TATT. Very true, sir, and desire to continue so. I have no more love for your daughter than I have likeness of you, and I have a secret in my heart which you would be glad to know and shan’t know, and yet you shall know it, too, and be sorry for’t afterwards. I’d have you to know, sir, that I am as knowing as the stars, and as secret as the night. And I’m going to be married just now, yet did not know of it half an hour ago; and the lady stays for me, and does not know of it yet. There’s a mystery for you: I know you love to untie difficulties. Or, if you can’t solve this, stay here a quarter of an hour, and I’ll come and explain it to you. SCENE VI. FORESIGHT, MISS PRUE. MISS. O father, why will you let him go? Won’t you make him to be my husband? FORE. Mercy on us, what do these lunacies portend? Alas! he’s mad, child, stark wild. MISS. What, and must not I have e’er a husband, then? What, must I go to bed to nurse again, and be a child as long as she’s an old woman? Indeed but I won’t. For now my mind is set upon a man, I will have a man some way or other. Oh, methinks I’m sick when I think of a man; and if I can’t have one, I would go to sleep all my life: for when I’m awake it makes me wish and long, and I don’t know for what. And I’d rather be always asleep than sick with thinking. FORE. Oh, fearful! I think the girl’s influenced too. Hussy, you shall have a rod. MISS. A fiddle of a rod, I’ll have a husband; and if you won’t get me one, I’ll get one for myself. I’ll marry our Robin the butler; he says he loves me, and he’s a handsome man, and shall be my husband: I warrant he’ll be my husband, and thank me too, for he told me so. SCENE VII. [_To them_] SCANDAL, MRS. FORESIGHT, _and_ NURSE. FORE. Did he so? I’ll dispatch him for’t presently. Rogue! O nurse, come hither. NURSE. What is your worship’s pleasure? FORE. Here, take your young mistress and lock her up presently, till farther orders from me. Not a word, Hussy; do what I bid you, no reply, away. And bid Robin make ready to give an account of his plate and linen, d’ye hear: begone when I bid you. MRS. FORE. What’s the matter, husband? FORE. ’Tis not convenient to tell you now. Mr. Scandal, heav’n keep us all in our senses—I fear there is a contagious frenzy abroad. How does Valentine? SCAN. Oh, I hope he will do well again. I have a message from him to your niece Angelica. FORE. I think she has not returned since she went abroad with Sir Sampson. Nurse, why are you not gone? SCENE VIII. FORESIGHT, SCANDAL, MRS. FORESIGHT, BEN. MRS. FORE. Here’s Mr. Benjamin, he can tell us if his father be come home. BEN. Who? Father? Ay, he’s come home with a vengeance. MRS. FORE. Why, what’s the matter? BEN. Matter! Why, he’s mad.