... “That wench, methinks,
If I were but well set on, for she is a _fable_,
If I were but hounded right, and one to teach me.”
Sympson reads “affable,” which Colman rejects, and says, “the next line
seems to enforce” the reading in the text.
Pity, that the editor did not explain wherein the sense, “seemingly
enforced by the next line,” consists. May the true word be “a sable”—that
is, a black fox, hunted for its precious fur? Or “at-able,”—as we now
say,—“she is come-at-able?”
“A Wife For A Month.”