Col. Your observation in the general is undoubtedly just: but, if you have the value for my cousin that you say you have, you must needs think —
Lovel. You must allow me, Sir, to interrupt you—IF I have the value I say I have—I hope, Sir, when I say I have that value, there is no room for that if, pronounced as you pronounced it with an emphasis.
Col. You have broken in upon me twice, Mr. Lovelace. I am as little accustomed to be broken in upon, as you are to be repeated upon.
Lord M. Two barrels of gunpowder, by my conscience! What a devil will it signify talking, if thus you are to blow one another up at every word?
Lovel. No man of honour, my Lord, will be easy to have his veracity called into question, though but by implication.
Col. Had you heard me out, Mr. Lovelace, you would have found, that my if was rather an if of inference, than of doubt. But 'tis, really a strange liberty gentlemen of free principles take; who at the same time that they would resent unto death the imputation of being capable of telling an untruth to a man, will not scruple to break through the most solemn oaths and promises to a woman. I must assure you, Mr. Lovelace, that I always made a conscience of my vows and promises.
Lovel. You did right, Colonel. But let me tell you, Sir, that you know not the man you talk to, if you imagine he is not able to rise to a proper resentment, when he sees his generous confessions taken for a mark of base-spiritedness.
Col. (warmly, and with a sneer,) Far be it from me, Mr. Lovelace, to impute to you the baseness of spirit you speak of; for what would that be but to imagine that a man, who has done a very flagrant injury, is not ready to show his bravery in defending it—
Mowbr. This is d——d severe, Colonel. It is, by Jove. I could not take so much at the hands of any man breathing as Mr. Lovelace before this took at your's.
Col. Who are you, Sir? What pretence have you to interpose in a cause where there is an acknowledged guilt on one side, and the honour of a considerable family wounded in the tenderest part by that guilt on the other?