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expert at her harpsichord--such a mistress of flat and sharp,
squallante, rumblante, and quiverante!--There was this time month--odds
minims and crotchets! how she did chirrup at Mrs. Piano's concert!
FAULKLAND
There again, what say you to this? you see she has been all mirth and
song--not a thought of me!
ABSOLUTE
Pho! man, is not music the food of love?
FAULKLAND
Well, well, it may be so.--Pray, Mr.--, what's his damned name?--Do you
remember what songs Miss Melville sung?
ACRES
Not I indeed.
ABSOLUTE
Stay, now, they were some pretty melancholy purling-stream airs, I
warrant; perhaps you may recollect;--did she sing, _When absent from my
soul's delight_?
ACRES
No, that wa'n't it.
ABSOLUTE
Or, _Go, gentle gales_! [Sings.]
ACRES
Oh, no! nothing like it. Odds! now I recollect one of them--_My heart's
my own, my will is free_. [Sings.]
FAULKLAND
Fool! fool that I am! to fix all my happiness on such a trifler!
'Sdeath! to make herself the pipe and ballad-monger of a circle! to
soothe her light heart with catches and glees!--What can you say to
this, sir?
ABSOLUTE
Why, that I should be glad to hear my mistress had been so merry, sir.
FAULKLAND
Nay, nay, nay--I'm not sorry that she has been happy--no, no, I am glad
of that--I would not have had her sad or sick--yet surely a sympathetic
heart would have shown itself even in the choice of a song--she might
have been temperately healthy, and somehow, plaintively gay;--but she
has been dancing too, I doubt not!
ACRES
What does the gentleman say about dancing?
ABSOLUTE
He says the lady we speak of dances as well as she sings.
ACRES
Ay, truly, does she--there was at our last race ball----
FAULKLAND
Hell and the devil! There!--there--I told you so! I told you so! Oh!
she thrives in my absence!--Dancing! but her whole feelings have been
in opposition with mine;--I have been anxious, silent, pensive,
sedentary--my days have been hours of care, my nights of
watchfulness.--She has been all health! spirit! laugh! song!
dance!--Oh! damned, damned levity!
ABSOLUTE
For Heaven's sake, Faulkland, don't expose yourself so!--Suppose she
has danced, what then?--does not the ceremony of society often oblige
----
FAULKLAND
Well, well, I'll contain myself--perhaps as you say--for form
sake.--What, Mr. Acres, you were praising Miss Melville's manner of
dancing a minuet--hey?
ACRES
Oh, I dare insure her for that--but what I was going to speak of was
her country-dancing. Odds swimmings! she has such an air with her!
FAULKLAND
Now disappointment on her!--Defend this, Absolute; why don't you defend
this?--Country-dances! jigs and reels! am I to blame now? A minuet I
could have forgiven--I should not have minded that--I say I should not
have regarded a minuet--but country-dances!--Zounds! had she made one
in a cotillion--I believe I could have forgiven even that--but to be
monkey-led for a night!--to run the gauntlet through a string of
amorous palming puppies!--to show paces like a managed filly!--Oh,
Jack, there never can be but one man in the world whom a truly modest
and delicate woman ought to pair with in a country-dance; and, even
then, the rest of the couples should be her great-uncles and aunts!
ABSOLUTE
Ay, to be sure!--grandfathers and grandmothers!
FAULKLAND
If there be but one vicious mind in the set, 'twill spread like a
contagion--the action of their pulse beats to the lascivious movement
of the jig--their quivering, warm-breathed sighs impregnate the very
air--the atmosphere becomes electrical to love, and each amorous spark