LE DEPIT AMOUREUX.

COMEDIE.

THE LOVE-TIFF.

A COMEDY IN FIVE ACTS.

(_THE ORIGINAL IN VERSE_.)

1656.




INTRODUCTORY NOTICE.

_The Love-tiff_ (_Le Depit-amoureux_) is composed of two
pieces joined together. The first and longest is a comparatively modest
imitation of a very coarse and indecent Italian comedy,
_L'Interesse_, by Signer Nicolo Secchi; its intrigue depends
chiefly on the substitution of a female for a male child, a change which
forms the groundwork of many plays and novels, and of which Shakespeare
has also made use. The second and best part of the _Love-tiff_
belongs to Moliere alone, and is composed chiefly of the whole of the
first act, the first six verses of the third scene, and the whole of the
fourth scene of the second act; these, with a few alterations and a few.
lines added, form, the comedy which the _Theatre Francaise_ plays
at the present time. It was first represented at Beziers towards the end
of 1656, when the States General of Languedoc were assembled in that