In his initial attempts to seduce Hellena in the second scene of Act 1, Willmore expresses his desire to be the first attendee of her banquet of love. This metaphor, which compares sex to a banquet, is one of many instances in the play where characters refer to love and lovemaking with euphemisms surrounding food and meals.
Oh, I long to come first to the banquet of love! and such a swinging appetite I bring – Oh I’m impatient.
This is the first time Willmore and Hellena meet, and he is eager to seduce her. From the outset, the two characters engage in witty banter that is replete with innuendo and that will continue throughout the play. One of the many metaphors that Willmore uses to refer to sex is this so-called banquet of love, for which he claims to have a "swinging appetite."
The next time Willmore and Hellena meet, he has just exited Angelica's house in the first scene of Act 3. He claims that he has spent the whole day looking for Hellena and asks to see her face. In her response, she appropriates his banquet metaphor:
HELLENA I’m afraid, my small acquaintance, you have been staying that swinging stomach you boasted of this morning; I then remember my little collation would have gone down with you, without the sauce of a handsome face – is your stomach so queasy now?
WILLMORE Faith, long fasting, child, spoils a man’s appetite – yet if you durst treat, I could so lay about me still –
Hellena, who is fully aware of Willmore's inconstancy, suggests that he must have done something about the "swinging appetite" he had earlier in the day if her face would now be enough to fill him up. Willmore jumps straight back into the metaphor and its logic, defending himself with the claim that fasting makes you less hungry over time.
In the second scene of Act 1, Willmore metaphorically refers to the women around him as roses. As referenced in the stage directions, a number of women "dressed like courtesans, with papers pinned on their breasts, and baskets of flowers in their hands" have just come on stage. The Englishmen discuss the women, and Willmore tries to get their attention:
WILLMORE Kind, and obliging to inform us – Pray where do these roses grow? I would fain plant some of ’em in a bed of mine.
WOMAN Beware such roses, sir.
WILLMORE A pox of fear: I’ll be baked with thee between a pair of sheets, and that’s thy proper still; so I might but strew such roses over me, and under me – fair one, would you would give me leave to gather at your bush this idle month; I would go near to make somebody smell of it all the year after.
In this scene, Willmore uses an extended gardening metaphor to express that he wants to sleep with the women on stage. When he says that he wants to plant the roses in his bed, he does not mean that he wants to plant roses in a flower bed, but that he wants to have sex with the women dressed as courtesans. There is similar innuendo at play when he says that he wants to strew roses over and under himself, when he asks to gather at the woman's bush, and when he says he will make someone smell of it for a year.
Because of Carnival, it remains ambiguous whether these metaphorical roses are actually courtesans. The stage directions reinforce this ambiguity, merely stating that the women who come on stage are "dressed as courtesans." Tuned into this ambiguity, Belvile tells the men that "They are, or would have you think they’re courtesans." He seems to be the only member of his group who is aware of the precariousness of the Carnival setting from the outset of the play.
The uncertainty of the metaphorical roses' identities foreshadows the men's difficulty with gleaning the identities of the women around them. Over the course of the following acts, Blunt thinks he's met his future wife but is just being duped by a clever prostitute, Belvile repeatedly interacts with Florinda without knowing it is her, and Willmore is kept in the dark about Hellena's wealth and social standing thanks to her disguises.
Throughout the play, women use the courtesan costume to move around the city and Carnival festivities freely. The only main female character whose identity is never concealed or misunderstood is Angelica. As a famous prostitute, she doesn't need to conceal her identity. On the contrary—she hangs her portrait out for the men of Naples to know and want her. While dressing up as a courtesan can give women a temporary sense of freedom and power, The Rover underlines the vulnerability that prostitutes are subjected to in a misogynistic world that is organized around strict socioeconomic hierarchies.
In the first scene of Act 2, Angelica and Moretta stand on the balcony and gaze out at the men who gaze at Angelica's portrait. Angelica expresses her opinion that all men are inconstant, and that she is therefore "resolved that nothing but gold shall charm [her] heart." Moretta responds with approval, metaphorically comparing love to a disease:
I’m glad on’t; ’tis only interest that women of our profession ought to consider: though I wonder what has kept you from that general disease of our sex so long, I mean that of being in love.
Having been a prostitute herself, Moretta knows how a woman in Angelica's position should best protect herself. She says that the interest of money is the only one that "women of [their] profession ought to consider," going on to express surprise at Angelica's immunity against the disease of love up until this point. This line foreshadows Angelica's imminent and unfortunate romantic attachment to Willmore. In addition, it offers a counterargument to the masculine perspective on love and lovemaking that the audience so frequently receives from the male characters.
