MR. BEN DIXON.
Forty-three, my dear. He told me so himself.
MRS. BEN DIXON.
Forty-three, and the rest. I'm not a chicken, and he wore his own beard when he played Macbeth to my child's head. He's fifty-five if he's a day, and she's accepted him because they were both starving—small blame to her for it. What we've got to do is to lift them out of this poverty and give them a start, and then there'll be no need for the poor girl to sacrifice herself.
MR. BEN DIXON.
But think of Mr. Cherry.
MRS. BEN DIXON.
Oh, Cherry's an old fool, as good and kind a one as ever lived—that's better than some of them are—but an old fool all the same. Now come, Ben, I'm going to do my duty by poor dead Hetty's bairns, and you've got to help me. If they were cannibals or converted acrobats with no claim upon you whatever, you'd be eager enough to.
MR. BEN DIXON.
Precisely so, my dear. That is just it. You see, a public philanthropist has no right to indulge in private charities. He is meant for all alike. He embraces mankind. I embrace mankind. You find me two hundred poor medical students with their sisters, needing assistance, and I shall be delighted to receive subscriptions on their behalf. (Aside.) Oh, he must have taken it with him.