_Enter_ Mrs. JOYNER _and_ Mrs. CROSSBITE. _Mrs. Joyn._ Good morrow, gossip. _Mrs. Cros._ Good morrow;--but why up so early, good gossip? _Mrs. Joyn._ My care and passionate concern for you and yours would not let me rest, in truly. _Mrs. Cros._ For me and mine? _Mrs. Joyn._ You know we have known one another long; I think it be some nine-and-thirty years since you were married. _Mrs. Cros._ Nine-and thirty years old, mistress! I'd have you to know, I am no far-born child; and if the register had not been burned in the last great fire, alas!--but my face needs no register sure; nine-and-thirty years old, said you? _Mrs. Joyn._ I said you had been so long married; but, indeed, you bear your years as well as any she in Pepper-alley. _Mrs. Cros._ Nine-and-thirty, mistress! _Mrs. Joyn._ This it is; a woman, now-a-days, had rather you should find her faulty with a man, I warrant you, than discover her age, I warrant you. _Mrs. Cros._ Marry, and 'tis the greatest secret far. Tell a miser he is rich, and a woman she is old,--you will get no money of him, not kindness of her. To tell me I was nine-and-thirty--(I say no more) 'twas un-neighbourly done of you, mistress. _Mrs. Joyn._ My memory confesses my age, it seems, as much as my face; for I thought-- _Mrs. Cros._ Pray talk nor think no more of any one's age; but say what brought you hither so early. _Mrs. Joyn._ How does my sweet god-daughter, poor wretch? _Mrs. Cros._ Well, very well. _Mrs. Joyn._ Ah, sweet creature! Alas! alas!--I am sorry for her. _Mrs. Cros._ Why, what has she done to deserve your sorrow, or my reprehension? _Enter_ LUCY, _and stands unseen at the door._ _Lucy._ What, are they talking of me? [_Aside._ _Mrs. Joyn._ In short, she was seen going into the meeting-house of the wicked, otherwise called the playhouse, hand in hand with that vile fellow Dapperwit. _Mrs. Cros._ Mr. Dapperwit! let me tell you, if 'twere not for Master Dapperwit, we might have lived all this vacation upon green cheese, tripe, and ox cheek. If he had it, we should not want it; but, poor gentleman! it often goes hard with him,--for he's a wit. _Mrs. Joyn._ So, then, you are the dog to be fed, while the house is broken up! I say, beware! The sweet bits you swallow will make your daughter's belly swell, mistress; and, after all your junkets, there will be a bone for you to pick, mistress. _Mrs. Cros._ Sure, Master Dapperwit is no such manner of man! _Mrs. Joyn._ He is a wit, you say; and what are wits, but contemners of matrons, seducers, or defamers of married women, and deflowerers of helpless virgins, even in the streets, upon the very bulks[36]; affronters of midnight magistracy, and breakers of windows? in a word-- _Mrs. Cros._ But he is a little wit, a modest wit, and they do no such outrageous things as your great wits do. _Mrs. Joyn._ Nay, I dare say, he will not say himself he is a little wit if you ask him.