LYDIA Well, I'll not detain you, coz.—Adieu, my dear Julia. I'm sure you are in haste to send to Faulkland.—There—through my room you'll find another staircase.
JULIA
Adieu! [Embraces LYDIA, and exit.]
LYDIA Here, my dear Lucy, hide these books. Quick, quick!—Fling Peregrine Pickle under the toilet—throw Roderick Random into the closet—put The Innocent Adultery into The Whole Duty of Man—thrust Lord Aimworth under the sofa—cram Ovid behind the bolster—there—put The Man of Feeling into your pocket—so, so—now lay Mrs. Chapone in sight, and leave Fordyce's Sermons open on the table.
LUCY
O burn it, ma'am! the hair-dresser has torn away as far as Proper
Pride.
LYDIA
Never mind—open at Sobriety.—Fling me Lord Chesterfields
Letters.—Now for 'em.
[Exit LUCY.]
[Enter Mrs. MALAPROP, and Sir ANTHONY ABSOLUTE.]
Mrs. MALAPROP There, Sir Anthony, there sits the deliberate simpleton who wants to disgrace her family, and lavish herself on a fellow not worth a shilling.
LYDIA
Madam, I thought you once——
Mrs. MALAPROP You thought, miss! I don't know any business you have to think at all—thought does not become a young woman. But the point we would request of you is, that you will promise to forget this fellow—to illiterate him, I say, quite from your memory.