Lord Fop. Why, then, it is, whether thou didst not write to my Lord Foppington, to come down and marry thy daughter?

Sir Tun. Yes, marry, did I, and my Lord Foppington is come down, and shall marry my daughter before she’s a day older.

Lord Fop. Now give me thy hand, old dad; I thought we should understand one another at last.

Sir Tun. The fellow’s mad!—Here, bind him hand and foot.

[They bind him.

Lord Fop. Nay, pr’ythee, knight, leave fooling; thy jest begins to grow dull.

Sir Tun. Bind him, I say—he’s mad: bread and water, a dark room, and a whip, may bring him to his senses again.

Lord Fop. Pr’ythee, Sir Tunbelly, why should you take such an aversion to the freedom of my address as to suffer the rascals thus to skewer down my arms like a rabbit!—[Aside.] Egad, if I don’t awake, by all that I can see, this is like to prove one of the most impertinent dreams that ever I dreamt in my life.

Re-enter Miss Hoyden and Nurse.

Miss Hoyd. [Going up to Lord Foppington.] Is this he that would have run—Fough, how he stinks of sweets!—Pray, father, let him be dragged through the horse-pond.

Lord Fop. This must be my wife, by her natural inclination to her husband.

[Aside.

Miss Hoyd. Pray, father, what do you intend to do with him—hang him?

Sir Tun. That, at least, child.

Nurse. Ay, and it’s e’en too good for him too.

Lord Fop. Madame la gouvernante, I presume: hitherto this appears to me to be one of the most extraordinary families that ever man of quality matched into.

[Aside.

Sir Tun. What’s become of my lord, daughter?

Miss Hoyd. He’s just coming, sir.

Lord Fop. My lord! what does he mean by that, now?

[Aside.

Re-enter Tom Fashion and Lory.

Stap my vitals, Tam, now the dream’s out!

[Runs.

Fash. Is this the fellow, sir, that designed to trick me of your daughter?