: 'twas
all my fault. (Exit NATHAN.) Zooks, sir! you are as
solemn as a snapping-turtle of a cold day; your face
is as awfully expressive as the Newgate Calendar;
methinks 'tis like an Egyptian antiquity, or a Greek


monument written over with tragical histories in love.
Methinks too I can read in it the history of Paris, that
unhappy fool, who, with the choice of any woman
in the world, contented himself with a woman no
better than she should be. Do you know any such
modern couple? any infatuated gentleman that has
preferred a—

ROS. Hark you, Ned; you are welcome to vent your
wit upon me; spend it lavishly, and if I cannot take
it humourously, I will at least bear it patiently. But
I cannot suffer sneers to be directed against a being,
who has no crimes but her misfortunes, no errors but
her griefs.

RAL.JR. Fiddlesticks! the bawd's daughter! Will you
let me see her? I have an admirable knack at smelling
out female hypocrisy. I was always fond of the sex,
and like the gallants of the day, feel myself wiser in
their company than in men's.

ROS. In one word, sir, I will put a stop to your 
sarcasms. This woman is not this girl's parent.

RAL.JR. Who told you so?

ROS. She herself.

RAL.JR. Ha, ha, ha! and are you the ass to believe her?
Why she will tell you a thousand other such secrets,
if she finds them agreeable to you. she will tell you,
she is of noble descent perhaps, irregularly derived
from his wicked majesty, George IV., or perhaps from
Buonaparte; or perhaps she will go higher, and swear


she is the daughter of—Venus herself! and fond of
her mother's occupation! Pray let me see her: I will
so rattle common sense into her ears.

ROS. Sir, if you would avoid giving me mortal offense,
say not a word more of her. Speak to me of tomorrow.

RAL.JR. Tomorrow! 'sblood! what a spectacle for 
tomorrow! Two merchants fighting for the possession
of a pearl with so big a flaw in it, 'tisn't half so
valuable as the rotten oyster that yielded it; two dogs
quarreling for a bone fit to turn a well bred stomach.
If you had but some decent thing to fight about! Sir,
I sometimes hope you may be killed tomorrow; it
would be an early end to a disgraceful passion.

ROS. And, sir, I would rather have your wish 
accomplished than hear more of this conversation.

RAL.JR. Well, well—what I have said was the duty of
a friend and an honest man. I came to see how your
spirits were disposed for the rencounter, and to bid
you hold yourself in readiness early in the morning.

ROS. I have completed my arrangements.

RAL.JR. I met old Headstrong near your door. He
apologized,—invited me to his house this evening,
and I want you to go along. Civility or affection 
demands a parting.

ROS. I am engaged for the evening.

RAL.JR. Humph! with this little she devil again! 
Goodbye.—of all the fools in this world, a woman's fool
is the most lamentable and ridiculous! (Exeunt.


SCENE 6. A room in HEADSTRONG S house. (Enter RAVIN and 
a servant.

SERV. Miss Headstrong will wait upon you in a moment, 
sir.
                          (Exit.

RAV. So! had the fates spared me but another week before 
this cussed cousin of mine made his appearance, I 
shouldn't have been left to kick my heels together, 
while the mistress of the mansion was preparing for her 
levee.—If I didn't know that Roslin was both a brave and 
an honourable fool, I should fear his story of Emma and 
that infernal cogniac had undermined me more than even 
Raleigh's impudence and good looks. But be it as it may, 
I will have one more snap-and-snarl with her; faith! but 
I will take infinite pleasure in quizzing her, till she 
grows as testy, and sputters as much as a green hickory 
log on a hot fire. —My dear Miss Headstrong!
                (Enter DIANA.

DIAN. Be seated, sir.

RAV. Humph! as embarrassed as the beginning of a love 
scene, and as dignified as the first paragraph of a 
sermon.—It is long, Miss Diana, since I have enjoyed the 
pleasure of your company alone.

DIAN. You should not have enjoyed it at this time, sir, 
but that I meant it for the last, and desired to express 
my contempt of your unhandsome behaviour.

RAV. Unhandsome behaviour, madam! You surprise me!


DIAN. Was it manly, sir, to take advantage of my
father's credulity, and make him behave uncivilly
and ungratefully to the preserver of his daughter?

RAV. (Aside.) Well, my arm wasn't hurt, that's a 
comfort!—Have a care, madam, that your concern in this
case does not spring rather from regard to the preserver 
than the father. Express it thus: Was it not
unmanly in Mr. Ravin to have me deprived of the
pleasure of Mr. Raleigh's company?

DIAN. And if that be part of my meaning, sir, as I
freely confess it was,—does that make your conduct
more excusable?

RAV. Most certainly: Jealousy makes fools and scoundrels 
of us all; and it is wonderful what silly and
scandalous tricks lovers will make use of to rid 
themselves of a rival.—Madam, let me be serious. There
was a time when I flattered myself my attentions were
not indifferent to you; and that your father's 
approbation found no opposition in yourself.

DIAN. There was a time, sir, when my father's 
approbation of any one was a sufficient passport to my
esteem.

RAV. I deceived myself with the hope that I was received 
upon a better footing than that of esteem.

DIAN. The deception then was the more pardonable
since it originated with yourself. I esteemed and 
received you as a gentleman and my father's friend;
and was satisfied with your attentions because there


was nothing in them either hateful or improper. With
greater intimacy than this I am not able to tax my
memory.

RAV. Your memory, I fear, is in this case subservient
to your inclination. Be candid, madam, and tell me
that this upstart Virginian has effected a change in
your heart; tell me this, madam, that I may be able
to record in the chronicles of female levity, one more
proof of inconstancy.

DIAN. If it be a proof of levity or inconstancy to 
prefer
an open and noble spirit to a cunning and slanderous
one, my confession is at your service: do with it as
you will.

RAV. You add insult to injury. But I have the means
of redress; let your minion beware me.

DIAN. And, sir, do you beware of him! and thank me
that he has not already devised a proper reward for
your insolence.

