AIR XXXIV. Of a noble race was Shinken.
Good madam Cook, the greasy,
Pray leave your saucy bawling,
Let all your toil
Be to make the pot boil,
For that’s your proper calling.
With men as wise as Robin,
A female judge may pass, sir;
For where the grey mare
Is the better horse, there
The horse is but an ass, sir.
SCENE V.
ROBIN, THOMAS, SUSAN.
SUSAN. Saucy fellow.
THOMAS. I suppose he is gone to inform master against you.
ROBIN. Let him go, I am too well with madam to fear any mischief he can make with master. — And harkye, between you and I, madam won’t suffer me to be turned out — you heard William upbraid me with stealing the beer for my own family; but she knows half of it hath gone to her own private cellar, where she and the parson sit and drink, and meditate ways to propagate religion in the parish —
SUSAN. Don’t speak against madam, Robin — she is an exceeding good woman to her own servants.
ROBIN. Ay, ay, to us upper servants — we that keep the keys fare well enough — and for the rest, let them starve for Robin. It’s the way of the world, Susan; the heads of all professions thrive, while the others starve.
AIR XXXV. Pierot’s Tune.
Great courtiers palaces contain,
While small ones fear the gaol,
Great parsons riot in champagne,
Small parsons sot on ale;
Great whores in coaches gang,
Smaller misses,
For their kisses,
Are in Bridewell banged;
While in vogue
Lives the great rogue,
Small rogues are by dozens hanged.
SCENE VI.
SUSAN, SWEETISSA.
SWEETISSA. Oh, brave Susan! what, you are resolved to keep open doings: when a woman goes without the precincts of virtue, she never knows where to stop.
AIR XXXVI. Country Garden.
Virtue within a woman’s heart,
By nature’s hand is rammed in,
There must be kept by steady art,
Like water when it’s damned in;
But the dam once broken,
Past all revoking,
Virtue flies off in a minute;
Like a river left,
Of waters bereft,
Each man may venture in it.
SUSAN. I hope you will pardon my want of capacity, madam, but I don’t know what you mean.
SWEETISSA. Your capacity is too capacious — madam.
SUSAN. Your method of talking, madam, is something dark.
SWEETISSA. Your method of acting is darker, madam.
SUSAN. I dare appeal to the whole world for the justification of my actions, madam; and I defy any one to say my fame is more sullied than my plates, madam.
SWEETISSA. Your pots you mean — madam: if you are like any plates, it is soup-plates, which any man may put his spoon into.
SUSAN. Me, madam?
SWEETISSA. You, madam.
AIR XXXVII. Dainty Davy.
SUSAN. What the devil mean you thus
Scandal scattering,
Me bespattering,
Dirty slut, and ugly puss,
What can be your meaning?
SWEET. Had you, madam, not forgot,
When with Bob you — you know what,
Surely, madam, you would not,
Twice inquire my meaning.
There, read that letter, and be satisfied how base you have been to a woman, to whom you have professed a friendship.
SUSAN. What do you mean by offering me a letter to read? when you know —
SWEETISSA. When I know you writ it, madam.
SUSAN. When you know I can neither write nor read, madam. — It was my parents’ fault, not mine, that gave me not a better education; and if you had not been taught to write, you would have been no more able to write than myself — though you barbarously upbraid me with what is not my fault.
SWEETISSA. How? — and is it possible you can neither read nor write?
SUSAN. Possible! — why should it be impossible for a servant not to be able to write — when so many gentlemen can’t spell —
SWEETISSA. Here is your name to a love-letter, which is directed to Robin — wherein you complain of his having left you, after he had enjoyed you.
SUSAN. Enjoyed me!
SWEETISSA. It is so, I assure you.
SUSAN. If ever I had any thing to say to Robin — but as one fellow servant might, say not to another fellow-servant, may my pot ne’er boil again!
SWEETISSA. I am sorry you cannot read, that you might see the truth of what I say, that you might read Susan Roastmeat in plain letters; and if you did not write it yourself, sure the devil must have writ it for you.
SUSAN. I think I have said enough to satisfy you, — and as much as is consistent with my honour.
SWEETISSA. You have, indeed, to satisfy me of your innocence — nor do I think it inconsistent with my honour to assure you I am sorry I said what I said — I do, and humbly ask your pardon, madam.
SUSAN. Dear madam, this acknowledgment from you is sufficient — Oh! Sweetissa, had I been one of those, I might have had to do with my young master.
SWEETISSA. Nay, for that matter, we might all have had to do with my young master; that argues little in your defence — but this I am assured of — if you cannot write at all — you did not write the letter.
AIR XXXVIII. Valentine’s day.
A woman must her honour save,
“While she’s a virgin found;
And he can hardly be a knave
Who is not worth a pound.
