A Series of Plays in which it is attempted to delineate The Stronger Passions of the Mind, Volume Two/The Election Act 3

by Joanna Baillie

ACT III.

SCENE I. Mrs. Baltimore's dressing-room. She is discovered sitting by a table, looking over papers.

Mrs. Baltimore.

Well, I have the satisfaction to find that my personal expences, for this last year, have been very moderate; but I am resolved they shall be still more contracted. Though ruin, I fear, cannot be averted, yet, when it does come, I can lift up my unblushing head, and say "this is no work of mine." No foolish debts of my contracting, Baltimore, shall add to the number of those claims that already so gallingiy press upon your proud and irritable mind; and which, perhaps, will, in the end, drive you from the long and fondly retained habitation of your forefathers. (leans pensively upon her arm for some time, then continues to look over more papers.)

Enter Charles, with a slow sauntering step.

Char. Let me see what o'clock it is now. What says my watch to it now? (looking at his watch) Pest take it! it is but ten minutes since I look'd last; and I could have sworn it was as good three quarters, or, at least, half an hour, as ever clock tick'd, or ever sand-glass ran. (yawning and stretching himself.) Ah! I find it has been but half an hour of a weary man's reckoning, who still sees two long long periods ycleped hours, lying between him and his dinner, like a dreary length of desert waste before the promised land, (yawning and stretching again.) My fishing tackle is all broke and destroyed, and Squire Sapling has borrowed my pointer. I have sat shaking my legs upon the corn-chest, till every horse in the stable is rubbed down, and the groom, happy dog! has gone with his broom in his hand, to sweep out the yard and the kennel. O dear! O dear! O dear! What shall I do?

Mrs. B. (rising from the table) Poor man! I pity you with all my heart; but I do think I could contrive to find employment for you, if you are inclined to it.

Char. Yes, Yes! I am inclined to it! Idleness is tiresome enough, God wot! I am inclined to it, be what it will. But what is it tho’? Have you any skanes of thread to wind?

Mrs. B. No, something better than that, Charles.

Char. What, card boxes to paste?

Mrs. B. Something better than that too.

Char. Poetry or advertisements to cut out of the news-paper?

Mrs. B. No, no, something; better than all these.

Char. (eagerly) It is some new employment then.

Mrs. B. Yes, Charles, a very new one indeed. What would you think of taking up a book and reading an hour before dinner?

Char. (disappointed.) Pshaw! is that your fine employment? I thought I was really to have something to do. I'll e'en go to the village again, and hear stories from old Margery, about the election and the old family grandeur of the Baltimores.

Mrs. B. Nay, don't put such an affront upon my recommendation. Do take up this book, and try, for once in your life, what kind of a thing reading quietly for an hour to one's self may be. I assure you there are many good stories in it, and you will get some little insight into the affairs of mankind, by the bye.

Char. No, no; no story read, can ever be like a story told by a pair of moving lips, and their two lively assistants the eyes, looking it to you all the while, and supplying every deficiency of words.

Mrs. B. But try it, only try it. You can't surely be so ungallant as to refuse me. (Gives him a book.)

Char. Well then, since it must be so, shew me where to begin. Some people, when they open a book, can just pop upon a good thing at once, and be diverted with it; but I don't know how it is, whenever I open a book, I can light upon nothing but long dry prefaces and dissertations; beyond which, perhaps, there may lie, at last, some pleasant story, like a little picture closet, at the end of a long stone gallery, or like a little kernel, buried in a great mountain of shells and of husks. I would not take the trouble of coming at it, for all that one gets.

Mrs.B. You shall have no trouble at all. There is the place to begin at. Sit down, then, and make no more objections. (points out the place, and returns to her papers again.)

(Charles sits down with his book: reads a little with one arm dangling over the back of the chair; then changes his position, and reads a little while with the other arm over the back of the chair; then changes his position again, and, after rubbing his legs with his book hand, continues to read a little more; then he stops, and brushes some dust off his breeches with his elbow.)

Mrs. B. (observing him, and smiling.) How does the reading go on?

Char. Oh, pretty well; I shall finish the page presently. (he reads a little longer, still fidgeting about, and then starting up from his seat.) By the bye, that hound of a shoemaker has forgot to send home my new boots. I must go and see after them.

Mrs. B. What could possibly bring your boots into your mind at this time, I wonder?

Char. It is no wonder at all; for whenever I begin to read, and that is not often, I confess, all the little odd things that have slipp'd out of my head for a month, are sure to come into it then. I must see after the boots tho'.