RAV. Insolence, madam! Ha, ha! does he regard my 
suspicions as insolent, and excuse himself from 
rewarding them under the fear of his lady's displeasure?  
Why this is excellent! henceforth, let a lover play the 
coward, his mistress will smile upon him for the 
compliment!

DIAN. Be assured, sir, that I repent very heartily of my 
interference, and in all future differences will suffer
Mr. Raleigh to take his own course.       (Exit.

RAV. Ha, ha! Now will she request the lad to horsewhip 
me, there's no doubt of it! Faith, her anger has
put me into a good humour.

(Enter HEADSTRONG.

HEAD. Good evening, Mr. Ravin, I am glad to see you.

RAV. Your servant. Upon my soul, Mr. Headstrong, this 
fellow has run away with Diana's heart and soul, and if 
you don't lock her up, he'll run away with her body too. 
She has been scolding me scurvily, and commending the 
scoundrel to my Face.

HEAD. Which scoundrel, sir?

RAV. Which! why this knave that calls himself Edward 
Raleigh, son—

HEAD. He is neither knave nor scoundrel, sir, as I am
well informed, but precisely the man he calls himself;
and I begin to feel that we have played the fool 
pitifullv.

RAV. Humph!

HEAD. What, in the name of all that's rational, put
such a conceit into your head?

RAV. Faith, I hardly know. Notions sometimes get into
men's heads, like frogs into limestone rocks and beetles
into oak trees; philosophy can't tell how nor why.—I
was curious to hear something of his famous cousin,
Garket the swindler: he himself is the cause of what
followed, for if he hadn't fallen into such a rage, and
decamped so suspiciously, I shouldn't have been so sure 
of it.

HEAD. You must beg his pardon: you have wronged him.

RAV. He has wronged me; he has robbed me of your 
daughter's affections. Before he came with his impudent 
round face and long rattling tongue, I had every
reason in the world to suppose she returned my passion; 
and to night she railed at me like a dog. Sir, I
would rather have a beating than such a scolding,
and especially for the sake of such a doubtful fellow.

HEAD. I tell you, sir, there is nothing doubtful about
Mr. Raleigh. He is an old friend of my nephew Roslin,
who has satisfied me of his character.

RAV. (Aside.) This Roslin is my evil genius; he crosses
me every way: But tomorrow settles all.—Sir, I am
happy to hear the gentleman is a gentleman; for I
should hate to be supplanted in your daughter's 
affections by a lowbred fellow.

HEAD. My daughter is in no danger of falling in love
with a lowbred fellow; and if she has an inclination
for Mr. Raleigh, I hope your philosophy will cure
your disappointment.

RAV. I hope it will.—The wind changes, and so does
man's good will.

HEAD. Look you, Mr. Ravin, nothing would have
pleased me better than to see you the husband of my
daughter; but I am not, in cool moments, the man
to adopt violence when persuasion fails, and to make
my own gratification the cause of my child's misery.
She loves you not. she is too high-spirited to be 
forced, and I love her too well to tyrannise.

RAV. Well, sir, I have only to thank you for your many
favours, and to take my leave. Tomorrow I return to
New England.

HEAD. I hope not so soon. I wish you would stay, and,
as a friend, advise with me in the case of young Mr.
Raleigh. I expect his father will be in town shortly.

RAV. Ha! his father!

HEAD. I was so foolish as to write to him about this
affair, and—

RAV. Curse the old fool! Nearly caught in my own trap!
I must be off.—Sir, it was very foolish. I cautioned
you to leave that matter to me. It was ridiculous.

HEAD. Ridiculous!

RAV. Very.—Unlucky ass that I am, the town's becoming 
too hot to hold me.—Farewell, sir.

HEAD. Nay, let us not part in anger. You will come
once more to see us.

          (Enter a servant.

SERV. Mr. Raleigh, sir.

          (Enter RALEIGH, JR.

RAV. Death and hell!—oh! 'tis only the cub!

HEAD. Lord, now these two wasps will be at loggerheads. 
Call Miss Headstrong hither. (Exit servant.)
Mr. Raleigh, I—

RAL.JR. Sir, I have suffered another man to step before 
me; but be assured, I will have a word to say to you in 
time.

RAV. At your service, sir.     (Exit.

HEAD. Mr. Raleigh, I must ask your pardon again—

RAL.JR. Let it be forgotten. Here comes one who has
already banished all resentment from my mind.
          (Enter DIANA.

HEAD. And here comes—Ha! who is this old gentleman?
          (Enter RALEIGH. SR. and O'SLASH.

RAL.JR. By all that's wonderful, that's pop! Father,
your blessing; and, in the name of heaven, what are
you doing in Philadelphia?—And Mr. O'Slash too!

RAL. SR. I came here to follow you incog, you rogue.
I have heard of your doings, sirrah, your harum-scarum, 
rake-helly doings. Old gentleman, this is my
son, Ned, and as proper a son as was ever begotten.

HEAD. If you are his father, sir, I hope, from your
present appearance in Philadelphia, that you did not
receive a foolish letter I sent you yesterday.

RAL. SR. But I did though; and I have come to find
the self same rogue you spoke of.

HEAD. Sir, affairs have changed wonderfully since I
wrote that silly letter. That, however, is the man
suspected.

RAL. SR. What that? Why that's my son, Ned; and I'll
cane any man that says he has the least resemblance
to Benjamin Garket, the Yankee.

DIAN. The Yankee! I thought he was a Southron.

RAL.JR. Father, the delusion is now over. Your hopeful
nephew is doubtless in Great Britain or Botany Bay
by this time; and you have just come in time to bid
me marry this young lady.

RAL.SR. Faith, Ned, she is pretty,—just what your
sister would have been—but she's drowned!

RAL.JR. Sir, you should not think of that unhappy
accident; it makes you melancholy.

RAL.SR. I never was melancholy in my life, puppy;
nor ever will be till I find Garket has escaped. Old
gentleman, what put this notion into your head?

DIAN. What kind of a looking man is Mr. Garket?

RAL.JR. That's more than I can say; I never saw him.

DIAN. Never saw him!

RAL.JR. No; he played his tricks while I was at college.

DIAN. Was he black-haired?

