[Source & note: The full text of The True-Born Irishman is available at the University of Oxford Text Archive - online; accessed 24.02.2015. The text is paginated using square brackets in the OTA edition. Dash has replaced em-dash in this version in order to separate words clearly for search purposes, &c. The letter - encoded in HTML as ſſ - has been altered to s when standing for that letter in modern typography. Some occasional typographical slips - e.g., frolie for frolic - have been silently corrected when met with.]
THE TRUE-BORN IRISHMAN; OR, IRISH FINE LADY. A COMEDY 0F TWO ACTS.
By CHARLES MACKLIN.
DUBLIN: SOLD BY THE BOOKSELLERS, M, DCC, LXXXIII.
[Price, a British Sixpence.]
Dramatis Personae
| MEN. |
WOMEN. |
|
MURROGH O’DOGHERTY,
Count MUSHROOM,
Counsellor HAMILTON,
Major GAMBLE,
PAT FITZMUNGREL,
JAMES,
JOHN,
WILLIAM.
|
Mrs. DIGGERTY,
Lady KINNEGAD,
Lady BAB FRIGHTFUL,
Mrs. GAZETTE,
Mrs. JOLLY,
KATTY FARREL. |
| |
|
Scene, Dublin. - A Room in Mr. O’Dogherty’s House. Time, from Noon to Evening. |
1.1. ACT I.
Enter O’Dogherty and Servant.
O’Dogh. WHO’s there?
Serv. Sir.
O’Dogh. Is John come in yet?
Serv. No, Sir.
O’Dogh. Be sure send him to me as soon as he comes in.
[Exit Serv. Enter John.]
John. I am here, Sir.
O’Dogh. Well, John, how is my brother after his journey?
John. The counsellor gives his compliments to you, sir, and thanks you for your enquiry: He is very well, and will wait on you as soon as he is dressed.
O’Dogh. Mighty well - what is that you have in your hand, John?
John. It is nothing for you, Sir - it is a card for my mistress, from Madam Mulroony; her man gave it me as I came in.
O’Dogh. Pray, let me see it - “Mrs. Mulroony makes her compliments to Mrs. Murrogh O’Dogherty, and likewise to Mr. Murrogh O’Dogherty, and hopes to have the favour of their company on Sunday the 17th instant, to play at cards, sup, and spend the evening, with Lady Kinnegad, Mrs. Cardmark, Miss Brag, Mr. Mushroom, Cornet Basilisk, Sir Anthony All-Night, Major Gamble, and a very jolly party.” - Here, John, take it to your mistress - I have nothing to say to it. (Exit John) - Well done Mrs. Mulroony - faith, and it well becomes your father’s daughter, and your husband’s wife, to play at cards upon a Sunday. She is another of the fine ladies of this country, who, like my wife, is sending her soul to the devil, and her husband to a gaol as fast as she can. The booby has scarce a thousand pounds a year in the world, yet he spends above two thousand in equipage, taste, high life, and jolly parties - besides what his fool of a wise loses to that female sharper, my Lady Kinnegad and her jolly party; which, if I may judge by my own wife, is at least a good two thousand more; so that by the rule of subtraction, take four thousand pounds a year out of one, and in a very little time nothing will remain but a goal, or an escape in the packet on Connaught Monday.
[Enter William shewing in Counsellor Hamilton.]
Will. Counsellor Hamilton. [Exit William.]
O’Dogh. Counsellor, you are welcome to Dublin.
Coun. Brother, I am extremely glad to see you.
O’Dogh. By my faith, and so am I you. Odzooks give us a kiss, man: I give you my honour I am as glad to see you in Dublin at this juncture, as I should to see a hundred head of fat bullocks upon my own land, all ready for Ballinasloe Fair.
Coun. Sir, your humble servant. That is a great compliment from you, brother, I know.
O’Dogh. It is a very true one I assure you.
Coun. Well, I see by the news-papers that my sister is returned from her coronation frolic, and in health I suppose, or you would have wrote me word had it been otherwise.
O’Dogh. Yes, yes, she is in health indeed, and returned with a vengeance.
Coun. Pray what is the matter?
O’Dogh. Ogho! enough is the matter, the devil an inhabitant in Swist’s Hospital for Lunatics, is in a worse pickle than she is.
