the father's personal vices, but is rooted in class distinction. Lovell rejects the idea of his descendants being "one part scarlet" (aristocratic) and "the other London blue" (common). The drama's class conflict can seem obscure to the modern reader, since Sir Giles Over-reach appears as an upper-class, not a lower-class figure: he is a knight and a rich man with large country estates, who lives the lavish lifestyle of the landed gentry. There is even a family connection between hero and villain: Frank Welborn is the nephew of Sir Giles' late wife. Yet Sir Giles himself expresses the conflict by noting that he is a "city" man—he comes from the financial milieu of the City of London with its worldly and materialistic values, the domain of nascent capitalism in contrast to the older social order rooted in feudalism. He observes that there is "More than a feud, a strange antipathy / Between us", the men of money, "and true gentry". For a conservative moralist like Massinger, the upper classes, the "true gentry", have a right to run society insofar as they fulfil the moral and ethical obligations of their traditional roles. It is Over-reach's rejection of those tradition moral and ethical standards, his embrace of ruthless competition, that makes him a villain. Synopsis Set in rural Nottinghamshire, the play opens with its protagonist, Frank Welborn, being ejected from an alehouse by Tapwell and Froth, the tavernkeeper and his wife. Welborn has been refused further service ("No booze? nor no tobacco?"); he quarrels with the couple and beats them, but is interrupted by Tom Allworth. The conversations in the scene supply the play's backstory, indicating that Welborn and Allworth are both members of the local gentry who have fallen victim to the financial manipulations of Sir Giles Over-reach. Welborn has lost his estates and been reduced to penury, while young Allworth has been forced to become the page of a local nobleman, Lord Lovell. Allworth offers Welborn a small sum, "eight pieces", to relieve his immediate wants, but Welborn indignantly rejects the offer from a junior contemporary; he says that as his own vices have led to his fall, he will rely on his own wits for his recovery. Tom Allworth's widowed mother, Lady Allworth, retains her country house; she is visited there by neighbours and prospective suitors, including Sir Giles. While she has her servants greet these guests with appropriate