Richard Brinsley Sheridan

“ Here, Louisa, tell this proud fool of yours that he's the only man I know that would renounce your fortune; and, by my soul! he's the only man in Spain that's worthy of it. There, bless you both: I'm an obstinate old fellow when I'm in the wrong; but you shall now find me as steady in the right.
Enter DON FERDINAND and DONNA CLARA.
Another wonder still! Why, sirrah! Ferdinand, you have not stole a nun, have you?
Don Fred. She is a nun in nothing but her habit, sir—look nearer, and you will perceive 'tis Clara d'Almanza, Don Guzman's daughter ”

“ Clara.
Canst thou be a lover,
And thus fly from me? [Both unveil.]
Don Ferd. How's this? My sister! Clara, too—I'm confounded.
Don. Louisa. 'Tis even so, good brother.
Paul. How! what impiety? did the man want to marry his own sister?
Don. Louisa. And ar'n't you ashamed of yourself not to know your own sister?
Don. Clara. To drive away your own mistress——
Don. Louisa. Don't you see how jealousy blinds people?
Don. Clara. Ay, and will you ever be jealous again?
Don Ferd. Never—never!—You, sister, I know will forgive me—but how, Clara, shall I presume——
Don. Clara. No, no ”

“ SCENE II.—DONNA LOUISA'S Dressing-Room. Enter ISAAC and MAID.
Maid. Sir, my mistress will wait on you presently.
[Goes to the door.]
Isaac. When she's at leisure—don't hurry her.— [Exit MAID.] —I wish I had ever practised a love-scene—I doubt I shall make a poor figure—I couldn't be more afraid if I was going before the Inquisition. So, the door opens—yes, she's coming—the very rustling of her silk has a disdainful sound.
Enter DUENNA dressed as DONNA LOUISA.
Now dar'n't I look round, for the soul of me—her beauty will certainly strike me dumb if I do. I wish she'd speak first. ”

“ Sir, you are very kind to favour me with your sentiments— and pray, what is your objection to him?
Don Ferd. He is a Portuguese, in the first place.
Don Jer. No such thing, boy; he has forsworn his country.
Don. Louisa. He is a Jew.
Don Jer. Another mistake: he has been a Christian these six weeks.
Don Ferd. Ay, he left his old religion for an estate, and has not had time to get a new one.
Don. Louisa. But stands like a dead wall between church and synagogue, or like the blank leaves between the Old and New Testament. ”

“ Don Ant. Isaac, one serious word—you'd better be content as you are; for, believe me, you will find that, in the opinion of the world, there is not a fairer subject for contempt and ridicule than a knave become the dupe of his own art.
Isaac. I don't care—I'll not endure this. Don Jerome, 'tis you have done this—you would be so cursed positive about the beauty of her you locked up, and all the time I told you she was as old as my mother, and as ugly as the devil. ”

“ Isaac. Psha! I tell you 'tis no such thing—you are the man she wants, and nobody but you. Here's ado to persuade you to take a pretty girl that's dying for you!
Don Ant. But I have no affection for this lady.
Isaac. And you have for Louisa, hey? But take my word for it, Antonio, you have no chance there—so you may as well secure the good that offers itself to you.
Don Ant. And could you reconcile it to your conscience to supplant your friend?
Isaac. Pish! Conscience has no more to do with gallantry than it has with politics. Why, you are no honest fellow if love can't make a rogue of you ”

“ Well, of all services, to serve a young lover is the hardest.—Not that I am an enemy to love; but my love and my master's differ strangely.—Don Ferdinand is much too gallant to eat, drink, or sleep:—now my love gives me an appetite—then I am fond of dreaming of my mistress, and I love dearly to toast her.—This cannot be done without good sleep and good liquor: hence my partiality to a feather- bed and a bottle. What a pity, now, that I have not further time, for reflections! but my master expects thee, honest Lopez, to secure his retreat from Donna Clara's window, as I guess.— [Music without.] ”

“ Zounds! this can never be Louisa—she's as old as my mother!
Duen. But former prepossessions give way to my father's commands.
Isaac. [Aside.] Her father! Yes, 'tis she then.—Lord, Lord; how blind some parents are!
Duen. Signor Isaac!
Isaac. [Aside.] Truly, the little damsel was right—she has rather a matronly air, indeed! ah! 'tis well my affections are fixed on her fortune, and not her person.
Duen. Signor, won't you sit? [She sits.]
Isaac. Pardon me, madam, I have scarce recovered my astonishment at your condescension, madam.— [Aside.] She has the devil's own dimples, to be sure! ”