Coun. You surprise me! - in what respect, pray?
O’Dogh. Why, with a distemper that she has brought over with her from England, which will, in a little time, I am afraid, infect the whole nation.
Coun. Pray, what may that be?
O’Dogh. Sir, it is called the Irish Fine Lady’s delirium, or the London vertigo; if you were to hear her when the sit is upon her - oh, she is as mad - the devil a thing in this poor country but what gives her the spleen, and the vapours - then such a phrenzy of admiration for every thing in England - and, among the rest of her madness, she has brought over a new language with her.
Coun. What do you mean by a new language?
O’Dogh. Why a new kind of a London English, that’s no more like our Irish English, than a coxcomb’ fine gilded chariot like a Glassmanogue noddy. - Why what name do you think she went by when she was in England?
Coun. Why, what name dare she go by but Dogherty?
O’Dogh. Dogherty! - ogho - upon my honour she startles when she hears the name of Dogherty, and blushes, and is as much ashamed as if a man had spoke bawdy to her. - No, no, my dear, she is no longer the plain, modest, good-natured, domestic, obedient Irish Mrs. O’Dogherty, but the travelled, rampant, high-lis’d, prancing English Mrs. Diggerty.
Coun. Ha, ha, ha! Mrs. Diggerty! ridiculous!
O’Dogh. Ay, ridiculous indeed! to change her name - was there ever such impertinence? But do you know, brother, among the rest of your sister’s whims and madnesses, that she is turned a great politician too concerning my name.
Coun. Ha, ha, ha! a politician I - Why how in the name of wonder and common sense can politics and the name of Dogherty be connected?
O’Dogh. O it’s a wonder indeed! - but strange as it is, they are connected - but very ridiculously as you may imagine.
Coun. But, prithee, by what means?
O’Dogh. Why, you must know, we are to have an election shortly for the county that I live in, which young Lord Turnabout wants to carry for one of his own gang; and as the election in a great measure depends upon my interest, the young fox, knowing the conceit and vanity of my wife, has taken her by her favourite soible, and tickled it up, by telling her that if I direct my interest properly, it would not be difficult to procure me a title. Now, sir, this piece of flattery has stirred up such a rage of quality and title in her giddy head, that I cannot rest night or day for her importunity - in short, she would have me desert my friends, and sell myself, my honour, and my country, as several others have done before me, merely for a title, only that she may take place of a parcel of foolish idle women, and sink the antient name of Dogherty in the upstart title of Lady Thingum, my Lady Fiddle F addle, or some such ridiculous nonsense.
Coun. But, sir, pray pause a little upon this business - my sister’s vanity, I grant you, may be ridiculous - but though you despise titles and ostentation, yet, as your interest can certainly make the member, were I in your circumstances, I would have a voice in the senate of my country - go into parliament for the county yourself.
O’Dogh. Ogh, I have been among them already, and I know them all very well. What signifies my sitting among hundreds of people with my single opinion all alone. When I was there before I was stigmatized as a singular blockhead, an impracticable fellow, only because I would not consent to sit like an image, and when the master of the puppets pulled the string of my jaw on one side, to say aye, and on t’other side, to say no, and to leap over a stick backwards and forwards, just as the faction of party and jobbers, and leaders, and political adventurers directed - ah, brother, brother, I have done with them all - oh, I have done with them all.
Coun. What, and after all your expence of opposing government right or wrong, and supporting your patriots, will you give them all up?
O’Dogh. Indeed I will - I was patriot mad I own, like a great many other fools in this distracted country - sir, I was so mad that I hated the very name of a courtier as much as an illiterate lay-swaddling methodist does that of a regular clergyman. But I am cured of that folly; for now I find that a courtier is just as honest a man as a patriot - my dear, they are both made of the same stuff; ah, I have at last found out what sort of an animal a patriot is.
Coun. Ay! - and pray, brother, what sort of an animal is he?
O’Dogh. Why he is a sort of a political weathercock, that is blown about by every wind of society, which the foolish people are always looking up at, and staring, and distracting themselves with the integrity of its vicissitudes - to-day it is blown by the rough, rattling, tempest of party; next day by the trade-wind of fly, subtle, veering faction; then by the headlong hurricane of the people’s hot foggy breath; huzza boys, down with the courtier, up with the patriot, ’till at last the smooth, sost, gentle warm breeze of interest blows upon it, and from that moment it rusts to a point, and never stirs after - so there is your puff patriot for you - ogh, to the devil I pitch them all.
