University of Virginia Library

Scene.—A Garden.
Mr. Selby—Mrs. Frampton.
SELBY.

MRS. FRAMPTON.
Even from her earliest school days—What of that?
Or how is she concerned in my fine riddles,
Framed for the hour's amusement?

SELBY.
By my hopes
Of my new interest conceiv'd in you,
And by the honest passion of my heart,
Which not obliquely I to you did hint;
Come from the clouds of misty allegory,
And in plain language let me hear the worst.
Stand I disgraced, or no?

MRS. FRAMPTON.
Then, by my hopes
Of my new interest conceiv'd in you,
And by the kindling passion in my breast,
Which through my riddles you had almost read,
Adjured so strongly, I will tell you all.
In her school years, then bordering on fifteen,
Or haply not much past, she loved a youth—

SELBY.
My most ingenuous Widow—

MRS. FRAMPTON.
Met him oft
By stealth, where I still of the party was—

SELBY.
Prime confidante to all the school, I warrant,
And general go-between—

[Aside.
MRS. FRAMPTON.
One morn he came
In breathless haste. “The ship was under sail,
Or in few hours would be, that must convey
Him and his destinies to barbarous shores,
Where, should he perish by inglorious hands,
It would be consolation in his death
To have call'd his Katherine his.”

SELBY.
Thus far the story
Tallies with what I hoped.

[Aside.
MRS. FRAMPTON.
Wavering between
The doubt of doing wrong, and losing him;
And my dissuasions not o'er hotly urged,
Whom he had flatter'd with the bride-maid's part;—

SELBY.
I owe my subtle Widow, then, for this.

[Aside.
MRS. FRAMPTON.
Briefly, we went to church. The ceremony
Scarcely was huddled over, and the ring
Yet cold upon her finger, when they parted—
He to his ship; and we to school got back,
Scarce miss'd, before the dinner-bell could ring.

SELBY.
And from that hour—

MRS. FRAMPTON.
Nor sight, nor news of him,
For aught that I could hear, she e'er obtain'd.

SELBY.
Like to a man that hovers in suspense
Over a letter just receiv'd, on which
The black seal hath impress'd its ominous token,
Whether to open it or no, so I
Suspended stand, whether to press my fate
Further, or check ill curiosity,
That tempts me to more loss.—The name, the name
Of this fine youth?

MRS. FRAMPTON.
What boots it, if 'twere told?

SELBY.
Now, by our loves,
And by my hopes of happier wedlocks, some day
To be accomplish'd, give me his name!

MRS. FRAMPTON.
'Tis no such serious matter. It was—Huntingdon.

SELBY.
[Aside.

MRS. FRAMPTON.
How, sir! I like not this.

[Aside.
SELBY.
No, no, I meant
Nothing but good to thee. That other woman,
How shall I call her but evasive, false,
And treacherous?—by the trust I place in thee,
Tell me, and tell me truly, was the name
As you pronounced it?

MRS. FRAMPTON.
Huntingdon—the name,
Which his paternal grandfather assumed,
Together with the estates, of a remote
Kinsman: but our high-spirited youth—

SELBY.
Yes—

MRS. FRAMPTON.
Disdaining
For sordid pelf to truck the family honours,
At risk of the lost estates, resumed the old style,
And answer'd only to the name of—

SELBY.
What—

MRS. FRAMPTON.
Of Halford—

SELBY.
[Aside. He makes the signal.

Enter Lucy and Katherine.
MRS. FRAMPTON.
Interrupted!

SELBY.
My sister here! and see, where with her comes
My serpent gliding in an angel's form,
To taint the new-born Eden of our joys.
Why should we fear them? We'll not stir a foot,
Nor coy it for their pleasures.

[He courts the Widow.
LUCY
(to Katherine).
This your free,
And sweet ingenuous confession, binds me
For ever to you; and it shall go hard,
But it shall fetch you back your husband's heart,
That now seems blindly straying; or at worst,
In me you have still a sister.—Some wives, brother,
Would think it strange, to catch their husbands thus
Alone with a trim widow; but your Katherine
Is arm'd, I think, with patience.

KATHERINE.
I am fortified
With knowledge of self-faults to endure worse wrongs,
If they be wrongs, than he can lay upon me;
Even to look on, and see him sue in earnest,
As now I think he does it but in seeming,
To that ill woman.

SELBY.
Good words, gentle Kate,
And not a thought irreverent of our Widow.
Why, 'twere unmannerly at any time,
But most uncourteous on our wedding day,
When we should shew most hospitable.—Some wine.
[Wine is brought.
I am for sports. And now I do remember,
The old Egyptians at their banquets placed
A charnel sight of dead men's skulls before them,
With images of cold mortality,
To temper their fierce joys when they grew rampant.
I like the custom well: and ere we crown
With freer mirth the day, I shall propose,
In calmest recollection of our spirits,
We drink the solemn ‘Memory of the dead’—

MRS. FRAMPTON.
Or the supposed dead—

[Aside to him.
SELBY.
[She fills.