RAL.JR. So they say; with a sneering, impudent, rascally 
sort of a face, and a kind of raggamuffin-like
gentility about him, said to be exceedingly becoming.

HEAD. And so, sir, I am well convinced how much I
have wronged your son, and am willing to repair
every thing in a manner which I think will please
him, and I hope yourself, by giving him my daughter.

RAL.SR. What! does he like her? Matrimony, sir, is a
serious thing, and not to be ventured upon without
seeing how the parties agree: And therefore, sir, let
me ask you what you think of the Slave System?

RAL.JR. Zounds, father! you are not the parties!

HEAD. I think it a system abhorrent to the general
principles of morality and justice, and disgraceful to
the character of our country.

RAL.SR. Humph!

RAL.JR. Lord! now for a squabble! Father, I forgot
to tell you—

RAL. SR. Stand aside, puppy.—In what light do you
look upon the Tariff, Mr. Headstrong?

HEAD. As an excellent encourager and preserver of
domestic enterprise:—

RAL.JR. Confound 'em! they'll be at it! Mr. Headstrong—

HEAD. And as the surest and speediest means of creating 
the same independence in our national economy,
which already exists in our national spirit.

RAL. SR. Humph! humph! What opinion do you entertain of 
the majesty of State Rights, when put in
opposition to Congressional supremacy?

RAL.JR. Now for it! Faint, fall into a swoon, Diana.

DIAN. Admirable! Let 'em alone; they argue rarely!

HEAD. I think the majesty of State Rights a very 
ridiculous subject, of which fools of the present day
make a bone of contention, and which knaves of a
future may make the apple of discord.

RAL.SR. Ned, put on your hat.—Sir, you are an ass.
—Start, puppy!—old fellow, I thought your gray
hairs smacked of wisdom; but such ignorance, folly,
prejudice and political blasphemy, as have this moment 
come from your lips, I have never before heard
uttered by the mouth of man. I would sooner match
my son to a squaw or an alligator, than to the heir
of such heresy and folly.—Get along, Ned.

RAL.JR. Sir, if you please, I mean to stay and marry
this lady.

RAL.SR. Out, you rascal, or I'll cane you. What! marry
such political principles!

RAL.JR. And pray what have political principles to
do with my love?

RAL.SR. Out, you rebel!

RAL.JR. Sir, I'll run away with her the first 
opportunity.

DIAN. Ha, ha, ha! What a merry old gentleman! He'll
make a rare father-in-law!

HEAD. Zounds! he is mad!

RAL.SR. Political fanaticism and corruption match
with patriotism! Get along with you.

RAL.JR. Father, I don't care a fig for politics and 
patriotism. I am in love.

RAL.SR. Out of this house, and never enter it more.
(Exeunt RAL.SR., RAL.JR., and O'SLASH.

HEAD. Why!

DIAN. Ha, ha, ha! I never saw such an amusing old
gentleman; I like him exceedingly, and will give my
ten fingers for his good opinion.

HEAD. He is an old ass, a true Southern political 
madman; and till I can become a convert to his 
ridiculous doctrine of slavery and State Rights, will 
never suffer his son to come near you. I begin to repent 
we were so precipitate with Mr. Ravin.

DIAN. Mr. Ravin! I hate that man, and, what is more,
I suspect him; I suspect him to be a villain, and a very 
extraordinary one. Black-haired, a sneering, impudent—
Heavens! father, have you ever seen any of his
Yankee relations?

HEAD. No; but he brought letters from the best men
in the state.

DIAN. Letters! Letters may be forged!

HEAD. Yes: He is of a rich and influential family, and
your folly has lost him to us. He departs tomorrow.

DIAN. Departs tomorrow! When did he determine on
t hat?

HEAD. This evening. I told him, I had written to Mr.
Raleigh—

DIAN. Did you? What did he say?

HEAD. He was very angry; said it was exposing our
folly too far; and then he said he would leave town.

DIAN. After you spoke of your letter? after, or before?

HEAD. After, I believe.  What mean all these eager 
questions?

DIAN. Dearest father, send for him, beg him to call on
you tomorrow morning; (Send for old Mr. Raleigh
too)—but don't tell him; don't let him know Mr.
Raleigh is in town. Oh! if the old gentleman had
come a moment sooner!

HEAD. Bless my soul, girl! what's the meaning of all
this? Why send for him?

DIAN. oh, you shall know. Tell him you want to send
money by him; but don't send it. Tell him anything
to get him here.

HEAD. Well, and when I get him here, what then?

DIAN. Then, if there be substance in woman's wit, or
wisdom in woman's penetration, you will find that he
who was so good at playing the fool, may be much
better at playing the villain! Come along, and I'll tell 
you all.

HEAD. The villain?

DIAN. Ay, the villain!     (Exeunt.



ACT FIVE.



SCENE 1. A room in a tavern.

          (Enter, severally, TOM TAFFRAIL, BOLT, and
a waiter.

BOLT. Hilloa there, Julep, has any one been for me,
yet?

WAITER. No, sir.

BOLT. The Doctor, Mossrose, Crossbar, none?

WAITER. No, sir.

TOM. Gi' me a glass of gin-sling there, shipmate, and
a r'ale Havanna.

BOLT. Damn it, can I have no witness?

TOM. A glass of ginsling, I say, friend, and a cigar.

BOLT. Ha! shipmate! wasn't it you that knocked me
down in the street t'other night?

TOM. I never logged it.

BOLT. Dammee, but you logged me though; and ever
since my head has felt like a logger head. Come, I know
you.

TOM. What was the 'casion?

BOLT. A woman. Come, I harbour no resentment; I
deserved all I got. you are an honest fellow, and I
want you to do me a service.

TOM. If it be as how there's nothing foul in it, dammed
here's for you, timber and tackle.

BOLT. There's a foul villain that picked my pocket in
it. That four-pound fist of yours first knocked me into
a trance, and then my pocket was picked.

