MRS. FRAMPTON
      It was my topic
      To-day; and every day, and all day long,
      I still am chiding with her.  “Child,” I said,
      And said it pretty roundly—­it may be
      I was too peremptory—­we elder school-fellows,
      Presuming on the advantage of a year
      Or two, which, in that tender time, seem’d much,
      In after years, much like to elder sisters,
      Are prone to keep the authoritative style,
      When time has made the difference most ridiculous—­

      SELBY
      The observation’s shrewd.

      MRS. FRAMPTON
      “Child,” I was saying,
      “If some wives had obtained a lot like yours,”
      And then perhaps I sigh’d, “they would not sit
      In corners moping, like to sullen moppets
      That want their will, but dry their eyes, and look
      Their cheerful husbands in the face,” perhaps
      I said, their Selby’s, “with proportion’d looks
      Of honest joy.”

      SELBY
      You do suspect no jealousy?

      MRS. FRAMPTON
      What is his import?  Whereto tends his speech? [Aside.]
      Of whom, of what, should she be jealous, sir?

      SELBY
      I do not know, but women have their fancies;
      And underneath a cold indifference,
      Or show of some distaste, husbands have mask’d
      A growing fondness for a female friend,
      Which the wife’s eye was sharp enough to see
      Before the friend had wit to find it out. 
      You do not quit us soon?

      MRS. FRAMPTON
      ’Tis as I find
      Your Katherine profits by my lessons, sir.—­
      Means this man honest?  Is there no deceit? [Aside.]

      SELBY
      She cannot chuse.—­Well, well, I have been thinking,
      And if the matter were to do again—­

      MRS. FRAMPTON
      What matter, sir?

      SELBY
      This idle bond of wedlock;
      These sour-sweet briars, fetters of harsh silk;
      I might have made, I do not say a better,
      But a more fit choice in a wife.

      MRS. FRAMPTON
      The parch’d ground,
      In hottest Julys, drinks not in the showers
      More greedily than I his words! [Aside.]

      SELBY
      My humour
      Is to be frank and jovial; and that man
      Affects me best, who most reflects me in
      My most free temper.

      MRS. FRAMPTON
      Were you free to chuse,
      As jestingly I’ll put the supposition,
      Without a thought reflecting on your Katherine,
      What sort of woman would you make your choice?