Mrs.B. Not just now.

Char. This very moment. There is no time to be lost. I must have them to-morrow at all events. Good bye to you. (looking to the window, as he passes on towards the door.) Ha! there comes a visitor for you.

Mrs. B. Who is it?

Char. It is Charlotte Freeman, walking very demurely, because she is within sight of the windows.

Mrs. B. I am sorry she is come. I have desired the servants to say I am from home. It is unpleasant to Mr. Baltimore to see any part of that family, and I have promised——no, no, I have——you must go to enquire after your boots, you say. (a gentle tap at the door.) come in.

Enter Charlotte.

Charl. (going up affectionately to Mrs. B.) I thought you would let me in. (curtseys affectedly to Charles.)

Mrs. B. Did the servants——

Charl. I saw no servants at all. I stole in by the little door of the shrubbery; for I did not like to go in by the great gate, lest I should meet Mr. Baltimore; and he always looks so strangely at me—But I beg pardon: I see I hurt you by saying so.

Mrs. B. Have you walk'd far this morning?

Charl. Only so far to see you; for you seem'd unwell when I saw you last, and I could not be happy 'till I inquired after you.

Mrs. B. You are very good, my dear Charlotte, I am very well.

Charl. (observing her embarrass'd.) I fear I come unseasonably.

Char. O, no! We were just wishing for some good girl to come to us; and when you go home again, I shall have the honour of attending you.

Charl. (affectedly.) No, I thank you, there is no occasion; I know my way very well.

Char. But I can shew you a better way, where there are fine sloes and blackberries on the hedges, if you have a mind to gather any. Eating such sweet fruit puts people into good humour, and cures them of affectation.

Charl. (disdainfully.) I don't know what you mean, Sir, by your sloes and your blackberries, but I suppose you want to shew me the place where you cropt your black puppy's ears the other day, and had your fingers well bit for your pains. I wonder whether you or the puppy were in the best humour upon that occasion.

Char. Faith, the puppy and I were very much the better for a piece of your flounced furbelow, which we found upon the hedge, to bind up our wounds for us. For you have a great sense of justice, Miss Freeman; you never take any thing off the bushes, without leaving something in return.

Charl. And you, too, Mr. Charles, are a gentleman of great honesty; for you would not take a bit of the poor dog's ears off, without leaving a bit of your own fingers in his mouth as an equivalent.

Mrs. B. How comes it that you two are always quarrelling, and yet always coming in one another's way? (to Char.) You forget: you must go and see after your boots.

Char. O! I can go to-morrow morning.

Mrs. B. But there is not a moment to be lost: you must have them at all events, you know. No, no; no lingering here: it is an errand of necessity. (pointing to the door.)(Exit Char. unwillingly.)

Charl. I'm glad you have sent him away, he is so forward and so troublesome. Perhaps I am a little so myself just now. If I am, don't make any ceremony of sending me off: for I see, my dear Mrs. Baltimore, your spirits are not so good as they used to be. O! if I could do any thing to cheer them!
(Looking wistfully at her.)

Mrs. B. I thank you, my good girl! you are not at all troublesome: you are very pleasant to me; and if it depended upon myself, I should like that we were often together.

Charl. (taking her hand warmly.) Should you? Well and if it depended upon me, I should be always with you. I should go wherever you went, and do whatever you did; and wear the same caps and gowns that you wear, and look just as like you as I could. It is a sad thing that I can get to you so seldom, with those eternal lessons at home, and Mr. Baltimore's stern looks, which almost frighten me when I come here. Do you know I have often thought of writing to you, but then I don't know what to say. It is strange, now! I know ladies, who love one another, write such long letters to one another every day, and yet I don't know what to say.

Mrs. B. And I have known, my dear Charlotte, ladies who did not love one another, do just the same thing.

Charl. Have you, indeed? La, that is wonderful! But don't you very often write long letters to the friends you love most?

Mrs. B. Indeed I don't write very often, nor very long letters to any body; and yet I have some friends whom I very dearly love.

Charl. (taking Mrs. B's. hand and skipping about her.) O! I am so glad to hear that! I thought all dear friends wrote to one another every day, and that every body knew what to say but myself.—When I am with Mama, I think it will be so difficult to become amiable and accomplished, as I ought to be, that I am quite discouraged; but when I am with you, it appears so pleasant and so easy, that I am put quite into good spirits again.—But, no, no! I do every thing so clumsily! and you do every thing so well!