KATHERINE.
I catch the awful import of your words;
And, though I could accuse you of unkindness,
Yet as your lawful and obedient wife,
While that name lasts (as I perceive it fading,
Nor I much longer may have leave to use it)
I calmly take the office you impose;
And on my knees, imploring their forgiveness,
Whom I in heav'n or earth may have offended,
Exempt from starting tears, and woman's weakness,
I pledge you, sir—The Memory of the Dead!

[She drinks kneeling.
SELBY.
'Tis gently and discreetly said, and like
My former loving Kate.

MRS. FRAMPTON.
Does he relent?

[Aside.
SELBY.
That ceremony past, we give the day
To unabated sport. And, in requital
Of certain stories, and quaint allegories,
Which my rare Widow hath been telling to me
To raise my morning mirth, if she will lend
Her patient hearing, I will here recite
A Parable; and, the more to suit her taste,
The scene is laid in the East.

MRS. FRAMPTON.
I long to hear it.
Some tale, to fit his wife.

[Aside.
KATHERINE.
Now, comes my Trial.

LUCY.
The hour of your deliverance is at hand,
If I presage right. Bear up, gentlest sister.

SELBY.
“The sultan Haroun”—Stay—O now I have it—
“The Caliph Haroun in his orchards had
A fruit-tree, bearing such delicious fruits,
That he reserved them for his proper gust;
And through the Palace it was Death proclaim'd
To any one that should purloin the same.”

MRS. FRAMPTON.
A heavy penance for so light a fault—

SELBY.
Pray you, be silent, else you put me out.
“A crafty page, that for advantage watch'd,
Detected in the act a brother page,
Of his own years, that was his bosom friend;
And thenceforth he became that other's lord,
And like a tyrant he demean'd himself,
Laid forced exactions on his fellow's purse;
And when that poor means fail'd, held o'er his head
Threats of impending death in hideous forms;
Till the small culprit on his nightly couch
Dream'd of strange pains, and felt his body writhe
In tortuous pangs around the impaling stake.”

MRS. FRAMPTON.
I like not this beginning—

SELBY.
Pray you, attend.
“The Secret, like a night-hag, rid his sleeps,
And took the youthful pleasures from his days,
And chased the youthful smoothness from his brow,
That from a rose-cheek'd boy he waned and waned
To a pale skeleton of what he was;
And would have died, but for one lucky chance.”

KATHERINE.
Oh!

MRS. FRAMPTON.
Your wife—she faints—some cordial—smell to this.

SELBY.
Stand off. My sister best will do that office.

MRS. FRAMPTON.
Are all his tempting speeches come to this?

[Aside.
SELBY.
What ail'd my wife?

KATHERINE.
A warning faintness, sir,
Seized on my spirits, when you came to where
You said “a lucky chance.” I am better now,
Please you go on.

SELBY.
The sequel shall be brief.

KATHERINE.
But, brief or long, I feel my fate hangs on it.

[Aside.
SELBY.
“One morn the Caliph, in a covert hid,
Close by an arbour where the two boys talk'd,
(As oft, we read, that Eastern sovereigns
Would play the eaves-dropper, to learn the truth,
Imperfectly received from mouths of slaves,)
O'erheard their dialogue; and heard enough
To judge aright the cause, and know his cue.
The following day a Cadi was despatched
To summon both before the judgment seat;
The lickerish culprit, almost dead with fear,
And the informing friend, who readily,
Fired with fair promises of large reward,
And Caliph's love, the hateful truth disclosed.”

MRS. FRAMPTON.
What did the Caliph to the offending boy,
That had so grossly err'd?

SELBY.
His sceptred hand
He forth in token of forgiveness stretch'd,
And clapp'd his cheeks, and courted him with gifts,
And he became once more his favourite page.

MRS. FRAMPTON.
But for that other—

SELBY.
He dismiss'd him straight,
From dreams of grandeur, and of Caliph's love,
To the bare cottage on the withering moor,
Where friends, turn'd fiends, and hollow confidants,
And widows, hide, who, in a husband's ear
Pour baneful truths, but tell not all the truth;
And told him not that Robin Halford died
Some moons before his marriage-bells were rung.
Too near dishonour hast thou trod, dear wife,
And on a dangerous cast our fates were set;
But Heav'n, that will'd our wedlock to be blest,
Hath interposed to save it gracious too.
Your penance is—to dress your cheek in smiles,
And to be once again my merry Kate.—
Sister, your hand,
Your wager won makes me a happy man,
Though poorer, Heav'n knows, by a thousand pounds
The sky clears up after a dubious day.
Widow, your hand. I read a penitence
In this dejected brow; and in this shame
Your fault is buried. You shall in with us,
And, if it please you, taste our nuptial fare:
For, till this moment, I can joyful say
Was never truly Selby's Wedding Day.