Chapter 4
Enter JESSAMY.
Positively this Mall is a very pretty place. I hope the cits won't ruin it by repairs. To be sure, it won't do to speak of in the same day with Ranelagh or Vauxhall; however, it's a fine place for a young fellow to display his person to advantage. Indeed, nothing is lost here; the girls have taste, and I am very happy to find they have adopted the elegant London fashion of looking back, after a genteel fellow like me has passed them.--Ah! who comes here? This, by his awkwardness, must be the Yankee colonel's servant. I'll accost him.
Enter JONATHAN.
JESSAMY
Votre tres-humble serviteur, Monsieur. I understand Colonel Manly, the Yankee officer, has the honour of your services.
JONATHAN
Sir!--
JESSAMY
I say, Sir, I understand that Colonel Manly has the honour of having you for a servant.
JONATHAN
Servant! Sir, do you take me for a neger,--I am Colonel Manly's waiter.
JESSAMY
A true Yankee distinction, egad, without a difference. Why, Sir, do you not perform all the offices of a servant? do you not even blacken his boots?
JONATHAN
Yes; I do grease them a bit sometimes; but I am a true blue son of liberty, for all that. Father said I should come as Colonel Manly's waiter, to see the world, and all that; but no man shall master me. My father has as good a farm as the colonel.
JESSAMY
Well, Sir, we will not quarrel about terms upon the eve of an acquaintance from which I promise myself so much satisfaction;--therefore, sans ceremonie--
JONATHAN
What?--
JESSAMY
I say I am extremely happy to see Colonel Manly's waiter.
JONATHAN
Well, and I vow, too, I am pretty considerably glad to see you; but what the dogs need of all this outlandish lingo? Who may you be, Sir, if I may be so bold?
JESSAMY
I have the honour to be Mr. Dimple's servant, or, if you please, waiter. We lodge under the same roof, and should be glad of the honour of your acquaintance.
JONATHAN
You a waiter! by the living jingo, you look so topping, I took you for one of the agents to Congress.
JESSAMY
The brute has discernment, notwithstanding his appearance.--Give me leave to say I wonder then at your familiarity.
JONATHAN
Why, as to the matter of that, Mr.--; pray, what's your name?
JESSAMY
Jessamy, at your service.
JONATHAN
Why, I swear we don't make any great matter of distinction in our state between quality and other folks.
JESSAMY
This is, indeed, a levelling principle.--I hope, Mr. Jonathan, you have not taken part with the insurgents.
JONATHAN
Why, since General Shays has sneaked off and given us the bag to hold, I don't care to give my opinion; but you'll promise not to tell--put your ear this way--you won't tell?--I vow I did think the sturgeons were right.
JESSAMY
I thought, Mr. Jonathan, you Massachusetts men always argued with a gun in your hand. Why didn't you join them?
JONATHAN
Why, the colonel is one of those folks called the Shin--Shin--dang it all, I can't speak them lignum vitae words--you know who I mean--there is a company of them--they wear a china goose at their button-hole--a kind of gilt thing.--Now the colonel told father and brother,--you must know there are, let me see--there is Elnathan, Silas, and Barnabas, Tabitha--no, no, she's a she--tarnation, now I have it--there's Elnathan, Silas, Barnabas, Jonathan, that's I--seven of us, six went into the wars, and I staid at home to take care of mother. Colonel said that it was a burning shame for the true blue Bunker Hill sons of liberty, who had fought Governor Hutchinson, Lord North, and the Devil, to have any hand in kicking up a cursed dust against a government which we had, every mother's son of us, a hand in making.
JESSAMY
Bravo!--Well, have you been abroad in the city since your arrival? What have you seen that is curious and entertaining?
JONATHAN
Oh! I have seen a power of fine sights. I went to see two marble-stone men and a leaden horse that stands out in doors in all weathers; and when I came where they was, one had got no head, and t'other wern't there. They said as how the leaden man was a damn'd tory, and that he took wit in his anger and rode off in the time of the troubles.
JESSAMY
But this was not the end of your excursion?
JONATHAN
Oh, no; I went to a place they call Holy Ground. Now I counted this was a place where folks go to meeting; so I put my hymn-book in my pocket, and walked softly and grave as a minister; and when I came there, the dogs a bit of a meeting-house could I see. At last I spied a young gentlewoman standing by one of the seats which they have here at the doors. I took her to be the deacon's daughter, and she looked so kind, and so obliging, that I thought I would go and ask her the way to lecture, and--would you think it?--she called me dear, and sweeting, and honey, just as if we were married: by the living jingo, I had a month's mind to buss her.
JESSAMY
Well, but how did it end?
JONATHAN
Why, as I was standing talking with her, a parcel of sailor men and boys got round me, the snarl-headed curs fell a-kicking and cursing of me at such a tarnal rate, that I vow I was glad to take to my heels and split home, right off, tail on end, like a stream of chalk.
JESSAMY
Why, my dear friend, you are not acquainted with the city; that girl you saw was a--[whispers.]
JONATHAN
Mercy on my soul! was that young woman a harlot!--Well! if this is New-York Holy Ground, what must the Holy-day Ground be!
JESSAMY
Well, you should not judge of the city too rashly. We have a number of elegant, fine girls here that make a man's leisure hours pass very agreeably. I would esteem it an honour to announce you to some of them.--Gad! that announce is a select word; I wonder where I picked it up.
JONATHAN
I don't want to know them.