Mrs. B. Don't be so diffident of yourself, Charlotte: remember you are but fifteen, and I am four-and-twenty.

Charl. I wonder how I shall look when I am four-and-twenty. I'm sure, notwithstanding all the pains both Mama and my Governess take with me, I don't think I look very well at present.

Mrs. B. Nay, my good Charlotte, you look very well always, when you don't attempt to look too well. I hope to see you turn out a very agreeable woman.

Charl. Do you think so? I am to go to public places with Mama next winter; and I have overheard her and my Governess whispering together as if I should have admirers coming about me then. But I don't think I shall. Do you think so?

Mrs. B. (smiling.) Indeed, I can't say: perhaps you may, and it is possible you may not; but the less you think of them, the more you will probably have.

Charl. I'm sure I think very little about them. And yet I can't help fancying to myself sometimes, how I shall behave to them.

Mrs. B. Ah! that is but a poor way of employing your fancy. Don't think too much about admirers; they won't admire you the more for that.

Charl. But I won't let them know that I think about them.

Mrs. B. But they will find it out.

Charl. Ha! but I will hold myself very high indeed, and not seem to care a farthing for one of them.

Mrs. B. But they will find it out nevertheless.

Charl. I'm sure I have heard that the young men now-a'-days are no great conjurers.

Mrs. B. That may be very true; but they are all conjurers enough to find that out, though better things should escape their penetration.

Mrs. B. (with some alarm.) I hear Mr. Baltimore coming.

Charl. You seem uneasy. Will he be angry to find me here?

Mrs. B. (much embarrassed) He will be surprised, perhaps; but he won't come here-—he is only passing to the library, I hope.

Charl. Ha! but he is coming though! (creeping behind Mrs. B.) He is just at the door. I will hide myself behind the open door of this cabinet, and do you stand before me till he goes away.

(She skulks behind the door of an open cabinet, and Mrs. B. stands up close by her to conceal her completely.)

Enter Baltimore.

Balt. The tide is running against me again; and even my own old servants, I have learnt, at this moment, are swilling themselves at the Cat and Bagpipes, with the damn'd ale and roast-beef of mine adversary. I am going to my attorney immediately; if any person on business should call in my absence, detain him till I return.

Mrs. B. Certainly. I wish you a pleasant ride, I think I shall take a little ramble presently, but shall leave your orders with the servants.

Balt. No, don't go out just now, I beg it of you. That little affected jade of Freeman's is prowling about; and I have already confessed to you, that it disturbs me to see you together.

Mrs. B. Ah! you are prejudiced: you talk without knowing her. She is a sweet tempered, kind hearted girl, and nature meant her for something very different from what she appears to be. (Charlotte behind, catches hold of Mrs. B's hand and kisses it.)

Balt. Yes, nature meant her for a clumsy—

Mrs. B. Pray don't delay going to your attorney!

Balt. A clumsy hoiden only; and, under the tuition of her ridiculous mother, she assumes all the delicate airs of a fine lady.

Mrs. B. Well, well, go to your attorney: it is all very harmless.

Balt. Well, well, it is all very harmless, if you will; and I have laughed at a thousand little affected fools, nearly as absurd as herself. But when I see those broad features of her father, stamped so strongly by nature upon her common-place countenance, pretending to wear the conscious importance of superior refinement, it provokes me beyond all patience that you should be so intimate with her.

Mrs. B. She is a girl that will very much improve by any reasonable intimacy, and will very soon become like the people she is with,

Balt. Very well, let her be as little with you, then, and as much with her own foolish absurd mother as possible; and the more ridiculous they both are, the greater pleasure I shall have in seeing them any where but in your company. I assure you I have no wish to reform them. It is one of the few consolations I receive in my intercourse with this man, to see him connected with such a couple of fools.

Mrs. B. O Baltimore! for heaven's sake stay no longer here!

Balt. Pray what is the meaning of this? are you in your senses?

Mrs. B. Scarcely, indeed, while you remain here, and talk thus.

Balt. What, does it affect you to this pitch, then? Are you attached to that girl?

Mrs. B. Indeed I am. (Charl. behind, catches Mrs. B's hand again, and kisses it very gratefully.)

Balt. Well, Madam; I see plainly enough the extent of your attachment to me. (walking up and down vehemently.) Methinks it should have been offensive to you even to have stroked the very ears of his dog. And that excrescence, that wart, that tadpole, that worm from the adder's nest which I abhor.

