GRICE E CARACCIOLO: IL COLLOQUIO

COLLOQUIAL IDIOM   The uttered speech of private life is fluctuating and variable. In  every period it varies according to the age, class, education, and habits of  the speaker. His social experience, traditions and general background,  his ordinary tastes and pursuits, his intellectual and moral cultivation are  all reflected in each man’s conversation. These factors determine and  modify a man’s mode of speech in innumerable ways. They may affect  his pronunciation, the speed of his utterance, his choice of vocabulary,  the shade of meaning he attaches to particular words, or turns of phrase,  the character of such similes and metaphors as occur in his speech, his  word order and the structure of his sentences.   But the individual speaker is also affected by the character of those  to whom he speaks. He adjusts himself in a hundred subtle ways to the  age, status, and mental attitude of the company in which he finds himself.  His own state of mind, and the mode of its expression are unconsciously  modified by and attuned to the varying degree of intimacy, agreement,  and community of experience in which he may stand with his companions  of the moment.   Thus an accomplished man of the world, in reality, speaks not  one but many slightly different idioms, and passes easily and instinc-  tively, often perhaps unknown to himself, from one to another, according  to the exigence of circumstances. The man who does not possess,  to some extent at least, this power of adjustment, is of necessity a stranger  in eveuy company but that of one particular type. No man who is not  a fool will consider it proper to address a bevy of Bishops in precisely  the same way as would be perfectly natural and suitable among a party  of fox-hunting country gentlemen.   A learned man, accustomed to choose his own topics of conversation  and dilate upon them at leisure in his College common room where he  can count upon the civil forbearance of other people like himself, would  be thought a tedious bore, and a dull one at that, if he carried his  pompous verbiage into the Officers’ Mess of a smart regiment. 'A  meere scholler is but a woefull creature says Sir Edmund Verney, in  a letter in which he discusses a proposal that his son should be sent to  Leyden, and observes concerning this— ‘ 'tis too private for a youth of  his yeares that must see company at convenient times, and studdy men as  well as bookes, or else his bearing may make him rather ridiculous then  esteemed ^   There is naturally a large body of colloquial expression which is  common to all classes, scholars, sportsmen, officers, clerics, and the rest,  but each class and interest has its own special way of expressing itself,  which is more or less foreign to those outside it. The average colloquial     360 COLLOQUIAL IDIOM   speech of any age is at best a compromise between a variety of different  jargons, each evolved in and current among the members of a particular  section of the community, and each, within certain social limits, affects  and is affected by the others. Most men belong by their ciicumstanccs  or inclinations to several speech-communities, and have little difficulty in  maintaining Ihhmsclvcs creditably in all of these. The wider the social  opportunities and experience of the individual, and the keener his lin-  guistic instinct, the more readily does he adapt himself to the company  in which he finds himself, and the more easily docs he fall into line with  its accepted traditions of speech and bc aiing.   But if so much variety in the details of colloquial usage exists in  a single age, with such well-marked differences between the conventions  of each, how much greater will be the gulf which separates the types of  familiar conversation in different ages. Do we realize that if we could,  by the workings of some Time Machine, be suddenly transported back  into the seventeenth century, most of us would find it extremely difficult  to carry on, even among the kind of people most nearly corresponding  with those with whom we are habitually associated in our present age,  the simplest kind of decent social intercourse? Even if the pronunciation  of the sixteenth century offered no difficulty, almost every other element  which goes to make up the medium of communication with our fellows  would do so.   We should not know how to greet or take leave of those we met, how  to express our thanks in an acceptable manner, how to ask a favour, pay  a compliment, or send a polite message to a gentleman's wife. We  should be at a loss how to begin and end the simplest note, whether to  an intimate friend, a near relative, or to a stranger. We could not scold  a footman, commend a child, express in appropriate terms admiration for  a woman’s beauty, or aversion to the opposite quality. We should hesitate  every moment how to address the person we were talking to, and should be  embarassed for the equivalent of such instinctive phrases as — look here, old  man ; my dear chap ; my dear Sir ; excuse me ; I beg your pardon ;  I’m awfully sorry; Oh, not at all; that 's too bad ; that ’s most amusing ;  you see ; don't you know ; and a hundred other trivial and meaningless  expressions with which most men fill out their sentences. Our innocent  impulses of pleasure, approval, dislike, anger, disgust, and so on, would  be nipped in the bud for want of words to express them. How should we  say, on the spur of the moment — what a pretty girl 1 ; what an amusing  play I ; how clever and witty Mr. Jones is ! ; poor woman ; that's a perfectly  rotten book ; I hate the way she dresses ; look here, Sir, you had better  lake care what you say ; Oh, shut up ; I'm hanged if I'll do that ; I’m very  much obliged to you. I'm sure ?   It is very probable that we perfectly grasp the equivalents of all these  and a thousand others when we read them in the pages of Congreve and  his contemporaries, but it is equally certain that the right expressions  would not rise naturally to our lips as we required them, were we  suddenly called upon to speak with My Lady Froth, or Mr. Brisk.   The fact is that we should feel thoroughly at sea in such company,  and should soon discover that we had to learn a new language of polite  society.     COLLOQUIAL IDIOM    362   In illustrating the colloquial style of the fifteenth century we have to  be content, either with the account of conversations given in letters, or with  such other passages from letters of the period as appear to be nearest  to the speech of everyday life.   The following passages are from the Shillingford Letters, to which  reference is repeatedly made in this book (see p. 65, &c.}, and are  extracted from the accounts given by the stout and genial Mayor of  Exeter, in letters to his friends, of his conversations with the Chancellor  during his visit to London.   Shillingford begins by referring to himself as ‘ the Mayer but suddenly  changes to the first person— in describing the actual meeting, again  returning for a moment to the impersonal phrase.   Jolm Shillingford*   ‘The Saterdey next (28 Oct. 1447) tberafter the mayer came to West-  minster sone apon ix. atte belle, and ther mette w* my lorde Chanceller atte  brode dore a litell fro the steire fote comyng fro the Sterrechamber, y yn  the courte and by the dore knellyng and salutyng hym yn the moste godely  wyse that y cowde and recommended yn to his gode and gracious lordship  my feloship and all the comminalte, his awne peeple and bedmen of the  Cite of Exceter. He seyde to the mayer ij tymes “ Well come ’’ and the  tyme “Right well come Mayer'’ and helde the Mayer a grete while faste by  the honde, and so went forth to his barge and w* hym grete presse, lordis  and other, &c. and yn especiall the tresorer of the kynges housholde, w*  wham he was at right grete pryvy communication. And therfor y, mayer,  drowe me apart, and mette w* hym at his goyng yn to his barge, and ther  toke my leve of hym, seyyng these wordis, “ My lord, y wolle awayte apon  youre gode lordship and youre better leyser at another tyme He seyde  to me ayen, “Mayer, y pray yow hertely that ye do so, and that ye speke w*  the Chief Justyse and what that ever he will y woll be all redy”. And thus  departed.* — pp. 5, 6.   A little later : —   * Nerthelez y awayted my tyme and put me yn presse and went right to my  lorde Chaunccller and seide, “My lorde y am come at your coinmaundc-  ment, but y se youre grete bysynesse is suchc that ye may not attencle ”,  He seide “Noo, by his trauthe and that y myght right well se”. Y scide  “Yee, and that y was sory and hadde pyty of his grete vexacion”. He  seide “ Mayer, y moste to morun ride by tyme to the Kyng, and come ayen  this wyke : ye most awayte apon my comyng, and then y wol speke the  justise and attende for yow ” &c. — p. 7.   * He seyde “ Come the morun Monedey ” (the Chancellor was speaking on  Sunday) . . . “the love of God ” Y seyde the tyme was to shorte, and prayed  hym of Wendysdey ; y enfourmed hym (of t)he grete malice and venym that  they have spatte to me yn theire answeris as hit appercth yn a copy that  y sende to yow of. My lorde seide, “ Alagge alagge, why wolde they do so ?  y woll sey right sbarpely to ham therfor and y nogh   Margery Brews*   The following brief extracts from the letters of Margery Brews, the  affianced wife of Jolm Fasten (junior) are like a ray of sunlight in the  dreary wilderness of business and litigation, which are the chief subjects  of correspondence between the Pa&tons. Even this Iove*letter is not     A FIFTEENTH-CENTURY LOVE-LETTER 363   wholly free from the taint, but the girl's gentle affection for her lover is  the prevailing note*   * Yf that ye cowde be content with that good and my por persone I wold  be the meryest mayclen on grounde, and yf ye thynke not your selffe soe  satysfyed or that ye myght hafe much mor good, as I hafe ujtidyrstonde be  youe afor ; good trewe and iovyng volentyne, that ye take no such labur  iippon yowe, as to come more for that matter, but let it passe, and never  more to be spokyn of, as I may be your trewe lover and bedewoman during  my lyfe .’ — Pas ton Letters^ hi, p. 172 (1477).   A few years later Mrs. Fasten writes to her 'trewe and Iovyng  volentyne ' : —   ' My mother in lawe thynketh longe she here no word from you. She is in  goode heaie, blissed be God, and al yowr babees also. I marvel I here no  word from you, weche greveth me ful evele. I sent you a letter be Basiour  sone of Norwiche, wher of I have no word.’ To this the young wife adds  the touching postscript : — ' Sir I pray yow if ye tary longe at London that it  wii plese to sende for me, for I thynke longe sen I lay in your armes.’ —  Paston Letie?-Sj iii, p. 293 (1482).    Sir Thomas More.   No figure in the eaily part of Henry VIII’s reign is more distin-  guished and at the same time more engaging than that of Sir Thomas  More* A few typical records of his conversation, as preserved by his  devoted biographer and son-in-law Roper, are chosen to illustrate the  English of this time. The context is given so that the extracts may  appear in Roper's own setting.   'Not long after this the Watter baylife of London (sonietyme his servaunte)  liereing, where he had beene at dinner, certayne Marchauntes^ liberally to  rayle against his ould Master, waxed so discontented therwith, that he  hastily came to him, and tould him what he had hard: "and were I Sir”  (quoth he) " in such favour and authoritie with my Prince as you are, such  men surely should not be suffered so villanously and falsly to misreport and  slander me. Wherefore 1 would wish you to call them before you, and to  there shame, for there lewde malice to punnish them.” Who smilinge upon  him sayde, " Watter Baylie, would you have me punnish them by whome  1 reccave more benefit! then by you all that be my frendes ? Let them  a Gods name speakc as lewdly as they list of me, and shoote never soe  many airowcs at me, so long as they do not hitt me, what am I the worse?  But if the should once hitt me, then would it a little trouble me : howbeit,  I trust, by Gods helpe, (here shall none of them all be able to touch me.  I have more cause, Water Bayly (I assure thee) to pittie them, then to  be angrie with them.” Such frutfiill communication had he often tymes  with his familiar frendes. Soe on a tyme walking a long the Thames syde  with me at Chelsey, in talkinge of other thinges he sayd to me, " Now,  would to God, Sonne Roger, upon condition three things are well estab-  lished in Christendome, I were put in a sacke, and here presently cast into the  Thames.” " What great thinges be these, Sir ” quoth I, " that should move  you $0 to wish?” "Wouldest thou know, sonne Roper, what they be”  quoth he? “Yea marry, Sir, with a good will if it please you”, quoth I,  “ I faith, they be these Sonne ”, quoth he. The first is, that where as the  most part of Christian princes be at mortall warrs, they weare at universal  peace. The second, that wheare the Church of Christ is at this present     COLLOQUIAL IDIOM    3^4   soare afflicted witli many heresies and errors, it were well settled in an  uniformity. The third, that where the Kinges matter of his marriage is now  come into question, it were to the glory of God and quietnesse of all parties  brought to a good conclusion : ’’ where by, as I could gather, he judged, that  otherwise it would be a disturbance to a great part of Christ endome/   ‘ When Sir Thomas Moore had continued a good while in the Tower, my  Ladye his wife obtayned license to see him, who at her first comminge like  a simple woman, and somewhat worldlie too, with this manner of salutations  bluntly saluted him, ‘‘What the good yeai'e, Moore” quoth shee,   I marvell that you, that have beene allwayes hitherimto taken for soe wise  a man, will now soe playe the foole to lye here in this close filthie prison, and  be content to be shutt upp amonge myse and rattes, when you might be  abroad at your libertie, and with the favour and good will both of the  King and his Councell, if you would but doe as all the Bushopps and best  learned of this Realme have done. And seeing you have at Chelsey a right  fayre house, your librarie, your books, your gallerie, your garden, your  orchards, and all other necessaries soe handsomely about you, where you  might, in the companie of me your wife, your children, and houshould be  merrie, I muse what a Gods name you meane here still thus fondlye to tarry.’'  After he had a while quietly hard her, “ I pray thee good Alice, tell me,  tell me one thinge.” “ What is that ? ” (quoth shee). “ Is not this house  as nighe heaven as myne owne?” To whome shee, after her accustomed  fashion, not likeinge such talke, answeared, “ Tilh valie, Tille valle ”  “How say you, Alice, is it not soe?” quoth he. Bone deus, bone  Deusy man, will this geare never be left?” quoth shee. “Well then  Alice, if it be soe, it is verie well. For I see noe great cause whie  I should soe much joye of my gaie house, or of any thinge belonginge  thereunto, when, if I should but seaven yeares lye buried under ground,  and then arise, and come thither againe, I should not fayle to finde some  Iherin that would bidd me gett out of the doores, and tell me that weare  none of myne. What cause have I then to like such an house as would  soe soone forgett his master?” Soe her perswasions moved him but a little.*   The last days of this good man on earth, and some of his sayings just  before his death, are told with great simplicity by Roper. We cannot  forbear to quote the affecting passage which tells of Sir Thomas More’s  last parting from his daughter, the writer’s wife.   ‘When Sir Tho. Moore came from Westminster to the Towreward againe,  his daughter my wife, desireous to see her father, whome shee thought shee  should never see in this world after, and alsoe to have his finall blessinge,  gave attendaunce aboutes the Towre wharfe, where shee knewe he should  passe by, eVe he could enter into the Towre. There tarriinge for his  coininge home, as soone as shee sawe him, after his blessinges on her  knees reverentlie receaved, shoe hastinge towards, without consideration  and care of her selfe, pressinge in amongest the midst of the thronge and  the Companie of the Guard, that with Hollbards and Billes weare round  about him, hastily ranne to him, and then openlye in the sight of all them  embraced and tooke him about the necke, and kissed him, whoe well likeing  her most daughterlye love and affection towards him, gave her his fatherlie  blessinge, and manye goodlie words of comfort besides, from whome after  shee was departed, shee not satisfied with the former sight of her deare  father, havinge respecte neither to her self, nor to the presse of the people  and multitude that were about him, suddenlye turned backe againe, and  rann to him as before, tqoke him about the necke, and divers tymes togeather  most lovinglay kissed him, and at last with a full heavie harte was fayne to  departe from him; the behouldinge whereof was to manye of them that were     SIR THOMAS MORFS LAST CONVERSATION 365   present thereat soe lamentablcj that it made them for very sorrow to mourne  and weepe.’   ^ In his last letter to his ' dearely beloved daughter, written with a Cole  Sir Thomas More refers to this incident : — ' And I never liked your  manners better, then when you kissed me last. For* I like when  daughterlie Love, and deare Charitie hath noe leasure to looke to worldlie  Curtesie   Next morning ‘ Sir Thomas even, and the Utas of St. Peeter in the yeare  of our Lord God 1537 . . , earlie in the morninge, came to him Sir Thomas  Pope, his singular trend, on messedge from the Kinge and his Councell,  that hee should before nyne of the clocke in the same morninge suffer  death, and that therefore fourthwith he should prepare himselfe thereto.   Pope sayth he, for your good tydinges I most hartily thankyou.  I have beene allwayes^ bounden much to the Kinges Highnes for the  benehtts and honors which he hath still from tyme to tyme most bounti-  fully heaped upon mee, and yete more bounden I ame to his Grace for  putting me into this place, where I have had convenient tyme and space to  have remembraunce of my end, and soe helpe me God most of all Pope,  am I bound to his Highnes, that it pleased him so shortlie to ridd me of  the miseries of this wretched world. And therefore will I not fayle most  earnestlye to praye for his Grace both here, and alsoe in another world, . . .  And I beseech you, good Pope, to be a meane unto his Highnes, that  my daughter Margarette may be present at my buriall.’’ “ The King is well  contented allreadie*' (quoth M^’ Pope) ‘‘that your Wife, Children and other  frendes shall have free libertie to be present thereat “O how much be-  hoiilden” then said Sir Thomas Moore “am I to his Grace, that unto my  poore buriall vouchsafeth to have so gratious Consideration.*’ Wherewithal!   Pope takeinge his leave of him could not refrayne from weepinge, which  Sir Tho. Moore perceavinge, comforted him in this wise, “ Quiete yourselfe  good M^ Pope, and be not discomforted. For I trust that we shall once in  heaven see each other full merily, where we shall bee sure to live and love  togeather in joyfull blisse eternally.**    Wolsey.   The Ij/e of Wolsey (1557), by George Cavendish, a faithful and  devoted servant of the Cardinal, who was with him on his death-bed,  gives a wonderfully interesting picture of this remarkable man, in affluence  and in adversity, and records a number of conversations which have  a convincing air of verisimilitude. The following specimens are taken  from the Kelmscott Press edition of 1893, which follows the spelling of  the author's MS. in the British Museum.   ‘ After ther departyng^ my lord came to the sayd howsse of Eston to his  lodgyng, where he had to supper with hyme dyvers of his frends of the court.  And syttyng at supper, in came to hyme Doctor Stephyns, the secretary,  late ambassitor unto Rome ; but to what entent he came I know not ;  howbeit my lord toke it that he came bothe to dissembell a certeyn  obedyence and love towards hyme, or ells to espie hys behaviour, and to  here his commynycacion at supper. Not withstandyng my lord bade hyme  well come, and commaundyd hyme to sytt down at the table to supper;  with whome my lord had thys commynycacion with hyme under thys  maner. Mayster Secretary, quod my lord, ye be-welcome home owt of  Rally; whan came ye frome Rome? Forsothe, quod he, I came home     366    COLLOQUIAL IDIOM    allmost a monethe agoo ; and where quod my lord have you byn ever  sence? Forsothe, quod he, folowyng the court this progresse. Than have  ye hunted and had good game and pastyme. Forsothe, Syr, quod he, and  so I have, I thanke the kyngs Majestie, What good greyhounds have ye?  quod my lord. I have some syr quod he. And thus in huntyng, and in  lyke disports, , passed they all ther commynycacion at supper. And after  supper my lord and he talked secretly together until it was mydnyght or  they departed.’ — p. 143,   ^Than all thyng beyng ordered as it is before reherced, my lord  prepared hyme to depart by water. ^ And before his departyng he com-  maundyd Syr William Gascoyne, his treasorer, to se these thyngs byfore  remembred, delyverd safely to the kyng at his repayer. That don, the  seyd Syr William seyd unto my lord. Syr I ame sorry for your grace, for  I understand ye shall goo strayt way to the tower. Ys this the good  comfort and councell, quod my lord, that ye can geve your mayster in  adversitie? Yt hathe byn allwayes your naturall inclynacion to be very  light of credytt, and mych more lighter in reporting of false newes,  I wold ye shold knowe, Syr William, and all other suche blasphemers,  that it is nothyng more false than that, for I never, thanks be to god,  deserved by no wayes to come there under any arrest, allthoughe it hathe  pleased the kyng to take my howse redy furnysshed for his pleasyr at this  tyme. I wold all the world knewe, and so I confesse to have no thyng,  other riches, honour, or dignyty, that hathe not growen of hyme and by  hyme ; therefore it is my verie dewtie to surrender the same to hyme agayn  as his very owen, with al my hart, or ells I ware and onkynd servaunt.  Therefore goo your wayes, and geve good attendaunce unto your charge,  that no thyng be embeselled.’ — p. 149.   ‘And the next day we removed to Sheffeld Parke, where therle of Shrews-  bury lay within the loge, and all the way thetherward the people cried and  lamented, as they dyd in all places as we rode byfore. And whan we came  in to the parke of Sheffeld, nyghe to the logge, my lord of Shrewesbury, with  my lady his wyfe, a trayn of gentillwomen, and all my lords gentilmen, and  yomen, standyng without the gatts of the logge to attend my lords commy ng,  to receyve hyme with myche honor ; whome therle embraced, sayeng these  words. My lord quod he, your grace is most hartely welcome unto me, and  glade to se you in my poore loge ; the whiche I have often desired ; and  myche more gladder if you had come after another sort. Ah, my gentill  lord of Shrewesbury quod my lord, I hartely thanke you ; and allthoughe  I have no cause to rejoyce, yet as a sorowe full hart may joye, I rejoyce my  chaunce, which is so good to come into the hands and custody of so noble  a persone, whose approved honor and wysdome hathe byn allwayes right  well knowen to all nobell estats. And Sir, howe soever my ongentill accusers  hathe used ther accusations agenst me, yet I assure you, and so byfore your  lordshipe and all the world do I protest, that my demeanor and procedyngs  hathe byn just and loyall towards my soverayn and liege lord ; of whose  behaviour and doyngs your lordshipe hathe had good experyence ; and evyn  accordyng to my trowthe and faythfulnes, so I bescche god helpe me in this  my calamytie. I dought nothyng of your Irouthe, quod therle, tlierfore my  lorde I beseche you be of good chere and feare not, for I have receyved  letters from the kyng of his owen hand in your favour and entertaynyng the  whiche you shall se. Sir, I ame nothyng sory but that I have not wherwith  worthely to receyve you, and to entertayn you accordyng to your honour and  my good wyll ; but suche as I have ye are most hartely welcome therto,  desiryng you to accept my good wyll accordyngly, for I wol not receyve you  as a prisoner, but as my good lord, and the kyngs trewe faythfull subjecte ;  and here is my wyfe come to salute you. Whome my lord kyst barehedyd,  and all hir gentilwomen ; and toke my lords servaunts by the hands, as well  gentilmen and yomen as other. Then these two lords went arme in arme     CARDINAL WOLSEY TAKES HIS LEAVE 367   into the logge, conductyng my lord into a fayer chamber at thend of a goodly  gallery within a newe tower, and here my lord was lodged.’ — p. 246.   Here are some short portions of dialogue between Wolsey and his  friends, just before his death :   * Uppon Monday in the mornyng, as I stode by his bedds' side, abought  viii of the clocke, the wyndowes beyng cloose shett, havyng wake lights  burnyng uppon the cupbord, I behyld hyme, as me seemed, drawyng fast to  his end. He perceyved my shadowe uppon the wall by his bedds side,  asked who was there. Sir I ame here, quod I. Howe do you ? quod he to  me. Very well Sir, if I myght se your grace well. What is it of the clocke ?  quod he to me. Forsothe Sir, quod I, it is past viii. of the clocke in the  mornyng. Eight of the clocke, quod he, that cannot be, rehersing dyvers  times eight of the clocke, eight of the clocke. Nay, nay, quod he at the last,  it cannot be viii of the clocke, for by viii of the clocke ye shal loose your  mayster ; for my tyme drawyth nere that I must depart out of this world.’  . . p. 265.   ‘ Mayster Kyngston farewell. I can no moore, but why she all thyngs to  have good successe. My tyme drawyth on fast. I may not tary with you.  And forget not I pray you, what I have seyd and charged you with all : for  whan I ame deade, ye shall peradventure remember my words myche better.  And even with these words he began to drawe his speche at lengthe and his  tong to fayle, his eyes beyng set in his hed, whos sight faylled hyme ; than  we began to put hyme in rembraunce of Christs passion, and sent for the  Abbott of the place to annele hyme ; who came with all spede and mynestred  unto hyme all the servyce to the same belongyng ; and caused also the gard  to stand by, bothe to here hyme talk byfore his deathe, and also to here  wytnes of the same ; and incontinent the clocke strake viii, at whiche tyme  he gave uppe the gost, and thus departed he this present lyfe.’— p. 276.   Latimer.   The Sermons of Bp. Latimer present good examples^ of colloquial  oratory, and the style is but little removed from the colloquial style of the  period. The following are from the Sermon of the Ploughers, preached  in 1548:   ' For they that be lordes vyll yll go to plough. It is no mete office for  them. It is not semyng for their state. Thus came up lordyng loiterers.  Thus crept in vnprechinge prelates, and so haue they longe continued.   ‘ For how many vnlearned prelates haue we now at this day ? And no  maruel. For if ye plough men yat now be, were made lordes they woulde  cleane gyue ouer ploughinge, they woulde leaue of theyr labour and fall to  lordyng outright, and let the plough stand. And then bothe ploughes nor  walkyng nothyng shoulde be in the common weale but honger. For euer  sence the Prelates were made Loordes and nobles, the ploughe standeth,  there is no worke done, the people starue.   ‘ Thei hauke, thei hunt, thei card, they dyce, they pastyme m theyr pre-  lacies with galaunte gentlemen, with theyr daunsmge mmyons, and with  theyr freshe companions, so that ploughinge is set a syde. And by tne  lordinge and loytryng, preachynge and ploughinge is cleane gone . .   ^^‘But^iiowe for the defaulte of vnpreaching prelates me thinke I coulde  gesse what myghte be sayed for excusynge of them : They are so troubeled  wyth Lordelye lyuynge, they be so placed in palacies, couched m courte^  ruffelynge in theyr rentes, daunceyng in theyr dominions, burdened with  ambassages, pamperynge of theyr paunches lyke a monke that maketh his     COLLOQUIAL IDIOM    368   jubilie, moundiynge in their maungers, and moylynge in their gaye manoures  and mansions, and so troubeled wyth loy terynge in theyr Lordeshyppes : that  they canne not attende it. They are other wyse occupyed, some in the  kynges matters, some are ambassadoures, some of the pryuie counsell, some  to furnyslie the courte, some are Lordes of the Parliamente, some are  presidentes, and some comptroleres of myntes. Well, well.   Is thys theyr duetye? Is thys theyr offyee? Is thys theyr callyng?  Should we haue ministers of the church to be comptrollers of the myntes ?  Is thys a meete office for a prieste that hath cure of soules ? Is this hys  charge ? I woulde here aske one question : I would fayne knowe who comp-  trolleth the deuyll at home at his parishe, whyle he comptrolleth the mynte ?  If the Apostles mighte not ieaue the office of preaching to be deacons, shall  one Ieaue it for myntyng ? ’   Wilson’s Ar^e of Rhetorique (1560) has a section 'Of deliting the  hearers, and stirring them to laughter ’ in which are enumerated ' What  are the kindes of sporting, or mouing to laughter'. The subject is  illustrated by various ' pleasant ' stories, which if few of them would now  make us laugh, are at least couched in a very easy and colloquial style  and enlivened by scraps of actual conversation. The most amusing  element in the whole chapter is the attitude of the writer to the subject,  and the combination of seriousness and scurrility with which it is handled.   ' The occasion of laughter’ says Wilson, 'and themeane that maketh us mery  ... is the fondnes, the filthines, the deformitie, and all such euill be-  hauiour as we see to be in other? ... Now when we would abashe a  man for some words that he hath spoken, and can take none aduauntage  of his person, or making of his bodie, we either doubt him at the first,  and make him beleeue that he is no wiser then a Goose : or els we confute  wholy his sayings with some pleasaunt iest, or els we extenuate and diminish  his doings by some pretie meanes, or els we cast the like in his dish, and  with some other devise, dash hym out of countenance : or last of all, we  laugh him to scorne out right, and sometimes speake almost neuer a word,  but only in continuaunce, shewe our selues pleasaunt’. — ^p. 136.   ‘ A frend of mine, and a good fellowe, more honest then wealthie, yea and  more pleasant then thriftie, liauing need of a nagge for his iourney that he  had in hande, and being in the countrey, minded to go to Parlnaie faire in  Lincolnshire, not farre from the place where he then laie, and meeting by the  way one of his acquaintaunce, told him his arrande, and asked him how  horses went at the Faire. The other aunswered merely and saidc, some  trot sir, and some amble, as farre as I can see. If their paces be altered,  I praye you tell me at our next meeting. And so rid away as fast as his  horse could cary him, without saying any word more, whereat he then  being alone, fel a laughing hartely to him self, and looked after a good  while, vntil the other was out of sight.’ — p. 140.   'A Gentleman hauing heard a Sermon at Panics, and being come home,  was asked what the preacher said. The Gentleman answered he would  first heare what his man could saie, who then waited vpon him, with his  hatte and cloake, and calling his man to him, sayd, nowe sir, whate haue  you brought from the Sermon. Forsothe good Maister, sayd the seruaunt  your cloake and your hatte- A honest true dealing seruaunt out of doubt,  piaine as a packsadclle, bauing a better soule to God, though his witte was  simple, then those haue, that vnder the colour of hearing, giuc them selues  to priuie picking, and so bring other mens purses home in their bosomes,  in the steade of other mens Sermons.’— pp. 14X-2.   These two stories are intended to illustrate the point that ' We shall  delite the hearers, when they looke for one ansvvere, and we make them     ‘DELITING THE HEARERS’    369   a cleane contrary, as though we would not seeme to vnderstand what they  would haue   ^Churlish aunsweres like the hearers sometimes very well. When the  father was cast in judgement, the Sonne seeing him weepe : why weepe  you Father? (quoth he) To whom his Father aunswered. ^What? Shall  I sing I pray thee seeing by Lawe I am condemned to "dye. Socrates  likewise bieing^ mooued of his wife, because he should dye an innocent  and guiltlesse in the Law: Why for shame woman (quoth he) wilt thou  haue me to dye giltic and deseruing. When one had falne into a ditch,  an other pitying his fall, asked him and saied : Alas how got you into  that pit ? Why Gods mother, quoth the other, doest thou aske me how  I got in, nay tell me rather in the mischiefe, how I shall get out.’   The nearest approach to the colloquial style in Bacon is to be found  in the Apophthegms, in which are scraps of conversation. A few may be  quoted, if only on account of the author.   ‘ Master Mason of Trinity College, sent his pupil to an other of the fellows,  to borrow a book of him, who told him, I am loth to lend my books out of  my chamber, but if it please thy tutor to come and read upon it in my chamber,  he shall as long as he will.” It was winter, and some days after the same  fellow sent to M^‘ Mason to borrow his bellows ; but M^’ Mason said to his  pupil, ‘‘ I am loth to lend my bellows out of my chamber, but if thy tutor  would come and blow the fire in my chamber, he shall as long as he will.”  —ApophtJi. 47, p. 1 1 3.   ^ There were fishermen drawing the river at Chelsea: M^* Bacon came  thither by chance in the afternoon, and offered to buy their draught : they  were willing. He askcvl them what they would take ? They asked thirty  shillings. M^ Bacon offered them ten. They refused it. Why then said  M^* Bacon, I will be only a looker on. They drew and catched nothing.  Saith M^ Bacon, Are not you mad fellows now, that might have had an  angel in your purse, to have made merry withal, and to have warmed you  thoroughly, and now you must go home with nothing. Ay but, saith the  fishermen, we had hope then to make a better gain of it. Saith M^’ Bacon,  ‘‘ Well my master, then I will tell you, hope is a good breakfast, but it is  a bad supper.” — p, 136.   Otway^s Comedies have all the coarseness and raciness of dialogue  of the latter half of the seventeenth century, and a pretty vein of genuine  comicality. They are packed with the familiar slang and colloquialisms  of the period. A few passages from Friendship in Fashion illustrate  at once the speech and the manners of the day.    Enter Lady SQUEAMISH at the Door,   Sir Noble Clmnsey, Hah, my Lady Cousin ! —Faith Madam you see I am  at it.   Malagene, The Devil’s wit, I think ; we could no sooner talk of wh —  but she must come in, with a pox to her. Madam, your Ladyship’s most  humble Servant.   Ldy Squ. Oh, odious ! insufferable ! who would have thought Cousin, you  would have serv’d me so— fough, how he stinks of wine, I can smell him  hither. — How have you the Patience to hear the Noise of Fiddles, and  spend your time in nasty drinking ?   Sir Noble, Hum ! ’tis a good Creature : Lovely Lady, thou shalt take  thy Glass.   Ldy Sgu, Uh gud ; murder 1 I had rather you had offered me a toad.   B b     370    COLLOQUIAL IDIOM    Sir N, Then Malagene, here’s a Health to my Lady Cousin’s Pelion  upon Ossa. [Drinks and breaks the   Ldy Squ, Lord, dear Malagene what ’s that ?   MaL A certain Place Madam, in Greece, much talk’t of by the Ancients ;  the noble Gentleman is well read.   Ldy Squ. 'Nay he’s an ingenious Person I’ll assure you.   Sir N. Now Lady bright, I am wholly thy Slave: Give me thy Hand,  I’ll go straight and begin my Grandmother’s Kissing Dance ; but first deign  me the private Honour of thy Lip.   Ldy Squ. Nay, fie Sir Noble 1 how I hate you now ! for shame be not so  rude : I swear you are quite spoiled. Get you gone you good-natur’d Toad  you. [Exetmti\    Malagene, . . . I’m a very good Mimick ; I can act Punchinello, Scara-  mouchir, Harlequin, Prince Prettyman or anything. 1 can act the rumbling  of a Wheel -barrow.   Valentine, The rumbling of a Wheel-barrow !   MaL Ay, the rumbling of a Wheel-barrow, so I say — Nay more than that,  I can act a Sow and Pigs, Saussages a broiling, a Shoulder of Mutton a  roasting : I can act a fly in a Honey-pot,   Truman, That indeed must be the Effect of very curious Observation.   MaL No, hang it, I never make it my business to observe anything, that  is Mechanicke. But all this I do, you shall see me if you will : But here  comes her Ladyship and Sir Noble.   Ldy Squ, Oh, dear M^ Truman, rescue me. Nay Sir Noble for Heav’n’s  sake.   Sir N, I tell thee Lady, I must embrace thee : Sir, do you know me ! I am  Sir Noble Clumsey : I am a Rogue of an Estate, and I live— Do you want  any money ? I have fifty pounds.   VaL Nay good Sir Noble, none of your Generosity we beseech you. The  Lady, the Lady, Sir Noble.   Sir N. Nay, ’tis all one to me if you won’t take ft, there it is. — Hang  Money, my Father was an Alderman.   MaL ’Tis pity good Guineas should be spoil’d, Sir Noble, by your leave.   [Picks up the Guineasl\   Sir N. But, Sir, you will not keep my Money ?   MaL Oh, hang Money, Sir, your Father was an Alderman.   Sir N, Well, get thee gone for an Arch-Wag — I do but sham all this  while i — ^but by Dad he ’s pure Company. . . .   . . . Lady, once more I say be civil, and come kiss me.   VaL Well done Sir Noble, to her, never spare.   Ldy Squ, I may be even with you tho for all this, Valentine : Nay  dear Sir Noble : M^ Truman, I’ll swear he’ll put me into Fits.   Sir N, No, but let me salute the Hem of thy Garment, Wilt thou marry  me? [LTneels.]   MaL Faith Madam do, let me make the Match.   Ldy Squ, Let me die Malagene, you are a strange Man, and Fll  swear have a great deal of Wit. Lord, why don’t you write ?   MaL Write? I thank your Ladyship for that with all my Heart. No  I have a Finger in a Lampoon or so sometimes, that ’s all.   Truman, But he can act.   Ldy Squ, I’ll swear, and so he does better than any one upon our  Theatres; I have seen him. Oh the English Comedians are nothing, not  comparable to the French or Italian: Besides we want Poets.   SirN, Poets! Why I am a Poet; I have written three Acts of a Play,  and have nam’d it already. ’Tis to be a Tragedy.   Ldy Squ. Oh Cousin, if you undertake to write a Tragedy, take my     ‘ PLEASURE INTOLERABLE ^ 3 ji   Counsel : Be sure to say soft melting tender things in it that may be moving,  and make your Lady’s Characters virtuous whatever you do.   Sir N. Moving I Why, I can never read it myself but it makes me laugh :  well, ’tis the pretty’st Plot, and so full of Waggery.   Ldy Sgti, Oh ridiculous I   Mai But Knight, the Title ; Knight, the Title.   Sir N, Why let me see ; ’tis to be called The Merry Conceits of Love ;  or the Life and Death of the Emperor Charles the Fifth, with the Humours  of his Dog Boabdillo.   Mai PI a, ha, ha. . . ,   Ldy Squ, But dear Malagene, won’t you let us see you act a little  something of Harlequin? I’ll swear you do it so naturally, it makes me  think Fm at the Louvre or Whitehall all the time. [Mai acis.] O Lord,  don’t, don’t neither ; I’ll swear you’ll make me burst. Was there ever any-  thing so pleasant ?   Trwn, Was ever anything so affected and ridiculous ? Her whole Life  sure is a continued Scene of Impertinence. What a damn’d Creature is  a decay’d Woman, with all the exquisite Silliness and Vanity of her Sex, yet  none of the Charms ! [Mai s^peaks in PunchinelMs voicei\   Ldy Squ, O Lord, that, that ; that is a Pleasure intolerable. Well, let  me die if I can hold out any longer.   A Comparison between the Stages, wiih an Examen of the Generous  Conqueror^ printed in 1702, is a dialogue between ^ Two Gentlemen’,  Sullen and Ramble (see below), and ^a Critick’,upon the plays of the day and  others of an earlier date. The style is that of easy and natural familiar con-  versation, with little or no artificiality, and incidentally, the tract throws  light upon contemporary manners and social habits. The following  examples are designed to illustrate the colloquial handling of indifferent  topics, and the small-talk of the early eighteenth century, as well as  the treatment of the immediate subject of the essay.   Sullen. They may talk of the Country and what they will, but the Park  for my money.   Ramble. In its proper Season I grant you, when the Mall is pav’d with  lac’d shoes ; when the Air is perfum’d with the rosie Breath of so many fine  Ladies ; when from one end to the other the Sight is entertain’d with nothing  but Beauty, and the whole Prospect looks like an Opera.   Sull And when is it out of Season Ramble ?   Ram. When the Beauties desert it ; when the absence of this charming  Company makes it a Solitude : Then Sullen, the Park is to me no more than  a Wilderness, a very Common ; and a Grove in a country Garden with a  pretty Lady is by much the pleasanter Landscape.   Sull To a Man of your Quicksilver Constitution it may be so, and the  Cuckoo in May may be Music t’ee a hundred Miles off, when all the Masters  in Town can’t divert you.   Ram. I love everything as Nature and the Nature of Pleasure has con-  triv’d it ; I love the Town in Winter, because then the Country looks aged  and deform’d ; and I hate the Town in Summer, because then the Country is  in its Glory, and looks like a Mistress just drest out for enjoyment.   Sull Very well distinguish’d : Not like a Bride, but like a Mistress.   Ram. I distinguish ’em by that comparison because I love nothing well  enough to be wedded to ’t : I’m a Proteus in my Appetite, and love to change  my Abode with my Inclination,   Sull I differ from you for the very Reason you give for your change ; the  Town is evermore the same to me ; and tho* the Season makes it look after  another manner, yet still it has a Face to please me one way or other, and  both Winter and Summer make it agreeable, —pp. 1-3*   B b 2     372    COLLOQUIAL IDIOM    Here is a conversation during dinner at the ' Blew Posts \   Critik, What have you order’d ?   Ramh. A Brace of Carp stew’d, a piece of Lamb, and a Sallet ; d’ee  like it ?   Crit, I like, anything in the World that will indure Cutting : Prithee  Cook make haste or expect I shall Storm thy Kitchin.   SulL Why thou’rt as hungry as if thou hadst been keeping Garrison in  Mantua : I don’t know whether Flesh and Blood is safe in thy Company.   CriL I wish with all my Heart thou wert there, that thou mightst under-  stand what it is to fast as 1 have done : Come, to our Places • . . the blessed  hour is come. . . . Sit, sit . . . fall to, Graces are out of Fashion.   Ramb. I wish the Charming Madam Subligny were here.   CriL Gad so don’t 1 : I had rather her P'eet were pegg’d down to the  Stage; at present my Appetite stands another way : Waiter, some Wine . , .  or I shall choak. . . .   Suit, This Fellow eats like an Ostrich, the Bones of these great Fish are  no more to him than the Bones of an Anchovy ; they melt upon his Tongue  like marrow Puddings.   Crit Ay, you may talk, but I’m sure I find ’em not so gentle ; here ’s  one yet in my Throat will be my death ; the Flask . . . the Flask . . . ,   Ramb. But Critick, how did you like the Play last Night ?   Crit. I’ll tell you by and by, Lord Sir, you won’t give a Man time to break  his Fast: This Fish is such washy Meat ... a Man can’t fix his knife in ’t,  it runs away from him as if it were still alive, and was afraid of the Hook :  Put the Lamb this way.   SulL The Rogue quarrels with the Fish, and yet you cou’d eat up the  whole Pond ; the late Whale at Cuckold’s point, with all its oderiferous Gar-  badge, wou’d ha’ been but a Meal to him : Well, how do you like the Lamb ?  does that feel your knife?   Crit. A little more substantial, and not much : Well, I shou’d certainly be  starv’d if I were to feed with the French, I hate their thin slops, their Pot-  tages, Frigaces, and Ragous, where a Man may bury his Hand in the Sauce,  and dine upon Steam : No, no, commend me to King Jemmy’s English  Surloin, in whose gentle Flesh a Man may plunge a Case-knife to the tip of  the Handle, and then draw out a Slice that will surfeit half a Score Yeoman of  the Guard. Some Wine ye Dog . . . there . , . now I have slain the Giant ;  and now to your Question . . . what was it you askt me ?   Ramb. Won’t you stay the Desert ? Some Tarts and Cheese ?   Crit I abominate Tarts and Cheese, they’re like a faint After-kiss, when  a Man is sated with better Sport ; there ’s no more Nourishment in ’em, than  in the paring of an Apple. Here Waiter take away. . . .   Ramb. Then remove every Thing but the Table-cloth.’ , .   Ramb. Here Waiter — send to the Booksellers in Pell mell for the Generous  Conqueror and make haste . . , you say you know the Author Critick.   Crit. By sight I do, but no further ; he ’s a Gentleman of good Extraction,  and for ought I know, of good Sense.   Ramb. Surely that’s not to be questioned; I take it for granted that  a Man that can write a Play, must be a Man of good Sense.   Crit That is not always a consequence, I have known many a singing  Master have a worse voice than a Parish Clerk, and I know two dancing  Masters at this time, that are directly Cripples : . . . A Ship-builder may fit  up a Man of War for the West Indies, and perhaps not know his Compas :  Or a great Trpelier, with Heylin, that writ the Geography of the whole  World, may, like him, not know the way from the next Village to his  own House.   Ramb. Your Comparisons are remote M*^ Critick.   Cfit. Not so remote as some successful Authors are from good sense ;     GENERAL CONVERSATION AFTER DINNER    373    Wit and Sense are no more the same than Wit and Humour; nay there is  even in Wit an uncertain Mode, a variable Fashion, that is as unstable as  the Fashion of our Cloaths : This may be proved by their Works who writ  a hundred Years ago, compar’d with some of the modern ; Sir Philip Sidney,  Don, Overbury, nay Ben himself took singular delight in playing with their  Words : Sir Philip is everywhere in his Arcadia jugling, which certainly by  the example of so great a Man, proves that sort of Wit then in Fashion ; now  that kind of Wit is call’d Punning and Quibbling, and is become too low for  the Stage, nay even for ordinary Converse ; so that when we find a Man who  still loves that old fashion’d Custom, we make him remarkable, as who is  more remarkable than Capt. Swan.   Ramb. Nay, your Quibble does well now a Days, your best Comedies  tast of ’em ; the Old Batchelor is rank.   Crit. But ’tis every Day decreasing, and Queen Betty’s Ruff and Fardin-  gale are not more exploded ; But Sense Gentlemen, is and will be the same  to the World’s end.   SulL And Nonsense is infinite, for England never had such a Stock and  such Variety.   Ramb. Yet I have heard the Poets that flourish’d in the last Reign but  two, complain of the same Calamity, and before that Reign the thing was the  same : All Ages have produced Murmurers ; and in the best of times you shall  hear the Trades-man cry — Alas Neighbour ! sad Times, very hard Times .. ,  not a Penny of Money stirring . . . Trade is quite dead, and nothing but War  . . . War and Taxes . . . when to my knowledge the gluttonous Rogue shall  drink his two Bottles at Dinner, and his Wife have half a Score of rich Suits,  a purse of Gold for the Gallant, and fifty Pounds worth of Gold and Silver  Lace on her under Petticoats.   Sail, Nay certainly, this that Ramble now speaks of is a great Truth;  those hypocritical Rogues are always grumbling; and tho’ our Nation never  had such a Trade, or so much Money, yet ’tis all too little for their voracious  Appetites : As I live — says he, I can’t afford this Silk one Penny cheaper —  d’ee mind the Rogues Equivocation ? as I live — ^that is, he lives like a Gen-  tleman — but let him live like a Tradesman and be hang’d ; let him wear  a Frock, and his Wife a blew Apron.   Ramb, See, the Book ’s here : go Waiter and shut the Door. — pp. 76-9.   The dialogue of Hichardson, ' sounynge in moral vertu ^ devoid of all  the lighter touches, is typical of the age that was beginning, the age of  reaction against the levities and negligences in speech and conduct  of the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries.   The following conversation of rather an agitated character, between  a mother and daughter, is from Letter XVI, in Clarissa Ifarlozue{i*j4S):   * • * • My mother came up to me. I love, she was pleased to say, to come  into this appartment.— No emotions child I No flutters ! — Am I not your  mother F—Am I not your fond, your indulgent mother P-— Do not discompose  me by discomposixig Do not occasion me uneasiness, when I would   glveyau nothing but pleasure. Come my dear, we will go into your closet. . . .  PI ear me out and then speak ; for I was going to expostulate. You are no  stranger to the end of M^ Solmes’s visits — O Madam! — Hear me out;  and then speak. — He is not indeed everything I wish him to be : but he is  a man of probity and has no vices — No vices Madam ! — Hear me out child. —  You have not behaved much amiss to him : we have seen with pleasur *. that  you have not — O Madam, must I not now speak ! I shall have done pre.‘ fently,  —A young creature of your virtuous and pious turn, she was pleased ! say,  cannot surely love a predicate ; you love your brother too well, to wish p see  any one who had like to have killed him, and who threatened youri incles  and defies us all You have had your own way six or seven times : v|? | w^nt     374    COLLOQUIAL IDIOM    to secure you against a man so vile. Tell me (I have a right to know)  whether you prefer this man to all others ? — Yet God forbid that I should  know you do ; for such a declaration would make us all miserable. Yet tell  me, a.re your affections engaged to this man ?   I know what the inference would be if I had said they were not You hesitate  — You answer me not — You cannot answer me — Rising — Nevermore will  I look upon you with an eye of favour — O Madam, Madam ! Kill me not  with your displeasure — I would not, I need not, hesitate one moment, did  I not dread the inference, if I answer you as you wish. — Yet be that inference  what it will, your threatened displeasure will make me speak. And I declare  to you, that I know not my own heart if it be not absolutely free. And pray,  let me ask my dearest Mamma, in what has my conduct been faulty, that  like a giddy creature, I must be forced to marr^r, to save me from— from  what ? Let me beseech you Madam to be the Guardian of my reputation \  Let not your Clarissa be precipitated into a stale she wishes not to enter into  with any man ! And this upon a supposition that otherwise she shall marry  herself, and disgrace her whole family.   