Throughout the play, Willmore, Blunt, and Frederick use food, combat, and maritime metaphors to express their views on romance and sex when they are among themselves. By contrast, when women are in the company of women, they often compare love to anguish and illness. Whereas the male characters tend to compare love to activities that involve vigor and deliberate action, several of the female characters seem to see love as something that happens to them. Unlike the young Cavaliers, who are exhilarated by the possibilities of romantic and sexual conquest, Moretta is disillusioned by the vulnerable position in which love puts women and—above all—prostitutes.
In the first scene of Act 3, Willmore returns to the other Englishmen after have sex with Angelica. As he boasts about his success to his friends, Willmore reveals that Angelica even gave him money. Having misunderstood, Blunt asks if they got married, and Willmore responds using a beekeeping metaphor:
BLUNT But hark’ee Sir, you are not married are you?
WILLMORE All the honey of matrimony, but none of the sting, friend.
In this metaphor, Willmore compares marriage to beekeeping. He claims that, in his relationship with Angelica, he has access to all of the honey as well as protection from being stung. According to Willmore, the good sides of marriage—the honey—are sex and financial gain, whereas the negative sides of marriage—the sting—are the commitment and constraints that it entails. He gets to have sex with Angelica and get money out of being with her, but he doesn't have to be constant to her.
The audience can't help but pity Angelica in this situation. At the bottom of the social hierarchy, she nevertheless holds power as a woman who works to support herself. This power is obstructed by Willmore, as her interaction with him was turned on its head. Not only charming Angelica enough to convince her to sleep with him without paying her anything, Willmore manages to get Angelica to pay him.
In his initial attempts to seduce Hellena in the second scene of Act 1, Willmore expresses his desire to be the first attendee of her banquet of love. This metaphor, which compares sex to a banquet, is one of many instances in the play where characters refer to love and lovemaking with euphemisms surrounding food and meals.
Oh, I long to come first to the banquet of love! and such a swinging appetite I bring – Oh I’m impatient.
This is the first time Willmore and Hellena meet, and he is eager to seduce her. From the outset, the two characters engage in witty banter that is replete with innuendo and that will continue throughout the play. One of the many metaphors that Willmore uses to refer to sex is this so-called banquet of love, for which he claims to have a "swinging appetite."
The next time Willmore and Hellena meet, he has just exited Angelica's house in the first scene of Act 3. He claims that he has spent the whole day looking for Hellena and asks to see her face. In her response, she appropriates his banquet metaphor:
HELLENA I’m afraid, my small acquaintance, you have been staying that swinging stomach you boasted of this morning; I then remember my little collation would have gone down with you, without the sauce of a handsome face – is your stomach so queasy now?
WILLMORE Faith, long fasting, child, spoils a man’s appetite – yet if you durst treat, I could so lay about me still –
Hellena, who is fully aware of Willmore's inconstancy, suggests that he must have done something about the "swinging appetite" he had earlier in the day if her face would now be enough to fill him up. Willmore jumps straight back into the metaphor and its logic, defending himself with the claim that fasting makes you less hungry over time.
In the third scene of Act 3, Willmore comes across Florinda in her garden at night and attempts to sexually assault her. When she says that she will cry "Rape!" if he continues, he accuses her of plotting to trap men by way of a spider metaphor:
A rape! Come, come, you lie, you baggage, you lie, what, I’ll warrant you would fain have the world believe now that you are not so forward as I. No, not you – why at this time of night was your cobweb door set open dear spider – but to catch flies?
In the rhetorical question at the end of his line, Willmore metaphorically compares Florinda to a cunning spider that has spun a cobweb to catch flies. He is suggesting that there is no way Florinda would open her gate at night and wait in the garden unless she was seeking to ensnare men like him. This metaphor underlines the threatening side of Willmore's seemingly harmless promiscuity. When he engages in witty banter with Hellena, the audience finds Willmore to be a charming and playful hero. In this scene, however, the audience recognizes that he can also be a violent predator.
This is an unusual metaphor coming from Willmore, who usually plays with language to boast of his prowess. Throughout The Rover, Willmore and the other male characters usually compare sex to activities that entail liveliness and reinforce their masculinity. This demonstrates the agency they feel in interactions with women. In this passage, Willmore uses a very different kind of metaphor to describe his interaction with Florinda. In place of a metaphor that relates to combat or ships to euphemize about sex (as he uses at other points in the play), he professes his powerlessness by comparing Florinda to a spider and himself to a fly. As a clever wordsmith, Willmore knows how to manipulate language to make himself the victor or victim—depending on which is favorable in the given situation.
In the fourth scene of Act 3, Willmore uses a maritime metaphor to express his jealousy over seeing Antonio pay Angelica a visit. This metaphor is relevant to Willmore's recent experiences, as he was at sea for a long time before reaching Naples.
How is this! a picaroon going to board my frigate! Here’s one chase-gun for you.