Coun. Ha, ha, ha! I am glad to find, brother, that you are come to that way of thinking at last, and I wish you had had the same notions years ago, it would have saved you many thousands.
O’Dogh. Indeed, and that it would - however experience is an excellent tutor, and as you are a young man, and just coming into the world, mine may be of some service to you; take this judgment from me then, and remember that an honest quiet country gentleman who out of policy and humanity establish es manufactories, or that contrives employment for the idle and the industrious, or that makes but a blade of corn grow where there was none before, is of more use to this poor country than all the courtiers, and patriots, and politicians, and prodigals that are unhanged; - so there let us leave them and return to my wife’s business.
Coun. With all my heart, I long to have a particular account of her conduct.
O’Dogh. O, brother, I have many grievances to tell you of, but I have one that’s more whimsical than all the rest.
Coun. Pray what is it?
O’Dogh. Why you must know, brother, I am going to be a cuckold as fast as I can.
Coun. Ha, ha, ha! that’s a comical grievance indeed.
O’Dogh. O stay ’till you hear the story, and I’ll engage you will say it is as comical a cuckoldom as ever was contrived.
Coun. I am glad to find, sir, it is of so sacetious a nature - pray let me hear this business?
O’Dogh. Sit down then, brother, for I have got a little touch of my gout, let us sit down for a moment, and I will let you into the whole affair.
Coun. Pray do, sir, for you have really raised my curiosity.
(Sits.)
O’Dogh. You must know, brother, there is an English coxcomb in this town just arrived among us, who thinks every woman that sees him is in love with him, and this spark, like another Paris of Troy, has taken it into his head to make a Helen of my wife, and a poor cuckoldy Menelaus of me.
Coun. Ha, ha, ha! Pray who is the spark?
O’Dogh. Why the name of this cuckoldmaker is Mushroom, but from his conceit and impertinence, the women and jokers of this town have dignified him with the title of Count Mushroom. Sir, he is the son of a pawn-broker in London, who having a mind to make a gentleman of his son, sent him to the university of Oxford; where, by mixing in the follies and vices of irregular youth, he got into a most sanguine friendsh ip with young Lord Old-Castle, who you know has a large estate in this country, and of whose ancestors mine have held long and profitable leases, which are now near expiring - in short, sir, this same Count Mushroom and my Lord became the Pylades and Orestes of the age, and so very fond was my Lord of him, that out of sheer friendsh ip to the Count, he got his sister with child.
Coun. Ha, ha, ha! that was friendly indeed.
O’Dogh. O yes, it was what you may call modern friendsh ip, taste, and bun tun; and my Lord being a man of gratitude, in return made him his agent in this country, and sent him over to settle his affairs here. And the Count and I being in treaty to renew the leases with my Lord, and we not being able to agree upon the terms, the coxcomb sends my wife a warm billedoux, in which he very gallantly tells her, that she shall decide the difference between us, and settle the leases at her own price, only upon the trifling condition that he may be permitted now and then to be the occasional lord of her ladysh ip’s matrimonial manor.
Coun. Impudent rascal! And, pray, what says my sister to all this?
O’Dogh. Why she does not know a word of the matter.
Coun. No! pray how came you to be acquainted with his letter then, and his designs upon my sister?
O’Dogh. Why there is the joke: it was by the help of Katty Farrel, my wife’s woman, by whose assistance I carry on a correspondence with the fellow in my wife’s name, unknown to her; and by that means I shall not only detect and expose the fellow, but get an excellent bargain of the leases, which are to be signed this very day.
Coun. But, sir, I hope you wont accept of leases upon those terms.
O’Dogh. O, I have no time to moralize with you on that point, but depend upon it I will convince you before I sleep of the propriety of my taking the leases: Lord, what signifies it; it is only a good bargain got from a foolish lord by the ingenuity of a knavish agent, which is what happens every day in this country, and in every country indeed.
Enter John.
John. Sir, Mr. Mushroom and Mr. Sharp the attorney are below.
O’Dogh. O, they are come about the leases. I will wait on them, John.
