Thus does our Author to your candour trust;Conscious, the free are generous, as just.
Characters New-York Maryland Col.MANLY, Mr Henry.Mr Hallam.
DIMPLE, Mr Hallam.Mr Harper.
VANROUGH, Mr Morris.Mr Morris.
JESSAMY, Mr Harper.Mr Biddle.
JONATHAN, Mr Wignell.Mr Wignell.
CHARLOTTE, Mrs Morris.Mrs Morris.
MARIA, Mrs Harper.Mrs Harper.
LETITIA, Mrs Kenna.Mrs Williamson.
JENNY, Miss Tuke.Miss W.Tuke.
SERVANTS
SCENE, NEW-YORK.
The Contrast.
ACT I.
Scene, an Apartment at CHARLOTTE'S.
CHARLOTTE and LETITIA discovered.
LETITIA
AND so, Charlotte, you really think the pocket-hoop unbecoming.
CHARLOTTE
No, I don't say so.It may be very becoming to saunter round the house of a rainy day; to visit my grand-mamma, or to go to Quakers' meeting: but to swim in a minuet, with the eyes of fifty well-dressed beaux upon me, to trip it in the Mall, or walk on the battery, give me the luxurious, jaunty, flowing, bell-hoop.It would have delighted you to have seen me the last evening, my charming girl! I was dangling o'er the battery with Billy Dimple; a knot of young fellows were upon the platform; as I passed them Ifaultered with one of the most bewitching false steps you ever saw, and then recovered myself with such a pretty confusion, flirting my hoop to discover a jet black shoe and brilliant buckle.Gad! how my little heart thrilled to hear the confused raptures of--"Demme, Jack, what a delicate foot!" "Ha! Gen-eral, what a well-turned--"
LETITIA
Fie! fie! Charlotte [stopping her mouth], I protest you are quite a libertine.
CHARLOTTE
Why, my dear little prude, are we not all such libertines? Do you think, when I sat tortured two hours under the hands of my friseur, and an hour more at my toilet, that I had any thoughts of my aunt Susan, or my cousin Betsey? though they are both allowed to be critical judges of dress.
LETITIA
Why, who should we dress to please, but those are judges of its merit?
CHARLOTTE
Why, a creature who does not know Buffon from Souflee--Man!--my Letitia--Man! for whom we dress, walk, dance, talk, lisp, languish, and smile.
Does not the grave Spectator assure us that even our much bepraised diffidence, modesty, and blushes are all directed to make ourselves good wives and mothers as fast as we can? Why, I'll undertake with one flirt of this hoop to bring more beaux to my feet in one week than the grave Maria, and her sentimental circle, can do, by sighing sentiment till their hairs are grey.
LETITIA
Well, I won't argue with you; you always out-talk me; let us change the subject.I hear that Mr.Dim-ple and Maria are soon to be married.
CHARLOTTE
You hear true.I was consulted in the choice of the wedding clothes.She is to be married in a delicate white sattin, and has a monstrous pretty brocaded lutestring for the second day.It would have done you good to have seen with what an affected indifference the dear sentimentalist turned over a thousand pretty things, just as if her heart did not palpitate with her approaching happiness, and at last made her choice and arranged her dress with such apathy as if she did not know that plain white sattin and a simple blond lace would shew her clear skin and dark hair to the greatest advantage.
LETITIA
But they say her indifference to dress, and even to the gentleman himself, is not entirely affected.
CHARLOTTE
How?
LETITIA
It is whispered that if Maria gives her hand to Mr.
Dimple, it will be without her heart.
CHARLOTTE
Though the giving the heart is one of the last of all laughable considerations in the marriage of a girl of spirit, yet I should like to hear what antiquated notions the dear little piece of old-fashioned prudery has got in her head.
LETITIA
Why, you know that old Mr.John-Richard-Robert-Jacob-Isaac-Abraham-Cornelius Van Dumpling, Billy Dimple's father (for he has thought fit to soften his name, as well as manners, during his English tour), was the most intimate friend of Maria's father.The old folks, about a year before Mr.Van Dumpling's death, proposed this match: the young folks were accordingly introduced, and told they must love one another.Billy was then a good-natured, decent-dress-ing young fellow, with a little dash of the coxcomb, such as our young fellows of fortune usually have.At this time, I really believe she thought she loved him;and had they been married, I doubt not they might have jogged on, to the end of the chapter, a good kind of a sing-song lack-a-daysaical life, as other honest married folks do.
CHARLOTTE
Why did they not then marry?
LETITIA
Upon the death of his father, Billy went to England to see the world and rub off a little of the patroon rust.During his absence, Maria, like a good girl, to keep herself constant to her nown true-love, avoided company, and betook herself, for her amusement, to her books, and her dear Billy's letters.But, alas!
how many ways has the mischievous demon of incon-stancy of stealing into a woman's heart! Her love was destroyed by the very means she took to support it.
CHARLOTTE
How?--Oh! I have it--some likely young beau found the way to her study.
LETITIA
Be patient, Charlotte; your head so runs upon beaux.Why, she read Sir Charles Grandison, Clarissa Harlow, Shenstone, and the Sentimental Journey; and between whiles, as I said, Billy's letters.But, as her taste improved, her love declined.The contrast was so striking betwixt the good sense of her books and the flimsiness of her love-letters, that she discovered she had unthinkingly engaged her hand without her heart; and then the whole transaction, managed by the old folks, now appeared so unsentimental, and looked so like bargaining for a bale of goods, that she found she ought to have rejected, according to every rule of romance, even the man of her choice, if im-posed upon her in that manner.Clary Harlow would have scorned such a match.
CHARLOTTE
Well, how was it on Mr.Dimple's return? Did he meet a more favourable reception than his letters?
LETITIA
