sness. Who was your father?
He was evidently a man of some wealth. Was he born in what the Radical
papers call the purple of commerce, or did he rise from the ranks of the
aristocracy?

Jack. I am afraid I really don't know. The fact is, Lady Bracknell, I
said I had lost my parents. It would be nearer the truth to say that my
parents seem to have lost me . . . I don't actually know who I am by
birth. I was . . . well, I was found.

Lady Bracknell. Found!

Jack. The late Mr. Thomas Cardew, an old gentleman of a very charitable
and kindly disposition, found me, and gave me the name of Worthing,
because he happened to have a first-class ticket for Worthing in his
pocket at the time. Worthing is a place in Sussex. It is a seaside
resort.

Lady Bracknell. Where did the charitable gentleman who had a first-class
ticket for this seaside resort find you?

Jack. [Gravely.] In a hand-bag.

Lady Bracknell. A hand-bag?

Jack. [Very seriously.] Yes, Lady Bracknell. I was in a hand-bag--a
somewhat large, black leather hand-bag, with handles to it--an ordinary
hand-bag in fact.

Lady Bracknell. In what locality did this Mr. James, or Thomas, Cardew
come across this ordinary hand-bag?

Jack. In the cloak-room at Victoria Station. It was given to him in
mistake for his own.

Lady Bracknell. The cloak-room at Victoria Station?

Jack. Yes. The Brighton line.

Lady Bracknell. The line is immaterial. Mr. Worthing, I confess I feel
somewhat bewildered by what you have just told me. To be born, or at any
rate bred, in a hand-bag, whether it had handles or not, seems to me to
display a contempt for the ordinary decencies of family life that reminds
one of the worst excesses of the French Revolution. And I presume you
know what that unfortunate movement led to? As for the particular
locality in which the hand-bag was found, a cloak-room at a railway
station might serve to conceal a social indiscretion--has probably,
indeed, been used for that purpose before now--but it could hardly be
regarded as an assured basis for a recognised position in good society.

Jack. May I ask you then what you would advise me to do? I need hardly
say I would do anything in the world to ensure Gwendolen's happiness.

Lady Bracknell. I would strongly advise you, Mr. Worthing, to try and
acquire some relations as soon as possible, and to make a definite effort
to produce at any rate one parent, of either sex, before the