W. S. Gilbert

“ The only line to fitly grace
My humble tomb, when I’ve run my race,
Is, “Reader, this is the resting-place
Of an unsuccessful duffer.”
I’ve fought them all, these ghosts of mine,
But the weapons I’ve used are sighs and brine,
And now that I’m nearly forty-nine,
Old age is my chiefest bogy;
For my hair is thinning away at the crown,
And the silver fights with the worn-out brown;
And a general verdict sets me down
As an irreclaimable fogy.
p. 44THE BISHOP AND THE ’BUSMAN It was a Bishop bold,
And London was his see,
He was short and stout and round about
And zealous as could be. ”

“ Do you write the bon bon mottoes my Elvira pulls at supper?”
But Henry Wadsworth smiled, and said he had not had that honour;
And Alfred, too, disclaimed the words that told so much upon her.
“Mister Martin Tupper, Poet Close, I beg of you inform us;”
But my question seemed to throw them both into a rage enormous.
Mister Close expressed a wish that he could only get anigh to me;
And Mister Martin Tupper sent the following reply to me:
“A fool is bent upon a twig, but wise men dread a bandit,”—
Which I know was very clever; but I didn’t understand it. ”

“ The worthy priest, he up and drew his cowl upon his crown,
And started off in haste to tell the news to Robber Brown—
To tell him how his daughter, who was now for marriage fit,
Had winked upon a sorter, who reciprocated it.
Good Robber Brown he muffled up his anger pretty well:
He said, “I have a notion, and that notion I will tell;
I will nab this gay young sorter, terrify him into fits,
And get my gentle wife to chop him into little bits. ”

“ To a promising young robber, the lieutenant of his band!
“This dreadful piece of news will pain your worthy parents so!
They are the most remunerative customers I know;
For many many years they’ve kept starvation from my doors:
I never knew so criminal a family as yours!
“The common country folk in this insipid neighbourhood
Have nothing to confess, they’re so ridiculously good;
And if you marry any one respectable at all,
Why, you’ll reform, and what will then become of Father Paul?” ”

“ If we stop down here much longer, really people will be talking.”
There were noblemen in coronets, and military cousins,
There were captains by the hundred, there were baronets by dozens.
Yet she heeded not their offers, but dismissed them with a blessing,
Then she let down all her back hair, which had taken long in dressing.
Then she had convulsive sobbings in her agitated throttle,
Then she wiped her pretty eyes and smelt her pretty smelling-bottle.
So I whispered, “Dear Elvira, say,—what can the matter be with you?
Does anything you’ve eaten, darling Popsy, disagree with you?” ”

“ With brutal conduct drives me mad.”
“I am appalled,” said Baines Carew.
“What! sound the matrimonial knell
Of worthy people such as these!
Why was I an attorney? Well—
Go on to the sævitia, please.”
“Domestic bliss has proved my bane,—
A harder case you never heard,
My wife (in other matters sane)
Pretends that I’m a Dicky bird!
“She makes me sing, ‘Too-whit, too-wee!’
And stand upon a rounded stick,
And always introduces me
To every one as ‘Pretty Dick’!”
“Oh, dear,” said weeping Baines Carew,
“This is the direst case I know.” ”

“ And ragged hair,
And every feature out of all proportion!
Embodiment of echoing inanity!
Excellent type of simpering insanity!
Unwieldy, clumsy nightmare of humanity!
I ring thy knell!
To-night thou diest,
Beast that destroy’st my heaven-born identity!
Nine weeks of nights,
Before the lights,
Swamped in thine own preposterous nonentity,
I’ve been ill-treated, cursed, and thrashed diurnally,
Credited for the smile you wear externally—
I feel disposed to smash thy face, infernally,
As there thou liest!
I’ve been thy brain:
I’ve been the brain that lit thy dull concavity! ”

