Dear Wife, be a little pacified, Don't let your Passion run away
with your Senses. Polly, I grant you, hath done a rash thing.
MRS. PEACHUM. If she had had only an Intrigue with the Fellow, why the
very best Families have excused and huddled up a Frailty of that sort.
'Tis Marriage, Husband, that makes it a Blemish.
PEACHUM. But Money, Wife, is the true Fuller's-Earth for Reputations,
there is not a Spot or a Stain but what it can take out. A rich Rogue
now-a-days is fit Company for any Gentleman; and the World, my Dear, hath
not such a contempt for Roguery as you imagine. I tell you, Wife, I can
make this Match turn to our Advantage.
MRS. PEACHUM. I am very sensible, Husband, that Captain Macheath is worth
Money, but I am in doubt whether he hath not two or three Wives already,
and then if he should die in a Session or two, Polly's Dower would come
into a Dispute.
PEACHUM. That, indeed, is a Point which ought to be consider'd.
Air XI.--A Soldier and a Sailor.
A Fox may steal your Hens, Sir,
A Whore your Health and Pence, Sir,
Your Daughter rob your Chest, Sir,
Your Wife may steal your Rest, Sir.
A Thief your Goods and Plate.
But this is all but picking,
With Rest, Pence, Chest and Chicken;
It ever was decreed, Sir,
If Lawyer's Hand is fee'd, Sir,
He steals your whole Estate.
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