Will. Why, the first you saluted is the same Ned Blunt you have often heard Belvile and I speak of: the other is a Rarity of another Nature, one Squire Fetherfool of Croydon, a tame Justice of Peace, who liv’d as innocently as Ale and Food could keep him, till for a mistaken Kindness to one of the Royal Party, he lost his Commission, and got the Reputation of a Sufferer: He’s rich, but covetous as an Alderman.
Beau. What a Pox do’st keep ’em Company for, who have neither Wit enough to divert thee, nor Good-nature enough to serve thee?
Will. Faith, Harry, ’tis true, and if there were no more Charity than Profit in’t, a Man would sooner keep a Cough o’th’ Lungs than be troubled with ’em: but the Rascals have a blind side as all conceited Coxcombs have, which when I’ve nothing else to do, I shall expose to advance our Mirth; the Rogues must be cozen’d, because they’re so positive they never can be so: but I am now for softer Joys, for Woman, for Woman in abundance—dear Hal. inform me where I may safely unlade my Heart.
Beau. The same Man still, wild and wanton!
Will. And would not change to be the Catholick King.
Beau. I perceive Marriage has not tam’d you, nor a Wife who had all the Charms of her Sex.
Will. Ay—she was too good for Mortals. [With a sham Sadness.
Belv. I think thou hadst her but a Month, prithee how dy’d she?
Will. Faith, e’en with a fit of Kindness, poor Soul—she would to Sea with me, and in a Storm—far from Land, she gave up the Ghost—’twas a Loss, but I must bear it with a Christian Fortitude.
Beau. Short Happinesses vanish like to Dreams.