SANDFORD Good-morrow to my fair mistress. 'Twas a chance I saw you, lady, so intent was I On chiding hence these graceless serving-men, Who cannot break their fast at morning meals Without debauch and mis-timed riotings. This house hath been a scene of nothing else But atheist riot and profane excess, Since my old master quitted all his rights here. MARGARET Each day I endure fresh insult from the scorn Of Woodvil's friends, the uncivil jests, And free discourses, of the dissolute men, That haunt this mansion, making me their mirth. SANDFORD Does my young master know of these affronts? MARGARET I cannot tell. Perhaps he has not been told. Perhaps he might have seen them if he would. I have known him more quick-sighted. Let that pass. All things seem chang'd, I think. I had a friend, (I can't but weep to think him alter'd too,) These things are best forgotten; but I knew A man, a young man, young, and full of honor, That would have pick'd a quarrel for a straw, And fought it out to the extremity, E'en with the dearest friend he had alive, On but a bare surmise, a possibility, That Margaret had suffer'd an affront. Some are too tame, that were too splenetic once. SANDFORD 'Twere best he should be _told_ of these affronts. MARGARET I am the daughter of his father's friend, Sir Walter's orphan-ward. I am not his servant maid, that I should wait The opportunity of a gracious hearing, Enquire the times and seasons when to put My peevish prayer up at young Woodvil's feet, And sue to him for slow redress, who was Himself a suitor late to Margaret. I am somewhat proud: and Woodvil taught me pride. I was his favourite once, his playfellow in infancy, And joyful mistress of his youth. None once so pleasant in his eyes as Margaret. His conscience, his religion, Margaret was, His dear heart's confessor, a heart within that heart, And all dear things summ'd up in her alone. As Margaret smil'd or frown'd John liv'd or died: His dress, speech, gesture, studies, friendships, all Being fashion'd to her liking. His flatteries taught me first this self-esteem, His flatteries and caresses, while he loved. The world esteem'd her happy, who had won His heart, who won all hearts; And ladies envied me the love of Woodvil. SANDFORD He doth affect the courtier's life too much, Whose art is to forget, And that has wrought this seeming change in him, That was by nature noble. 'Tis these court-plagues, that swarm about our house, Have done the mischief, making his fancy giddy With images of state, preferment, place, Tainting his generous spirits with ambition.