Ensign. Contradiction, no, no, I allow'd all she said, with, undoubtedly, Madam,—I am of your Mind, Madam, it must be so—Natural Causes, &c.
Sir Jam. Ha, ha, ha, I think it is a supernatural Cause, which enables thee to go thro' this Fatigue; if it were not to raise thy Fortune, I should think thee mad to pursue her.
He cannot edge in a word of love so absorbed does she declare herself to be in observing the circulation of blood in a fish's tail. Valeria is quite ahead of her time in her passion for dissection. She has devoted her pretty dove to the cause of research, and offers her jewels in return for her cousin's fine Italian greyhound, likewise to be used in her pursuit of anatomical secrets. When accused of cruelty she exclaims in quite a modern tone, "Can Animals, Insects, or Reptiles be put to a nobler use than to increase our Knowledge?" She loses her sailor lover by breaking in upon his sea lingo with a request that he should speak, "properly, positively, laconically, and naturally" and by deluging him with questions about mermaids and the inhabitants of the stars. He quickly determines that he doesn't regard a "Philosophical Gimcrack the value of a cockle-shell," and considers the lovely young Valeria as "fitter for Moorfields than Matrimony." She turns away from him with a sigh at the time wasted on a being so irrational as a suitor, and devotes herself again to the "immense Pleasures of dear, dear Philosophy."
Lady Reveller and her woman, Alphiew, sharply criticize Valeria for her unfeminine occupations.
Lady. Will you ever be weary of these Whimsies?
Val. Whimsies! Natural Philosophy a Whimsy! Oh! the unlearned World.
Lady. Ridiculous Learning!
Alp. Ridiculous, indeed, for Women; Philosophy suits our Sex as Jack Boots would do.
Val. Custom would bring them as much in Fashion as Furbeloes, and Practice would make us as valiant as e'er a Hero of them all; the Resolution is in the Mind—Nothing can enslave that.