“ He sought by open censure to enhance
Their dread of joining harmless social jollity.
Yet he enjoyed (a fact of notoriety)
The ordinary pleasures of society.
One evening, sitting at a pantomime
(Forbidden treat to those who stood in fear of him) ,
Roaring at jokes, sans metre, sense, or rhyme,
He turned, and saw immediately in rear of him,
His peace of mind upsetting, and annoying it,
A curate, also heartily enjoying it.
Again, ’t was Christmas Eve, and to enhance
His children’s pleasure in their harmless rollicking,
He, like a good old fellow, stood to dance ”

“ And she whispered, “Ferdinando, do you really, really love me?”
“Love you?” said I, then I sighed, and then I gazed upon her sweetly—
For I think I do this sort of thing particularly neatly.
“Send me to the Arctic regions, or illimitable azure,
On a scientific goose-chase, with my Coxwell or my Glaisher!
“Tell me whither I may hie me—tell me, dear one, that I may know—
Is it up the highest Andes? down a horrible volcano?”
But she said, “It isn’t polar bears, or hot volcanic grottoes:
Only find out who it is that writes those lovely cracker mottoes!” ”

“ A feeling of disgust upon her senses there will fall
When she looks upon his body chopped particularly small.”
He traced that gallant sorter to a still suburban square;
He watched his opportunity, and seized him unaware;
He took a life-preserver and he hit him on the head,
And Mrs. Brown dissected him before she went to bed.
And pretty little Alice grew more settled in her mind,
She never more was guilty of a weakness of the kind,
Until at length good Robber Brown bestowed her pretty hand
On the promising young robber, the lieutenant of his band. ”

“ Perceived one day, his glasses through,
The kings that came from Chickeraboo.
“Dear eyes!” said Admiral Pip, “I see
Three flourishing islands on our lee.
And, bless me! most remarkable thing!
On every island stands a king! ”

“ A Sassenach chief may be bonily built,
He may purchase a sporran, a bonnet, and kilt;
Stick a skeän in his hose—wear an acre of stripes—
But he cannot assume an affection for pipes.
Clonglockety’s pipings all night and all day
Quite frenzied poor Pattison Corby Torbay;
The girls were amused at his singular spleen,
Especially Ellen M‘Jones Aberdeen,
“Macphairson Clonglocketty Angus, my lad,
With pibrochs and reels you are driving me mad.
If you really must play on that cursed affair,
My goodness! play something resembling an air.” ”

“ To a pretty little cottage close to Shanklin, Isle of Wight.
But now—you’ll doubt my word, I know—
In a month they both returned, and lo!
Astounding fact! this happy pair
Took a gentlemanly residence in Canonbury Square!
They led a weird and reckless life,
They dined each day, this man and wife
(Pray disbelieve it, if you please) ,
On a joint of meat, a pudding, and a little bit of cheese.
In time came those maternal joys
Which take the form of girls or boys,
And strange to say of each they’d one—
A tiddy-iddy daughter, and a tiddy-iddy son! ”

“ A milder curate going.
A friend arrived one day
At Spiffton-extra-Sooper,
And in this shameful way
He spoke to Mr. Hooper:
“You think your famous name
For mildness can’t be shaken,
That none can blot your fame—
But, Hooper, you’re mistaken!
“Your mind is not as blank
As that of Hopley Porter,
Who holds a curate’s rank
At Assesmilk-cum-Worter.
“He plays the airy flute,
And looks depressed and blighted,
Doves round about him ‘toot,’
And lambkins dance delighted.
“He labours more than you
At worsted work, and frames it ”

“ Look thou within thee, ere again ill-using me.
Art thou aware
Of nothing there
Which might abuse thee, as thou art abusing me?
A brain that mourns thine unredeemed rascality?
A soul that weeps at thy threadbare morality? ”

“ Seven weary years I wandered—Patagonia, China, Norway,
Till at last I sank exhausted at a pastrycook his doorway.
There were fuchsias and geraniums, and daffodils and myrtle,
So I entered, and I ordered half a basin of mock turtle.
He was plump and he was chubby, he was smooth and he was rosy,
And his little wife was pretty and particularly cosy.
And he chirped and sang, and skipped about, and laughed with laughter hearty—
He was wonderfully active for so very stout a party.
And I said, “O gentle pieman, why so very, very merry? ”

