On that condition I will; but should the torrent run against you, I shall be a fashionable friend and hiss with the rest.

Luck. No, a man who could do so unfashionable and so generous a thing as Mr Witmore did this morning——

Wit. Then I hope you will return it, by never mentioning it to me more. I will now to the pit.

Luck. And I behind the scenes.

SCENE IX.—LUCKLESS, HARRIOT.

Luck. Dear Harriot!

Har. I was going to the playhouse to look after you—I am frightened out of my wits—I have left my mother at home with the strangest sort of man, who is inquiring after you: he has raised a mob before the door by the oddity of his appearance; his dress is like nothing I ever saw, and he talks of kings, and Bantam, and the strangest stuff.

Luck. What the devil can he be?

Har. One of your old acquaintance, I suppose, in disguise—one of his majesty's officers with his commission in his pocket, I warrant him.

Luck. Well, but have you your part perfect?

Har. I had, unless this fellow hath frightened it out of my head again; but I am afraid I shall play it wretchedly.

Luck. Why so?

Har. I shall never have assurance enough to go through with it, especially if they should hiss me.

Luck. Oh! your mask will keep you in countenance, and as for hissing, you need not fear it. The audience are generally so favourable to young beginners: but hist, here is your mother and she has seen us. Adieu, my dear, make what haste you can to the playhouse.

[Exit.

SCENE X.—HARRIOT, MONEYWOOD.

Har. I wish I could avoid her, for I suppose we shall have an alarum.

Money. So, so, very fine: always together, always caterwauling. How like a hangdog he stole off; and it's well for him he did, for I should have rung such a peal in his ears.—There's a friend of his at my house would be very glad of his company, and I wish it was in my power to bring them together.

Har. You would not surely be so barbarous.

Money. Barbarous! ugh! You whining, puling fool! Hussey, you have not a drop of my blood in you. What, you are in love, I suppose?

Har. If I was, madam, it would be no crime,

Money. Yes, madam, but it would, and a folly too. No woman of sense was ever in love with anything but a man's pocket. What, I suppose he has filled your head with a pack of romantick stuff of streams and dreams, and charms and arms. I know this is the stuff they all run on with, and so run into our debts, and run away with our daughters. Come, confess; are not you two to live in a wilderness together on love? Ah! thou fool! thou wilt find he will pay thee in love just as he has paid me in money. If thou wert resolved to go a-begging, why did you not follow the camp? There, indeed, you might have carried a knapsack; but here you will have no knapsack to carry. There, indeed, you might have had a chance of burying half a score husbands in a campaign; whereas a poet is a long-lived animal; you have but one chance of burying him, and that is, starving him.

Har.