When then, Clary [passing over the force of my plea] if your heart be free  — O my beloved Mamma, let the usual generosity of your dear heart operate  in my favour.^ Urge not upon me the inference that made me hesitate.   I won’t be interrupted, Clary — You have seen in my behaviour to you, on  this occasion, a truly maternal tenderness ; you have observed that I have  undertaken the task with some reluctance, because the man is not everything ;  and because I know you carry your notions of perfection in a man too high.  — Dearest Madam, this one time excuse me ! Is there then any danger that  I should be guilty of an imprudent thing for the man’s sake you hint at ?  Again interrupted! Am I to be questioned, and argued with? You know  this won’t do somewhere else. You know it won’t. What reason then,  ungenerous girl, can you have for arguing with me thus, but because you  think from my indulgence to you you may ?   What can I say ? What can I do ? What must that cause be that will not  bear being argued upon ?   Again ! Clary Harlowe —   Dearest Madam forgive me : it was always my pride and my pleasure to  obey you. But look upon that man — see but the disagreeableness of his  person — Now, Clary, do I see whose pei'son you have in your eye ! — Now is  M^’ Solmes, I see, but coinparatively disagreeable ; disagreeable only as an«  other man has a much more specious person.   But, Madam, are not his manners equally so 1 — Is not his person the true  representation of his mind ? — That other man is not, shall not be, anything  to me, release me from this one man, whom my heart, unbidden, resists.   Condition thus with your father. Will he bear, do you think, to be thus  dialogued with? Have I not conjured you, as you value my peace — What is  it that / do not give up ?*~-This very task, because I apprehended you would  not be easily persuaded, is a task indeed upon me. And will you give up  nothing ? Have you not refused as many as have been offered to you ? If you  would not have us guess for whom, comply ; for comply you must, or be  looked upon as in a state of defiance with your whole family. And saying  thus she arose, and went from me.’   Miss AusteiL.   The following examples of Miss Austen’s dialogue are not selected  because they are the most sparkling conversations in her works, but  rather because they appear to be typical of the way of speech of the  period, and further they illustrate Miss Austeff s incomparable art. The  first passage is ixomEmma^ which was written between i8ii and     CONVERSATION OF MR. WOODHOUSE    3^5   i8i6. Mr. Woodhouse and his daughter have just received an invitation  to dine with the Coles, enriched tradespeople who had settled in the  neighbourhood. Emma's view of them was that they were ' very respect-  able in their way, but they ought to be taught that it was not for them to  arrange the times on which the superior families would visit them On  the present occasion, however, ‘ she was not absolutely w^ithout inclina-  tion for the party. The Coles expressed themselves so properly — there  was so much real attention in the manner of it — so much consideration  for her father/ Emma having decided in her own mind to accept the  invitation — some of her intimate friends were going — it remained to  explain to her father, the ailing and fussy Mr. Woodhouse, that he  would be left alone without his daughter s company for the evening, as it  was out of the question that he should accompany her. ‘ He was soon  pretty well resigned.’   ‘ I am not fond of dinner-visiting ” said he ; “I never was. No more is  Emma. Late hours do not agree with us. I am sorry and Cole  should have done it. I think it would be much better if they would come in  one afternoon next summer and take their tea with us ; take us in their  afternoon walk, which they might do, as our hours are so reasonable, and  yet get home without being out in the damp of the evening. The dews of  a summer evening are what I would not expose anybody to. However as  they are so very desirous to have dear Emma dine with them, and as you  will both be there [this refers to his friend Weston and his wife], and  Knightley too, to take care of her I cannot wish to prevent it, provided  the weather be what it ought, neither damp, nor cold, nor windy.” Then  turning to Weston with a look of gentle reproach — “Ah, Miss Taylor,  if you had not married, you would have staled at home with me.”   “ Well, Sir ”, cried Weston, as I took Miss Taylor away, it is incumbent  upon me to supply her place, if I can ; and I will step to M^’® Goddard in  a moment if you wish it.” . . . With this treatment M^ Woodhouse was  soon composed enough for talking as usual. “ He should be happy to see  M^*® Goddard. He had a great regard for Goddard; and Emma  should write a line and invite her. James could take the note. But first  there must be an answer written to M’^® Cole.”   “ You will make my excuses, my dear, as civilly as possible. You will say  that I am quite an invalid, and go nowhere, and therefore must decline their  obliging invitation ; beginning with my comj^limentsy of course. But you will  do everything right. I need not tell you what is to be done. We must  remember to let James know that the carriage will be wanted on Tuesday.  I shall have no fears for you with him. We have never been there above  once since the new approach was made ; but still I have no doubt that James  will take you very safely ; and when you gel there you must tell him at what  time you would have him come for you again ; and you had better name an  early hour. You will not like staying late. You will get tired when tea is over.”   “ But you would not wish me to come away before I am tired, papa ? ”   Oh no my love ; but you will soon be tired. There will be a great many  people talking at once. You will not like the noise.”   “But my dear Sir,” cried M^’ Weston, “if Emma comes away early, it  will be breaking up the party.”   “ And no great harm if it does ” said Woodhouse. “ The sooner every  party breaks up the better.”   “ But you do not consider how it may appear to the Coles. Emma’s going  away directly after tea might be giving offense. They are good-natured  people, and think little of their own claims ; but still they must feel that  anybody’s hurrying away is no great compliment ; and Miss Woodhouse’s     COLLOQUIAL IDIOM    3?6   doing it would be more thought of than any other personas in the room.  You would not wish to disappoint and mortify the Coles, I am sure, sir;  friendly, good sort of people as ever lived, and who have been your neighbours  these /en years.”   ‘^No, upon no account in the world, Weston, I am much obliged to  you for reminding me. I should be extremely sorry to be giving them any  pain. I know what worthy people they are. Peny tells me that Cole  never touches malt liquor. You would not think it to look at him, but he is  bilious — M^' Cole is very bilious. No, I would not be the means of giving  them any pain. My dear Emma we must consider this. I am sure rather  than run any risk of hurting and Cole you would stay a little longer  than you might wish. You will not regard being tired. You will be perfectly  safe, you know, among your friends.”   Oh 5^es, papa. I have no fears at all for myself ; and I should have no  scruples of staying as late as Weston, but on your account. I am only  afraid of your silting up for me. I am not afraid of your not being ex-  ceedingly comfortable with Goddard. ^ She loves piquet, you know ; but  when she is gone home I am afraid you will be sitting up by youiself, instead  of going to bed at your usual time ; and the idea of that would entirely  destroy my comfort. You must promise me not to sit up.” *   The next example is in a very different vein. It is from Sense and  Sensibility (chap, xxi) and records the mode of conversation of the  Miss Steeles. These two ladies are among Miss Austen's vulgar  characters, and their speech lacks the restraint and decorum which her  better-bred personages invariably exhibit. While the Miss Steeles’ con-  versation is in sharp contrast with that of the Miss Dashwoods, with  whom they are here engaged, both in substance and manner, it evidently  passed muster among many of the associates of the latter, especially with  their cousin Sir John Middleton, in whose house, as relations of his  wife's, the Miss Steeles are staying. Apart from the vulgarity of thought,  the diction appears low when compared with that of most of Miss Austen's  characters. As a matter of fact it is largely the way of speech of the  better society of an earlier age, which has come down in the world, and  survives among a pretentious provincial bourgeoisie.   ‘ ‘^What a sweet woman Lady Middleton is” said Lucy Steele . . . '‘And  Sir John too ” cried the elder sistei', “ what a charming man he is ! ” . . .   And what a charming little family they have ! I never saw such fine children  in my life. I declare I quite doat upon them already, and indeed I am  always destractedly fond of children.” "I should guess so” said Elinor  with a smile “from what I witnessed this morning.”   “I have a notion” said Lucy, “you think the little Middletons rather too  much indulged ; perhaps they may be the outside of enough ; but it is natural  in Lady Middleton; and for my part I love to see children full of life and  spirits ; I cannot bear them if they are tame and quiet”   “I confess ” replied Elinor, “that while I am at Barton Park, I never  think of tame and quiet children with any abhorrence.” *    “ And how do you like Devonshire, Miss Dashwood ? (said Miss Steele)  I suppose you were very sorry to leave Sussex.”   In some suiyrise at the familiarity of this question, or at least in the  manner in which it was spoken, Elinor replied that she was.   “Norland is a prodigious beautiful place, is not it?” added Miss Steele,  “We have heard Sir John admire it excessively,” said Lucy, who seemed  to think some apology necessary for the freedom of her sister. “ I think     MISS LUCY STEELE    B11   every one admire it ’'replied Elinor, “who ever saw the place; though  it is not to be supposed that any one can estimate its beauties as we do."   “ And had you many smart beaux there ? I suppose you have not so many  in this part of the world ; for my part I think they are a vast addition  always."   “ But why should you think " said Lucy, looking ashamec^ of her sister,  “that there are not as many genteel young men in Devonshire as Sussex."   “ Nay, my dear, Fm sure I don’t pretend to say that there an’t. Fm sure  there ’s a vast many smart beaux in Exeter ; but you know, how could I tell  what smart beaux there might be about Norland? and I was only afraid the  Miss Dashwoods might find it dull at Barton ; if they had not so many as  they used to have. But perhaps you young ladies may not care about beaux,  and had as lief be without them as with them. For my part, I think they are  vastly agreeable, provided they dress smart and behave civil. But I can’t  bear to see them dirty and nasty. Now, there’s Rose at Exeter, a pro-  digious smart young man, quite a beau, clerk to Simpson, you know,  and yet if you do but meet him of a morning, he is not fit to be seen. I sup-  pose your brother was quite a beau, Miss Dashwood, before he married, as  he was so rich ? "   “ Upon my word," replied Elinor, “I cannot tell you, for I do not per-  fectly comprehend the meaning of the word. But this I can say, that if he  ever was a beau before he married, he is one still, for there is not the smallest  alteration in him."   “ Oh ! dear 1 one never thinks of married men’s being beaux — they have  something else to do."   “Lord! Anne", cried her sister, “you can talk of nothing but beaux; —  you will make Miss Dashwood believe you think of nothing else."’   It is not surprising that ‘ “ this specimen of the Miss Steeles’" was enough.  The vulgar freedom and folly of the eldest left her no recommendation  and as Elinor was not blinded by the beauty, or the shrewd look of the  youngest, to her want of real elegance and artlessness, she left the house  without any wish of knowing them better   Greetings and Farewells.   Only the slightest indication can be given of the various modes of greet-  ing and bidding farewell These seem to have been very numerous, and  less stereotyped in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries than at present. It  is not easy to be sure how soon the formulas which we now employ, or  their ancestral forms, came into current use. The same form often serves  both at meeting and parting.   In 1451, Agnes Paston records, in a letter, that "after evynsonge,  Angnes Ball com to me to my closett and dad me good evyn \ In the  account, quoted above, p. 362, given by Shillingford of his meetings  with the Chancellor, about 1447, he speaks of "saluting hym yn the  moste godely wyse that y coude ' but does not tell us the form he used.  The Chancellor, however, replies " Welcome^ ij times, and the tyme   Right met come Mayer'% and helde the Mayer a grete while faste by  the honde I   In the sixteenth century a great deal of ceremonial embracing and  kissing was in vogue. Wolsey and the King of France, according to  Cavendish, rode forward to meet each other, and they embraced each  other on horseback. Cavendish himself when he visits the castle of the  Lord of Cr^pin, a great nobleman, in order to prepare a lodging for     3^S    COLLOQUIAL IDIOM    the Cardinal, is met by this great personage, who ^ at his first coming  embraced me, saying I was right heartily welcome'. Henry VIII was  wont to walk with Sir Thomas More, ' with his arm about his neck \  The actual formula used in greeting and leave-taking is too often un-  recorded. When the French Embassy departs from England, whom  Wolsey has sb splendidly entertained, Cavendish says — ' My lord, after  humble commendations had to the French King bade them adieu'. The  Earl of Shrewsbury greets the Cardinal thus — ‘ My Lord, your Grace is  most heartily welcome unto me', and Wolsey replies ‘Ah my gentle  Lord of Shrewsbury, I heartily thank you '.   It is not until the appearance of plays that we find the actual forms of  greeting recorded with frequency. In Roister Doister, there are a fair  number: — God heepe thee worshipful Master Roister Doister; Welcome  my good wenche ; God you saue and see Nourse ; and the reply to this —  Welcome friend Merrygreeke; Good flight Roger old farewell   Roger old knaue ; well mef^ I bid you right welcome, A very favourite  greeting is God he with you,   God continue your Lordship is a form of farewell in Chapman's  Monsieur D'Olive, and God-den ‘ good evening occurs in Middleton's  Chaste Maid in Cheapside. Sir Walter Whorehoimd in the same play  makes use of the formula ‘ I embrace your acquaintance Sir \ to which  the reply is vows your service Str\ Massinger's New Way to pay  old Debts contains various formulas of greeting. I ain still your creature^  says Allworth to his step-mother Lady A. on taking leave ; of two old  domestics he takes leave with ‘ rny service to both \ and they reply ‘ ours  waits on you In reply to the simple Farewell Tom, of a friend,  All worth answers ^ All joy stay with you \ Sir Giles Overreach greets  Lord Lovel with ‘ Good day to My Lord ' ; and the prototype of the modern  how are you is seen in Lady Allworth's ‘ Hoiv dost thou Marrall P '  A graceful greeting in this play is ‘ Fou are happily encountered'.   The later seventeenth-century comedies exhibit the characteristic  urbanity of the age in their formulas of greeting and leave-taking.   ‘ A happy day to you Madam is Victoria's morning compliment to  Mrs. Goodvile in Otway's Friendship in Fashion, and that lady replies—  ‘ Dear Cousin, your humble servant'. Sir Wilfull Witwoud in Congreve's  Way of the World, says ‘ Save you Gentleman and Lady ' on entering  a room. His younger brother, on meeting him, greets him with ‘ Four  servant Brother", and the knight replies ‘ servant! Why yours Sir,  Four servant again ; "s heart, and your Friend and Servant to that \  Tm everlastingly your humble servant, deuce take me Madam, says Mr. Brisk  to Lady Froth, in the Double Dealer.   