you cannot forget the many repeated vows and promises you formerly made me. VELLUM. I shou'd as soon forget the multiplication table. ABIGAL. I have always taken your part before my lady. VELLUM. You have so, and I have item'd it in my memory. ABIGAL. For I have always look'd upon your interest as my own. It is nothing but your cruelty can hinder them from being so. I must strike while the iron's hot. [Aside.]-Well, Mr. Vellum, there is no refusing you, you have such a -bewitching tongue! VELLUM. How? Speak that again! ABIGAL. Why then in plain English, I love you. VELLUM. Thou sum total of all my happiness! I shall grow extravagant! I can't forbear!to drink thy virtuous Inclinations in a bumper of sack. Your lady must make haste, my duck, or we shall provide a young steward to the estate, before she has an heir to it-prithee my dear, does she intend to marry Mr. Tinsel ? ABIGAL. Marry him! my love, no, no! we must take care of that! there would be no staying in the house for us if she did. That young rake-hell wou'd send all the old servants a grazing. You and I shou'd be discarded before the honey-moon was at an end. VELLUM. Prithee, sweet one, does not this drum put the thoughts of marriage out of her head? ABIGAL. This drum, my dear, if it be well manag'd, will be no less than a thousand pound in our way. VELLUM. Ay, say'st thou so, my turtle? ABIGAL. Since we are now as good as man and wife-I mean almost as good as man and wife-I ought to conceal nothing from you. VELLUM. Certainly my dove, not from thy yoke fellow, thy help-mate, thy own flesh and blood! ABIGAL. Hush! I hear Mr. Tinsel's laugh, my lady and he are a coming this way; if you will take a turn without, I'll tell you the whole contrivance. ACT IV. SCENE I. ENTER VELLUM AND BUTLER. VELLUM. JOHN, I have certain orders to give you and there fore be attentive. that.—I BUTLER. Attentive! Ay, let me alone for that. I suppose he means being sober. [Aside. VELLUM. You know I have always recommended to you a method in your business, I wou'd have your knives and forks, your spoons and napkins, your plates and glasses, laid in a method. BUTLER. Ah, Master Vellum, you are such a sweet spoken man, it does one's heart good to receive your orders. VELLUM. Method, John, makes business easy, it banishes all perplexity and confusion out of families. BUTLER. How he talks! I cou'd hear him all day. VELLUM. And now, John, let me know whether your table. linen, your side-board, your cellar, and every thing else within your province, are properly and methodically dispos'd for an entertainment this evening. BUTLER. Master Vellum, they shall be ready at a quarter of an hour's warning. But pray, sir, is this entertainment to be made for the conjurer? VELLUM. It is, John, for the conjurer, and yet it is not for the conjurer. BUTLER. Why, look you Master Vellum, if it is for the conjurer, the cook-maid shou'd have orders to get him some dishes to his palate. Perhaps he may like a little brimstone in his sauce. VELLUM. This conjurer, John, is a complicated creature, an amphibious animal, a person of a twofold nature-But he eats and drinks like other men. BUTLER, Marry, Master Vellum, he shou'd eat and drink as much as two other men, by the account you give of him. VELLUM. Thy conceit is not amiss, he is indeed a double man, ha, ha, ha! BUTLER. Ha! I understand you, he's one of your hermaphrodites, as they call 'em. VELLUM. He is married, and he is not married. He hath |