Mrs. B. For heaven's sake go away! you kill, you distract me!

Balt. Yes, yes. Madam; I see plainly enough I am married to a woman who takes no common interest, who owns no sympathy with my feelings.

(He turns upon his heel in anger to go away, whilst Charlotte springs from her hiding place, and slipping softly after him, makes a motion with her foot as if she would give him a kick in the going out; upon which Balt. turns suddenly round and sees her. She stops short quite confounded; and he, glancing a look of indignation at his wife, fixes his eyes sternly upon Charlotte, who, recoiling from him step by step as he sternly frowns upon her, throws herself at last upon Mrs. B's neck, and bursts into tears. Balt. then turns upon his heel angrily and exit.)

Charl. (sobbing.) I shall never be able to look up again as long as I live. There never was any body like me; for, always when I wish to behave best, something or other comes across me and I expose myself. I shall be so scorn'd and laught at!—I'll never enter this house any more—Oh! oh! oh! Some devil put it into my head, and I could not help it. I'll go home again, and never come a visiting any more.—Oh! oh! oh! I am so disgraced!

Mrs. B. Be comforted, my dear Charlotte! It was but a girl's freak, and nobody shall know any thing of it. But, indeed, you had better go home.

Charl. Yes, I'll go home and never return here any more. But, oh, my dear Mrs. Baltimore, don't despise me!

Mrs. B. No, my dear girl, I love you as much as ever.

Charl. Do you indeed. And yet I must not come to you again. O, I shall wander every morning on the side of the little stream that divides your grounds from ours; and if I could but see you sometimes on the opposite side, calling over to me, I should be happy! It is so good in you to say that you love me; for I shall never love myself any more.

(Exeunt Mrs. B. soothing and comforting Charl. as they go off.)

SCENE II. A small anti-room in Freeman's house.

Enter Mrs. Freeman with letters in her hand.

Mrs. Free. (holding out her letters.) Pretty well, I think, for one day's post. I should write to my dear Mrs. Languish too, if my extracts from Petrach were ready.

Enter Governess in great haste.

Gov. O dear, Madame! I don't know what ting I shall do wit Miss Freeman.

Mrs. Free. What is the matter?

Gov. She come in, since a very little time from her walk, and I believe she be to see Madame Baltimore too, as drooping and as much out of spirit as a pair of ruffles wid de starch out of dem; and she sit down so (imitating her.) quite frompish, and won't read her lesson to me, though I speak all de good words to her dat I can.

Mrs. Free. Well, go to her again, and I'll follow you immediately, and speak to her myself.
(Exit Governess.

(Mrs. Free. after putting up her letters very leisurely, and looking at one or two of them goes out.)

SCENE III. Charlotte is discovered sitting in a disconsolate posture, on a low stool in the middle of the room; the Governess standing by her, endeavouring to soothe and coax her, whilst she hitches away from her fretfully, pushing her stool towards the front of the stage every time the Governess attempts to soothe her.

Gov. Do be de good young lady, now, and read over your lesson.

Charl. Can't you let me alone for a moment? I'm not in a humour just now.

Gov. You be in de humours, but in de bad humours, I see. I will put you in de good humours. Look here! Fal, lal, de laddy, daddy (singing fantastically.) Why don't you smile, Miss? You love dat air, don't you? (putting her hand soothingly on Charlotte's shoulder, and grinning in her face.)

Charl. (shaking off her hand impatiently, turning her back to her, and sitting on the other side of the stool.) I don't like it a bit.

Gov. O, but you do! And den de pretty steps I shew'd you: if you would read your lesson, now, we should dance dem togeder. (singing and dancing some French steps fantastically.) Why don't you look at me? Don't it amuse you, Miss?

Charl. What amusement is it to me, do you think, to see a pair of old fringed shoes clattering upon the boards?

Gov. (shrugging her shoulders.) Mon Dieu! she has no taste for any of de elegancies. (putting her hand upon Charlotte's shoulder coaxingly.) But if you don't speak well de French and write well de French, de pretty fine gentlemans won't admire you.

Charl. (shaking off her hand again, and turning from her to sit on the other side of the stool.) And what do I care for de pretty fine gentlemans, or de pretty fine ladies either? I wish there was not such a thing in the world as either of them.

Gov. (casting up her eyes.) Mon Dieu! She wish us all out of de world.

