BLOUNT (followingLady Worrymore, as she turns away moodily).
Nay, my Lady, don't let the writer of that beautiful sonnet be curtailed of his honours, because of my delinquency. It were an insult to the whole nine Muses to send poetry away uncrowned, when prose has been so nobly rewarded.
CLERMONT.
Pray, don't urge it. Her Ladyship, perhaps, thinks such poetry unworthy to be ranked with such prose; and we ought not to——
LADY WORRYMORE.
By no means, Mr. Clermont; by no means. The merit of that beautiful sonnet cannot be affected in my estimation by any adventitious circumstances.
LORD WORRYMORE.
That's right, Lady Worrymore; let every thing rest on its own merit, he! he! he! That is the golden rule to go by.
BLOUNT (as before).
Now do you unveil that bust, Miss Frankland. Ha! you retire behind backs, and won't do it.—I'll do it myself, then, though I be but an un-
