PHIL. _Will she, nill she, quick, out she goes_! Although another should take the fever's part, pay no attention; laugh at the gossips; _will she, nill she, quick, out she goes. Will she, nill she, will she, nill she_. This _will she, nill she_, says a great deal more than it seems. I do not know if every one is like me, but I discover in it a hundred meanings. BEL. It is true that it says more than its size seems to imply. PHI. (_to_ TRISSOTIN). But when you wrote this charming _Will she, nill she_, did you yourself understand all its energy? Did you realise all that it tells us, and did you then think that you were writing something so witty? TRI. Ah! ah! ARM. I have likewise the _ingrate_ in my head; this ungrateful, unjust, uncivil fever that ill-treats people who entertain her. PHI. In short, both the stanzas are admirable. Let us come quickly to the triplets, I pray. ARM. Ah! once more, _will she, nill she_, I beg. TRI. _Will she, nill she, quick, out she goes!_ PHI., ARM. _and_ BEL. _Will she, nill she!_ TRI. _From your apartment richly lined._ PHI., ARM. _and_ BEL. _Rich apartment!_ TRI. _Where that ingrate's outrageous mind._ PHI., ARM. _and_ BEL. That ungrateful fever! TRI. _At your fair life her javelin throws._ PHI. _Fair life!_ ARM. _and_ BEL. Ah! TRI. _What! without heed for your high line, She saps your blood with care malign..._ PHI., ARM. _and_ BEL. Ah! TRI. _Redoubling outrage night and day! If to the bath you take her down, Without a moment's haggling, pray, With your own hands the miscreant drown._ PHI. Ah! it is quite overpowering. BEL. I faint. ARM. I die from pleasure. PHI. A thousand sweet thrills seize one. ARM. _If to the bath you take her down,_ BEL. _Without a moment's haggling, pray,_ PHI. _With your own hands the miscreant drown_. With your own hands, there, drown her there in the bath. ARM. In your verses we meet at each step with charming beauty. BEL. One promenades through them with rapture. PHI. One treads on fine things only. ARM. They are little lanes all strewn with roses. TRI. Then the sonnet seems to you.... PHI. Admirable, new; and never did any one make anything more beautiful. BEL. (_to_ HENRIETTE). What! my niece, you listen to what has been read without emotion! You play there but a sorry part! HEN. We each of us play the best part we can, my aunt, and to be a wit does not depend on our will. TRI. My verses, perhaps, are tedious to you. HEN. No. I do not listen. PHI. Ah! let us hear the epigram. TRI. ON A CARRIAGE OF THE COLOUR OF AMARANTH GIVEN TO ONE OF HIS LADY FRIENDS. [2] PHI. His titles have always something rare in them. ARM. They prepare one for a hundred flashes of wit. TRI. _Love for his bonds so dear a price demands, E'en now it costs me more than half my lands, And when this chariot meets your eyes, Where so much gold emboss'd doth rise That people all astonished stand, And Laïs rides in triumph through the land..._