TOM. Look ye here, Mr. What-d'ye-call-'em, you're
not the only man that has been run foul of by unlawful 
cruisers in this here cursedty deceitful town.
There's sharks and sword-fish enough, though they
keep their heads under water, to nibble one's eyes out
of his head, and run their snouts into one's keel. I
have seen a painted pirate run up into a gentleman's
head-quarters as naturally as into a Spanish West India 
harbour; and I've found a counterfeiting knave
carry his unlawful paper into a gaming house with as
little conscience as a New York speculator sends pewter
quarter-dollars to Hayti.—But what has that to do
with your pockets? and how am I concerned in the
matter?

BOLT. I want you to help me take the cheat.

TOM. With all my heart; and I hope you'll sarve me
the same turn. You see this here Twenty; 'tis as fair a
looking Twenty as one may look on; but the banks
have laid it under embargo, and I am recommended
to take the fellow that palmed it on me. I got it at the
billiard table of an ugly knave, a cheating land rat,
who, I am told is a great lover of this here tavern.

BOLT. You may command my services. But hearken; I only 
suspect a fellow, and I have a scheme for trying
him. I learnt it of a New Yorker, who played it with
great success on a fellow of the same trade.—Huzza!
boys, welcome! (Enter MOSSROSE and CROSSBAR.)
This is the good fellow that knocked me down t'other
night; but I don't know his name.

TOM. My name's Thomas Taffrail, first officer of the
ship Liz. Lucky, and damned lucky she is, old Liz.

BOLT. Which of you saw me last when I was on the
pavement ?

MOSS. I; I went for a hack, and left the doctor with
you.

BOLT. I suspect the doctor of picking my pocket when
you were gone, and fobbing me of my patent lever.

MOSS. and CROSS . You don't say so! the doctor!

BOLT. Ay. I believe he is but a wolf. Damn him, I
thought he was a vulgar fellow, for all Ravin introduced 
him; and I was always ashamed of his company, he looks 
so cursed shabby. Come up stairs, and
I'll tell you my plan.—Julep, when the doctor comes,
swear I am alone, mind you, alone!     (Exeunt.



SCENE 2. Another room in the same.
        (Enter the same.

BOLT. I tell you, he is a scurvy fellow. My pocket was
picked and my fob emptied, as I lay under his keeping;
so there's no harm in trying the rascal.—Some one lend 
me his watch.—I am provided with a pocket book and cash 
all marked. So—Get you to the closets, and be quiet.

WAIT. The doctor is come.

     (Enter WAITER

BOLT. Ensconce! quick! ( Whey conceal.) Did you say
Alone?

WAIT. Yes sir, alone.

BOLT. Show him up. (Exit WAITER.) Now for a knave 
taking.—Silence, ye grunting whelps, or you'll spoil 
all. There! (breaks a wine-glass.) Peace, ye 
eaves'droppers: I am breaking the glasses and getting 
horrid
drunk; I am going through my degrees. In the first, I 
shall be wonderful funny and good-natured, and pun 
vilely, and sing like a hack-driver; in the second, I 
shall be cursed stupid, and look as solemn as a 
philosopher—hickup! in the third, as quarrelsome as a 
Kentucky freeholder; and in the fourth as peaceable and 
humble as a whiskey-brewer,—hickup. Now I'm in the 
first.—There, smash! (breaks a glass.) Ha, ha, ha! that 
was a very funny glass, he couldn't stand on his legs, 
he was so full of wine. Enter conspirator —(Enter 
RINGFINGER.) Fol de rod rob (sings) so he said there was 
nothing like wine. Fol de rol.

RING. Mr. Bolt, how d'ye do?

BOLT. Troubled with the blues, doctor, very blue—ha,
ha, ha! Poz, I couldn't get any company, and I am
resolved to be drunk, drunk, ye grinning porpoise,
extraor'nary drunk.


RING. And have you had no one with you?

BOLT. Yes; there was the dandy and the poet; but they
got drunk and complained of dyspepsy; so the dogs
had to dose with hickory ashes and go to bed,—the
beasts! to get drunk! lord! what fools men are to get
drunk!—Here soak, you rogue; choice as sunshine.
As for me, I have joined the Temperance Society, and
I carry Chamber's medicine, and I order cabbage on
table, so I never get drunk.—Drink, you porpoise. If
you should become cosey, I'll send to the'pothecary
for sat aeratis, sat gratis, you dog; it sobers one 
quicker than pump water, sat gratis.

RING. Ha, ha! you are funny. Here's your health!

TOM. (Aside.) The identical devil that give me the
Twenty!

RING. A bumper to all absent friends.

BOLT. And to all dead ones, doctor; for to die is a
solemn thing, and to be much thought of. our time
is short; (Pulls out a watch;) it is now ten o'clock, 
and tomorrow we may be in our graves.

RING. Why! have you found your watch?

BOLT. No, but I've bought a better. Sha'n't be stolen,
for, look ye, I keep it in my coat pocket instead of my
fob; and nobody would think of looking for one's
watch in one's coat pocket, would they?

RING. No, not they.—oh! Temptation!—A cunning
conceit that. Your health.

BOLT. Your's heartily. And they sha'n't steal my pocket-
book neither; for, ye see, I keep it in my hat, and my
hat I keep on my head; and they wouldn't think of
taking off my hat to look for it, would they?

RING. Ha, Ha! you are the cunningest fellow.—Spare
me, Temptation! I have sworn off.—In your hat! ha,
ha! 'Tis a very handsome one—Who made it? (takes it
from BOLT'S head.)

BOLT. Shelmerdine. Take care of my pocket-book.

RING. I will: (takes the pocket-book, and restores the 
hat.) There now; keep it on, and all's safe. Your 
health.

BOLT. Very well, I thank you; 'twas never better. But
I feel a little vertigo. One might think I was drunk,
but I a'n't, for you see I don't stagger, and I can walk
the crack with any man, only I'm giddy,—that's all,
—not drunk.   Falls into 

RING. FINGER.' S arms.

RING. Not at all; only vertigo.—What noise was that?
I thought I heard a stirring!

BOLT. 'Twas my new watch ticking in my pocket.

RING. Do you feel it now? (Steals the watch.)

BOLT. Yes, it's going.

RING. What's going?

BOLT. Vertigo. But I'm wondrous sleepy

RING. . I'll take you to bed.