JESSAMY
Come, come, my dear friend, I see that I must assume the honour of being the director of your amusements. Nature has given us passions, and youth and opportunity stimulate to gratify them. It is no shame, my dear Blueskin, for a man to amuse himself with a little gallantry.
JONATHAN
Girl huntry! I don't altogether understand. I never played at that game. I know how to play hunt the squirrel, but I can't play anything with the girls; I am as good as married.
JESSAMY
Vulgar, horrid brute! Married, and above a hundred miles from his wife, and thinks that an objection to his making love to every woman he meets! He never can have read, no, he never can have been in a room with a volume of the divine Chesterfield.--So you are married?
JONATHAN
No, I don't say so; I said I was as good as married, a kind of promise.
JESSAMY
As good as married!--
JONATHAN
Why, yes; there's Tabitha Wymen, the deacon's daughter, at home; she and I have been courting a great while, and folks say as how we are to be married; and so I broke a piece of money with her when we parted, and she promised not to spark it with Solomon Dyer while I am gone. You wouldn't have me false to my true-love, would you?
JESSAMY
May be you have another reason for constancy; possibly the young lady has a fortune? Ha! Mr. Jonathan, the solid charms: the chains of love are never so binding as when the links are made of gold.
JONATHAN
Why, as to fortune, I must needs say her father is pretty dumb rich; he went representative for our town last year. He will give her--let me see--four times seven is--seven times four--nought and carry one,-- he will give her twenty acres of land--somewhat rocky though--a Bible, and a cow.
JESSAMY
Twenty acres of rock, a Bible, and a cow! Why, my dear Mr. Jonathan, we have servant-maids, or, as you would more elegantly express it, waitresses, in this city, who collect more in one year from their mistresses' cast clothes.
JONATHAN
You don't say so!--
JESSAMY
Yes, and I'll introduce to one of them. There is a little lump of flesh and delicacy that lives at next door, waitress to Miss Maria; we often see her on the stoop.
JONATHAN
But are you sure she would be courted by me?
JESSAMY
Never doubt it; remember a faint heart never--blisters on my tongue--I was going to be guilty of a vile proverb; flat against the authority of Chesterfield. I say there can be no doubt that the brilliancy of your merit will secure you a favourable reception.
JONATHAN
Well, but what must I say to her?
JESSAMY
Say to her! why, my dear friend, though I admire your profound knowledge on every other subject, yet, you will pardon my saying that your want of opportunity has made the female heart escape the poignancy of your penetration. Say to her! Why, when a man goes a-courting, and hopes for success, he must begin with doing, and not saying.
JONATHAN
Well, what must I do?
JESSAMY
Why, when you are introduced you must make five or six elegant bows.
JONATHAN
Six elegant bows! I understand that; six, you say? Well--
JESSAMY
Then you must press and kiss her hand; then press and kiss, and so on to her lips and cheeks; then talk as much as you can about hearts, darts, flames, nectar, and ambrosia--the more incoherent the better.
JONATHAN
Well, but suppose she should be angry with I?
JESSAMY
Why, if she should pretend--please to observe, Mr. Jonathan--if she should pretend to be offended, you must-- But I'll tell you how my master acted in such a case: He was seated by a young lady of eighteen upon a sofa, plucking with a wanton hand the blooming sweets of youth and beauty. When the lady thought it necessary to check his ardour, she called up a frown upon her lovely face, so irresistibly alluring, that it would have warmed the frozen bosom of age; remember, said she, putting her delicate arm upon his, remember your character and my honour. My master instantly dropped upon his knees, with eyes swimming with love, cheeks glowing with desire, and in the gentlest modulation of voice he said: My dear Caroline, in a few months our hands will be indissolubly united at the altar; our hearts I feel are already so; the favours you now grant as evidence of your affection are favours indeed; yet, when the ceremony is once past, what will now be received with rapture will then be attributed to duty.
JONATHAN
Well, and what was the consequence?
JESSAMY
The consequence!--Ah! forgive me, my dear friend, but you New England gentlemen have such a laudable curiosity of seeing the bottom of everything;--why, to be honest, I confess I saw the blooming cherub of a consequence smiling in its angelic mother's arms, about ten months afterwards.
JONATHAN
Well, if I follow all your plans, make them six bows, and all that, shall I have such little cherubim consequences?
JESSAMY
Undoubtedly.--What are you musing upon?
JONATHAN
You say you'll certainly make me acquainted?-- Why, I was thinking then how I should contrive to pass this broken piece of silver--won't it buy a sugar-dram?
JESSAMY
What is that, the love-token from the deacon's daughter?--You come on bravely. But I must hasten to my master. Adieu, my dear friend.
JONATHAN
Stay, Mr. Jessamy--must I buss her when I am introduced to her?
JESSAMY
I told you, you must kiss her.
JONATHAN
Well, but must I buss her?
JESSAMY
Why, kiss and buss, and buss and kiss, is all one.
JONATHAN
Oh! my dear friend, though you have a profound knowledge of all, a pungency of tribulation, you don't know everything. [Exit.
JESSAMY, alone.
Well, certainly I improve; my master could not have insinuated himself with more address into the heart of a man he despised. Now will this blundering dog sicken Jenny with his nauseous pawings, until she flies into my arms for very ease. How sweet will the contrast be between the blundering Jonathan and the courtly and accomplished Jessamy!
END OF THE SECOND ACT.