Scene VII.

Love for Love

by William Congreve

BEN, and MISS PRUE.

BEN LEGEND
Come mistress, will you please to sit down? for
an you stand a stern a that'n, we shall never grapple together.
Come, I'll haul a chair; there, an you please to sit, I'll sit by
you.

MISS PRUE
You need not sit so near one, if you have anything
to say, I can hear you farther off, I an't deaf.

BEN LEGEND
Why that's true, as you say, nor I an't dumb, I
can be heard as far as another,--I'll heave off, to please you.
[Sits farther off.] An we were a league asunder, I'd undertake to
hold discourse with you, an 'twere not a main high wind indeed, and
full in my teeth. Look you, forsooth, I am, as it were, bound for
the land of matrimony; 'tis a voyage, d'ye see, that was none of my
seeking. I was commanded by father, and if you like of it, mayhap I
may steer into your harbour. How say you, mistress? The short of
the thing is, that if you like me, and I like you, we may chance to
swing in a hammock together.

MISS PRUE
I don't know what to say to you, nor I don't care
to speak with you at all.

BEN LEGEND
No? I'm sorry for that. But pray why are you so
scornful?

MISS PRUE
As long as one must not speak one's mind, one had
better not speak at all, I think, and truly I won't tell a lie for
the matter.

BEN LEGEND
Nay, you say true in that, it's but a folly to
lie: for to speak one thing, and to think just the contrary way is,
as it were, to look one way, and to row another. Now, for my part,
d'ye see, I'm for carrying things above board, I'm not for keeping
anything under hatches,--so that if you ben't as willing as I, say so
a God's name: there's no harm done; mayhap you may be shame-faced;
some maidens thof they love a man well enough, yet they don't care to
tell'n so to's face. If that's the case, why, silence gives
consent.

MISS PRUE
But I'm sure it is not so, for I'll speak sooner
than you should believe that; and I'll speak truth, though one should
always tell a lie to a man; and I don't care, let my father do what
he will; I'm too big to be whipt, so I'll tell you plainly, I don't
like you, nor love you at all, nor never will, that's more: so
there's your answer for you; and don't trouble me no more, you ugly
thing.

BEN LEGEND
Look you, young woman, you may learn to give good
words, however. I spoke you fair, d'ye see, and civil. As for your
love or your liking, I don't value it of a rope's end; and mayhap I
like you as little as you do me: what I said was in obedience to
father. Gad, I fear a whipping no more than you do. But I tell you
one thing, if you should give such language at sea, you'd have a cat
o' nine tails laid cross your shoulders. Flesh! who are you? You
heard t'other handsome young woman speak civilly to me of her own
accord. Whatever you think of yourself, gad, I don't think you are
any more to compare to her than a can of small-beer to a bowl of
punch.

MISS PRUE
Well, and there's a handsome gentleman, and a fine
gentleman, and a sweet gentleman, that was here that loves me, and I
love him; and if he sees you speak to me any more, he'll thrash your
jacket for you, he will, you great sea-calf.

BEN LEGEND
What, do you mean that fair-weather spark that
was here just now? Will he thrash my jacket? Let'n,--let'n. But an
he comes near me, mayhap I may giv'n a salt eel for's supper, for all
that. What does father mean to leave me alone as soon as I come home
with such a dirty dowdy? Sea-calf? I an't calf enough to lick your
chalked face, you cheese-curd you: --marry thee? Oons, I'll marry a
Lapland witch as soon, and live upon selling contrary winds and
wrecked vessels.

MISS PRUE
I won't be called names, nor I won't be abused
thus, so I won't. If I were a man [cries]--you durst not talk at his
rate. No, you durst not, you stinking tar-barrel.