BOLT. First, rascal! I'll take you to the mayor! Appear,
witnesses, and view the thief, the pick-pocket!

RING. Lord! gentlemen! what do you mean?

BOLT. Mean, scoundrel! Where's my watches and
pocket-books?

TOM. Do you know this here Twenty, my heart? 'Tis
sworn to be counterfeit.

RING. O gadswogs!

TOM. Oh ho! Gadswogs again! If this shark isn't the
painted privateer, may I never see salt water. You'll
not break your arrest the second time, Mr. Gadswogs.

RING. It was only a joke, gentlemen.

BOLT. We'll try that. What, pick pocket, counterfeiter,
and housebreaker! That's fourteen years in the 
penitentiary.

RING. For heaven's sake, not the penitentiary! keep
me from penitentiaries and solitary cells, and I'll tell
all; I'll inform, I'll turn states-evidence, I'll blow
Ben, I'll turn state's-evidence, I'll—

CROSS. Who's that you'll blow? what's that you'll tell?

BOLT. Come along, thief!

RING. Save me from the penitentiary, and I'll blow
Ben, brother Ben; I'll turn state's-evidence,—I'll turn
—I'll blow—                      (Exeunt.



SCENE 3. A room in HEADSTRONG'S house.
(Enter HEADSTRONG and DIANA.

HEAD. I shall grow distracted.  You are as bad as Ravin
himself in your suspicions.

DIAN. Be it so. There is something more in him than I 
like, something more in his ridiculous conjectures about 
Mr. Raleigh, something more in his appearance and 
conduct than can be well explained. Have you
sent for Mr. Raleigh?

HEAD. Yes. You are leading me by the nose, to make
another fool of myself.

DIAN. Be patient, sir. If I am wrong this time, I'll
never ask my own way again,—that' s till I am married .
(Enter a servant.

SERV. Mr. Ravin.

          (Exit.

          (Enter RAVIN.

DIAN. Sir, I have taken the liberty of sending for you,
to ask your pardon for some foolish and uncivil 
expressions, which I made use of when I saw you last. —
Would they would come!

RAV. That's because she has a favour to ask, confound
her!—They are forgotten, madam.

HEAD. Pray sit down, Mr. Ravin. The message with
which I will trouble you is not yet prepared.—Are
they coming?—It is dangerous to send a large sum
by mail.—Look out the window—They will never
come.—I am sorry to trouble you with it.

RAV. It will not trouble me, sir.—The old ass! that's
what Jack calls temptation! Put money into my
pocket! Well, the lord knows, I am very trustworthy.

DIAN. . Be easy, sir.

HEAD. What noise is that?

BOLT. (Within.) Put a constable at the front door and
one in the garden.

RAV. Ha! I will see what this uproar means.

DIAN. Stay, sir. Oh! what can it mean. O support me!
I faint! I—oh! oh!—

RAV. Fear nothing.—Damn her fainting fits. 'Tis nothing 
I'll warrant.

         (Enter BOLT, TOM, MOSSROSE, CROSSBAR, with 
RINGFINGER and constables.

BOLT. Ten thousand pardons for this violent intrusion.
—Seize the villain.—Be not alarmed, madam.—

DIAN. Seize who?

BOLT. Humph! I should know that voice; but mum's
the word.—Benjamin Garket.

DIAN. I said it!

RAV. Bless my soul! Mr. Bolt, what is the meaning of
all this? Do you go a visiting in your degrees?

BOLT. Fellow, I am half minded to kick you for your
impudence. Seize him. Mr. Benjamin Garket of Virginia, 
you will now bid adieu to Mr. Robert Ravin
of New Hampshire.

RAV. Gentlemen, what means this ridiculous violence?
Unhand me, fellow.

BOLT. Zounds! you carry it well. Do you know this
man?

RAV. Certainly: that is—

RING. Your brother Jack Ben,—Jack Garket. Oh Ben,
it's all blown, and there's no use in bullywragging
any more.

BOLT. Yes, these are the two loving brothers,—notorious 
swindlers, robbers, counterfeiters—

TOM. Witness this here Twenty. And piratical rascals,
and—

BOLT. And pick-pockets,—witnesses in abundance

RAV. Sir, in your ear, I will repay this insolence
shortly.

BOLT. Pugh! you knave! and wanted me to be your
second!—second to a swindler! Faugh! Come, you
must march. Link your arms with your brother, and
march.

RAV. My brother! What! does this rascal call himself
my brother? and is it from his evidence I am thus
infamously insulted?

RING. Ben, you know I am your brother, but now I
am turned state's evidence against you.

RAV. Fool, this will not serve you. Come along, and let
me see if this lying rogue will repeat his knaveries
before a magistrate.

RING. What, Ben, do you disown me? I couldn't help it,
no I couldn't. But you'd better confess. I've blown all,
all. They've sent for old Gall to witness against you,
and when they come to the rollers, and the Twenty
plate! Oh lord! that somebody had but hanged me
yesterday!

RAV. Humph! How long is this farce to continue?

DIAN. We have another actor in it. Walk in, Mr.Raleigh.
          (Enter RALEIGH, SR. RALEIGH, JR. and O'SLASH.

RAV. Ha!

HEAD. That such things should happen in my house!

RAL.SR. Oh you outrageous rascal!-are you caught
at last? This is the end of all your rogueries, the
penitentiary, the penitentiary!

RAV. Oh!

RAL.SR. What, has he soul enough to groan?

RING Any body'd groan, that was going to the 
penitentlary.

RAV. Sir, have pity on me.

RAL.SR. Pity! Why you are a fool as well as a villain.

RAV. I'll buy your pity. Sir, you once loved me well;
you gave me your niece—

RAL.SR. Whom you deserted, you puppy; I gave you
an office in a bank, which you robbed, you dog; I
gave you credit, which you abused, you scoundrel.

RAV. I confess it all. But save me from ignominy and
punishment, and I will repay all a thousand fold.

RAL.SR. What a cowardly puppy you are!

RAV. Use your interest for banishment, not imprisonment, 
and I will bless your old age with a long lost
daughter.

