<Li> Jonathan: Manly's waiter / servant, represents the New England Yankee, an unsophisticated country bumpkin, honest and patriotic </Li> <Li> Jenny: Maria's waiter / servant, Jessamy's friend </Li> <P> Setting: New York City, New York </P> <P> The play begins with the coquettish Charlotte and Letitia talking about the forthcoming marriage and Maria's distress due to her father's marriage plans for her . Billy Dimple's father was Van Rough's business partner . Before the death of Dimple's father, a marriage between Van Rough's Daughter, Maria, and Dimple was settled . While Dimple becomes snobbish in England, Maria betakes herself to books that "improve her taste": "The contrast was so striking betwixt the good sense of her books, and the flimsiness of her love - letters, that she discovered that she had unthinkingly engaged her hand without her heart ." </P>

Where does the action of royall tyler's play the contrast take place