University of Virginia Library

SCENE I.

—The Green Park.
Sir Charles Le Brun alone.
SIR CHARLES.
Lady le Brun believes me out of town.
It is not much amiss sometimes to try
These small deceptions on our loving wives,
Merely to mark how harmlessly they pass
Their melancholy hours when we are absent.
My lady is a miracle of goodness;
Devotes best portion of her time to play,—
Yet finds some hours to moralise, no doubt,
With the Lord Transit.
Pliant appears.
Hah! your servant, sir!
Your very humble servant, Mr. Pliant!
Are you not now of all mankind—

PLIANT.
The best.—
I know you meant to say it: but don't praise me;
Your praise confounds me: I can bear my own,
I'm us'd to that.

SIR CHARLES.
You will have none from me.
Why did you trap me into a discussion
With Transit, and then turn about, and leave me
To be a laughing-stock, for my credulity?

PLIANT.
Why did I turn about?—Was it not time?
Cou'd I be too respectful of a life
So infinitely precious to the world?
Who wou'd have led the fashions of the Town,
Had we lost you? How many brilliant eyes
Wou'd have been blind with weeping!

SIR CHARLES.
Come, no raillery.
I think my wife, for one, wou'd have surviv'd it.

PLIANT.
Oh such an angel woman! such a heart!

SIR CHARLES.
What do you know of her?

PLIANT.
What do I know?
Enough to canonize her for a saint.

SIR CHARLES.
To which of all her numberless perfections
Has she made you the confidential witness?

PLIANT.
You'll see—you'll see.

SIR CHARLES.
I shall be glad to hear
What I'm to see.

PLIANT.
You're going out of Town—

SIR CHARLES.
Within this hour.

PLIANT.
Go, go! you safely may.
Her time will be most blessedly employ'd;
She is the most benevolent of beings:
Your house will be the scene of reconcilement.
I've been to Transit with your lady's letter—
Oh! such a peace-maker!

SIR CHARLES.
A perfect saint.

PLIANT.
You see that I know something.

SIR CHARLES.
Yes, I see it.
You saw the letter too?

PLIANT.
I saw her write it.

SIR CHARLES.
You took it to him?

PLIANT.
To be sure I did.

SIR CHARLES.
Quite right, quite right. It was an invitation?

PLIANT.
At eight o'clock this evening.—Ah, my friend,
You are the happiest man—

SIR CHARLES.
You make me so,
By telling me the virtues of my wife.
At eight this evening?

PLIANT.
Yes.

SIR CHARLES.
Before that hour
I shall be fifty miles upon my way.
Good b'ye! I must make ready for my journey.

[Exit.
PLIANT.
There, there now! Sure I am the luckiest fellow
At making people happy with each other!
It is a gift—by Heav'n, an actual gift!
It can be nothing less. There is he gone
As gayly out of Town, as free from care,
As if he had no wife at all to think of.
My lady may be virtuous, nay, she is so
For aught I know; but if I were her husband,
I should not take that letter quite so coolly:
I watch'd her as she wrote it, and can swear
To more than one tear that the writing cost her.
Well, well—I'm but the bearer of the letter;
And be it what it may, by this manœuvre
I've made all parties safe. Trust me for that.
Yes, yes; I take that credit to myself.

[Exit.