All. Ha, ha, ha.

La. Rod. Oh Mr. Nicknack!  I hear the Bauble-Frigot’s in the River,
I’m on Tip-toes to see what’s imported:  Are the Catalogues out yet?

Nick. Your Ladyship is set down for the whole Cargo, to select where you please, tho’ the Ladies teize me as much for new Fancies, as your good for nothing Actresses do a Poet for Parts, at the disposal of a new Comedy; and I protest Madam, I find it as difficult to get Goods fast enough, as a Woman that Lies in ev’ry Year does to get God-fathers.

La. Rod.  Pray, Mr. Nicknack, what Demands have the Ladies made on you.

Nick My Lady Swine-love has bespoke a Dozen of Bermudas Pigs; my Lady Noisy a screaming Parrot; my Lady Squelch a Dutch Mastiff; my Lady Hoyden-tail a Cat o’ Mountain; Mrs. Tireman a large Baboon, and Mrs. Lick-it an Italian Greyhound.

La. Rod.  You have an infallible Snare for our Sex; but I wonder, Mr. Nicknack, how so refin’d a Merchant as you, can endure the smoaky Coffee-Houses, and the dirty Exchange.

Nick.  Madam, I use Robin’s, as nice a Coffee-House as Tom’s, where no Smoaking’s allow’d, but a little Betony or Colt’s-foot to a few Hundred thousand Pound Men; as for the Change, I must own, Dutch-Shapes, and Jew-Faces are not so agreeable to look at, as the Beauties at Hampton-Court; and I wonder the better sort of Merchants don’t walk above Stairs, that in a dead time o’ Business, when we have little to employ our Thoughts, we may divert our Opticks with the pretty Sempstresses.

Sir Har.  When Business is at an ebb, what occasion have you to be there.

Nick.  Only the Hopes of bubling you Beau-Baronets, that come thither to show your Equipage, and laugh at Men of Business, where we invite you to Dinner at Pontack’s, drink heartily about, and then draw you in for a thousand Guineas on some publick Wager,—­Tho’ really the greatest Misfortune that attends a Merchant is an indispensable Necessity of being ev’ry Day at Change; for shou’d the least Ill-news happen, and a Merchant absent, whip, they protest his Bills, report he’s in Holland, when, poor Soul, he’s gone no farther than to the Saturday’s Club at Black-heath Bowling-Green.

L. Rod.  I think you have Travell’d tho’, Mr. Nicknack.

Nick.  To Leghorne and Smirna, Madam, instead of France and Italy, where I had like to have had a Scimiter in my Guts, by an impotent old Turk, that spy’d me glancing at his Wife, when he had a hundred and fifty besides, and was past the use of one of ’em.

Col. Were you never at Virginia and Barbadoes?