st not go. Lady G----, if your
own heart justifies you for your part in this misunderstanding, say so; I
challenge you to say so.--She was silent.

HAR. If otherwise, own your fault, promise amendment--ask pardon.

LADY G. Hey-day!

HAR. And my lord will ask yours, for mistaking you--For being too
easily provoked--

LORD G. Too easily, madam--

HAR. What generous man would not smile at the foibles of a woman whose
heart is only gay with prosperity and lively youth; but has not the least
malice in it? Has not she made choice of your lordship in preference of
any other man? She rallies every one; she can't help it: she is to
blame.--Indeed, Lady G----, you are. Your brother felt your edge; he
once smarted by it, and was angry with you.--But afterwards, observing
that it was her way, my lord; that it was a kind of constitutional gaiety
of heart, and exercised on those she loved best; he forgave, rallied her
again, and turned her own weapons upon her; and every one in company was
delighted with the spirit of both.--You love her, my lord.

LORD G. Never man more loved a woman. I am not an ill-natured man--

LADY G. But a captious, a passionate one, Lord G----. Who'd have
thought it?

LORD G. Never was there, my dear Miss Byron, such a
strangely-aggravating creature! She could not be so, if she did not
despise me.

LADY G. Fiddle-faddle, silly man! And so you said before. If you
thought so, you take the way, (don't you?) to mend the matter, by dancing
and capering about, and putting yourself into all manner of disagreeable
attitudes; and even sometimes being ready to foam at the mouth?--I told
him, Miss Byron, There he stands, let him deny it, if he can; that I
married a man with another face. Would not any other man have taken this
for a compliment to his natural undistorted face, and instantly have
pulled off the ugly mask of passion, and shewn his own?--

LORD G. You see, you see, the air, Miss Byron!--How ludicrously does
she now, even now--

LADY G. See, Miss Byron!--How captious!--Lord G---- ought to have a
termagant wife: one who could return rage for rage. Meekness is my
crime.--I cannot be put out of temper.--Meekness was never before
attributed to woman as a fault.

LORD G. Good God!--Meekness!--Good God!

LADY G. But, Harriet, do you judge on which side the grievance lies.--
Lord G---- presents me with a face for his, that I never saw him wear
before marriage: He has cheat