Your servant is a very usual formula at this period, on joining or  leaving company. In Vanbrugh's Journey to London, Colonel Courtly  on entering is greeted by Lady Headpiece — Colonel your servant; her  daughter Miss Betty varies it with^ — Four servant Colonel, and the visitor  replies to both — Ladies, your most ohedienL   Mr. Trim, the formal coxcomb in ShadwelFs Bury Fair, parts thus  from his friends — Sir, I kiss your hands ; Mr, Wildish— -S’/r your most  humble servant; Trim — Oldwii I am your most faithful servant;  Mr. Oldwit — Four servant sweet il/'* Trim,     BEGINNINGS AND ENDINGS OF LETTERS    379    Four servant, madam good morrow to you, is Lady Arabella's greeting  to Lady Headpiece, who replies — to you Madam (Vanbrugh's  Journey to London). The early eighteenth century appears not to  differ materially from the preceding in its usage. Lord Formal in  Fielding's Love in Several Masques, says Ladies your most humble  servafit, and Sir Apish in the same play — Four Ladyships everlasting  creature^    Epistolary Formulas.   The writing of letters, both familiar and formal, is such an inevitable  part of everyday life, that it seems legitimate to include here some  examples of the various methods of beginning and ending private letters  from the early fifteenth century onwards. A proper and exhaustive  treatment of the subject would demand a rather elaborate classification,  according to the rank and status of both the writer and the recipient,  and the relation in which they stood to each other — whether master  and servant, or dependant, friend, subject, child, spouse, and so on.  In the comparatively few examples here given, out of many thousands,  nothing is attempted beyond a chronological arrangement The status  and relationship of the parties is, however, given as far as possible. We  note that the formula employed is frequently a conventional and more  or less fixed phrase which recurs, with slight variants, again and again.  At other times the opening and closing phrases are of a more personal  and individual character.   1418. Archbp* Chichele to Hen. V, Signs simply: your preest and bede-  man. — Ellis, i. i. 5.   142 5. IVilL Fasten to . Right worthy and worshepfull Sir. I recom-   maunde me to you, &c. Ends : Almyghty God have you in his governaunce.  Your frend unknowen. — Past. Letters, i. 19-20.   1440. Agnes to Will. Fasten. Inscribed: To my worshepful housbond  W. Paston be this letter takyn. Dere housbond I reccommaunde me to yow.  Ends : The Holy Trinite have you in governaunce. — P. L. i. 38-9.   1442-5. Dtike of Buckingham to Lord Beau 7 nont, Ryght worshipful and  with all my herte right enterly beloved brother, I recomaunde me to you,  thenking right hastili your good brotherhode for your gode and gentill letters.  I beseche the blissid Trinite preserve you in honor and prosperite. Your  trewe and feithfull broder H. Bukingham. — P. L- i. 61-2.   1443. Margaret to John Paston. Ryth worchipful husbon, I reccomande  me to yow desyryng her tel y to her of your wilfar. Almyth God have you in  his kepyn and sendo yow helth, Yorys M. Paston. — P. L. i. 48-9.   1444. James Gresham to Will. Fasten. Please it your good Lordship to  wete, &c. Ends : Wretyn right simply the Wednesday next to fore the Fest.  By your laiost symple servaunt — P. L. i, 50.   1444, Duchess of Norfolk to J. Past 07 i. Ryght tmsty and entirely wel-  bclovcd we grete you wel hertily as we kan , . . and siche agrement as, &c.  ... we shall duely performe yt with the myght of Jesu who haff you in his  blissed keping. — P. L. i. 57,   1444. Sir R. Ckamberlayn to Agn. Paston. Ryght worchepful cosyn,  I comand me to you. And I beseche almyty God kepe you. Your Cosyn  Sir Roger Chamberlain.   1445. Agnes to Edm. Fasten. To myn welbelovid sone. I grete you wel.  Be your Modre Angnes Paston.— i, 58, 59.     380 COLLOQUIAL IDIOM   1449, Marg, to John Paston. Wretyn at Norwych in hast, Be your gronyng  Wyfr.-~i. 76“7-   1449. Same to sa 7 ne. No mor I wryte to ^ow atte this tyme* Your Mar-  karyte Paston. — i. 42-3.   1449. John Paston, Ends : Be ^owre pore Broder*   1449. E Its. ^ Clare to J, Paston, No raore I wrighte to 50 w at this tyme,  but Holy Cost have 50W in kepyng. Wretyn in haste on Scynt Peterys day  be candel lyght, Be your Cosyn E. C. — P. L. i. 89-90.   1450. Duke of Suffolk to his son. My dear and only welbeloved sone.  Your trewe and lovynge fader Suffolk. — P. L. i. 12 1-2.   1450, IVilL Lomme to J, Paston, I prey you this bille may recomaunde  me to mastrases your moder and wyfe. Wretyn yn gret hast at London. —  P.L. i. 126.   1450. y. Gresham to ^ my Mats ter Whyte Esguyer\ After due recomen-  dacion I recomaund me to yow.   1450. J, Paston to above, James Gresham, I pray you labour for the, &c.  — i. 145*   1450. Justice Yelverton to Sir J, Fastolf, By your old Servaunt William  Yelverton Justice. — P, L. i. 166.   1453. Agnes toJ, Paston, Sone I grete you well and send you Godys  blessyng and myn. Wretyn at Norwych ... in gret hast, Be your moder  A. Paston. — P. L. i. 259.   1454. J, Paston to Earl of Oxford* Youre servaunte to his powr John  Paston. — P. L. i. 276,   1454. Lord Scales to J, Paston, Our Lord have you in governaunce. Your  frend The Lord Scales. — P. L. i. 289.   1454, Thomas Howes to J, Paston, I pray God kepe yow. Wiyt at Castr  hastly ij day of September, Your owne T. Howes. — P. L. i. 301.   1454. The same. Your chapleyn and bedeman Thomas Howes.— *i. 31 8.   1455. /• PoLstolf to Duke of Norfolk, Writen at my pore place of  Castre, Your humble man and servaunt. — P. L. i. 324.   1455. /. Cudworth, Bp. of Lmcoln^ to J, Patton, And Jesu preserve you,  J. Bysshopp of Lincoln. — P.L. i. 350.   1456. Archbp, Bourchier to Sir J, Fastolf, The blissid Trinitee have you  everlastingly in His keping, Written in my manoir of Lamehith, Your feith-  full and trew Th, Cant. — P. L. i. 382.   1456 (Nephew to uncle). H, Fylinglay to Sir J, Fastolf Ryght wor-  shipful unkell and my ryght good master, I recomniaund me to yow wyth all  my servys. And Sir, my brother Paston and I have, &c. . . . Your nevew  and servaunt — P. L. i. 397.   1458. John Jerningham to Marg, Paston. Nomor I wryte unto you at  this tyme. . . . Your owne umhle servant and cosyn J. J.— P, L. i. 429.   1458 (Daughter to her mother). Elh, Poynings to Agn, Paston, Right  worshipful and my most entierly belovde moder, in the most lowly maner  I recomaund me unto your gode moderhode. . . . And Jesu for his grete  mercy save yow. By your humble daughter. — P. L. i, 434-5.   1469. Chancellor and University of Oxford to Sir John Say, Ryght wor-  shipful our trusty and entierly welbeloued, after harty commendacyon. . . .  Ends : yo’-' trew and harty louers The Chancelir and Thuniversite of Oxon-  ford. — Ellis.   1477. John Paston to Ms mother* Your sone and humbyll servaunt P. —  P. L. iii. 176.   1481-4. Edm, Paston to Ms mother, umble son and servant. —   P. L. iii, 280.   1482. J, Paston to Ms mother. Your sone and trwest servaunt — P. h*  iii. 290.   1482. Margery Paston to her hushaftd. No more to you at this tyme, Be  your servaunt and bede woman.— iii. 293,     LONGWINDED GREETINGS    381    1485. Duke of Norfolk to J, Faston. Welbelovyd frend I cummaund me  to yow. . . . I shall content you at your metyng with me, Yower lover J. Nor-  folk.— iii. 320,   1485. Eliz, Browne to J. Paston. Your loving awnte E. B.   1485. Duke of Suffolk to f Paston, Ryght welbeloved we grete you well.  . , . Suffolk, yor frende. — iii. 324-5.   1490. Bp* of Durham to Sir fohn Paston* IH2, Xps*. Rygiit wortchipful  sire, and myne especial and of long tyme apprevyd, trusty and feythful frende,  I in myne hertyeste wyse recommaunde me un to you. . . , Scribyllyd in the  moste haste, at my castel or manoir of Aucland the xxvij of Januay. Your  own trewe luffer and frende John Duresme. — iii. 363.   1490. Lumen H ary son to Sir f Past on. Onerabyll and well be lov^^'d  Knythe, I commend me on to 5our masterchepe and to my lady 5owyr wyffe.  . , . No mor than God be wyth 50W, L. H. at ^ouyr comawndment.   1503. Q. Margaret of Scotland to her father Hen. VII. My moste dere  iorde and fader in the most humble wyse that I can thynke I recommaunde  me unto your Grace besechyng you off your dayly blessyngys. . . . Wrytyn  wyt the hand of your humble douter Margaret. — Ellis i. i. 43.   Hen. VI J to his Mother.^ the Countess of Richmond. Madam, my most  enterely wilbeloved Lady and Moder . . . with the hande of youre most  humble and lovynge sone. — Ellis, i. i. 43-5.   Margaret to Hen. VI 1 . My oune suet and most deare kynge and all my  worldly joy, yn as humble manner as y can thynke I recommand me to your  Grace ... by your feythful and trewe bedewoman, and humble modyr Mar-  garet R, — Ellis, i. I. 46.   1513. Q. Margaret oj Scotland to Hen. VI IL Richt excellent, richt hie  and mithy Prince, our derrist and best belovit Brothir. . . . Your louyn systar  Margaret. — Ellis, i. i. 65. (The Queen evidently employed a Scottish Secre-  tary.)   1515. Margaret to Wolsey. Yours Margaret R. — Ellis, i. i. 131.   1515. Thos. Lord Howard, Lord Admiral, to Wolsey. My owne gode  Master Awlmosner. . . . Scrybeled in gret hast in the Mary Rose at Plymouth  half o^' after xj at night . . . y^ own Thomas Howard.   c. 1515. West Bp. of Ely to Wolsey. Myne especiall good Lorde in my  most humble wise I recommaund me to your Grace besechyng you to con-  tynue my gode Lorde, and I schall euer be as I am bounden your dayly  bedeman. . . . Y^ chapelayn and bedman N 1 . Elien.   c. 1520. Archbp. Warham to Wolsey. Please ityo^ moost honorable Grace  to understand. ... At your Graces commaundement, Willm. Cantuar. —  Ellis, iii. I. 230. Also : Euer, your own Willm. Cantuar.   Langland Bp. of Lincoln to Wolsey. My bownden duety mooste lowly  remembrede unto Your good Grace. . . . Yo^ moste humble bedisman John  Lincoln.— Ellis, iii. l. 248.   Cath, of Aragon to Princess Mary. Doughter, I pray you thinke not, &c.  —Ellis, i, 2. 19, • . . Your lovyng mother Katherine the Queue.   Archibald, E. of Angus. Addresses letter to Wolsey : To my lord Car-  dinallis grace of Ingland. — Ellis, iii. i. 291.   1521. Bp. Tunstal to Wolsey. Addresses letter :— to the most reverend  fader in God and his most singler good Lorde Cardinal. — Ellis, iii. i* 273.   Ends a letter : By your Gracys most humble bedeman Cuthbert TunstalL  —Ellis, iii. I. 332 -   1515 or 1521. Duke of Buckingham to Wolsey, Yorys to my power  E. Bukyngham.   Gccvin Douglas, Bp. of Dunkeld, to Wolsey. ZgI chaplan wy^ his lawfull  seruyse Gavin bischop of Dunkeld.— Ellis, iii. i. 294- Zo^ humble servytor  and Chaplein of Dunkeld.— Ellis, iii. i. 296. Zo^ humble seruytor and  dolorous Chaplan of Dunkeld.— Ellis, iii. i. 303-   Wolsey to Gardiner {afterwards Bp. of Winchester)* Ends : Your assurjd     382 COLLOQUIAL IDIOM   lover and bedysman T. Car^s Ebor.— Ellis, i. 2. 6. Again : Wryttyn hastely  at Asher with the rude and shackyng hand of your dayly bedysman and  assuryd frende T. Car^^® Ebor.   1532. T/ios, AudUy {Lord Keeper) to CromwelL Yo^' assured to his litell  Thomas Audeley Gustos Sigiili.   Edw. E, of Hertford {afterwards Lord Protector). Thus I comit you to  God hoo send yo^‘ lordshep as well to far as I would mi selfe . . . w^ the hand  of yo^ lordshepis assured E. Hertford.   Hen. VI 11 to Catherine Parr. No more to you at thys tyme swethart  both for lacke off tyme and gret occupation off bysynes, savyng we pray you  in our name our harte blessyngs to all our chyldren, and recommendations to  our cousin Marget and the rest off the laddis and gentyll women and to our  Consell alsoo. Wryttyn with the hand off your lovyng howsbande Henry R.  — Ellis, i. 2. 130.   Princess Mary to CromwelL Marye Princesse. Maister Cromwell I  commende me to you. — Ellis, i. 2. 24,   Prince Edward to Catherine Parr. Most honorable and entirely beloued  mother. . . . Your Grace, whom God have ever in his most blessed keping.  Your louing sonne, E. Prince. — Ellis, i. 2. 13 1.   1547. Henry Radclyf E. of Sussex, to his wife. Madame with most  lovyng and hertie commendations. — Ellis, i. 2. 137.   Princess Elizabeth to Ediv. VI. Your Maiesties humble sistar to com-  maundement Elizabeth. — Ellis, i. 2. 146 ; Your Maiesties most humble sistar  Elizabeth. — Ellis, i. 1. 148.   Princess Elizabeth to Lord Protector. Your assured frende to my litel  power Elizabeth. — Ellis, i. 2. 158.   Edward VI to Lord Protector Somerset. Derest Uncle. . . • Your good  neuew Edward. — Ellis, ii. i. 148.   Q.Mary to Lord Admiral Seymour. Your assured frende to my power  Marye. — Ellis, i. 2. 153.   Princess Elizabeth to Q. Mary (on being ordered to the Tower). Your  Highnes most faithful subjec that hath bine from the begining and wyl be to  my ende, Elizabeth. (Transcr. of 1732). — Ellis, ii. 2. 257.   1553, Princess Elizabeth to the Lords of the Council. Your verye lovinge  frende, Elizabeth- — Ellis, ii. 2. 213.   1554, Henry Darnley to Q. Mary of England. Your Maiesties moste  bounden and obedient subjecte and servant Henry Darnley.   Queen Dowager to Lord Admiral Seymour. By her ys and schalbe  your humble true and lovyng wyffe duryng her lyf Kateryn the Quenc. — Ellis,  i. 2. 152.   Q. Mary to Marquis of Winchester, Your Mystresse assured Marye the  Queue. -—Ellis, ii. 2. 252.   Sir John Grey of Pyrgo to Sir William Cecil. It is a great while me  thinkethe, Cowsine Cecill, since I sent unto you. ... By your lovyng cousin  and assured frynd John Grey. — Ellis, ii, 2. 73-4; Good cowsyne Cecil!. . , .  By yo^ lovyng Cousine and assured pouer frynd dowring lyfe John Grey. —  Ellis, ii. 2. 276.   Lady Catherine Grey, Cmmtess of Hertford, to Sir W, Cecil. Good cosyne  Cecill . . . Your assured frend and cosyne to my small power Katheryne  Hartford. — Ellis, ii. 2. 278 ; Your poore cousyne and assured frend to my  small power Katheryne Hartford. — Ellis, ii. 2. 287.   1564. Sir W. Cecil to Sir Thos. Smith. Your assured for ever W. Cecill.  — Ellis, ii. 2. 295 ; Yours assured W. Cecill— Ellis, ii, 2. 297 ; Your assured  to command W, Cecill — Ellis, ii. 2, 300.   1 566. Duchess of Somerset to Sir W. Cecil. Good M^ Secretary, yf I have  let you alone all thys whyle I pray you to thynke yt was to tary for my L, of  Leycesters assistans. ... I can nomore . . , and so do leave you to God Yo’^  assured lovyng frynd Anne Somerset,— Ellis, ii. 288.     SECOND HALF OF SIXTEENTH CENTURY 383   Christopher Jonson, Master of Winchester^ to Sir W, CeciL Right  honourable my duetie with all humblenesse consydered. . . . Your honoures  most due to commando, Christopher Jonson. — Ellis, ii. 2. 313.   1569. Lacfy Stanhope to Sir W, CeciL Right honorable, my humble  dewtie premised. . . . Your honors most humblie bound Anne Stanhope. —  Ellis, il 2. 324. _ ^ ^ ^ ,   1574. Sir Philip Sidney to the E. of Leicester, Righte Honorable and my  singular good Lorde and Uncle. . . . Your L. most obedi. . . , Philip Sidney.  —Works, p. 345.   1576. Sir Philip Sidney to Sir Francis Walsingham, Righte Honorable  ... I most humbly recommende my selfe unto yow, and leaue yow to the  Eternals most happy protection, . , . Yours humbly at commawndement  Philipp Sidney.   1578. Sir Philip Sidney to Edward Molineux^ Esq. (Secretary to Sir H.  Sidney), Molineux, Few words are best My letters to my father have  come to the eyes of some. Neither can I condemn any but you. . . . (The  writer assures M. that if he reads any letter of his to his father ^ without his  commandment or my consent, I will thrust my dagger into you. And trust  to it, for I speak it in earnest’. . . .) In the meantime farewell. From court  this last of May 1 578, By me Philip Sidney.— p. 328.   1580. Sir Philip Sidney to his brother Robert. My dear Brother . . .  God bless you sweet boy and accomplish the joyful hope I conceive of you.  , . . Lord I how I have babbled : once again farewell dearest brother. Your  most loving and careful brother Philip Sidney.   1582. Thomas Watson ^ To the frendly Reader^ (in Passionate Centurie of  Love). Courteous Reader , . . and so, for breuitie sake (I) aprubtlie make and  end ; committing the to God, and my worke to thy fauour. Thine as thou  art his, Thomas Watson.   Anne of Denmark to James L Sir ... So kissing your handes I remain  she that will ever love Yow best, Anna R. — Ellis, i. 3. 97.   c. 1585. Sir Philip to Walsingham. Sir , . . your louing cosin and frend.  In several letters to Walsingham Sidney signs *your humble Son’. ^   1586. Wm. Webbe to Ma. (= ^ Master ’) Edward Sulyard Esquire (Dedi-  catory Epistle to the Discourse of English Poetrie). May it please you Syr,  thys once more to beare with my rudenes, &c. ... I rest, Your worshippes  faithfull Seruant W. W.   1593. Edward Alleyn to his wife. My good sweete mouse . . . and so  swett mouse farwell. — Mem. of Edw. Alleyn, L 36; my good sweetharte and  loving mouse . . . thyn ever and no bodies else by god of heaven. — ibid.   1596, Thos., Lord Buckhurst, afterwards Earl of Dorset^ to Sir Robert  CeciL Sir . . . Your very lo: frend T. Buckhurst.   1 597, Sir W. Raleigh to Cecil. S*^ I humblie thanke yow for your letter . , .  