BUTLER
      He’ll have his humour; best not interrupt him.

      PHILIP
      ’Tis market-day, thought I; and the poor beasts,
      Meeting such droves of cattle and of people,
      May take a fright; so down the lane I trundled,
      Where Goodman Dobson’s crazy mare was founder’d,
      And where the flints were biggest, and ruts widest,
      By ups and downs, and such bone-cracking motions,
      We flounder’d on a furlong, till my madam,
      In policy, to save the few joints left her,
      Betook her to her feet, and there we parted.

      ALL
      Ha! ha! ha!

      BUTLER
      Hang her! ’tis pity such as she should ride.

      WAITING-MAID
      I think she is a witch; I have tired myself out
      With sticking pins in her pillow; still she ’scapes them—­

      BUTLER
      And I with helping her to mum for claret,
      But never yet could cheat her dainty palate.

      HOUSEKEEPER
      Well, well, she is the guest of our good Mistress,
      And so should be respected.  Though I think
      Our Master cares not for her company,
      He would ill brook we should express so much,
      By rude discourtesies, and short attendance,
      Being but servants. (A bell rings furiously.) ’Tis her bell
        speaks now;
      Good, good, bestir yourselves:  who knows who’s wanted?

      BUTLER
      But ’twas a merry trick of Philip coachman. [Exeunt.]

SCENE.—­Mrs. Selby’s Chamber.

MRS. FRAMPTON, KATHERINE, working.

      MRS. FRAMPTON
      I am thinking, child, how contrary our fates
      Have traced our lots through life.  Another needle,
      This works untowardly.  An heiress born
      To splendid prospects, at our common school
      I was as one above you all, not of you;
      Had my distinct prerogatives; my freedoms,
      Denied to you.  Pray, listen—­

KATHERINE I must hear What you are pleased to speak!—­How my heart sinks here! [Aside.]

      MRS. FRAMPTON
      My chamber to myself, my separate maid,
      My coach, and so forth.—­Not that needle, simple one,
      With the great staring eye fit for a Cyclops! 
      Mine own are not so blinded with their griefs
      But I could make a shift to thread a smaller. 
      A cable or a camel might go through this,
      And never strain for the passage.

      KATHERINE

      I will fit you.—­
      Intolerable tyranny! [Aside.]

      MRS. FRAMPTON
      Quick, quick;
      You were not once so slack.—­As I was saying,
      Not a young thing among ye, but observed me
      Above the mistress.  Who but I was sought to
      In all your dangers, all your little difficulties,
      Your girlish scrapes?  I was the scape-goat still,
      To fetch you off; kept all your secrets, some,
      Perhaps, since then—­