She says she saw a hideous toad once in a nasty pond, and she says
that rather would she take that noisome reptile and clasp its slimy
bosom to her own than tolerate one instant's touch from his (the
villain's) arms.

This sweet prattle of hers, however, only charms him all the more. He
says he will win her yet.

Nor does the villain seem much happier in his less serious love
episodes. After he has indulged in a little badinage of the above
character with his real lady-love, the heroine, he will occasionally
try a little light flirtation passage with her maid or lady friend.

The maid or friend does not waste time in simile or in metaphor. She
calls him a black-hearted scoundrel and clumps him over the head.

Of recent years it has been attempted to cheer the stage villain's
loveless life by making the village clergyman's daughter gone on him.
But it is generally about ten years ago when even she loved him, and
her love has turned to hate by the time the play opens; so that on the
whole his lot can hardly be said to have been much improved in this
direction.

Not but what it must be confessed that her change of feeling is, under
the circumstances, only natural. He took her away from her happy,
peaceful home when she was very young and brought her up to this
wicked overgrown London. He did not marry her. There is no earthly
reason why he should not have married her. She must have been a fine
girl at that time (and she is a good-looking woman as it is, with dash
and go about her), and any other man would have settled down cozily