[_Reads._] "Extract of a letter from a gentleman
in Boston, dated February the third, 1788.--Our convention will pass the
federal government by a considerable majority: The more it is examined, the
more converts are made for its adoption. This you may rely on."

LOVEYET. 'Tis a cursed lie.--Why, why, you confounded scoundrel, do you
mean to ridicule your master?

THOMAS. I ask pardon, sir; I thought it was the _New-York Journal_; but I
see it is Mr. Child's _Daily Advertiser_.

LOVEYET. A plague on his aristocratic intelligence!--Begone, you vile foe
to American Liberty, or I'll--

[_Exit THOMAS._

_Enter TRUEMAN._

What, my friend Trueman! well, what's the news, eigh?

TRUEMAN. I have not learn'd a single monosyllable, sir.

LOVEYET. Nothing concerning this same Constitution there is so much talk
about, friend Horace? A miserable Constitution, by the bye. If mine was no
better,--ugh, ugh, ugh,--I say, if--ugh, ugh, if my constitution was no
better than this same political one, I solemnly swear, as true as I am this
day, man and boy, two score and three years, five months, eleven days, six
hours, and, and,--[_Pulling out his watch._] fifty-nine minutes old; why,
I--I--I would,--I don't know what I wou'd not do. Ugh, ugh.

TRUEMAN. Mr. Loveyet, you run on in such a surprising manner with your
narrations, imprecations, admirations, and interrogations, that, upon my
education, sir, I believe you are approaching to insanity, frenzy, lunacy,
madness, distraction,--a man of your age--

LOVEYET. Age, sir, age!--And what then, sir, eigh! what then? I'd have you
to know, sir, that I shall not have lived forty years till next spring
twelvemonth, old as I am; and if my countenance seems to belie me a little
or so, why--trouble, concern for the good of my country, sir, and this
tyrannical, villainous Constitution have made me look so; but my health is
sound, sir; my lungs are good, sir, [_Raising his voice._]--ugh, ugh,
ugh,--I am neither spindle-shank'd nor crook-back'd, and I can kiss a
pretty girl with as good a relish as--ugh, ugh,--ha, ha, ha. A man of five
and forty, old, forsooth! ha, ha. My age, truly!--ugh, ugh, ugh.

TRUEMAN. You talk very valiantly, Mr. Loveyet; very valiantly indeed; I
dare say now you have temerity and enterprise enough, even at this time of
day, to take a _wife_.

LOVEYET. To be sure I have. Let me see,--I shou'd like a woman an inch o