[Exit John.]
Now, brother, you shall see one of the pertest and most conceited impudent coxcombs that has ever yet been imported into this land, or that disgraced humanity.
[Mushroom without.]
Mush. My compliments, Mrs. Katty, to your lady, I will be with her in the twinkling of a star, or in less time than a single glance of her own immortal beauty can pass to the centre of an amorous heart.
O’Dogh. Orra now did you ever hear such cursed nonsense.
Enter Mushroom.
Mush. My dear Diggerty, I kiss your hands. I am come on purpose - I beg ten thousand pardons - I understood you were alone - you are busy I presume.
O’Dogh. Indeed, Count, we are not. This gentleman is a relation - my wife’s brother - counsellor Hamilton, whom you have so osten heard me talk of, and with whom I desire you will be acquainted.
Mush. Sir, I feel a superlative happiness in being known to you, I have long expected and long wish ed for it with a lover’s appetite; therefore without waiting for the dull avocation of experience, or the pedantic forms of ceremony, I beg you will honour me with a niche in your esteem, and register me in the select catalogue of your most constant and most ardent friends and admirers.
Coun. O dear sir, you are superabundantly obliging - this is such a favour -
Mush. No, no, no - none, none - give me your hand, Hamilton, you are my friend Diggerty’s friend, and that’s enough - I’ll serve you - say no more - I’ll serve you - rely upon me - I live in this town quite en famille - I go about every where, am of no party but those of love, pleasure and gallantry - the women like and command me at cards, tea, scandal and dancing - the men, at wit, hazard, jolly parties, a late hour and a bottle - I love ease, hate ceremony, and am at home wherever I go - that’s my system, Hamilton - ha, is not that taste, life, philosophy, and summum bonum - ha, my dear, at home wherever I go, an’t I, Diggerty.
O’Dogh. O, indeed, to give you your due, Count, you are never bash ful in any place.
Mush. Never, never, my dear.
O’Dogh. No faith, nor none of your family I believe.
Mush. Ha, ha, ha! never, never, my dear Diggerty - bash fulness is a mark of ignorance, an uncourtly, vulgar disease - what we men of the world are never infected with - but, my dear Diggerty, I am come on purpose to settle with you; my attorney with the leases is below, for as I know my lord would be loth to lose you as a tenant, and as I am convinced it would be for his interest you should have the lands, why we will even sign and seal at once upon your own terms - for really I think tenants in Ireland want encouragement - they are rack’d too high - they are indeed - it is a shame they should be rack’d so high.
O’Dogh. Faith, Count, there’s many a true word poke in jest.
Mush. Upon my honour I am serious - you want encouragement in trade too.
O’Dogh. But do you really think so?
Mush. I do upon my honour, and I will speak to some people of consequence about it on the other side, as soon as I return.
O’Dogh. Orra but will you?
Mush. I will upon my honour.
O’Dogh. O aye, you politicians promise us the devil and all while you are among us, but the moment you get o’t’other side, you have devilish bad memories.
Coun. You seem to like Ireland, sir.
Mush. O immensely, sir - it is a damn’d fine country, sir - and excellent claret - excellent claret upon my honour! ’tis true indeed it is not such claret as we drink in London - however, upon the whole, it’s a pretty, neat, light, sost, silky, palateable wine, and I like it mightily - but your fish in this here country is horrid. There you want taste, Hamilton - that there is an article of the scavoir vivre, in which you are totally ignorant - quite barbarous -
Coun. Aye! in what respect, sir?
Mush. Oh, my dear Hamilton, how can you ask such a question - you, you, now - who have been in London! - why you eat all your fish here too noo -
Coun. Too noo?
Mush. Yes, all too noo - why you eat it the very day - nay, sometimes the very hour it comes out of the water - now that there is a total want of taste - quite barbarous.
O’Dogh. O yes, brother, we eat all our fish in this here country too noo - too noo a great deal. Now, I fancy, Count, we should keep our fish before we dress it, as you keep your venison, till it has got the hot gout.
Mush. Ha, ha, ha! - the hot gout - ha, ha, ha! - Oh, I shall expire - my dear Diggerty, I honour your hot gout - but your French is a little en Irlandois - en Provence - haut gout is the word.
