Pet. What Herds of Cuckolds would Spain breed—’Slife, I could find in my Heart to forswear your Service: Have I taught ye your Trade, to become my Instructor, how to cozen a dull phlegmatick greasy-brain’d Englishman?—go and expect your Wishes.
Will. So, she has sent her Matron to our Coxcomb; she saw he was a Cully fit for Game—who would not be a Rascal to be rich, a Dog, an Ass, a beaten, harden’d Coward—by Heaven, I will possess this gay Insensible, to make me hate her—most extremely curse her—See if she be not fallen to Pray’r again, from thence to Flattery, Jilting and Purse-taking, to make the Proverb good—My fair false Sybil, what Inspirations are you waiting for from Heaven, new Arts to cheat Mankind!—Tell me, with what Face canst thou be devout, or ask any thing from thence, who hast made so leud a use of what it has already lavish’d on thee?
La Nu. Oh my careless Rover! I perceive all your [hot Shot] is not yet spent in Battel, you have a Volley in reserve for me still—Faith, Officer, the Town has wanted Mirth in your Absence.
Will. And so might all the wiser part for thee, who hast no Mirth, no Gaiety about thee, and when thou wouldst design some Coxcomb’s ruin; to all the rest, a Soul thou hast so dull, that neither Love nor Mirth, nor Wit or Wine can wake it to good Nature—thou’rt one who lazily work’st in thy Trade, and sell’st for ready Mony so much Kindness; a tame cold Sufferer only, and no more.
La Nu. What, you would have a Mistress like a Squirrel in a Cage, always in Action—one who is as free of her Favours as I am sparing of mine—Well, Captain, I have known the time when La Nuche was such a Wit, such a Humour, such a Shape, and such a Voice, (tho to say Truth I sing but scurvily) ’twas Comedy to see and hear me.
Will. Why, yes Faith for once thou wert, and for once mayst be again, till thou know’st thy Man, and knowest him to be poor. At first you lik’d me too, you saw me gay, no marks of Poverty dwelt in my Face or Dress, and then I was the dearest loveliest Man—all this was to my outside; Death, you made love to my Breeches, caress’d my Garniture and Feather, an English Fool of Quality you thought me—’Sheart, I have known a Woman doat on Quality, tho he has stunk thro all his Perfumes; one who never went all to Bed to her, but left his Teeth, an Eye, false Back and Breast, sometimes his Palate too upon her Toilet, whilst her fair Arms hug’d the dismember’d Carcase, and swore him all Perfection, because of Quality.
La Nu. But he was rich, good Captain, was he not?
Will. Oh most damnably, and a confounded Blockhead, two certain Remedies against your Pride and Scorn.
La Nu. Have you done, Sir?
Will. With thee and all thy Sex, of which I’ve try’d an hundred, and found none true or honest.