RAL.SR. A daughter! I never had but one, and she
was drowned.

RAV. She was not,—neither she nor her nurse.

RAL.JR. Sir, this fellow will say any thing to screen
himself from punishment.

RAL.SR. Get out of my way, puppy.—What of my
daughter? What of my girl? speak!

RAV. She lives, sir, and—

RAL.SR. Now if you lie, you wretch, I'll have you
hanged, I will. Where is she?

RAV. Her savage nurse ran away with her, educated
her for, and would have devoted her to the worst of
purposes. 'Twas I that saved her from pollution and
perdition.

RAL.SR. I'll do all I can for you, you dog. you are an
honest fellow at bottom, for all of your knavery.

RAV. I took her from the beldam, I preserved her,
I—

RING. Yes, he saved her; I can certify to that; he saved
her for himself: and, dang him, we'd all have been as
happy as dogs, if he hadn't wanted to be too loving
to her.

RAL.JR. Ha!—What a horrible thought!

RAL.SR. Where is she? where is she?

RAL.JR. Ay, where is she, villain? Why do you look so
fiercely on me, and smile?

RAV. I was smiling to think what fools you were to 
rejoice in my story, and what an ass I was to suppose it
could benefit me.

RAL.SR. Where is she?

RAV. Why she ran away.

RAL.SR. Ran away! Whither?

RAV. Not far. you will find her by asking of this young
man's friend and this old man's nephew, Mr. Roslin,
for Emma Gall;—

RAL.JR. Oh God!

RAV. For your daughter is Emma Gall, and Emma Gall
is his mistress. Settle it between you.
          (Exit RALEIGH, JR.

RAL.SR. Ah! lord! take the arch-devil away; hang
him, hang him; I'll petition to have him hanged,
hanged, hanged. Oh lord! oh lord! mistress! Would
she had been drowned.

TOM. Old Gentleman, though this tale speaks as
straight forward as a log book, I will take it upon me
to say the man lies, and the truth isn't in him; and
if you'll just loose him for five minutes, and show
him fair play, I'll engage to flog him till he confesses
himself a liar.

DIAN. Good man, I know you.—Take the wretches
away. (Exeunt RAVIN, RING FINGER, BOLT, MOSSROSE,
CROSSBAR, and constables.) Be pacified, sir. I'll stake
my life that the villain is false, and said this only 
out of malice. If Emma Gall, that unhappy girl, be your
daughter, then I can assert that, six months ago, a
more innocent and modest creature never breathed.
I'll stake my life she is innocent.

HEAD. Hold! My nephew swore she was as virtuous as
my own child; and put these papers into my hand, saying 
they were proofs of her honesty. This for my own
keeping, I will open; the other is directed to his 
mother.  Eh! what's this, a deed of gift to "Emma, 
commonly called Emma Gall", of—eh! how many thousand?

RAL. SR. A settlement! a settlement! the wages of her 
infamy! 'tis plain. Would she had been drowned!  Would 
she had been drowned!

DIAN. The other paper, father! break it open, break it
open!

RAL. SR. Yes, give me more proof; that I may curse
the day she was born.

HEAD. (Reads.) "My beloved mother: An unhappy son
begs to recommend to your protection an unfortunate
but innocent girl."

DIAN. . There! innocent! I said it.

HEAD. "I loved her, and, though appearances and evil
tongues have spoken against her pure fame, would
have married her. But her noble spirit, refused to
match a suspected name with mine, although this
would have rescued her from penury, sorrow and
oppression."

DIAN. There! noble!

HEAD. "I have applied a pittance of my wealth (for
she has nothing but her virtue and magnanimity,) to
assist her in the search after her parents, whom she
has never seen and from whom most probably she
was stolen. Assist and protect her, for she is worthy
your kindness."

RAL. SR. Huzza! ha, ha, ha! He shall marry her! She
is innocent! I knew it, and so did you, and you shall
have Ned for saying so; and Ned is a good boy. Come
here, Ned, you rogue, and kiss her.

O'SLASH. Faith, but he is gone,—gone to get an umbrelly, 
I fancy, to k' ape the tears from falling on his back. 
Sure, sir, if ye would be after r'ading that same letter 
again, it would pl'ase me exceedingly, for it is as 
melancholy as my ould mother's last groan.

TOM. I won't say that, but I will say, he was a damned
honest chap that wrote it.

RAL.SR. Where did he go? when did he go.

O'SLASH. Where, honey, I can't tell; but when, when
that divil, Garket, spake about Misther Roslin, and
she, dear, being his—O the vicious sarpent! I can't
spake it.

DIAN. O sirs, come to my cousin's house, quick! Edward 
is hot-headed, and has not heard all

RAL.SR. Now I'll bet any body a dollar, the rogue has
gone to fight, without saying a word about it, for Ned
will fight. Quick.—If he kills Roslin, I'll have him
hanged, for I intend Roslin shall be my son-in-law.
          (Exeunt.



SCENE 4. A room in ROSLIN'S house.
(Enter ROSLIN and NATHAN.

ROS. 'Tis strange he comes not!

NATH. Sir, if you can't take me with you, wouldn't you
like to hear one more joke before you go? I have been
studying half a dozen, and if you choose, I'll write
them fair and put them into your trunk, to help the
dulness of the steamboat.

ROS. My poor boy, I have lost my relish for jokes. I 
envy you your spirits and your boyhood. Once I was like 
yourself.

NATH. Sir, you are not an old man; and if gravity comes
as soon and unexpected over youth as a cloud over an
American sky, I pray heaven I may be a boy to my
dying day.

ROS. Your fate will be one chequered with joy and
sorrow. I can read your character and fortunes in
after life; they are those of a man of genius. You
will neglect the golden chances of life, and for the
hope of enjoying a barren reputation, for the sake
of praise and fame, you will devote yourself to a
profession whose rewards are for the most part
poverty and mortification; and sometimes, boy,
when I am dead, you will feel I have well predicted
your fate.

NATH. When you are dead, sir, I will write your
Epitaph. I wrote Miss Emma's this morning. Sir, I
sometimes think she and I ought to be brother and
sister.

ROS. And why?

