_Aldo._ [_Aside._] Before George, a proper fellow, and a swinger he should be, by his make! the rogue would humble a whore, I warrant him.--You are welcome, sir, amongst us; most heartily welcome, as I may say. _Wood._ All's well: he knows me not.--Sir, your civility is obliging to a stranger, and may befriend me, in the acquaintance of our fellow-lodgers. _Aldo._ Hold you there, sir: I must first understand you a little better; and yet, methinks, you should be true to love. _Wood._ Drinking and wenching are but slips of youth: I had those two good qualities from my father. _Aldo._ Thou, boy! Aha, boy! a true Trojan, I warrant thee! [_Hugging him._] Well, I say no more; but you are lighted into such a family, such food for concupiscence, such _bona roba's_! _Wood._ One I know, indeed; a wife: But _bona roba's_, say you? _Aldo._ I say, _bona roba's_, in the plural number. _Wood._ Why, what a Turk Mahomet shall I be! No, I will not make myself drunk with the conceit of so much joy: The fortune's too great for mortal man; and I a poor unworthy sinner. _Aldo._ Would I lie to my friend? Am I a man? Am I a christian? There is that wife you mentioned, a delicate little wheedling devil, with such an appearance of simplicity; and with that, she does so undermine, so fool her conceited husband, that he despises her! _Wood._ Just ripe for horns: His destiny, like a Turk's, is written in his forehead.[1] _Aldo._ Peace, peace! thou art yet ordained for greater things. There is another, too, a kept mistress, a brave strapping jade, a two-handed whore! _Wood._ A kept mistress, too! my bowels yearn to her already: she is certain prize. _Aldo._ But this lady is so termagant an empress! and he is so submissive, so tame, so led a keeper, and as proud of his slavery as a Frenchman. I am confident he dares not find her false, for fear of a quarrel with her; because he is sure to be at the charges of the war. She knows he cannot live without her, and therefore seeks occasions of falling out, to make him purchase peace. I believe she is now aiming at a settlement. _Wood._ Might not I ask you one civil question? How pass you your time in this noble family? For I find you are a lover of the game, and I should be loth to hunt in your purlieus. _Aldo._ I must first tell you something of my condition. I am here a friend to all of them; I am their _factotum_, do all their business; for, not to boast, sir, I am a man of general acquaintance: There is no news in town, either foreign or domestic, but I have it first; no mortgage of lands, no sale of houses, but I have a finger in them. _Wood._ Then, I suppose, you are a gainer by your pains. _Aldo._ No, I do all _gratis_, and am most commonly a loser; only a buck sometimes from this good lord, or that good lady in the country: and I eat it not alone, I must have company. _Wood._ Pray, what company do you invite?