“ To- morrow, your father forces Louisa to marry Isaac, the Portuguese—but come with me, and we'll devise something I warrant.
Don Ferd. I must go home.
Don Ant. Well, adieu!
Don Ferd. But, Don Antonio, if you did not love my sister, you have too much honour and friendship to supplant me with Clara—
AIR—Don Ant.
Friendship is the bond of reason;
But if beauty disapprove,
Heaven dissolves all other treason
In the heart that's true to love.
The faith which to my friend I swore,
As a civil oath I view;
But to the charms which I adore,
'Tis religion to be true. [Exit.] ”

“ For friends in all the aged you'll meet,
And brothers in the young.
Isaac. Conduct the lady to my lodgings, Carlos; I must haste to Don Jerome. Perhaps you know Louisa, ma'am. She's divinely handsome, isn't she?
Don. Louisa. You must excuse me not joining with you.
Isaac. Why I have heard it on all hands.
Don. Louisa. Her father is uncommonly partial to her; but I believe you will find she has rather a matronly air.
Isaac. Carlos, this is all envy.—You pretty girls never speak well of one another.— [To DON CARLOS.] Hark ye, find out Antonio, and I'll saddle him with this scrape, I warrant. ”

“ Psha! you talk like a blockhead! nobility, without an estate, is as ridiculous as gold lace on a frieze coat.
Don Ferd. This language, sir, would better become a Dutch or English trader than a Spaniard.
Don Jer. Yes; and those Dutch and English traders, as you call them, are the wiser people. Why, booby, in England they were formerly as nice, as to birth and family, as we are: but they have long discovered what a wonderful purifier gold is; and now, no one there regards pedigree in anything but a horse. Oh, here comes Isaac! I hope he has prospered in his suit. ”

“ With a heart at ease, merry, merry glees
Can never fail to please.
Don. Clar.
Nor, while we are so joyous,
Shall anxious fear annoy us;
Let us laugh and play, so blithe and gay,
Till we banish care away. ”

“ Why, 'slife! you are as great a rogue as Isaac!
Don Ant. No, Don Jerome; though I have profited by this paper in gaining your daughter's hand, I scorn to obtain her fortune by deceit. There, sir— [Gives a letter.] Now give her your blessing for a dower, and all the little I possess shall be settled on her in return. Had you wedded her to a prince, he could do no more.
Don Jer. Why, Gad, take me, but you are a very extraordinary fellow! But have you the impudence to suppose no one can do a generous action but yourself? ”

“ SCENE III.—A Room in DON JEROME'S House. Enter DONNA LOUISA and DUENNA.
Don. Louisa. But, my dear Margaret, my charming Duenna, do you think we shall succeed?
Duen. I tell you again, I have no doubt on't; but it must be instantly put to the trial. Everything is prepared in your room, and for the rest we must trust to fortune.
Don. Louisa. My father's oath was, never to see me till I had consented to——
Duen. 'Twas thus I overheard him say to his friend, Don Guzman,—I will demand of her to-morrow, once for all, whether she will consent to marry Isaac Mendoza ”

“ Isaac. And such a dupe as Antonio!
Don Jer. True; never were seen such a couple of credulous simpletons! But come, 'tis time you should see my daughter—you must carry on the siege by yourself, friend Isaac.
Isaac. Sir, you'll introduce——
Don Jer. No—I have sworn a solemn oath not to see or to speak to her till she renounces her disobedience; win her to that, and she gains a father and a husband at once.
Isaac. Gad, I shall never be able to deal with her alone; nothing keeps me in such awe as perfect beauty—now there is something consoling and encouraging in ugliness. ”

“ Isaac. Well, you may stay if you will; but I'll get some one to marry me: for by St. Iago, he shall never meet me again, while I am master of a pair of heels. [Runs out.—DONNA LOUISA lets down her veil.]
Enter DON FERDINAND.
Don Ferd. So, sir, I have met with you at last.
Don Ant. Well, sir.
Don Ferd. Base, treacherous man! whence can a false, deceitful soul, like yours, borrow confidence, to look so steadily on the man you've injured!
Don Ant. Ferdinand, you are too warm: 'tis true you find me on the point of wedding one I loved beyond my life ”

“ Here! how durst you, fellow, thus abruptly break in upon our devotions?
Port. I thought they were finished.
Paul. No, they were not—were they, brother Francis?
Fran. Not by a bottle each.
Paul. But neither you nor your fellows mark how the hours go; no, you mind nothing but the gratifying of your appetites; ye eat, and swill, and sleep, and gourmandise, and thrive, while we are wasting in mortification.
Port. We ask no more than nature craves.
Paul. 'Tis false, ye have more appetites than hairs! and your flushed, sleek, and pampered appearance is the disgrace of our order— out on't! ”

