Belisa, the Dama Melindrosa, the lady with the vapours, of Lope’s comedy, is the daughter of a rich widow, Lisarda, and she has a brother, Don Juan. The brother spends his nights serenading ladies, in company with his friend Eliso, and lies in bed till midday. Belisa has hitherto refused all the husbands proposed by her mother, giving more or less fantastical reasons in each case, and is a very airy whimsical young person. In the first scene of the play Lisarda confides her troubles with her children to her brother Tiberio, the _barba_--beard, or old man--of the piece. Lisarda professes her desire to get her children married and settled in life, in order that she may retire to the country with one gentlewoman and a slave, there to bewail her lost lord (who, we learn, has been dead for about a year), like the tender turtle on a thorn. Tiberio pooh-poohs his sister’s sentiments, and makes the unsympathetic remark that widows generally seem to find solitude a thorn, to judge by their perpetual fidgeting, but offers to use his influence to persuade Belisa to marry. Then follows a scene with the young lady. She knows she is going to be sermonised, and puts on all her airs and graces. A chair is brought for Tiberio and cushions for the ladies, who squat on them in the old Spanish fashion. Mme. d’Aulnoy, the author of the fairy tales, who came to Spain as wife of the French Ambassador, has explained how intolerable she found this attitude. Belisa provokes her uncle, who has the usual peppery temper of the _barba_, into expressing a desire to box her ears, but will accept no husband. To this party enter an _alguacil_, or officer of police, with an _escribano_, a species of attorney and process-server. We learn that Lisarda has a claim on her son’s friend Eliso, who owed her husband money, and will not pay it. She has therefore sued out a writ, and is sending the officers to seize a _prenda_, or pledge, which she can keep or sell for the discharge of the debt, if Eliso will not pay what he owes.