Charl. I'm sure I should live an easier life than I do, if there was not—

Enter Mrs. Freeman.

Mrs. Free. What freak is this you have taken into your head. Miss Freeman, not to read with Ma'moiselle. It won't do, I assure you, to follow your own whimsies thus. You must study regularly and diligently, if you would ever become an elegant and accomplished woman.

Charl. I'm sure I shall never become either elegant or accomplished. Why need I scrawl versions eternally, and drum upon the piano-forte, and draw frightful figures till my fingers ache, and make my very life irksome to me, when I know very well I shall never be better than a poor heedless creature, constantly forgetting and exposing myself, after all? I know very well I shall never be either elegant or accomplished.

Mrs. Free. Why should you suppose so? there is no merit in being too diffident.

Gov. You should not tink so poor of yourself, Miss. You come on very well. Several lady say dat you are become so like to me in all de airs, and de grace, and de manners, dat you are quite odder ting dan you were.

Charl. No wonder, then, that they laugh at me.

Gov. (casting up her eyes.) Mon Dieu! She is mad! shall I shut her up in her chamber?

Mrs. Free. Stop a little, if you please: she does not speak altogether from the purpose neither. Come, come, Miss Freeman: rouse yourself up, and have some laudable ambition: the distinction of elegant accomplishments is not to be obtained without industry and attention.

Charl. I wish I were with some of the wild people that run in the woods, and know nothing about accomplishments! I know I shall be a blundering creature all my life, getting into scrapes that no body else gets into; I know I shall. Why need I study my carriage, and pin back my shoulders, and hamper myself all day long, only to be laughed at after all?

Mrs. Free. I don't know what you may meet with when you chuse to visit by yourself, Miss Freeman, but in my company, at least, you may be satisfied upon that score.

Charl. And what satisfaction will it be to me that we are ridiculous together? I would rather be laughed at alone than have people laughing at us both, as they do.

Mrs. Free. (with amazement.) The creature is beside herself in good earnest! What do you mean child? Who have you been with? Who has put these things into your head? If Mrs. Baltimore can find no better conversation for you than this kind of insolent impertinence, she is poorly employed indeed.

Charl. It was not Mrs. Baltimore that said so.

Mrs. Free. Who said so then? somebody has, I find.

Charl. It was Mr. Baltimore.

Mrs. Free. And you had the meanness to suffer such words in your presence?

Charl. It was not in my presence neither, for he did not see me.

Mrs. Free. And where was you then?

Charl. Just behind the train of Mrs. Baltimore's gown, till he should go out again.

Mrs. Free. And so you sneaked quietly in your hiding-place, and heard all this insolent abuse? Mean creature! a girl of any spirit would have rushed out upon him with indignation.

Charl. And so I did rush out.

Mrs. Free. And what did you. say to him?

Charl. (sillily) I did not say any thing.

Mrs. Free. I hope you resented it, then, by the silent dignity of your behaviour.

Charl. (much embarrassed.) I'm sure I don't know—I did but give him a little make-believe kick with my slipper, as he went out at the door, when he turned round of a sudden, with a pair of terrible eyes staring upon me like the Great Mogul.

Mrs. Free. A make-believe kick! what do you mean by that?

Charl. La! just a little kick on—on—

Mrs. Free. On what, child?

Charl. La! just upon his coat behind as he went out at the door.

Mrs. F. And did you do that? Oh! it is enough to make one mad! You are just fit to live with the Indians, indeed, or the wild Negroes, or the Hottentots! To disgrace yourself thus, after all the pains I have taken with you! It is enough to drive one mad! Go to your own room directly, and get sixteen pages of blank verse by rote. But I'm sure you are fitter company for the pigs than the poets.

Charl. How was I to know that he had eyes in the back of his neck, and could know what was doing behind him?

Mrs. Free. He shall have eyes upon all sides of his head if he escape from my vengeance. It shall cost him his election, let it cost me what it will. (rings the bell violently.) Who waits there? (enter a servant.) Order the chariot to he got ready immediately. (exit servant) I will go to Mr. Jenkison directly. He has already pointed out the means; and I shall find money, without Mr. Freeman's knowing any thing of the matter, to manage it all, well enough.

Charl. La! I'm sure I knew well enough I did wrong; but I did not think of all this uproar about it.

Mrs. Free. Go to your own room, child: I can't abide the sight of you. (Exeunt Mrs. Free. on one side of the stage, and Charl. and Governess on the other.)

END OF THE THIRD ACT.