“ Good lack, with what eyes a father sees! As I have life, she is the very reverse of all this: as for the dimity skin you told me of, I swear 'tis a thorough nankeen as ever I saw! for her eyes, their utmost merit is not squinting—for her teeth, where there is one of ivory, its neighbour is pure ebony, black and white alternately, just like the keys of a harpsichord. ”

“ To you no soul shall bear deceit,
No stranger offer wrong;
But friends in all the aged you'll meet,
And lovers in the young.
But when they learn that you have blest
Another with your heart,
They'll bid aspiring passion rest,
And act a brother's part:
Then, lady, dread not here deceit,
Nor fear to suffer wrong ”

“ Dare such a thing as you pretend to talk of beauty?—A walking rouleau?—a body that seems to owe all its consequence to the dropsy! a pair of eyes like two dead beetles in a wad of brown dough! a beard like an artichoke, with dry, shrivelled jaws that would disgrace the mummy of a monkey? ”

“ Isaac. Nay, they have the cunning of serpents, that's the truth on't.
Don Jer. Psha! they are cunning only when they have fools to deal with. Why don't my girl play me such a trick? Let her cunning over- reach my caution, I say—hey, little Isaac!
Isaac. True, true; or let me see any of the sex make a fool of me!— No, no, egad! little Solomon (as my aunt used to call me) understands tricking a little too well. ”

“ But first let the priest put it out of his power to recall his word.—I'll fly to procure one.
Don. Louisa. Nay, if you part with me again, perhaps you may lose me.
Don Ant. Come, then—there is a friar of a neighbouring convent is my friend; you have already been diverted by the manners of a nunnery; let us see whether there is less hypocrisy among the holy fathers. ”

“ Ser. Sir, here is Signor Isaac. [Exit.]
Enter ISAAC.
Don Jer. So, my dear son-in-law—there, take my blessing and forgiveness. But where's my daughter? where's Louisa?
Isaac. She's without, impatient for a blessing, but almost afraid to enter.
Don Jer. Oh, fly and bring her in.— [Exit ISAAC.] Poor girl, I long to see her pretty face.
Isaac. [Without.] Come, my, charmer! my trembling angel!
Re-enter ISAAC with DUENNA; DON JEROME runs to meet them; she kneels.
Don Jer. Come to my arms, my— [Starts back.] Why, who the devil have we here?
Isaac. Nay, Don Jerome, you promised her forgiveness ”

“ I ne'er could any lustre see
In eyes that would not look on me;
I ne'er saw nectar on a lip,
But where my own did hope to sip. ”

“ Sure, sir, there must be some mistake; it can't be my sister whom he has seen.
Don Jer. 'Sdeath! you are as great a fool as he! What mistake can there be? Did not I lock up Louisa, and haven't I the key in my own pocket? and didn't her maid show him into the dressing-room? and yet you talk of a mistake! No, the Portuguese meant to insult me—and, but that this roof protects him, old as I am, this sword should do me justice.
Isaac. I [Aside.] must get off as well as I can—her fortune is not the less handsome. ”

“ Conscience has no more to do with gallantry than it has with politics. ”

“ Ferdinand, you are a prudent young rogue, and I forgive you: and, ifecks, you are a pretty little damsel. Give your father-in-law a kiss, you smiling rogue!
Don. Clara. There, old gentleman; and now mind you behave well to us.
Don Jer. Ifecks, those lips ha'n't been chilled by kissing beads! Egad, I believe I shall grow the best-humoured fellow in Spain. Lewis! Sancho! Carlos! d'ye hear? are all my doors thrown open? Our children's weddings are the only holidays our age can boast; and then we drain, with pleasure, the little stock of spirits time has left us.— [Music within.] ”

“ This bottle's the sun of our table,
His beams are rosy wine
We, planets, that are not able
Without his help to shine. ”

“ Soft pity never leaves the gentle breast
Where love has been received a welcome guest; ”

“ In eyes that would not look on me; ”

“ But the most remarkable part of his character is his passion for deceit and tricks of cunning.
Don. Louisa. Though at the same time the fool predominates so much over the knave, that I am told he is generally the dupe of his own art.
Don Ferd. True; like an unskilful gunner, he usually misses his aim, and is hurt by the recoil of his own piece. ”