THWAITES. (_to WHITEWASH_) Please, sir, a knowin' party, as calls himself your clerk, has brought this. (_gives letter to WHITEWASH; WHITEWASH opens letter at first with indifference, but proceeds to read with eagerness; DE WINDSOR, AGATHA, and FERGUSON come forward, R._) DE W. (R. C.) My dear, this matter is settled; you shall be the wife of Mr. Tango. AGATHA. (R.) La, papa! how shocking! FERGUS. (_coming down R._) I beg your pardon; you don't mean Tom Tango, of the Stock Exchange? DE W. Yes, I do. AGATHA. Then you haven't heard the news: he was declared a defaulter this vewy afternoon. DE W. The devil! One swindles--another tells lies: where can I find an honest man? WHITE. (_rises, having been seated while reading letter_) Here! (_leading PAWKINS forward_) Look at that face--and read that letter? (_gives it_) The sum and substance of it is this: A notorious pickpocket has just been arrested, and retains me for the defence--confessing that he threw the watch into Pawkins' umbrella. PAWKINS. Does he? Then there's some good in the waggerbone after all. DE W. Well,--as a barrister who twaddles, is better than a stock jobber who waddles--here's my daughter. (_joins the hands of WHITEWASH and AGATHA_) PAWKINS. Ah! werry good! Jines hands and gives the paternal blessing! All right and proper! But wot good comes to me on it all? It strikes me you are a rum lot--you are. There's this 'ere wenerable party--(DE WINDSOR) asks me to 'is house--gives me a hice, which doesn't agree with me, and does me out o' three bob at cards! Here's another chap (FERGUSON) as talks as if he had gooseberries in his mouth, and tries to stop my windpipe. Then here's a sort o' costermonger in disguise (THWAITES) as interferes with my young 'oman.--And here--(WHITEWASH) here's the wust villain on 'em all. Ladies and gents, if I'm in any trouble touching your good-will--him's the party you must pitch into--cos vy? Don't you see? He's retained for the defence. WHITE. That won't do! I haven't had a refresher. PAWKINS. Haven't you? Then take your refresher there--(_pointing to AUDIENCE_) that's my refresher. Give me them 'ere parties on my side, and hang me if I'll want any defence at all! FERGUS. DE W. AGATHA. WHITE. PAWKINS. THWAITES. R. L. Curtain. Transcriber's Note This transcription is based on images digitized by Google from a copy made available by the University of Illinois and posted by the HathiTrust at: catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/100213071 In general, this transcription attempts to retain the punctuation and spelling of the source text. A few changes were made for the sake of consistency and to correct minor errors. The following changes were noted: - p. 2: Changed the name "Fergusson" in both the character list and the costume notes to "Ferguson" to be consistent with how the name is spelled elsewhere in the text.