The Lady of Lyons | Page 5

will go and bury myself in my chateau, study philosophy, and turn
woman-hater. Refused! they ought to be sent to a madhouse!-- Ladies, I
have the honor to wish you a very good morning. [Exit.
Mme. Deschap. How forward these men are!--I think, child, we kept up
our dignity. Any girl, however inexperienced, knows how to accept an
offer, but it requires a vast deal of address to refuse one with proper
condescension and disdain. I used to practise it at school with the
dancing-master.
Enter DAMAS.
Damas. Good morning, cousin Deschappelles.--Well, Pauline, are you
recovered from last night's ball?--So many triumphs must be very
fatiguing. Even M. Glavis sighed most piteously when you departed;
but that might be the effect of the supper.
Pauline. M. Glavis, indeed!
Mme. Deschap. M. Glavis?--as if my daughter would think of M.
Glavis!

Damas. Hey-day!--why not?--His father left him a very pretty fortune,
and his birth is higher than yours, cousin Deschappelles. But perhaps
you are looking to M. Beauseant,--his father was a marquis before the
Revolution.
Pauline. M. Beauseant!--Cousin, you delight in tormenting me!
Mme. Deschap. Don't mind him, Pauline!--Cousin Damas, you have no
susceptibility of feeling,--there is a certain indelicacy in all your
ideas.--M. Beauseant knows already that he is no match for my
daughter!
Damas. Pooh! pooh! one would think you intended your daughter to
marry a prince!
Mme. Deschap. Well, and if I did?--what then?--Many a foreign
prince--
Damas [interrupting her]. Foreign prince!--foreign fiddlestick!-- you
ought to be ashamed of such nonsense at your time of life.
Mme. Deschap. My time of life!--That is an expression never applied to
any lady till she is sixty-nine and three-quarters;-- and only then by the
clergyman of the parish.
Enter Servant.
Servant. Madame, the carriage is at the door. [Exit.
Mme. Deschap. Come, child, put on your bonnet--you really have a
very thorough-bred air--not at all like your poor father.--[Fondly]. Ah,
you little coquette! when a young lady is always making mischief, it is
a sure sign that she takes after her mother!
Pauline. Good day, cousin Damas--and a better humor to you.--[Going
back to the table and taking the flowers]. Who could have sent me these
flowers? [Exeunt PAULINE and MADAME DESCHAPPELLES.
Damas. That would be an excellent girl if her head had not been turned.

I fear she is now become incorrigible! Zounds, what a lucky fellow I
am to be still a bachelor! They may talk of the devotion of the sex-- but
the most faithful attachment in life is that of a woman in love-- with
herself. [Exit.
SCENE II.
The exterior of a small Village Inn--sign, the Golden Lion--A few
leagues from Lyons, which is seen at a distance.
Beau. [behind the scenes.] Yes, you may bait the horses; we shall rest
here an hour.
Enter BEAUSEANT and GLAVIS.
Gla. Really, my dear Beauseant, consider that I have promised to spend
a day or two with you at your chateau, that I am quite at your mercy for
my entertainment,--and yet you are as silent and as gloomy as a mute at
a funeral, or an Englishman at a party of pleasure.
Beau. Bear with me!--the fact is that I am miserable.
Gla. You--the richest and gayest bachelor in Lyons?
Beau. It is because I am a bachelor that I am miserable.--Thou knowest
Pauline--the only daughter of the rich merchant, Mons. Deschappelles?
Gla. Know her?--who does not?--as pretty as Venus, and as proud as
Juno.
Beau. Her taste is worse than her pride.--[Drawing himself up.] Know,
Glavis, she has actually refused me!
Gla. [aside]. So she has me!--very consoling! In all cases of heart-ache,
the application of another man's disappointment draws out the pain and
allays the irritation.--[Aloud.] Refused you! and wherefore?
Beau. I know not, unless it be because the Revolution swept away my
father's title of Marquis,--and she will not marry a commoner. Now, as

we have no noblemen left in France,--as we are all citizens and equals,
she can only hope that, in spite of the war, some English Milord or
German Count will risk his life, by coming to Lyons, that this fille du
Roturier may condescend to accept him. Refused me, and with
scorn!--By Heaven, I'll not submit to it tamely:-- I'm in a perfect fever
of mortification and rage.--Refuse me, indeed!
Gla. Be comforted, my dear fellow,--I will tell you a secret. For the
same reason she refused ME!
Beau. You!--that's a very different matter! But give me your hand,
Glavis,--we'll think of some plan to humble her. Mille diables! I should
like to see her married to a strolling player!
Enter Landlord and his Daughter from the Inn.
Land. Your servant, citizen Beauseant,--servant, Sir. Perhaps you will
take dinner before you proceed to your chateau; our larder is most
plentifully supplied.
Beau. I