On horseback he who cannot ride,
On horseback did not rob;
And since a pen you cannot guide,
You never wrote to Bob.
SCENE VII.
MASTER OWEN APSHINKEN and MR. APSHONES.
MR. APSHONES. I desire not, Mr. Owen, that you would marry my daughter; I had rather see her married to one of her own degree. I had rather have a set of fine healthy grandchildren ask me blessing, than a poor puny breed of half-begotten brats — that inherit the diseases as well as the titles of their parents.
MASTER OWEN Apshinken. Pshaw, pshaw, master Apshones, these are the narrow sentiments of such old fellows as you, that have either never known or forgotten the world, that think their daughters going out of the world, if they go five miles from them — and had rather see them walk a foot at home than ride in a coach abroad.
MR. APSHONES. I would not see her ride in her coach this year, to see her ride in an hearse the next.
MASTER OWEN APSHINKEN. You may never arrive to that honour, good sir. .
MR. APSHONES. I would not advise you to attempt bringing any dishonour on us — that may not be so safe as you imagine.
MASTER OWEN APSHINKEN. So safe!
MR. APSHONES. No, not so safe, sir, — I have not lost my spirit with my fortune; I am your father’s tenant, but not his slave. Though you have ruined many poor girls with impunity, you may not always succeed so — for, let me tell you, sir, whoever brings dishonour on me, shall bring ruin on himself.
MASTER OWEN APSHINKEN. Ha — ha — ha!
MR. APSHONES. I believe both Sir Owen and her ladyship too good people to suffer you in these practices, were they acquainted with them — Sir Owen hath still behaved as the best of landlords; he knows a landlord should protect, not prey on his tenants — should be the shepherd, not the wolf to his flock; but one would have thought you imagined we lived under that barbarous custom — I have read of — when the landlord was entitled to the maidenheads of all his tenants’ daughters.
MASTER OWEN APSHINKEN. Ha, ha, ha! thou art a very ridiculous, comical, odd sort of an old fellow, faith.
MR. APSHONES. It is very likely you and I may appear in the same light to one another. — Your dress would have mad
e as ridiculous a figure in my young days as mine does now. What is the meaning of all that plastering upon your wigs? unless you would insinuate that your brains lie on the outside of your heads.
MASTER OWEN APSHINKEN. Your daughter likes our dress, if you don’t.
MR. APSHONES. I desire you would spare my daughter, sir, — I shall take as much care of her as I can, — and if you should prevail on her to her ruin, be assured your father’s estate should not secure you from my revenge. — You should find that the true spirit of English liberty acknowledges no superior equal to oppression.
MASTER OWEN APSHINKEN. The true spirit of English liberty — ha, ha, ha! — thou art not the first father, or husband, that hath blustered in this manner, and been afterwards as quiet as a lamb. — He were a fine gallant, indeed, who would be stopped in the pursuit of his mistress by the threatenings of her relations. — Not that I should care to venture, if I thought the fellow in earnest — but your heroes in words are never so in deeds.
AIR XXXIX. My Chloe, why do you slight me?
The whore of fame is jealous,
The coward would seem brave;
For we are still most zealous
What most we want to have.
The madman boasts his senses,
And he, whose chief pretence is
To liberty’s defence, is
Too oft the greatest slave.
SCENE VIII.
MASTER OWEN AFSIIINKEN and MOLLY.
MASTER OWEN ATSIIINKEN. She here!
MOLLY. Cruel, dost thou fly me? am I become hateful in thy sight? — are all thy wicked vows forgotten; for sure if thou didst even remember them, they would oblige thee to another behaviour.
MASTER OWEN APSHINKEN. Can you blame me for obeying your commands in shunning you? Sure you have forgotten your last vows, never to see me more.
MOLLY. Alas! you know too well that I am as insincere in every repulse to you as you have been in your advances to me. How unjustly do men accuse us of using a lover ill when we are no sooner in his power than he uses us so?
AIR XL. Sylvia, my dearest.
Cruellest creature, why have you wooed me,
Why thus pursued me,
Into love’s snare?
While I was cruel
I was your jewel;
Now I am kind, you bid me despair.
Nature’s sweet flowers warm seasons nourish,
In summer flourish,
Winter’s their bane:
Love, against nature
Checked, grows the greater;
And best is nourished with cold disdain.
MASTER OWEN APSHINKEN. How canst thou wrong me so, my dear Molly? Your father hath been here, and insulted me in the rudest manner; but notwithstanding that I am resolved —
MOLLY. To fulfil your promise, and marry me?
MASTER OWEN APSHINKEN. Why dost thou mention that hateful word? That, that is the cruel frost which nips the flower of love. Politeness is not a greater enemy to honesty, nor quadrille to common sense, than marriage is to love. They are fire and water, and cannot live together. Marriage is the only thing thou shouldst ask, that I would not grant.
