hated your poor dear uncle before marriage as if he'd been a
blackamoor--and yet, miss, you are sensible what a wife I made!--and
when it pleased Heaven to release me from him, 'tis unknown what tears
I shed!--But suppose we were going to give you another choice, will you
promise us to give up this Beverley?

LYDIA
Could I belie my thoughts so far as to give that promise, my actions
would certainly as far belie my words.

Mrs. MALAPROP
Take yourself to your room.--You are fit company for nothing but your
own ill-humours.

LYDIA
Willingly, ma'am--I cannot change for the worse. [Exit.]

Mrs. MALAPROP
There's a little intricate hussy for you!

Sir ANTHONY
It is not to be wondered at, ma'am,--all this is the natural
consequence of teaching girls to read. Had I a thousand daughters, by
Heaven! I'd as soon have them taught the black art as their alphabet!

Mrs. MALAPROP
Nay, nay, Sir Anthony, you are an absolute misanthropy.

Sir ANTHONY
In my way hither, Mrs. Malaprop, I observed your niece's maid coming
forth from a circulating library!--She had a book in each hand--they
were half-bound volumes, with marble covers!--From that moment I
guessed how full of duty I should see her mistress!

Mrs. MALAPROP
Those are vile places, indeed!

Sir ANTHONY
Madam, a circulating library in a town is as an evergreen tree of
diabolical knowledge! It blossoms through the year!--And depend on it,
Mrs. Malaprop, that they who are so fond of handling the leaves, will
long for the fruit at last.

Mrs. MALAPROP
Fy, fy, Sir Anthony! you surely speak laconically.

Sir ANTHONY
Why, Mrs. Malaprop, in moderation now, what would you have a woman
know?

Mrs. MALAPROP
Observe me, Sir Anthony. I would by no means wish a daughter of mine to
be a progeny of learning; I don't think so much learning becomes a
young woman; for instance, I would never let her meddle with Greek, or
Hebrew, or algebra, or simony, or fluxions, or paradoxes, or such
inflammatory branches of learning--neither would it be necessary for
her to handle any of your mathematical, astronomical, diabolical
instruments.--But, Sir Anthony, I would send her, at nine years old, to
a boarding-school, in order to learn a little ingenuity and artifice.
Then, sir, she should have a supercilious knowledge in accounts;--and
as she grew up, I would have her instructed in geometry, that she might
know something of the contagious countries;--but above all, Sir
Anthony, she shoul