O’Dogh. Yes, yes - I understand you - Fogo.
Mush. Ha, ha, ha! - Hamilton, you are a little odd in this here country in some points - your friend there - is - you understand me - however upon the whole, take you altogether, you are a damn’d honest, tory rory, rantum scantum, dancing, singing, laughing, boozing, jolly, friendly, fighting, hospitable people, and I like you mightily.
Omnes. Ha, ha, ha!
Coun. Upon my word, sir, the people of Ireland are much obliged to you for your helter skelter, rantum scantum portrait of them.
O’Dogh. Indeed and that we are; and so you like us mightily?
Mush. I do upon honour, and I believe I shall marry one of your women here, grow domestic, and settle among you.
O’Dogh. Orra but will you do us that honour?
Mush. I really intend it.
O’Dogh. Faith then you will be a great honour to us, and you will find a great many relations here, Count; for we have a large crop of the Mushrooms in this here country.
Mush. O, sir, I don’t doubt it, for we are a numerous family both in England and Ireland - but I beg pardon, my dear Diggerty, I must rob you of my company for a moment to pay my devoirs to your lady; I know she is impatient to see me upon a particular affair - I will return upon the wings of diligence, then sign, squeeze wax, and dedicate to wit, mirth, and convivial jollity - Hamilton, yours, yours - my dear Diggerty, give me thy hand - from this moment set me down as thy unalterable friend - for I intend to be well with thy wife this very evening.
[Exit.
O’Dogh. Sure there never was so conceited and so impertinent a coxcomb as this puppy.
Enter Katty Farrel.
Oh here is Katty Farrel. So, Katty, do you see who’s here, child - your friend the counsellor.
Katty. Sir, your humble servant, I am glad to see you look so well. I hope all your good family are in health.
Coun. All very well, I thank you, Mrs. Katty.
O’Dogh. Well, well, now your ceremonies are over, let us to business - is your fine mistress dressed yet?
Katty. Yes, sir - but she has had a sad misfortune.
O’Dogh. What is that, Katty?
Katty. The money, sir, that you gave her to pay the mercer’s bill, from Covent-Garden, that was sent after her, she lost last night to my Lady Kinnegad, and some more of them, at bragg - but do not take any notice that I have told you of it, for she intends to borrow as much from Mr. Mushroom for a day or two as will pay the bill.
Coun. Why the woman has lost all sense of shame. (Aside.)
O’Dogh. Katty, that must not be. She must not do so mean a thing upon any account, as to borrow money of Mushroom. I will let you have the money to pay the bill, and do you say you borrowed it of your brother, or some friend or other, for her.
Katty. I will, sir.
[Exit. Mrs. Diggerty, Mushroom, &c. laugh very loud without.]
O’Dogh. So, the toilet council is broke up at last - here she comes, as fantastically fine, as a fine lady in a play. Ogho, what a head she has.
Enter Mrs. Diggerty and Mushroom.
Mrs. Dig. Brother, I am veestly glad to see you.
Coun. Welcome from England, sister.
Mrs. Dig. I am imminsely obligated to you, brother.
Coun. I hope it answered your expectation, sister.
Mrs. Dig. Transcendantly.
Coun. I am glad it pleased you.
Mrs. Dig. Ravish ingly.
Coun. Indeed!
Mrs. Dig. Beyond all degrees of compirison.
O’Dogh. O yes - beyond all degrees of compirison.
Mrs. Dig. Veest! imminse! extatic! I never knew life before - every thing there is high, tip top, the grand monde, the bun tun - and quite teesty.
O’Dogh. O yes, every thing there is quite teesty, brother.
Mrs. Dig. Well, Count, do you know that you pleased me veestly last night; I never saw you in such high humour - brother, I believe you do not know Mr. Mushroom, an English gentleman; pray let me have the honour of introducing him to you.
Coun. I have had that honour already, sister.
Mush. Yes, madam, Hamilton and I are old acquaintance.
O’Dogh. O yes they are old acquaintance, they have known each other above these two minutes.
Coun. Pray how do you like London, sister?
Mrs. Dig. O the place of the world, brother.
Coun. Then Dublin I suppose -
Mrs. Dig. O, dear brother, don’t neem them together.
O’Dogh. O no, you must not neem them together.