MOLLY. And till you grant that, I will grant nothing else.
MASTER OWEN APSHINKEN. It is for your sake I would not marry you; for I could never love, if I was confined to it.
AIR XLI.
How happy’s the swain,
Whom beauty firing,
All admiring,
All desiring,
Never desiring in vain.
How happy to rove
Through sweetest bowers,
And cull the flowers
In the delicious garden of love.
How wretched the soul,
Under control.
To one poor choice confined a while,
Wanton it exerts the lass,
No no let the joys of my life,
Like the years in circles roll,
But since you are so ungrateful,
Since my service is so hateful,
Willing I my place forsake.
MOLLY. He’s gone! lie’s lost for ever! irrevocably lost: Oh! virtue! where’s thy force? where are those thousand charms that we are told to lie in thee, when lovers cannot see them? Should Owen e’er return, should he renew his entreaties, I fear his success; for I find every day love attains more and more ground of virtue.
AIR XLII. Midsummer wish.
When love is lodged within the heart
Poor virtue to the outworks flies,
The tongue in thunder takes its part,
And darts in lightning from the eyes.
From lips and eyes with gested grace,
In vain she keeps out charming him,
For love will find some weaker place
To let the dear invader in.
ACT III.
SCENE I.
SIR OWEN APSHINKEN’S House.
SIR OWEN APSHINKEN. [Smoking.] What a glorious creature was he who first discovered the use of tobacco! — the industrious retires from business — the voluptuous from pleasure — the lover from a cruel mistress — the husband from a cursed wife — and I from all the world to my pipe.
AIR XLIII. Freemason’s Tune.
Let the learned talk of books,
The glutton of cooks.
The lover of Celia’s soft smack-o;
No mortal can boast
So noble a toast,
As a pipe of accepted tobacco.
Let the soldier for fame,
And a general’s name,
In battle get many a thwack-o;
Let who will have most,
Who will rule the roast,
Give me but a pipe of tobacco.
Tobacco gives wit
To the dullest old cit,
And makes him of politics crack-o;
The lawyers i’ th’ hall
Were not able to bawl,
Were it not for a whiff of tobacco.
The man whose chief glory
Is telling a story,
Had never arrived at the knack-o,
Between every heying,
And as I was saying,
Did he not take a whiff of tobacco.
The doctor who places
Much skill in grimaces,
And feels your pulse running tick-tack-o;
Would you know his chief skill?
It is only to fill,
And smoke a good pipe of tobacco.
The courtiers alone
To this weed are not prone;
Would you know what ‘tis makes them so slack-o!
‘Twas because it inclined
To be honest the mind,
And therefore they banished tobacco.
SCENE II.
Sir Owen and Lady Apshinken.
LADY APSHINKEN. It is very hard, my dear, that I must be an eternal slave to my family; that the moment my back is turned every thing goes to rack and manger; that you will take no care upon yourself, like a sleepy good-for-nothing drone as you are.
SIR OWEN APSHINKEN. My wife is a very good wife, only a little inclined to talking. If she had no tongue, or I had no ears, we should be the happiest couple in Wales.
LADY APSHINKEN. Sir Owen! Sir Owen! it is very well known what offers I refused when I married you.
SIR OWEN APSHINKEN. Yes, my dear, it is very well known, indeed — I have heard of it often enough in conscience. — But of this I am confident — if you had ever had a better offer, you knew your own interest too well to have refused it.
LADY APSHINKEN. Ungrateful man! — If I have shown that I know the value of money, it has been for your interest as well as mine; and let me tell you, sir, whenever my conscience hath struggled with my interest, she hath always got the better.
SIR OWEN APSHINKEN. Why possibly it may be so — for I am sure whichever side your tongue is of, will get the better. — And harkye, my dear, I fancy your conscience and your tongue lie very near together. — As for your interest, it
lies too near your heart to have any intercourse with your tongue.
LADY APSHINKEN. Methinks, Sir Owen, you should be the last who reflected on me for scolding your servants.
SIR OWEN APSHINKEN. So I would, if you would not scold at me. — Vent your ill-nature on all the parish, let me and my tobacco alone, and I care not; but a scolding wife to me is a walking bass-viol out of tune.
LADY APSHINKEN. Sir, sir, a drunken husband is a bad fiddlestick to that bass-viol, never able to put her into tune, nor to play any tune upon her.
SIR OWEN APSHINKEN. A scolding wife is rosin to that fiddlestick, continually rubbing it up to play, till it wear out.
AIR XLIV. Tenant of my own.
Of all bad sorts of wives
The scolds are sure the worst,
With a hum drum, scum, hurry scurry scum,
Would I’d a cuckold been,
Ere I had been accurst
Complete Fictional Works of Henry Fielding Page 274