In this metaphor, Antonio is the picaroon—a pirate—and Angelica is Willmore's frigate—a warship. The verb "to board" is a euphemism for sex; Willmore is provoked by the idea that Antonio is going to have sex with Angelica. By invoking the chase-gun, which is a gun that is positioned at the front or back of a warship, Willmore is leveling a threat at the intruder on his sexual relationship. Although Willmore's comparison of Angelica to a vessel—that is boarded by all sorts of men—is quite demeaning, it is worth nothing that this objectification is related to the tradition of referring to boats and ships in the feminine third person.
Willmore once again employs a maritime metaphor when he is pursuing Florinda in the third scene of Act 4. In this scene, Willmore misinterprets her anxious glances as seductive ones and exclaims:
Ah! There she sails, she looks back as she were willing to be boarded, I’ll warrant her prize.
Willmore once again invokes the tradition of referring to vessels in the feminine. Watching her leave the scene—because she is scared of being discovered by her brother—Willmore says she is sailing away and presumes that she is asking to "be boarded." As with Angelica in the preceding act, Willmore uses the verb "to board" as a euphemism for sex. This scene comes after Willmore has already subjected Florinda to the threat of sexual violence. His repetition of the metaphor of boarding a ship to talk about having sex with a woman reminds the audience that Willmore is not simply a witty and charming hero.
In the first scene of Act 4, the audience finds Belvile imprisoned in Antonio's house after he's been wrongly accused of injuring Antonio in a sword fight. Arrested for Willmore's crimes, Belvile fears that he will now be unable to find Florinda before she's married off to Antonio. The scene opens with a soliloquy in which Belvile personifies fortune as he bemoans his bad luck:
When shall I be weary of railing on Fortune, who is resolved never to turn with smiles upon me?
This first line of the soliloquy is a rhetorical question in which Belvile expresses that he's tired of complaining about his misfortune—something he feels that he's been doing a lot recently. Instead of referring back to fortune with a "which" in the second clause, he refers to it with a "who." He then claims that fortune has decided never to turn with smiles upon him. "Smile upon" is a phrasal verb that means to regard favorably. Taken literally, the smiling upon contributes to the personification of fortune. Taken figuratively, the smiling upon underlines Belvile's impression of his own bad luck.
This personification returns at the very end of the same scene, when Belvile apostrophizes fortune in another soliloquy:
Fantastic Fortune, thou deceitful light,
That cheats the wearied traveller by night,
Though on a precipice each step you tread,
I am resolved to follow where you lead.
Belvile addresses fortune and compares it to a deceitful light that misleads travelers at night. In this metaphor, the traveler in question is himself—he feels that he consistently finds himself in challenging situations that aren't his own fault. However, it is also possible that he's suggesting that Antonio is being misled by fortune's deceitful light. Earlier in the scene, Antonio has instructed Belvile to fight on his behalf in a duel over a maid. Belvile is sure he is speaking of Florinda. If fortune is playing tricks on Belvile, it is without a doubt also playing tricks on Antonio, as he doesn't realize he is asking his rival for Florinda to represent him in a duel over her.
Belvile concludes his apostrophic personification of fortune in the last two lines, stating that though it may take him down dangerous paths, he has no choice but to follow it and see where it will lead him. The character's personification of fortune in these two soliloquies underlines that he is both frustrated with and accepting of his circumstances. Ultimately, Belvile is a brave and experienced Cavalier who recognizes that one cannot have control over all that happens in one's life.
In the fourth scene of Act 3, Willmore uses a maritime metaphor to express his jealousy over seeing Antonio pay Angelica a visit. This metaphor is relevant to Willmore's recent experiences, as he was at sea for a long time before reaching Naples.
How is this! a picaroon going to board my frigate! Here’s one chase-gun for you.
In this metaphor, Antonio is the picaroon—a pirate—and Angelica is Willmore's frigate—a warship. The verb "to board" is a euphemism for sex; Willmore is provoked by the idea that Antonio is going to have sex with Angelica. By invoking the chase-gun, which is a gun that is positioned at the front or back of a warship, Willmore is leveling a threat at the intruder on his sexual relationship. Although Willmore's comparison of Angelica to a vessel—that is boarded by all sorts of men—is quite demeaning, it is worth nothing that this objectification is related to the tradition of referring to boats and ships in the feminine third person.
Willmore once again employs a maritime metaphor when he is pursuing Florinda in the third scene of Act 4. In this scene, Willmore misinterprets her anxious glances as seductive ones and exclaims:
Ah! There she sails, she looks back as she were willing to be boarded, I’ll warrant her prize.
Willmore once again invokes the tradition of referring to vessels in the feminine. Watching her leave the scene—because she is scared of being discovered by her brother—Willmore says she is sailing away and presumes that she is asking to "be boarded." As with Angelica in the preceding act, Willmore uses the verb "to board" as a euphemism for sex. This scene comes after Willmore has already subjected Florinda to the threat of sexual violence. His repetition of the metaphor of boarding a ship to talk about having sex with a woman reminds the audience that Willmore is not simply a witty and charming hero.
