xhausted. Oh wedlock, wedlock! why did I
ever venture again into thy holy state--of misery! Of all the taxes laid
on mankind by respect to society and the influence of example, no one is
so burthensome as that which obliges a man to submit to a thousand ills
at home, rather than be suspected of being a bad husband abroad. (_enter
servant_) Go to your lady.

_Serv._ I told her ladyship five times before, sir Willoughby, that
breakfast was waiting.

_Sir W._ Then tell her once more, and that will make six, and say I
earnestly request the favour she will hasten to breakfast, as while she
stays I starve.

_Serv._ Yes, sir Willoughby, but she'll stop the longer for the message.
(_Aside going out._) [_Exit._

_Sir W._ My wife is the very devil. It seems that she'd be miserable if
she did not think me happy; yet her tenderness is my eternal torment;
her affection puts me in a fidget, and her fondness in a fever.

_Enter servant._

_Serv._ My lady says she wont detain you a moment, sir Willoughby.
[_Exit._

_Sir W._ The old answer. Then she's so nervous. A nervous wife is worse
than a perpetual blister; and then, as the man says in the play, your
nervous patients are always ailing, but _never die_. Zounds! why do I
bear it? 'tis my folly, my weakness, to dread the censure of the world,
and to sacrifice every comfort of my fire side to the ideal advantage of
being esteemed a _good husband_. (_Lady Worret is heard speaking
behind_) Hark! now she begins her morning work, giving more orders in a
minute than can be executed in a month, and teasing my daughter to death
to teach her to keep her temper; yet every body congratulates me on
having so good a wife; every body envies me so excellent an economist;
every body thinks me the happiest man alive; and nobody knows what a
miserable mortal I am.

_Lady W._ (_behind_) And harkye, William, (_entering with servant_) tell
the coachman to bring the chariot in a quarter of an hour: and William,
run with these books immediately to the rector's; and William, bring up
breakfast this moment.

_Will._ Yes, my lady: (_aside_) Lord have mercy upon us! [_Exit._

_Lady W._ My dear sir Willoughby, I beg a thousand pardons; but you are
always so indulgent that you really spoil me. I'm sure you think me a
tiresome creature.

_Sir W._ No, no, my life, not at all. I should be very ungrateful if I
didn't value you _just exactly as highly_ as you deserve.

_Lady W._ I certainly _deserv