NATH. Because she appears to have the same pedigree
with myself, and in my mind ought to take the same
name.—so, here comes the Virginia gentleman. I
like that man, he is so merry.
            (Enter RALEIGH, JR.

RAL.JR. Begone, boy

NATH. Umph!

(Exit.

ROS. I have been waiting for you. I have prepared
every thing, and now—

RAL.JR. Have you prepared for death?

ROS. A singular question! Come, let us go.

RAL.JR. Stay. Your man is in prison.

ROS. In prison!

RAL.JR. Ay, for a knave that has no equal on Earth.
His devil has deserted him. Sir, that man is my cousin
the knave, Benjamin Garket; and I wouldn't have you
harm my cousin, though he is a knave, ha, ha!

ROS. Then the quarrel is over, thank heaven! and now
for a more agreeable duty.

RAL.JR. Stay, sir. There's another lays claim to the
combat with you.

ROS. Another!

RAL.JR. Ay. One you have injured beyond forgiveness.

ROS. I have injured no man.

RAL.JR. By heaven, you have;—one that loves you too,
and yet will slay you.

ROS. You jest!

RAL.JR. You have dishonoured him, made him and his
whole house loathsome to themselves and all, 
ridiculously loathsome.

ROS. If I have wronged any one it was unconsciously.

RAL.JR. Unconsciously! I know it was. I know you
love me, and would not willingly load me with shame
and disgrace.

ROS. You!

RAL.JR. Ay, me! your friend! The city rings with it
already; and I must kill you.

ROS. You are mad!

RAL.JR. Come take it. 'Twas meant for this morning's
duty, and will serve your turn. Take your place.

ROS. Heaven bless me, Ned! are your wits gone? or is
this but a boyish jest?

RAL.JR. I am serious and rational. Take it and defend
yourself.

ROS. He is mad, mad! and dangerous. So, ho! there!

RAL.JR. Peace! I can trifle no longer. Take the weapon,
or I will blow you through the head.

ROS. Madman! how have I injured you?

RAL.JR. I'll not blister my tongue, nor shock your ears
by speaking how. But you are a villain. Defend yourself.

ROS. Ha! steps on the stairs.—

RAL.JR. Then there is not a moment to be lost. Heaven
have mercy on your soul!

(Enter RALEIGH, SR., HEADSTRONG, DIANA,
and NATHAN.

RAL.SR. Hold, you fool; give me the pistol, you brawling 
puppy. Sir, you are a hot-headed fellow, and I am
half minded to cane you, I am, you dog. How dare
you think of pointing a pistol at a man, without
asking my permission, you puppy?—so, he's a pretty
fellow, and I like him hugely.—How dare you,
you young rake-hell, point a pistol at my son Ned?

ROS. If you are that madcap's father, I must beg you to
keep him out of mischief: He's crazy. 'Sdeath, he was
about to shoot me! He talked about injuries, wrongs,
dishonour, and so forth, when, on my life, I know less
of his meaning than he does himself.

RAL.SR. Sir, you are a base, prevaricating fellow; and
Ned speaks the truth.

ROS. How, sir!

HEAD. Let me explain.

RAL.SR. Keep dumb, old gentleman. Here, you, I tell
you, you look like an exceeding wicked young man.
Send directly for that piece of scarlet deviltry you 
stole from her honest parent, honest old Gall; that 
painted girl, I say, that wench, that horrible young 
hypocrite, sir, that—that—

DIAN. Is this old gentleman mad!

RAL.SR. That Emma Gall, that's her name.

ROS. Sir, I believe insanity runs in your family. 
Whatever interest you may have in this unfortunate girl, 
I know not; but this I am sure of, every Epithet you
have applied to her is excused only by your dotage.
How is this, uncle? What means this?

HEAD. It means that you are accused (Stand back,
Dy:) of—pooh! Send for the girl here. Bring her, little
fellow.                    (Exit NATHAN.

ROS. I have already said, and I repeat, that your 
suspicions are slanders only upon your own good sense; 
and I must add, this singular visit and ridiculous
charge are as unwelcome as meddlesome.

RAL.SR. Hear him! Stand back. (Enter EMMA and
NATHAN.) Lord, but she is a sweet looking creature!

NATH. Come on; don't be afraid; they won't eat you.

DIAN. Let me speak to her, father; she is frighted.

HEAD. Peace. Let this old madcap play out his plot.

ROS. Sir, if you intend to take upon you any 
officiousness, remember it is a woman, a virtuous, 
delicate and unhappy woman you speak to.

RAL.SR. Oh Ned! look at her!

EM. Sir, what is the meaning of this? Why am I called
before strangers that do not, and acquaintances that
will not know me?

ROS. That these old folks will answer. They come, I
believe, to vent some silly and unmanly slander; but
rest assured that their attempts will only fix you more
firmly in my esteem.

RAL.SR. Stand away, you talkative fellow. Here you,
you girl (Oh the mouse!) what's your name?

NATH. What an old fool, to talk that way to a pretty
young lady!

EM. Alas! I know not, sir.

RAL.SR. I am told it is a devilish bad one, and that 
this fellow here has been trying to make it worse.

EM. You should not jest with the unhappy.

RAL.SR. You're right: I shall blubber by and by like
a teething child. Don't you know it' s a sad thing for a 
young woman's fame to be found under this fellow's
protection? for how can he protect that in another
which he has not himself?

EM. I know I am destitute and misunderstood, reproached 
not only for my misfortunes, but for accepting the 
kindness of the benevolent.

RAL. SR. How she talks!—But this fellow is a deceiver,
a very dragon; the greatest rake, villain, rascal, 
scoundrel, cut-throat—

EM. Hold, sir. Now I find I was deceived in you. I
thought you a kind and just man: you are not.

RAL.SR. The sweet imp! he shall have her, ha, ha,
ha!—How now, mistress! Why he is accused, and he
can't deny it, of stealing you from your parents; nay
of breaking open the house, knocking down your good
old mother, and carrying you off, before she was done
crying mercy.