Mrs. Dig. Upon my honour, Dublin, after seeing London, looks like Irish -Town or Ring’s-End: Oh, every thing I set my eyes on here gives me the ennui, and the countre cure.
O’Dogh. O yes, every thing here gives her the contre coeur; that is a disease she has brought over with her from London that we know nothing of here.
Mrs. Dig. The streets are so narrow, the houses so dirty, and the people so ridiculous! then the women, Count! ha, ha, ha! - I can’t help laughing when I think of them. Well, I am convinced that the women of this here country who have never travelled, have nothing of that - a - a - non-chalance, and that jenny-see-quee that we have in London.
O’Dogh. O no, brother! the women have nothing of that jenny-see-quee, that she has brought over with her from London.
Mrs. Dig. But, Mushroom - I don’t know if what I am going to tell you be conceit or real; but, upon my honour, when I first came from England - you must know, brother, I came over in the picket.
O’Dogh. O yes, brother, she came over in the picket.
Mrs. Dig. Yes, sir, I came over in the picket, and we had a great orage - I don’t believe, Mr. Diggerty, you know what an orage is.
O’Dogh. Indeed you may take your oath I don’t, my dear.
Mrs. Dig. That is, sir, becase you have not been in foreign parts - then I will tell you what an orage is - sir, an orage is a storum.
O’Dogh. Madam, I thank you for your intelligence - indeed you are very learned and very obliging.
Mrs. Dig. And so, as I was saying, Count, we had a great storum, and the picket - I shall never forget it - the picket landed us about twenty miles from Dublin - and so, do you know, I say, Mushroom, that I fancied, being just come from England, that the very dogs here when they barked, had the brogue, ha, ha, ha!
Omnes. Ha, ha, ha!
Mush. Why then, by all that’s gothic, madam, I have thought so a thousand times.
Mrs. Dig. You have!
Mush. I have, upon honour.
Mrs. Dig. Have you ever observed it, brother? Mr. Diggerty, what do you think? Hav’n’t the dogs of this here country the brogue?
O’Dogh. Indeed and that they have, my dear, and the cows too, and the sheep, and the bullocks, and that as strong as ever your own mother had it, who was an O’Gallagher.
Mrs. Dig. Oh!
G’Dogh. Not two of whose ancestors could ever speak three words of English to be understood.
Mrs. Dig. You are a strange rude man, Mr. Diggerty, to tell me of my mother’s family - you know I always despised my mother’s family - I hate the very name of Gallagher, and all the old Irish whatever.
Coun. The present company excepted, sister - your husband, you know -
Mrs. Dig. O, I never think of him.
Coun. Ha, that’s polite indeed.
O’Dogh. O no, she never thinks of me.
Coun. Well, but sister, you have given us no account of the coronation, no doubt you were there.
] Mrs. Dig. There! O Moundew! - What a quistion! Why I was in every part of it - ax Mushroom else.
Mush. Every where, every where - she was every where, and with every body.
O’Dogh. Well, well - then I suppose it was very fine; but after all now, was it as fine as our riding the fringes here, or the lord lieutenant going to the parliament house.
Mrs. Dig. He, he, he! O shocking! don’t neem them together - now that is so Irish - but, brother, what would have afforded you the highest entertainment, was the city feast. O that there was imminse.
O’ Dogh. O yes, that there was imminse, brother, and much finer than this here.
Coun. Then you were at the city feast too, sister?
Mrs. Dig. O dear, yes! the court never stirred without me.
O’Dogh. No, indeed, the court never stirred without her.
Mrs. Dig. And the lord mayor made a point of having me there: so I went with her Grace, a friend of mine, and a party of the court, as one of the housh old - but the minute I went in every eye was upon me: Lord, it was veestly pleasant to see how the she grocers, the she mercers, the she dyers, the she hosiers, and the she taylors did stare at me - I was very brilliant that’s certain - rather more so than I was at the wedding.
O’Dogh. O indeed I don’t doubt but you were a sight.
Mrs. Dig. O pray, Mr. Diggerty, be quiet, and don’t interrupt me. - Well, but, brother, as I was saying, it was imminsely entertaining to hear the awkward city creatures whisper and give their vardee upon me, in their city manner - Lord, is this the handsome Irish woman? - the famous Irish toast? the celebrated Mrs. Diggerty - ha! - I don’t think she is so handsome, says one - hum! - well enough, says another, only I don’t like her nose - pray, doesn’t she squint? says a third - O yes, she certainly squints, says a fourth - and she is a little crooked - but she is genteel - O yes, yes, the city creatures all allowed I was genteel.
