CROAKER, beating him.

Dog, do you refift; do you refift?

POSTBOY.

Zounds! mafter, I'm not he; there's the man that we thought was the rogue, and turns out to be one of the company.

How !

CROAKER.

HONEYWOOD.

Mr. Croaker, we have all been under a strange mistake here; I find there is nobody guilty; it was all an error; entirely an error of our own.

CROAKER.

And I fay, Sir, that you're in an error; for there's guilt and double guilt, a plot, a damned jefuitical peftilential plot, and I must have proof of it.

Do but hear me.

HONEYWOOD.

CROAKER.

What, you intend to bring 'em off, I fuppofe; I'll hear nothing.

HONEYWOOD.

Madam, you feem at least calm enough to hear reafon.

Excufe me.

OLIVIA.

HONEYWOOD.

Good Jarvis, let me then explain it to you.

JARVIS.

JARVIS.

What fignifies explanations, when the thing is done?

HONEYWOOD.

Will nobody hear me? Was there ever such a set, fo blinded by paffion and prejudice! (To the poftboy.) My good friend, I believe you'll be surprised, when I affure you

POSTBOY.

Sure me nothing-I'm fure of nothing but a good beating.

CROAKER.

Come, then, you, madam, if you ever hope for any favour or forgiveness, tell me fincerely all you know of this affair.

OLIVIA.

Unhappily, Sir, I'm but too much the caufe of your fufpicions: you fee before you, Sir, one that with falfe pretences has ftept into your family to betray it not your daughter

Not my daughter!

CROAKER.

OLIVIA.

Not your daughter-but a mean deceiver-whofupport me, I cannot

HONEYWOOD.

Help, fhe's going, give her air.

CROAKER.

CROAKER.

Aye, aye, take the young woman to the air; I would not hurt a hair of her head, whose ever daughter she may be-not so bad as that neither. [Exeunt all but Croaker.

CROAKER.

Yes, yes, all's out; I now fee the whole affair: my fon is either married, or going to be fo, to this lady, whom he imposed upon me as his fifter. Aye, certainly fo; and yet I don't find it afflicts me fo much as one might think. There's the advantage of fretting away our misfortunes beforehand, we never feel them when they come.

Enter Mifs RICHLAND and Sir WILLIAM,

Sir WILLIAM.

But how do you know, madam, that my nephew intends fetting off from this place?

Mifs RICHLAND.

My maid affured me he was come to this inn, and my own knowledge of his intending to leave the kingdom, fuggefted the reft. But what do I fee, my guardian here before us! Who, my dear, Sir, could have expected meeting you here? to what accident do we owe this pleasure ?

CROAKER.

To a fool, I believe.

Mifs RICHLAND.

But, to what purpofe did you come ?

CROAKER,

Why, Mr. Honeywood brought me here, to do nothing, now I am here; and my fon is going to be married to I don't know who, that is here: so now you are as wife as I am.

Mifs RICHLAND.

Married! to whom, Sir?

CROAKER.

To Olivia; my daughter as I took her to be; but who the devil fhe is, or whose daughter she is, I know no more than the man in the moon.

Sir WILLIAM.

fa

Then, Sir, I can inform you; and, though a ftranger, yet you shall find me a friend to your mily: it will be enough, at prefent, to affure you, that, both in point of birth and fortune, the young lady is at least your fon's equal. Being left by her father, Sir James Woodville

CROAKER.

Sir James Woodville! What, of the west?

Sir WILLIAM.

Being left by him, I fay, to the care of a mercenary wretch, whofe only aim was to fecure her fortune to himself, she was sent to France, under pretence of education; and there every art was tried to fix her for life in a convent, contrary to her inclinations. Of this I was informed, upon my arrival at Paris; and, as I had been once her father's friend, I did all in my power to fruftrate her guardian's bafe intentions. I had even meditated to rescue her from his authority, when your fon stept in with more pleafing violence, gave her liberty, and you a daughter.

CROAKER.

But I intend to have a daughter of my own chufing, Sir. A young lady, Sir, whofe fortune, by my intereft with those who have intereft, will be double what my fon has a right to expect. Do you know Mr. Lofty, Sir.

Sir WILLIAM.

Yes, Sir; and know that you are deceived in him. But ftep this way, and I'll convince you.

[Croaker and Sir William feem to confer.

Enter HONEY WOOD.

HONEYWOOD.

Obftinate man, ftill to perfift in his outrage! infulted by him, defpifed by all, I now begin to grow . contemptible, even to myfelf. How have I funk by

VOL. II.

I

too