S^ I pray love vs in your element and wee will love and honor yow in ours  and every wher. And remayne to be comanded by yow for evermore  W Ralegh.   1602. Same to same. Good Secretary. . . . Thus I rest, your very  loving and assured frend T, Buckhurst,— Works, xxxiv-xi.   1603. Same to same. My very good Lord. . ♦ . So I rest as you know,  Ever yours T. Buckurst   1605, Same to same. ... I pray God for your health and for mine own  and so rest Ever yours ...   1607. Same to the University of Oxford. Your very loving friend and  Chancellor T. Dorset— xlvi.   cr. 1608. Sir Menry Wotton to Henry Prince of Wales. Youre zealous  pooie servant H. W. — Ellis, i. 3* loo.   Q. Anne of Denmark to Sir George Villiers (afterwards Duke of Buc-  kingham). My kind Dog. # • . So wishing you all happiness Anna R.  Ellis, i. 3, ICO.     384 COLLOQUIAL IDIOM   16 1 1. Charles Duke of York to Prince Heniy. Most loving Brother  I long to see you, . . . Your H. most loving brother and obedient servant,  Charles. — Ellis, i. 3. 96.   1612. Prince Charles to James L Your most humble and most   obedient sone and servant Charles. — Ellis, i. 3. 102.   Same to Viljiers. Steenie, There is none that knowes me so well as your-  self. . , . Your treu and constant loving frend Charles P. — Ellis, i. 3. 104.   King Jaynes to Buckingham or to Prince Charles, My onlie sweete and  deare chylde I pray thee haiste thee home to thy deare dade by sunne setting  at the furthest. — Ellis, i. 3. 120.   Sa 7 ne to Buckingham, My Steenie. . . . Your clear dade, gosseppe and  stewarde. — Ellis, i. 3, 159.   Same to both. Sweet Boyes. . . . God blesse you both my sweete babes,  and sende you a safe and happie returne, James R. — Ellis, i. 3 121.   Prmce Charles a?id Buckingham to James, Y’our Majesties most humble  and obedient sone and servant Charles, and your humble slave and doge  Steenie.—Ellis, i. 3. 122.   1623. Buckingham to James. Dere Dad, Gossope and Steward. . . • Your  Majestyes most humble slave and doge Steenie. — Ellis, i, 3. 146-7.   1623. Lord Herbert to James, Your Sacred Majesties most obedient,  most loyal, and most affectionate subjecte and servant, E. Herbert   The letters of Sir John Suckling (Works, ii, Reeves & Turner) are  mostly undated, but one to Davenant has the date 1629, and another to  Sir Henry Vane that of 1632.   The general style is more modern in tone than those of any of the  letters so far referred to. (See on Suckling’s style, pp. 152-3.) The  beginnings and endings, too, closely resemble and are sometimes identical  with those of our own time.   To Davenant, Vane, and several other persons of both sexes, Suckling  signs simply — ^ Your humble servant J. S.’, or 'J. Suckling’. At least  two, to a lady, end * Your humblest servant The letter to Davenant  begins ‘WilL; that to Vane — ‘Right Honorable’. Several letters  begin ‘ Madam ‘ My Lord one begins ‘ My noble friend another  ‘ My Noble Lord several simply ‘ Sir The more fanciful letters,  to Aglaura, begin ‘ Dear Princess ’, ‘ Fair Princess ’, ‘ My clear Dear  ‘ When I consider, my dear Princess ’, &c. One to a cousin begins  ‘ Honest Charles   The habit of rounding off the concluding sentence of a letter so that  the valedictory formula and the writer’s name form an organic part of it,  a habit very common in the eighteenth century — in Miss Burney, for  instance — is found in Suckling’s letters. For example : ‘ I am still the   humble servant of my Lord that 1 was, and when I cease to be so,   I must cease to be John Suckling’; ‘yet could never think myself  unfortunate, while I can write myself Aglaura her humble servant ’ ; ‘ and  should you leave that lodging, more wretched than Montferrat needs  must be your humble servant J. S.’, and so on.   The longwindedness and prolixity wiiich generally distinguish the  openings and closings of letters of the fifteenth and the greater part of  the sixteenth century, begin to disappear before the end of the latter  period. Suckling is as neat and concise as the letter-writers of the  eighteenth century. ‘Madam, your most humble and faithful servant'  might serve for Dr. Johnson.     DR. AND MRS. BASIRE    3S5   Most of our modern formulas were in use before the end of the first  half of the seventeenth century, though some of the older phrases still  survive. But we no longer find " I commend me unto your good master-  ship, beseeching the Blessed Trinity to have you in his governance and  such-like lengthy introductions. The Correspondence of Dr. Basire (see  pp. 163-4) is very instructive, as it covers the period from 1634 to 1675,  by which latter date letters have practically reached their modern form.  Dr. Basire writes in 1635-6 to Miss Frances Corbet, his fiancee, 'Deare  Fanny ^ Deare Love ^ ^ Love and ends ' Your most faithfuil frend J. B.',  'Thy faithful frend and loving servaunt J. B.", 'Your assured frend  and loving well-wisher J. B/, 'Your ever iouing frend J. B.' When  Miss Corbet has become his wife, he constantly writes to her in his  exile which lasted from 1640 to 1661, letters which apart from our present  purpose possess great human and historical interest. These letters generally  begin ' My Dearest', and ' My deare Heart', and he signs himself ' Your  very Iouing husband', 'Yours, more than ever', 'Your faithful husband',  ' My dearest. Your faithful friend ', ' Yours till death ' Meanewhile assure  your selfe of the constant love of— My dearest — ^Your loyall husband   The lady to whom these affectionate letters were addressed, bore with  wonderful patience and cheerfulness the anxieties and sufferings incident  upon a state bordering on absolute want caused by her husband's depriva-  tion of his living under the Commonwealth, his prolonged absence, together  with the cares of a family of young children, and very indifferent health.  She was a woman of great piety, and in her letters ‘ many a holy text  around she strews ' in reply to the religious soliloquies of her husband. Her  letters all begin ' My dearest ’, and they often begin and close with pious  exclamations and phrases — 'Yours as much as euer in the Lord, No, more  thene euer ' ; ' My dearest, I shall not faile to looke thos plases in the  criptur, and pray for you as becometh your obedient wife and serunt in  the Lord F. B. ’ ; another letter is headed ' Jesu 1 and ends — ' I pray God  send vs all a happy meting, I ham your faithful in the Lord, F. B.'  Many of the letters are headed with the Sacred Name. Others of  Mrs. Basire's letters end — 'Farwall my dearest, I ham yours faithful  for euer'; 'I euer remine Yours faithfuil in the Lord'; 'So with my  dayly prayers to God for you, I desire to remene your faithfuil loveing  and obedient wif '.   It may be worth while to give a few examples of beginnings and ends  of letters from other persons in the Basire Correspondence, to illustrate  the usage of the latter part of the seventeenth century.   These letters mostly bear, in the nature of an address, long superscrip-  tions such as 'To the Reverend and ever Honoured Doctour Basire,  Prebendary of the Cathedral Church in Durham. To be recommended  to the Postmaster of Darneton' (p. 213, dated 1662).   This letter, from Prebendary Wrench of Durham, begins ' Sir and  ends — ' Sir, Your faithfuil and unfeigned humble Servant R. W.'   In the same year the Bishop of St. David's begins a letter to Dr. Basire  — ' Sir and ends — ' Sir, youre uerie sincere friend and seruant, Wil.  St, David's p. 219,   The Doctor's son begins — ' Reverend Sir, and most loving Father '  and ends with the same formula, adding — ' Your very obedient Son, P. B ^     3^6    COLLOQUIAL IDIOM    p. 221. To his Bishop (of Durham) Dr. Basire begins 'Right Rev.  Father in God, and my very good Lord ending ' I am still, My L<i,  Your Lp 3 . faithfull Servant Isaac Basire’. In 1666 the Bishop of Carlisle,  Dr. Rainbow, evidently an old friend of Dr. B/s, begins 'Good  Mr. Archdeacon and ends ' I commend you and yours to God’s grace  and remaine,'Your very faithfull frend Edw, Carlioi’, p. 254.   In 1668 the Bishop of Durham begins ' M^ Archdeacon ’ and ends ' In  the interim I shall not be wanting at this distance to doe all I can, who  am, Sir, Your very loving ffriend and servant TJo. Duresme', p. 273.  Dr. Barlow, Provost of Queen’s, begins 'My Reverend Friend’, and  ends ‘Your prayers are desired for, Sir, Your affectionate friend and  Seruant, Tho. Barlow’, p. 302 (1673). Dr. Basire begins a letter to  this gentleman — ‘ Rev. Sir and my Dear Friend ’ . . , ending ' I remain,  Reverend Sir, Your affectionate frend, and faithful servant To his  son Isaac, he writes in 1664 — 'Beloved Son’, ending — ‘So prays your  very lovinge and painfull Father, Isaac Basire ’.   Having now brought our examples of the various types of epistolary  formulas down to within measurable distance of our own practice, we  must leave this branch of our subject. Space forbids us to examine and illus-  trate here the letters of the eighteenth century, but this is the less necessary  as these are very generally accessible. The letters of that age, formal or  intimate, but always so courteous in their formulas, are known to most  readers. Some allusion has already been made (pp. 20-1) to the tinge of  ceremoniousness in address, even among friends, which survives far into  the eighteenth century, and may *be seen in the letters of Lady Mary  Montagu, of Gray, and Horace Walpole, while as late as the end of the  century we find in the letters of Cowper, unsurpassed perhaps among  this kind of literature for grace and charm, that combination of stateliness  with intimacy which has now long passed away.    Exclamations, Expletives, Oaths, &e.   Under these heads comes a wide range of expressions, from such as  are mere exclamations with little or no meaning for him who utters or  for him who hears them, or words and phrases added, by way of emphasis,  to an assertion, to others of a more formidable character which are  deliberately uttered as an expression of spleen, disappointment, or rage,  with a definitely blasphemous or injurious intention. In an age like  ours, where good breeding, as a rule, permits only exclamations of the  mildest and most meaningless kind, to express temporary annoyance,  disgust, surprise, or pleasure, the more full-blooded utterances of a former  age are apt to strike u$ as excessive. Exclamations which to those who  used them meant no more than ' By Jove ’ or ' my word ’ do to us, would  now, if they were revived appear almost like rather blasphemous irreve-  rence. It must be recognized, however, that swearing, from its mildest  to its most outrageous forms, has its own fashions. These vary from  age to age and from class to class. In every age there are expressions  which are permissible among well-bred people, and others which are not.  In certain circles an expression may be regarded with dislike, not so     UNMEANING EXCLAMATIONS    387    much because of any intrinsic wickedness attributed to it, as merely  because it is vulgar. Thus there are many sections of society at the  present time where such an expression as ‘ O Crikey * is not in use. No  one would now pretend that in its present form, whatever may underlie  it, this exclamation is peculiarly blasphemous, but many persons would  regard it with disfavour as being merely rather silly and distinctly  vulgar. It is not a gentleman’s expression. On the other hand, ^ Good  Heavens \ or ^ Good Gracious \ while equally innocuous in meaning and  intention, would pass muster perhaps, except among those who object, as  many do, to anything more forcible than ‘ dear me \   Human nature, even when most restrained, seems occasionally to  require some meaningless phrase to relieve its sudden emotions, and the  more devoid of all association with the cause of the emotion the better  will the exclamation serve its purpose. Thus some find solace in such  a formula as ‘ O liitle haiC which has the advantage of being neither  particularly funny nor of overstepping the limits of the nicest decorum,  unless indeed these be passed by the mere act of expressing any emotion  at all. It is really quite beside the mark to point out that utterances of  this kind are senseless. It is of the very essence of such outbursts — the  mere bubbles on the fountain of feeling — ^that they are quite unrelated  to any definite situation. There is a certain adjective, most offensive to  polite ears, which plays apparently the chief r 61 e in the vocabulary of  large sections of the community. It seems to argue a certain poverty  of linguistic resource when we find that this word is used by the same  speakers both to mean absolutely nothing — being placed before every  noun, and often adverbially before all adjectives — and also to mean a  great deal — everything indeed that is unpleasant in the highest degree.  It is rather a curious fact that the word in question while always impos-  sible, except perhaps when used as it were in inverted commas, in such  a way that the speaker dissociates himself from all responsibility for, or  proprietorship in it, would be felt to be father more than ordinarily  intolerable, if it were used by an otherwise polite speaker as an absolutely  meaningless adjective prefixed at random to most of the nouns in a sen-  tence, and worse than if it were used deliberately, with a settled and full  intent. There is something very terrible in an oath torn from its proper  home and suddenly implanted in the wrong social atmosphere. In these  circumstances the alien form is endowed by the hearers with mysterious  and uncanny meanings ; it chills the blood and raises gooseflesh.   We do not propose here to penetrate into the sombre history of  blasphemy proper, nor to exhibit the development through the last few  centuries of the ever-changing fashions of profanity. At every period  there has been, as Chaucer knew —   a companye   Of yonge folk, that haunteden folye,   As ryot, hasard, stewes and tavemes,   Wher-as with harpes, lutes and gitemes, ^   They daunce and pleye at dees both day and night,   And ete also and drinken over hit might,   Thurgh which they doon the devel sacrifyse  Within the develes tempel in cursed wyse,   By superfiuitee abhominable;   c c 2     388 COLLOQUIAL IDIOM   Hir othes been so grete and so dampnable^   That it is grisly for to here hem swere ;   Our blissed lordes body they to-tere;   Hem though te Jewes rent him noght y-nough.   We are concerned, for the most part, with the milder sort of expres-  sions which serve to decorate discourse, without symbolizing any strong  feeling on the part of those who utter them. Some of the expletives  which in former ages were used upon the slightest occasion, would  certainly appear unnecessarily forcible for mere exclamations at the  present day, and the fact that such expressions were formerly used so  lightly, and with no blasphemous intention, shows how frequent must  have been their employment for familiarity to have robbed them of all  meaning.   So saintly a person as Sir Thomas More was accustomed, according  to the reports given of his conversation by his son-in-law, to make use  of such formulas as a Gods name^ p. xvi ; would to God, ibid. ; in good  faith, xxviii, but compared with some of the other personages mentioned  in his Life, he is very sparing of such phrases. The Duke of Norfolk,  ‘his singular deare friend*, coming to dine with Sir Thomas on one  occasion, ‘ fortuned to find him at Church singinge in the quiere with  a surplas on his backe ; to whome after service, as the(y) went home  togither arme in arme, the duke said, “ God body, God body, My lord  Chauncellor, a parish Clark, a parish Clarke ! ” '   On another occasion the same Duke said to him ^ By the Masse,  Moore, it is perillous strivinge with Princes ... for Gode's body,  Moore, Indignatio principis mors est *, p. xxxix. In the conversation  in prison, with his wife, quoted above, p. 364, we find that the good  gentlewoman ‘ after her accustomed fashion * gives vent to such exclama-  tions as ‘ What the goody ear e Moore ' : ‘ Tille mile, tille vallc ' ; ^ Bone   deus, hone Deus man \ ‘ I muse what a Gods name you meane here thus  fondly to tarry*. At the trial of Sir Thomas More, the Lord Chief  Justice swears by St, Julian — ‘ that was ever his oath p. li.   ‘ Tilly folly, Sir John, ne’er tell me and ‘ What the good year ! ' are  both also said by Mrs. Quickly in Henry IV, Pt. II, ii. 4. Marry, which  means no more than ‘ indeed *, was a universally used expletive in the  sixteenth century, Roper uses it in speaking to More, Wolsey uses it,  according to Cavendish ; it is frequent in Roister Doister, and is con-  stantly in the mouths of Sir John Falstaff and his merry companions.  