O’Dogh. O yes, yes, to be sure they all allowed she was genteel.
Mrs. Dig. But, brother - O Lud! I had like to have forgot - do you know that the Count is one of the prettiest poets in England, aye, or in Ireland either.
Mush. O heavens! madam!
Mrs. Dig. He is, by my honour.
Coun. I do not doubt the gentleman’s talents in the least, sister.
Mush. Sir, you are very polite, the lady is pleas’d to rally, that’s all, for my muse is but a smatterer - a slattern - a meer slip-shod lady.
Mrs. Dig. Do not mind him, brother, what I say is true. He is a mighty pretty poet, and to convince you that he is, I will shew you some verses that he indited upon me, as I was dancing at court - (Pulls them out). - Here they are, brother: Count, will you be so obliging as to read them to my brother?
Mush. Madam, as the sublime bard politely sings, the nod of beauty sways both gods and men, and I obey. Gentlemen, the title will at once let you into the whole of what you are to expect in this little production. “An extempore on the famous Mrs. O’Diggerty’s dancing at court.” - Now attend -
When beauteous Diggerty leads up the dance
In fair Britannia’s court,
Then ev’ry heart is in a prance,
And longs for Cupid’s sport.
Beaux ogle, and pant and gaze,
Belles envy and sneer, yet praise,
As Venus herself were there;
And prudes agree, it must be she,
It must be she - or Diggerty,
It must be she - or Diggerty,
Or Diggerty, the fair.” |
[Bows very low to Mrs. Diggerty.] That’s all, gentlemen, that’s all - only a jeu d’esprit, as I told you; a slight effort of a muse, bound in the silken chains of beauty and delight.
[He bows, she curtsies.]
Coun. Conceited coxcomb!
(Aside.)
Mush. And now, madam, I have a favour to beg of you.
Mrs. Dig. O command it - what is it?
Mush. Why, madam, as the celebrated doctor Thomas Augustus Arne has honoured this hasty offspring with an alliance of his harmonious mule, and as your ladyship has frequently heretofore enlivened it with your vocal glee, shall we beg that you will once more animate these verbal images with a touch of your Promethean pipe.
Mrs. Dig. O dear, Count, you are veestly panegyrical.
Coun. Aye, aye, come, sister, as you have the tune oblige us with it.
Mrs. Dig. I will try, brother, what I can do - but, by my honour, I have a great big cold - hem, hem! -
Mush. The worse your voice, madam, the more your taste will shine.
Mrs. Dig. Nay, Count, voice or no voice I will make an effort - Sol-la-mi-fa-sol, &c. - Upon my honour I have no more voice than a killing.
SONG. [During the song Mushroom beats time conceitedly, but so as not to interrupt her, or interfere with her acting it.]
Mush. Bravo! bravissimo! carissimo! novellissimo! transcendissimo! and every superlativissimo in the sublime region of excellentissimo!
O’Dogh. Come, Count, now if you please we will go down, and sign the leases, and dispatch the attornies.
Mush. With all my heart.
[Exit O’Dogh.]
Mrs. Dig. You dine here, Count.
Mush. Do I breathe! do I exist! I will but just step down, sign the leases, and return on the wings of inclination - ma chere belle sans, adieu. [Exit.]
Mrs. Dig. Au revoir - well, he is a most humourous creature, and mighty witty: don’t you think so, brother?
Coun. Very witty, indeed, and I suppose understands a lady’s toilet -
Mrs. Dig. The best of any man in the world, the most handy-creature about a woman - and such teest - but, brother, you must sup with us to-night - I have a few friends - a private peerty this evening: Lady Kinnegad, Lady Pam, old Lady Bab Frightful, Mrs. Gazette, Mr. Mushroom, Pat Fitzmungrel, Major Gamble, Mrs. Cardmark, and half a score more - quite a private peerty - you must be with us, brother - we are to have a little gambling and dancing, and are to be mighty jolly - I shall expect you - yours, yours - I must go finish m