_Enter Lady ~Townly~, Lord ~Townly~ following._ Lady _Town._ Well! look you, my Lord; I can bear it no longer! nothing still but about my faults, my faults! an agreeable subject truly! Lord _Town._ Why, Madam, if you won't hear of them; how can I ever hope to see you mend them? Lady _Town._ Why, I don't intend to mend them----I can't mend them----you know I have try'd to do it an hundred times, and--it hurts me so--I can't bear it! Lord _Town._ And I, Madam, can't bear this daily licentious abuse of your time and character. Lady _Town._ Abuse! Astonishing! when the Universe knows, I am never better company, than when I am doing what I have a mind to! But to see this world! that Men can never get over that silly spirit of contradiction----why but last _Thursday_ now----there you wisely amended one of my faults as you call them----you insisted upon my not going to the Masquerade----and pray, what was the consequence! was not I as cross as the Devil, all the night after? was not I forc'd to get company at home! and was not it almost three o'clock in the morning, before I was able to come to myself again? and then the fault is not mended neither,----for next time, I shall only have twice the inclination to go: so that all this mending, and mending, you see, is but dearning an old ruffle, to make it worse than it was before. Lord _Town._ Well, the manner of womens living, of late, is insupportable; and one way or other---- Lady _Town._ It's to be mended, I suppose! why so it may; but then, my dear Lord, you must give one time----and when things are at worst, you know, they may mend themselves! ha! ha! Lord _Town._ Madam, I am not in a humour, now, to trifle. Lady _Town._ Why then, my Lord, one word of fair argument--to talk with you, your own way now----You complain of my late hours, and I of your early ones----so far are we even, you'll allow----but pray which gives us the best figure in the eye of the polite world? my active, spirited three in the Morning, or your dull, drowsy eleven at Night? Now, I think, one has the air of a Woman of Quality, and t'other of a plodding Mechanic, that goes to bed betimes, that he may rise early, to open his shop!----Faugh! Lord _Town._ Fy, fy, Madam! is this your way of reasoning? 'tis time to wake you then----'tis not your ill hours alone, that disturb me, but as often the ill company that occasion those ill Hours. Lady _Town._ Sure I don't understand you now, my Lord; what ill company do I keep?