By sweete Sanct Anne, by cocke, by gog, by cocks precious potsiick, kocks  nownes, by the armes of Caleys, and the more formidable by the passion of  God Sir do not so, all occur in Roister Doister, and further such exclama-  tions as O Lords, hoigh dagh !, I dare sweare, I shall so God me saue,  I make God a vow (also written avow), would Christ I had, &c. Meaning-  less imprecations like the Devil take me, a mischiefe take his token and him  and thee too are sprinkled about the dialogue of this play. The later plays  of the great period offer a mine of material of this kind, but only a few  can be mentioned here. What a Devil (instead of the Devil), what a pox,  hfr lady, bounds, d blood, Gods body, by the mass, a plague on thee, are  among the expressions in the First Part of Henry IV, In the Second     SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY EXPLETIVES    3S9    Part Mr. Justice Shallow swears by cock and pie. By the side of these  are mild formulas such as Tm a Jew else^ Tm a rogue if I drink today.   In Chapman’s comedies there is a rich sprinkling both of the slighter  forms of exclamatory phrases, as well as of the more serious kind. Of  the former we may note j/ faitk^ Ur lord^ Ur lady, by the Lord, How the  divell (instead of how a devil), all in A Humorous Day's Mirth ; He he  sworne, All Fooles; of the latter kind of expression Gods precious soles.,  H. D. M. ; sjoot, shodie, God^s my life, Mons. D'Olive ; Gods my passion,  H. D. M. ; swounds, zwoundes, Gentleman Usher.   Massinger's New Way to pay old Debts has 'slight, 'sdeath, and a fore-  shadowing of the form of asseveration so common in the later seventeenth  century in the phrase — ‘ If I know the mystery . . . may I perish ii. 2,   It is to the dramatists of the later seventeenth and early eighteenth  century that the curious inquirer will go for expletives and exclamatory  expressions of the greatest variety. Otway, Congreve, and Vanbrugh  appear to excel all their predecessors and contemporaries in the fertility  of their invention in this respect. It is indeed probable that while some  of the sayings of Mr. Caper, my Lady Squeamish, my Lady Plyant,  my Lord Foppington, and others of their kidney, are the creations of the  writers who call these ' strange pleasant creatures ' into existence, many  others were actually current coin among the fops and fine ladies of the  period. Even if many phrases used by these characters are artificial con-  coctions of the dramatists they nevertheless are in keeping with, and  express the spirit and manners of the age. If Mr. Galsworthy or  Mr. Bernard Shaw were to invent corresponding slang at the present  day, it would be very different from that of the so-called Restoration  Dramatists. The bulk of the following selection of expletives and oaths is  taken from the plays of Otway, Congreve, Wycherley, Mrs. Aphra Behn,  Vanbrugh, and Farquhar. A few occur in Shadwell, and many more  are common to all writers of comedies. These are undoubtedly genuine  current expressions some of which survive.   Among the more racy and amusing are : —   Ld me die : ‘ Let me die your Ladyship obliges me beyond expression*  (Mr. Saunter in Otway's Friendship in Fashion) ; ^ Let me die, you have  a great deal of wit' (Lady Froth, Congreve's Double Dealer); also  much used by Melantha, an affected lady in Dryden's Marriage \ la   Mode. . . 1   Ld me perish — ‘ I'm your humble servant let me perish ' (Brisk, Double   Dealer) ; also used by Wycherley, Love in a Wood.   ^le (Vanbrugh's Relapse),   Death and eternal iartures Sir, I vow the packet's (= pocket) too high  (Lord Foppington),   Burn me if I do (Farquhar, Way to win him).   Mai me, ^ rat my packet handkerchief (Lord Foppington).   Never Never stir if it did not' (Caper, Otway, Friendship in   Love) ; * Thou shalt enjoy me always, dear, dear friend, never stir '•   BU take my death you're handsomer ' (Mrs. Millamont, Congreve, Way   of the World). ,   Bm a Person (Lady Wishfort, Way of the World).     390    COLLOQUIAL IDIOM    Stap my vitals (Lord Foppington ; very frequent).   Split my wmdpipe — Lord Foppington gives his brother his blessing, on  finding that the latter has married by a trick the lady he had designed  for himself— 'You have married a woman beautiful in her person,  charming in her airs, prudent in her canduct, canstant in her inclina-  tions, and of a nice marality split my windpipe   As I hope to breathe (Lady Lurewell, Farquhar, Sir Harry Wildair),   Tm a Dog if do (Wittmore in Mrs. Behn’s Sir Patient Fancy).   By the Universe (Wycherley, Country Wife).   I swear and declare (Lady Plyant) ; / swear and vow (Sir Paul Plyant,  Double Dealer) ; I do protest and vow (Sir Credulous Easy, Aphra Behn’s  Sir Patient Fancy) ; I protest I swoon at ceremony (Lady Fancyfull,  Vanbrugh, Provok'd Wife) ; 1 profess ingenuously a very discreet young  man (Mrs, Aphra Behn, Sir Patient Fancy).   Gads my hfe (Lady Plyant).   O Crimine (Lady Plyant).   O Jeminy (Wycherley, Mrs. Pinchwife, Country Wife).   Gad take me, between you and I, I was deaf on both ears for three  weeks after (Sir Humphrey, Shadwell, Bury Fair).   ril lay my Life he deserves your assistance (Mrs. Sullen, Farquhar,  Beaux' Strategem).   By the Lord Harry (Sir Jos. Wittol, Congreve, Old Bachelor).  the universe (Wycherley, Mrs. Pinchwife, Country Wife).   Gadzooks (Heartfree, Vanbrugh, Provok'd Wife) ; Gadt s Bud (Sir Paul  Plyant, Double Dealer) ; Gud soons (Lady Arabella, Vanbrugh, Journey  to London) ; Marry-gep (Widow Blackacre, Wycherley, Plain Dealer) ;  ^sheart (Sir Wilful, Congreve, Way of the World) ; Eh Gud, eh Gud  (Mrs. Fantast, Shadwell, Bury Fair); Zoz I was a modest fool; ads^-  zoz (Sir Credulous Easy, Devonshire Knight, Aphra Behn, Sir  Petulant Fancy); 'D's diggers Sir (a groom in Sir Petulant Fancy);  ^sheart (Sir Wilf. Witwoud, Congreve, Way of the World); odsheart  (Sir Noble Clumsey, Otway, Friendship in Fashion); Adsheart (fkx Jos,  Wittol, Congreve, Old Bachelor) ; Gadswouns (Oldfox, Plain Dealer).  By the side of marry, frequent in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,  the curious expression Marry come up my dirty cousin occurs in Swift's  Polite Conversations (said by the young lady), and again in Fielding's  Tom Jones — said by the lady's maid Mrs. Honor. With this compare  marry gep above, which probably stands for ' go up   Such expressions as Lard are frequent in the seventeenth-century  comedies, and the very modern-sounding as sure as a gun is said by  Sir Paul Plyant in the Double Dealer.   The comedies of Dryden contain but few of the more or less mild, and  fashionable, semi-bantering exclamatory expressions which enliven the  pages of many of his contemporaries ; he sticks on the whole to the more  permanent oaths — 'sdeath, ^sblood, &c. It must be allowed that the  dialogue of Dry den's comedies is inferior to that of Otway or Congreve  in brilliancy and natural ease, and that it probably does not reflect the  familiar colloquial English of the period so faithfully as the conversation  in the works of these writers. Dryden himself says, in the Defense of  the Essay of Dramatic Poesy, ' I know I am not so fitted by Nature to     DECAY OF THE OLDER PROFANITY    391   write Comedy : 1 want that Gaiety of Flumour which is required to it.  My Conversation is slow and dull, my Humour Saturnine and reserv’d :  In sliortj I am none of those who endeavour to break all Jests in Com-  pmy, or make Repartees   It may be noted that the frequent use — almost in ever;^ sentence — of  such phrases as A/ me perish, hum me, and other meaningless interjec-  tions of this order, is attributed by the dramatists only to the most  frivolous fops and the most affected women of fashion. The more  serious characters, so far as such exist in the later seventeenth-century  comedies, aie addicted rather to the weightier and more sober sort of  swearing. It is perhaps unnecessary to pursue this subject beyond the*  first third of the eighteenth century. Farquhar has many of the manner-  isms of his slightly older contemporaries, and some stronger expressions,  e. g. ‘ There was a neighbour's daughter I had a woundy kindness for  Truman, in Twin Rivals ; but Fielding in his numerous comedies has  but few of the objurgatory catchwords of the earlier generation. Swearing,  both of the lighter kind as well as of the deliberately profane variety,  appears to have diminished in intensity, apart from the stage country  squire, suc h as Squire Badger in Don Quixote, who says ^ShodUkins and  ecod, and Squire Western, whose artless profanity is notorious. Ladies  in these plays, and in Swift's Polite Conversations, still say lard, O Ltid,  and la, and mercy, ^shuhs, God bless my eyesight, but the rich variety of  expression which we find in Lady Squeamish and her friends has  vanished. Some few of the old mouth-filling oaths, such as zounds,  ^sdeath, and so on, still linger in Goldsmith and Sheridan, but the number  of these available for a gentleman was very limited by the end of the  century. From the beginning of the nineteenth century it would seem  that nearly all the old oaths died out in good society, as having come to  be considered, from unfamiliarity, either too profane or else too devoid  of content to serve any purpose. It seems to be the case that the serious  oaths survive longest, or at any rate die hardest, while each age produces  its own ephemersil formulas of mere light expletive and asseveration.    Hyperbole ; Compliments ; Approval ; Disapproval ; Abuse,   Very characteristic of a particular age is the language of hyperbole  and exaggeration as found in phrases expressive on the one hand of  compliments, pleasure, approval, amusement, and so on, and of disgust,  dislike, anger, and kindred emotions, on the other. Incidentally, the  study of the different modes of expressing such feelings as these leads  us also to observe the varying fashion in intensives, corresponding to the  present-day awfully, frightfully, and the rest, and in exaggeration generally,  especially in paying compliments.   The following illustrations are chiefly drawn from the seventeenth  century, which offers a considerable wealth of material.   It is wonderful what a variety of expressions have been in use, more  or less transitorily, at different periods, as intensives, meaning no more  than i>iry, very much, &c. Rarely in Chapman^s Gentleman Usher —  ^How did you like me aunt? 0 rarely, rarely \ ^Oh lord, that, that is     39S    COLLOQUIAL IDIOM    a pleasure intolerahU \ Lady Squeamish in Otway’s Friendship in Love ;  ‘Let me die if that was not extravaganily pleasant vtry amusing),  ibid. ; ^ I vow he himself sings a tune extreme prettily \ ibid. : ‘ I love  dancing immoderately \ ibid. ; ‘ O dear ’tis violent hot \ ibid. ; ‘ Deuce take  me if your Ladyship has not the art of surprising the most naturally in  the world — I hope you'll make me happy in communicating the Poem  Brisk in Congreve's Double Dealer ; ‘With the reserve of my Honour,  I aSvSure you Careless, I don't know anything in the World I would  refuse to a Person so meritorious — You’ll pardon my want of expression',  Lady Plyant in Double Dealer; to which Careless replies — ‘O your  “Xadyship is abounding in all Excellence^ particularly that of Phrase ; My  Lady Froth is very well in her Accomplishments — But it is when my  Lady Plyant is not thought of— if that can ever be ' ; Lady Plyant : —  ‘O you overcome me — That is so excessive' ; Brisk, asked to write notes  to Lady Froth's Poems, cries ‘ With all my Heart and Soul, and proud of  the vast Honour let me perish ‘ I swear Careless you are very  alluring^ and say so many fine Things, and nothing is so moving as a fine  Thing. . , . Well, sure if I escape your Importunities, I shall value myself  as long as I live, I swear ; Lady Plyant. The following bit of dialogue  between Lady Froth and Mr. Brisk illustrates the fashionable mode of  bandying exaggerated, but i*ather hollow compliments.   ‘ Ldy P. Ah Gallantry to the last degree — Brisk was ever anything so  well bred as My Lord ? Brisk — Never anything but your Ladyship let me  perish. Ldy F, O prettily turned again ; let me die but you have a great  deal of Wit. Mellefont don^t you think Brisk has a World of Wit ?  MeUefont — O yes Madam. Brisk — O dear Madam — Ldy F» An mfinite  deal! Brisk, O Heaven Madam. ■'Ldy F. More Wit — than Body.  Brisk — Pm everlastingly your humble Servant^ deuce take me Madam.   Lady Fancyful in Vanbrugh’s Provok'd Wife contrives to pay herself  a pretty compliment in lamenting the ravages of her beauty and the con-  sequent pretended annoyance to herself — ‘ To confess the truth to you,  Fm so everlastingly fatigued with the addresses of unfortunate gentlemen  that were it not for the extravagancy of the example, I should e'en tear  out these wicked eyes with my own fingers, to make both myself and  mankind easy   Swift's Polite Conversations consist of a wonderful string of slang  words, phrases, and clicMs^ all of which we may suppose to have been  current in the conversation of the more frivolous part of Society in the  early eighteenth century. The word pure is used for very — ‘ this almond  pudden is pure good ’ ; also as an Adj., in the sense of excellent^ as in ‘ by  Dad he's pure Company \ Sir Noble Clumsey's summing-up of the 'Arch-  Wag' Malagene. To divert in the characteristic sense of ‘amuse',  and instead of this — ‘ Well ladies and gentlemen, you are pleased to divert  yourselves'. Lady Wentworth in 1706 speaks of her ‘munckey' as  ‘ full of devertin tricks and twenty years earlier Cary Stewkley (Verney),  taxed by her brother with a propensity for gambling, writes ‘ whot dus  becom a gentilwoman as plays only for divariion I hope I know   The idiomatic use of obliging is shown in the Polite Conversations, by  Lady Smart, who remarks, in answer to rather excessive praise of her  house — ‘ My lord, your lordship is always very obliging ' ; in the same     ENJOYMENT OF ^WAGGERY'; BACKBITING 393   sense Lady Squeamish says 'I sweai*e Mr. Malagene you are a very  obliging person \   Extreme amusement, and approval of the persons who provoke it, are  frequently expressed with considerable exaggeration of phrase. Some  instances are quoted above, but a few more may be added^. ‘ A you mad  slave you, you are a ticUing Acior\ says Vincentio to Pogio in Chapman’s  Gentleman Usher.   Mr. Oldwit, in Shadwelbs Bury Fair, professes great delight at the  buffoonery of Sir Humphrey : — ‘ Forbear, pray forbear ; you'll be the  death of me ; 1 shall break a vein if I keep you company, you arch Wag  you, . . . Well Sir Humphrey Noddy, go thy ways, thou art the ar«hesT  Wit and Wag. I must forswear thy Company, thou'lt kill me elsei'  The arch wag asks ' What is the World worth without Wit and Waggery  and Mirth ? and describing some prank he had played before an admiring  friend, remarks — Mf you’d seen his Lordship laugh! I thought my  Lord would have killed himself. He desired me at last to forbear ; he  was not able to endure it! 'Why what a notable Wag^s this" is said  sarcastically in Mrs. Aphra Behn’s Sir Patient Fancy.   The passages quoted above, pp. 369-71, from Otway’s Friendship in  Love illustrate the modes of expressing an appreciation of ' Waggery   In the tract Reasons of Mr. Bays for changing his religion (1688),  Mr. Bays (Dryden) remarks a propos of something he intends to write —  ^you 'll half kill yourselves with laughing at the conceit and again  ' I protest Ml’ Crites you are enough to make anybody split with laugh-  ing', Similarly 'Miss’ in Polite Conversation declares — 'Well, I swear  you'll make one die with laughing   The language of abuse, disparagement, contempt, and disapproval,  whether real or in the nature of banter, is equally characteristic.   The following is uttered with genuine anger, by Malagene Goodvile  in Otway’s Friendship in Love, to the njusicians who are entertaining  the company — ' Hold, hold, what insufferable rascals are these ? Why  you scurvy thrashing scraping mongrels, ye make a worse noise than  crampt hedgehogs. ’Sdeath ye dogs, can’t you play more as a gentleman  sings ? ’   The seventeenth-century beaux and fine ladies were adepts in the art  of backbiting, and of conveying in a few words a most unpleasant picture  of an absent friend — 'O my Lady Toothless’ cries Mr. Brisk in the  Double Dealer, ' O she ’s a mortifying spectacle, she "s always chewing  the cud like an old Ewe ’ ; ' Fie M*^ Brisk, Eringos for her cough ’ pro-  tests Cynthia ; Lady Froth : — ' Then that t’other great strapping Lady—  I can't hit of her name ; the old fat fool that paints so exorbitantly ’ ;  Brisk : — ' I know whom you mean — But deuce take me I can't hit of her  Name neither— Paints d’ye say ? Why she lays it on with a trowel’   Mr. Brisk knows well how to 'just hint a fault ' Don't you apprehend  me My Lord? Careless is a very honest fellow, but harkee — ^you under-  stand me — somewhat heavy, a little shallow or so   Lady Froth has a picturesque vocabulary to express disapproval—  '0 Filthy M** Sneer? he's a nauseous figure, a most fulsamic Fop .  