A lively comedy opens with a practical joke on a drunken tinker and then follows households in a university town where a wealthy father's two daughters attract suitors; the younger is mild and courted through disguise while the elder resists marriage and sharpens her tongue. A bold outsider courts the elder with theatrical tactics to break her will, while trickery, masked identities, and servants' plots arrange romances. Scenes move between domestic interiors and a country house as witty language, role-playing, and debates about obedience, performance, and gender inform confrontations and a final public test of married behavior.