Lady _Town._ O! there's no life like it! why t'other day for example, when you din'd abroad; my Lord and I, after a pretty chearful _tête à tête_ meal, sat us down by the fire-side, in an easy indolent, pick-tooth way, for about a quarter of an hour, as if we had not thought of any other's being in the room----at last, stretching himself, and yawning----My Dear, says he,----aw----you came home very late, last night----'Twas but just turn'd of Two, says I----I was in bed--aw----by eleven, says he; so you are every night, says I----Well, says he, I am amazed you can sit up so late----How can you be amaz'd, says I, at a thing that happens so often?----upon which we enter'd into a conversation----and tho' this is a point has entertain'd us above fifty times already, we always find so many pretty new things to say upon it, that I believe in my soul, it will last as long as we live. Lady _Grace._ But pray! in such sort of family dialogues (tho' extremely well for passing the time) don't there, now and then, enter some little witty sort of bitterness? Lady _Town._ O yes! which does not do amiss at all! A smart repartee, with a zest of recrimination at the head of it, makes the prettiest sherbet; Ay, ay! if we did not mix a little of the acid with it, a matrimonial Society would be so luscious, that nothing but an old liquorish prude would be able to bear it. Lady _Grace._ Well,----certainly you have the most elegant taste---- Lady _Town._ Tho' to tell you the truth, my Dear, I rather think we squeez'd a little too much lemon into it, this bout; for it grew so sour at last, that--I think----I almost told him, he was a fool----and he again----talk'd something oddly of----turning me out of doors. Lady _Grace._ O! have a care of that! Lady _Town._ Nay, if he should, I may thank my own wise father for that---- Lady _Grace._ How so? Lady _Town._ Why----when my good Lord first open'd his honourable trenches before me, my unaccountable Papa, in whose hands I then was, gave me up at discretion. Lady _Grace._ How do you mean? Lady _Town._ He said, the wives of this age were come to that pass, that he would not desire even his own Daughter should be trusted with pin-money; so that my whole train of separate inclinations are left entirely at the mercy of an husband's odd humours. Lady _Grace._ Why, that, indeed, is enough to make a woman of spirit look about her! Lady _Town._ Nay, but to be serious; my Dear; what would you really have a woman do in my case? Lady _Grace._ Why----If I had a sober husband as you have, I would make myself the happiest wife in the world by being as sober as he.