EM. You are deceived. I see that slander 
misinterprets,
  The noblest deeds, and of an act that angels 
  Are proud to witness, will form a tale 
  That devils shrink abashed from. Hear the truth: 
  From violence, from the brutality 
  Of drunkenness, (when she you called my mother,
  Scoffed at my cries,) this gentleman rescued me;
  And, though suspicion called me low and base,
  Cast me not out upon the frowning world,
  To roam a beggar and a wretch forever.
  I had no friends, no parents, and no home:
  He gave them all, offered a home, a parent
  In his good mother, and in himself a friend.
  If there be fault in this, be mine the blame.

DIAN. It is shameful to trifle with her longer. Emma!
My friend! my sister!

RAL.JR. And mine.—That I should be the dog to suspect 
her!

RAL.SR. Kiss me, you melancholy thing, kiss your
father.

EM. Father!

RAL.SR. Why yes, didn't I tell you before? I thought you
was drowned; but it was all a sham of that damned
old hag—

EM. Oh sir! and a brother! Am I not in a dream?

ROS. And a lover too, Emma. Are we not all in a dream?
Pr'ythee, pinch me, Nathan. Ha, ha, ha! why this is
rare! You, sir, her father? you my friend's father, the
father of—

RAL.SR. of Emma Raleigh, you dog, no more Emma GALL.

EM. Oh, sir, and my mother! Have I a mother?

O'SLASH. Why look ye, young jewel, you had a mother;
but when we were hunting for you, she took it into her
head you had gone to heaven; and there she went to
look after you.

RAL.SR. And wasn't she disappointed though? ha, ha,
ha!

ROS. Hark you, Ned, you once wished you had
a sister to give me. Shall I have her? You don't
value her very high, I know; a pearl with so big a Jaw,
—a bone fit to turn a well bred stomach,—ha, ha, ha!
Give me your hand; take it, or I'll blow you through
the head.

RAL.JR. Curse your reminiscences: I was a fool, and
so were you.

HEAD. How many brains are running topsy-turvy
now!

NATH. I have seen the like in novels and plays: but
that such things should happen in Philadelphia!

RAL . S R. Come here, you jade. Now what are the young
fools talking about?

ROS. Of another change of names, my dear sir.

EM. I hardly know how to realize my new condition.
But if gratitude to my preserver does not argue 
ingratitude to my father, I would gladly convince this
gentleman, that what Emma Gall could not hear,
Emma Raleigh is desirous to grant.

DIAN. And if I may follow a good example, I am ready
to hear what this young wretch has got to say. Come,
say it, and be quick.

RAL. SR. Send for a parson.

DIAN. For what, sir?

RAL. SR. A parson; and we'll all be married together.

DIAN. But the State's Rights, sir?

RAL.SR. A fig for State's Rights! Send me a parson.

DIAN. And the tariff?

RAL.SR. May go to the devil. I'll never talk politics
again. He shall have you.

DIAN. What, marry such political principles! political 
fanaticism and corruption! Sooner match my son to e 
squaw or an alligator. Let me ask you what you think of 
the Slave System, Mr. Raleigh?

RAL.SR. Take her away, Ned, or she'll set me crazy.
Old fellow, a'n't you pleased? and you, you young
spider, what's-your-name, a'n't you pleased? you
with your mouth open there?

NATH. My name's Nobody, and I am surprised. What,
is that young lady your daughter? and is she to be
married?

RAL.SR: Yes, all to be married, monkey.

NATH. And what's to become of me? am I to be married
too? If I am, I pray you will find me some rich old
woman, rich, for it is as ridiculous to match wit with
poor beauty, as to tie an eagle to a snappin'-turtle;
and old, for by the time she dies and leaves me her
money, I shall just be old enough to marry somebody
else, and then youth and beauty for my money.—
Sir, had you never a son stolen away as well as a
daughter?

RAL.SR. No.

NATH. Well, well, I shall perhaps find some dull old
fellow one day, to father me and my jokes. But this is
all very strange; very strange adventures; and when
I am a man, I will make 'em into a tragico-comical
play; and I think, 'twill succeed, for what Nobody
writes, nobody ought to damn.

RAL.JR. Succeed! what will the people think of it?

NATH. Think nothing at all, till they have heard what
folks t'other side the water say of it. Nobody has a
right here, in such matters to think first and for 
himself. We're too young a people for that; and our 
modesty says we want judgement, and must form our
opinions at second hand.—Well, fun for me, and good
luck for all. I desire to congratulate all here, these
matrimonial ladies and gentlemen, and especially

  Miss Emma, for she has found a father.
  Alas for me! no father yet appears,
  To call me son, and lug me by the ears;

  To find me friends, and buy me a school-master,
  By rods to make ideas gallop faster;

  Where e'er he walked, to bid the people follows
  And show me for a smart dog, like Apollo.

  Shall I go look for him the wide world through?
  Perhaps he's lurking in the midst of you!

  Faith! there's a face I'd almost call his own,
  'Cause of its threatning and parental frown,
  Expressing very clearly to my eye,
  You mischievous dog, I'll flog you by and by.

  And there's another; better still! it smiled!
  Like a kind father on a pardoned child:
  And there's another,—smiling too!—another!

  Each one that smiles must be my father's brother:—

  My honoured uncles!—Faith! and there's a cousin!
  How d'e do?—Another! one, two, three, a dozen!
  Be all relations; and as such, you'll pass
  A kinder sentence on our Looking Glass. (Exeunt. 

FINIS



Page 15. Fip. An abbreviation of fippenny bit=fivepence:
a colloquial name formerly common in Pennsylvania and 
several of the Southern States for the
Spanish half-real, the value of which was about
six cents.

Page 21. Springes. A springe is a noose or snare for 
catching small game.

Page 32. Boggle at. Boggle, to take alarm; start with
fright; shy, as a horse.

Page 34. Fobbed. Fob, to rob or to cheat.

Page 67. Jersey comings. Coling is probably a colloquial
use of the word, colline, a hill.

Page 69. Bona-roba. A Courtesan; a mistress.



OF this book, there were made by Pynson Printers
of New York, four hundred and sixty-five copies for
subscription by friends of THE COLOPHON.
In The Month of May,

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MCM XXX III.