her[1]. She is quite above thinking of a settlement, jointure, or pin-money. She takes the
- ↑ Girtred. Good lord, that there are no fairies now-a-days, Syn.
you myself. I praise God, I have wherewithal. But as for you, daughter—
Gir. Aye, mother, I must be a lady to-morrow; and by your leave, mother (I speak it not without my duty, but only in the right of my husband), I must take place of you, mother.
Mrs. Touch. That you shall, lady-daughter; and have a coach as well as I.
Gir. Yes, mother; but my coach-horses must take the wall of your coach-horses.
Touch. Come, come, the day grows low; ’tis supper time: and, sir, respect my daughter; she has refused for you wealthy and honest matches, known good men.
Gir. Body o’ truth, citizen, citizens! Sweet knight, as soon as ever we are married, take me to thy mercy, out of this miserable city. Presently: carry me out of the scent of Newcastle coal and the hearing of Bow-bell, I beseech thee; down with me, for God’s sake.” Act I. Scene I.
This dotage on sound and show seemed characteristic of that age (see New Way to Pay Old Debts, &c.)—as if in the grossness of sense, and the absence of all intellectual and abstract topics of thought and discourse (the thin, circulating medium of the present day) the mind was attracted without the power of resistance to the tinkling sound of its own name with a title added to it, and the image of its own person tricked out in old-fashioned finery. The effect, no doubt, was also more marked and striking from the contrast between the ordinary penury and poverty of the age and the first and more extravagant demonstrations of luxury and artificial refinement.
