_Mrs. Blandish._ These are the attentions that establish valuable friendships in female life. By adapting myself to the whims of one, submitting to the jest of another, assisting the little plots of a third, and taking part against the husbands with all, I am become an absolute essential in the polite world; the very soul of every fashionable party in town or country. _Blandish._ The country! Pshaw! Time thrown away. _Mrs. Blandish._ Time thrown away! As if women of fashion left London, to turn freckled shepherdesses.--No, no; cards, cards and backgammon, are the delights of rural life; and, slightly as you may think of my skill, at the year's end I am no inconsiderable sharer in the pin-money of my society. _Blandish._ A paltry resource----Gambling is a damned trade, and I have done with it. _Mrs. Blandish._ Indeed! _Blandish._ Yes; 'twas high time.--The women don't pay; and as for the men, the age grows circumspect in proportion to its poverty. It's odds but one loses a character to establish a debt, and must fight a duel to obtain the payment. I have a thousand better plans, but two principal ones; and I am only at a loss which to chuse. _Mrs. Blandish._ Out with them, I beseech you. _Blandish._ Whether I shall marry my friend's intended bride, or his sister. _Mrs. Blandish._ Marry his intended bride?----What, pig-iron and usury?--Your opinion of her must advance your addresses admirably. _Blandish._ My lord's opinion of her will advance them; he can't bear the sight of her, and, in defiance of his uncle, Sir Clement Flint's, eagerness for the match, is running mad after an adventure, which I, who am his confidant, shall keep going till I determine.--There's news for you. _Mrs. Blandish._ And his sister, Lady Emily, the alternative! The first match in England, in beauty, wit, and accomplishment. _Blandish._ Pooh! A fig for her personal charms; she will bring me connexion that would soon supply fortune; the other would bring fortune enough to make connexion unnecessary. _Mrs. Blandish._ And as to the certainty of success with the one or the other---- _Blandish._ Success!--Are they not women?--But I must away. And first for Lord Gayville, and his fellow student, Clifford. _Mrs. Blandish._ Apropos! Look well to Clifford. Lady Emily and he were acquainted at the age of first impressions. _Blandish._ I dare say he always meant to be the complete friend of the family; for, besides his design on Lady Emily, his game, I find, has been to work upon Lord Gayville's understanding; he thinks he must finally establish himself in his esteem, by inexorably opposing all his follies.--Poor simpleton!--Now, my touch of opposition goes only to enhance the value of my acquiescence. So adieu for the morning--You to Miss Alscrip, with an unction of flattery, fit for a house-painter's brush; I to Sir Clement, and his family, with a composition as delicate as ether, and to be applied with the point of a feather.