Nauseous and filthy are favourite words in this period, but are often used so  as to convey little or no specific meaning, or in a tone of rather affectionate     394    COLLOQUIAL IDIOM    banter. ^ He ’s one of those nauseous offerers at wit Wycherley’s Country  Wife ; ^ A man must endeavour to look wholesome ’ says Lord Foppington  in Vanbrugh's Relapse, ‘lest he make so nauseous a figure in the side  box, the ladies should be compelled to turn their eyes upon the Play ’ ;  again the same nobleman remarks ‘ While I was but a Knight I was  a very nauseous fellow ’ ; and, speaking to his tailor — I shall never be  reconciled to this nauseous packet A remarkable use of the verb, to  express a simple aversion, is found in Mrs. Millamont’s ^ I nauseate walking ;  'tis a country divertion ' (Congreve, Way of the World).   In the Old Bachelor, Belinda, speaking of Belmour with whom she is  Th In^e, cries out, at the suggestion of such a possibility — ‘ Filthy Fellow I  ... Oh I love your hideous fancy I Ha, ha, ha, love a Man 1 ' In the  same play Lucy the maid calls her lover, Setter, ‘ Beast, filthy toad ’  during an exchange of civilities. ‘ Foh, you filthy toad I nay, now IVe  done jesting ’ says Mrs. Squeamish in the Country Wife, when Horner  kisses her. ‘Out upon you for a filthy creature' cries ‘Miss^ in the  Polite Conversations, in reply to the graceful banter of Neverout.   Toad is a term of endearment among these ladies ; ‘ I love to torment  the confounded toad' says Lady Fidget, speaking of Mr. Horner for  whom she has a very pronounced weakness. ‘ Get you gone you good-  natur’d toad you ' is Lady Squeamish's reply to the rather outre compli-  ments of Sir Noble.   Plague (Vb.), plaguy^ plaguily are favourite expressions in Polite Con-  versations. Lord Sparkish complains to his host — ‘ My Lord, this venison  is plaguily peppered ' ; ' 'Sbubs, Madam, I have burnt my hand with your  plaguy kettle ' says Neverout, and the Colonel observes, with satisfaction,  that ‘ her Ladyship was plaguily bamb'd ‘ Don't be so teizing ; you  plague a body so ! can't you keep your filthy hands to yourself? ' is  a playful rap administered by ‘ Miss ' to Neverout.   Strange is another word used very indefinitely but suggesting mild  disapproval — ‘ I vow you'll make me hate you if you talk so strangely, but  let me die, I can't last longer ' says Lady Squeamish, implying a certain  degree of impropriety, which nevertheless makes her laugh ; again, she  says, ‘I'll vow and swear my cousin Sir Noble is a strange pleasant  creature   We have an example above of exorbitantly in the sense of ‘out-  rageously', and the adjective is also used in the same sense — ^‘Most  exorbitant and amazing' is Lady Fantast’s comment, in Bury Fair, upon  her husband's outburst against her airs and graces. We may close this  series of illustrations, which might be extended almost indefinitely, with  two from the Verney Memoirs, which contain idiomatic uses that have  long since disappeared. Susan Verney, wishing to say that her sister's  husband is a bad-tempered disagreeble fellow, writes ‘poore peg has  married a very humersome cros boy as ever I see' (Mem. ii. 361, 1:647).  Edmund Verney, Sir Ralph's heir, having had a quarrel with a neigh*  bouring squire concerning boundaries and rights of way, describes him  as ‘very malicious and stomachfull' (Mem. iv. 3:77, 1682). The phrase  ‘as ever I see' is common in the Verney letters, and also in the Went-  worth Papers.     PARAGON OF PERFECTION'    395    Preciosity, &c.   We close this chapter with some examples of seventeenth-century  preciosity and euphemism. The most characteristic specimens of this  kind of affected speech are put by the writers into the mopths of female  characters, and of these we select Shadwell's Lady Fantast and her  daughter (Bury Fair), Otway's Lady Squeamish, Congreve's Lady  Wishfort, and Vanbrugh's Lady Fancyful in the Provok'd Wife. Some  of the sayings of a few minor characters may be added ; the waiting-  maids of these characters are nearly as elegant, and only less absurd  than their mistresses.   Luce, Lady Fantast's woman, summons the latter's stepdaughter as  follows : — ^ Madam, my Lady Madam Fantast, having attir'd herself in  her morning habiliments, is ambitious of the honour of your Ladyship's  Company to survey the Fair ' ; and she thus announces to her mistress  the coming of Mrs. Gertrude the stepdaughter : — ‘ Madame, M^s Gatty  ' will kiss your Ladyship's hands here incontinently '. The ladies Fan-  tast, highly respectable as they are in conduct, are as arrant, pretentious,  and affected minxes as can be found, in manner and speech, given to  interlarding their conversation with sham French, and still more dubious  Latin. Says the daughter — ‘To all that which the World calls Wit and  Breeding, I have always had a natural Tendency, a penchen^ derived, as  the learned say, ex traduce, from your Ladyship : besides the great  Prevalence of your Ladyship's most shining Example has perpetually  stimulated me, to the sacrificing all my Endeavours towards the attaining  of those inestimable Jewels ; than which, nothing in the Universe can be  so much a mon gre, as the French say. And for Beauty, Madam, the  stock I am enrich'd with, comes by Emanation from your Ladyship, who  has been long held a Paragon of Perfection : most Charmanf, most Tuant!  ‘Ah my dear Child' replies the old lady, ‘II alas, alas 1 Time has been,  and yet I am not quite gone . When Gertrude her stepsister, an  attractive and sensible girl, comes in Mrs. Fantast greets her with  ‘ Sweet Madam Gatty, I have some minutes impatiently expected your  Arrival, that I might do myself the Great Honour to kiss your hands and  enjoy the Favour of your Company into the Fair ; which I see out of my  Window, begins to fill apace.'   To this piece of afifectation Gatty replies very sensibly, ‘ I got ready as  soon as e'er I could, and am now come to wait on you ', but old Lady  Fantast takes her to task, with ‘ Oh, fie, Daughter ! will you never attain  to mine, and my dear Daughter's Examples, to a more polite way of  Expression, and a nicer form of Breeding ? Fie, fie ; I come to wait on  you! You should have said; I assure you Madam the Honour is all  on my side ; and I cannot be ambitious of a greater, than the sweet  Society of so excellent a Person. This is Breeding/ ‘Breeding!'  exclaims Gatty, ‘ Why this had been a Flam, a meer Flam And with  this judgement, we may leave My Lady Fantast.   We pass next to Lady Squeamish, who is rather ironically described by  Goodvile as ‘the most exact Observer of Decorums and Decency alive  Her manner of greeting the ladies on entering, along with her cousin  Sir Noble Clumsey, if it has the polish, has also the insincerity of her     30    COLLOQUIAL IDIOM    age—' Dear Madam Goodvile, ten thousand Happinesses wait on you !  Fair Madam Victoria, sweet charming Camilla, which way shall I express  my Service to you ? — Cousin your honour, your honour to the Ladies. —  Sir Noble : — Ladies as low as Knee can bend, or Head can bow, I salute  you all : And Gallants, I am your most humble, most obliged, and most  devoted Servant/   The character of this charming lady, as well as her taste in language,  is well exhibited in the following dialogue between her and Victoria.   ^ Oh my dear Victoria ! the most unlock’d for Happiness ! the pleasantest  Wlc^ent ! the strangest Discovery ! the very thought of it were enough to  cure Melancholy. Valentine and Camilla, Camilla and Valentine, ha, ha, ha,   Viet, Dear Madam, what is ’t so transports you ?   Ldy Sqti, Nay ’tis too precious to be communicated : Hold me, hold me,  or I shall die with laughter — ha, ha, ha, Camilla and Valentine, Valentine and  Camilla, ha, ha, ha — 0 dear, my Heart’s broke.   Viet, Good Madam refrain your Mirth a little, and let me know the Story,  that I may have a share in it.   Ldy Squ, An Assignation, an Assignation tonight in the lower Garden ; —  by strong good Fortune I overheard it all just now — but to think of the  pleasant Consequences that will happen, drives me into an Excess of Joy  beyond all sufferance.   Viet, Madame in all probability the pleasantest Consequence is like to be  theirs, if any body’s ; and I cannot guess how it should touch your Ladyship  in the least.   Ldy Squ, O Lord, how can you be so dull ? Why, at the very Hour and  Place appointed will I greet Valentine in Camilla’s stead, before she can be  there herself ; then when she comes, expose her Infamy to the World, till  I have thorowly revenged my self for all the base Injuries her Lover has  done me.   Viet But Madam, can you endure to be so malicious ?   Ldy Squ, That, that ’s the dear Pleasure of the thing ; for I vow I’d  sooner die ten thousand Deaths, if I thought I should hazard the least  Temptation to the prejudice of my Honour.   Viet, But why should your Ladyship run into the mouth of Danger?  Who knows what scurvy lurking Devil may stand in readiness, and seize  your Virtue before you are aware of him ?   Ldy Squ, Temptation? No, I’d have you know I scorn Temptation:  I durst trust myself in a Convent amongst a Kennel of cramm’d Friers:  Besides, that ungrateful ill-bred fellow Valentine is iny mortal Aversion,  more odious to me than foul weather on a May-day, or ill smell in a Morning.  ... No, were I inclined to entertain Addresses, I assure you I need not  want for Servants ; for I swear I am so perplexed with Billet-Doux^ every  day, I know not which way to turn myself: Besides there’s no Fidelity, no  Honour in Mankind. O dear Victoria I whatever you do, never let Love  come near your Heart : Tho really 1 think true Love is the greatest Pleasure  in the World.’   And so we let Lady Squeamish go her ways for a brazen jilt, and an  affected, humoursome baggage. If any one wishes to know whither her  ways led her, let him read the play.   Only one more example of foppish refinement of speech from this  play — the remarks of the whimsical Mr. Caper to Sir Noble Clumsey,  who coming in drunk, takes him for a dandng-master — ^ I thought you  had known me’ says he, rather ruefully, but adds, brightening— 'I doubt     ^OECONOMY OF FACE^    397   you may be a little overtaken. Faith, dear Heart, Fm glad to see you so  merry I ’   The character of Lady Wishfort in the Way of the World is perhaps  one of the best that Congreve has drawn; her conversation in spite of  the deliberate affectation ir^ phrase is vivid and racy, and for all its  preciosity has a naturalness which puts it among the triumphs of Con-  greve’s art. He contrives to bring out to the full the absurdity of the  lady’s mannerisms, in feeling and expression, to combine these with vigour  and ease of diction, and to give to the whole that polish of which he is the  unquestioned master in his own age and for long after.   The position of Lady Wishfort is that of an elderly lady of great ouii  ward propriety of conduct, and a steadfast observer of decorum, in sjl^ch  no less than in manners. Her equanimity is considerably upset by the  news that an elderly knight has fallen in love with her portrait, and wishes  to press his suit with the original. The pretended knight is really a valet  in disguise, and the whole intrigue has been planned, for reasons into  which we need not enter here, by a rascally nephew of Lady Wishfort’s.  This, however, is not discovered until the lover has had an interview with  the sighing fair. The first extract reveals the lady discussing the coming  visit with Foible her maid (who is in the plot).   ‘ I shall never recompose my Features to receive Sir Rowland with any  Oeconomy of Face Fm absolutely decayed. Look, F oible.   Foible, Your Ladyship has frown’d a little too rashly, indeed Madam.  There are some Cracks discernible in the white Varnish.   Ldy W, Let me see the Glass— Cracks say’st thou ? Why I am arrantly  flead (e. g. flayed) — I look like an old peel’d Wall. Thou must repair me  Foible before Sir Rowland comes, or I shall never keep up to my picture.   F, I warrant you, Madam ; a little Art once made your picture like you ;  and now a little of the same Art must make you like your Picture. Your  Picture must sit for you, Madam.   Ldy W, But art thou sure Sir Rowland will not fail to come ? Or will he  not fail when he does come? Will he be importunate, Foible, and push?  For if he should not be importunate ... I shall never break Decorums —   I shall die with Confusion ; if I am forc’d to advance— O no, I can never  advance. ... I shall swoon if he should expect Advances. No, I hope  Sir Rowland is better bred than to j)ut a Lady to the Necessity of breaking  her Forms. I won’t be too coy neither.— I won’t give him Despair— But  a little Disdain is not amiss ; a little Scorn is 2X\mm%,--Foible.--h little  Scorn becomes your Ladyship . — Ldy IV. Yes, but Tendeimess becomes me  best— A Sort of a Dyingness— You see that Picture has a Sort of a — Ha  Foible !— A Swimmingness in the Eyes— Yes, I’ll look so— My Neice affects  it but she wants Features. Is Sir Rowland handsom ? Let my Toilet be  remov’d— I’ll dress above. I’ll receive Sir Rowland here. Is he handsom ?  Don’t answer me. I won’t know : I’ll be surpris’d ; He’ll be taken by Sm-  prise.— By Storm Madam. Sir Rowland’s a brisk Man.— TV.  —Is he ! O then he’ll importune, if he ’s a brisk Man. I shall save Decorums  if Sir Rowland importunes. I have a mortal Terror at the Apprehension of  offending against Decorums. O Pm glad he ’s a brisk Man. Let my things  be remov’d good Foible*’   The next passage reveals the lady ready dressed, and expectant of  Sir Rowlands arrival.   — ‘Well, and how do I look Foible! — Z; Most killing well, Madam.  Ldy IV, Well, and how shall I receive him ? In what Figure shall I give     39S colloquial IDIOM   his Heart the first Impression ? There is a great deal in the first Impression,  Shall I sit? — No, I won’t sit — I’ll walk— ay I’ll walk from the door upon his  Entrance; and then turn full upon him — No, that will be too sudden. I’ll  lie, ay Ell lie down — I’ll receive him in my little Dressing-Room. There *s  a Couch — Yes, yes, I’ll give the first Impression on a Couch — I won’t lie  neither, but loll, and lean upon one Elbow; with one Foot a little dangling  off, jogging in ^ thoughtful Way — Yes— Yes — and then as soon as he appears,  start, ay, start and be surpris’d, and rise to meet him in a pretty Disorder —  Yes — O, nothing is more alluring than a Levee from a Couch in some Con-  fusion— It shews the Foot to Advantage, and furnishes with Blushes and  recomposing Airs beyond Comparison. Hark ! there ’s a Coach.’   .^t it is when theure du Berger draws near, as she supposes, that  Lady Wishfort rises to the subiimest heights of expression : —   ‘Well, Sir Rowland, you have the Way, — you are no Novice in the Labyrinth  of Love— You have the Clue — But as I’m a Person, Sir Rowland, you must  not attribute my yielding to any sinister Appetite, or Indigestion of Widow-  hood ; nor impute my Complacency to any Lethar^ of Continence — I hope  you don’t think me prone to any iteration of Nuptials — If you do, I protest  I must recede — or think that I have made a Prostitution of Decorums, but  in the Vehemence of Compassion, or to save the Life of a Person of so much  Importance — Or else you wrong my Condescension — If you think the least  Scruple of Carnality was an Ingredient, or that —   Here Foible enters and announces that the Dancers are ready, and thus  puts an end to the scene at its supreme moment of beauty — and  absurdity. Even Congreve could not remain at that level any longer.   It is worth while to record that in this play, a maid, well called Mincings  announces — ‘ Mem, I am come to acquaint your Laship that Dinner is  impatient The hostess invites her guests to go into dinner with the  phrase — ‘ Gentlemen, will you walk ? '   This chapter and book cannot better conclude than with a typical piece  of seventeenth-century formality. May it symbolize at once the author's  leave-taking of the reader and the eagerness of the latter to pursue the  subject for himself.   The passage is from the Provok’d Wife : —   ‘ Lady FancyfuL Madam, your humble servant, I must take my leave.   Lady Brute. What, going already madam ?   Ldy F. I must beg you’ll excuse me this once ; for really 1 have eighteen  visits this afternoon. . . . {Goin^ Nay, you shan’t go one step out of  the room.   Ldy B. Indeed I’ll wait upon you down.   Ldy F. No, sweet Lady Brute, you know I swoon at ceremony.   Ldy B, Pray give me leave — Ldy F. You know I won’t — I^dy B. — You  know I must. — Ldy F. — Indeed you shan’t — Indeed I will — Indeed you shan’t  — Ldy B. — ^Indeed I will.   Ldy F. Indeed you shan’t. Indeed, indeed, indeed, you shan’t’   [Exit running. They follow.\