FIRST WAITER
So does Hammond for that matter.

SECOND WAITER
Faith, so it does if you go to spell it.  I did not think of that.  I
begin to be of your opinion; he is certainly a Hammond.

FIRST WAITER
Here comes Susan Chambermaid, may be she can tell.

Enter Susan.

BOTH
Well, Susan, have you heard any thing who the strange gentleman is?

SUSAN Haven’t you heard? it’s all come out; Mrs. Guesswell, the parson’s widow, has been here about it.  I overheard her talking in confidence to Mrs. Setter and Mrs. Pointer, and she says, they were holding a sort of cummitty about it.

BOTH
What?  What?

SUSAN There can’t be a doubt of it, she says, what from hisfigger and the appearance he cuts, and his sumpshous way of living, and above all from the remarkable circumstance that his surname should begin with an H., that he must be—­

BOTH
Well, well—­

SUSAN
Neither more nor less than the Prince.

BOTH
Prince!

SUSAN
The Prince of Hessy-Cassel in disguise.

BOTH
Very likely, very likely.

SUSAN
Oh, there can’t be a doubt on it.  Mrs. Guesswell says she knows it.

FIRST WAITER
Now if we could be sure that the Prince of Hessy what-do-you-call-him
was in England on his travels.

SECOND WAITER
Get a newspaper.  Look in the newspapers.

SUSAN
Fiddle of the newspapers, who else can it be?

BOTH
That is very true (gravely).

Enter Landlord.

LANDLORD Here, Susan, James, Philip, where are you all?  The London coach is come in, and there is Mr. Fillaside, the fat passenger, has been bawling for somebody to help him off with his boots. (The Chambermaid and Waiters slip out.)

(Solus.) The house is turned upside down since the strange gentleman came into it.  Nothing but guessing and speculating, and speculating and guessing; waiters and chambermaids getting into corners and speculating, ostlers and stable-boys speculating in the yard, I believe the very horses in the stable are speculating too, for there they stand in a musing posture, nothing for them to eat, and not seeming to care whether thay have any thing or no; and after all what does it signify?  I hate such curious—­odso, I must take this box up into his bed-room—­he charged me to see to it myself—­I hate such inquisitive—­I wonder what is in it, it feels heavy (Reads) “Leases, title deeds, wills.”  Here now a man might satisfy his curiosity at once.  Deeds must have names to them, so must leases and wills.  But I wouldn’t—­no I wouldn’t—­it is a pretty box too—­prettily dovetailed—­I admire the fashion of it much.  But I’d cut my fingers off, before I’d do such a dirty—­what have I to do—­curse the keys, how they rattle—­rattle in one’s pockets—­the keys and the halfpence (takes out a bunch and plays with them).