“ When something checked the current of his frolicking:
That curate, with a maid he treated lover-ly,
Stood up and figured with him in the “Coverley!”
Once, yielding to an universal choice
(The company’s demand was an emphatic one,
For the old Bishop had a glorious voice) ,
In a quartet he joined—an operatic one.
Harmless enough, though ne’er a word of grace in it,
When, lo! that curate came and took the bass in it!
One day, when passing through a quiet street,
He stopped awhile and joined a Punch’s gathering ”

“ Oh, with pleasure!
“Wear all my hair in curl?
Stand at my door and wink—so—
At every passing girl?
My brothers, I should think so!
“For years I’ve longed for some
Excuse for this revulsion:
Now that excuse has come—
I do it on compulsion!!!”
He smoked and winked away—
This Reverend Hopley Porter—
The deuce there was to pay
At Assesmilk-cum-Worter.
And Hooper holds his ground,
In mildness daily growing—
They think him, all around,
The mildest curate going. ”

“ Old heads upon young shoulders we must not expect to find:
We mustn’t be too hard upon these little girlish tricks—
Let’s see—five crimes at half-a-crown—exactly twelve-and-six.”
“Oh, father,” little Alice cried, “your kindness makes me weep,
You do these little things for me so singularly cheap—
Your thoughtful liberality I never can forget ”

“ And heard, as Punch was being treated penalty,
That phantom curate laughing all hyænally.
Now at a picnic, ’mid fair golden curls,
Bright eyes, straw hats, bottines that fit amazingly,
A croquêt-bout is planned by all the girls ”

“ The bet is undecided.
p. 484THE PHANTOM CURATE.
A FABLE A BISHOP once—I will not name his see—
Annoyed his clergy in the mode conventional;
From pulpit shackles never set them free,
And found a sin where sin was unintentional.
All pleasures ended in abuse auricular—
The Bishop was so terribly particular.
Though, on the whole, a wise and upright man,
He sought to make of human pleasures clearances;
And form his priests on that much-lauded plan
Which pays undue attention to appearances. ”

“ You’re drearier than I!”
p. 138A DISCONTENTED SUGAR BROKER A Gentleman of City fame
Now claims your kind attention;
East India broking was his game,
His name I shall not mention:
No one of finely-pointed sense
Would violate a confidence,
And shall I go
And do it? No!
His name I shall not mention.
He had a trusty wife and true,
And very cosy quarters,
A manager, a boy or two,
Six clerks, and seven porters.
A broker must be doing well
(As any lunatic can tell)
Who can employ
An active boy,
Six clerks, and seven porters. ”

“ The curate vanished—no one since has heard of him.
p. 492THE SENSATION CAPTAIN No nobler captain ever trod
Than Captain Parklebury Todd,
So good—so wise—so brave, he!
But still, as all his friends would own,
He had one folly—one alone—
This Captain in the Navy.
I do not think I ever knew
A man so wholly given to
Creating a sensation,
Or p’raps I should in justice say—
To what in an Adelphi play
Is known as “situation.” ”

“ And solaced their souls with the following words:
“Oh, maidens,” said Pattison, touching his hat,
“Don’t blubber, my dears, for a fellow like that;
Observe, I’m a very superior man,
A much better fellow than Angus M‘Clan.” ”

“ So pretty and wee,
As pretty, as pretty, as pretty could be.”
But the babe, with a dig that would startle an ox,
With his “C’ck! Oh, my!—
Go along wiz ’oo, fie!”
Would exclaim, “I’m afraid ’oo a socking ole fox.”
Now a father it shocks,
And it whitens his locks,
When his little babe calls him a shocking old fox. ”

“ They see in the cup he waves on high
A tinselled emptiness.
Those aged men so lean and wan,
They’ve seen it all before,
They know they’ll see the charlatan
But twice or three times more.
And so they bear with dance and song,
And crimson foil and green,
They wearily sit, and grimly long
For the Transformation Scene.
p. 155KING BORRIA BUNGALEE BOO King Borria Bungalee Boo
Was a man-eating African swell ”

“ To bust myself with rage I’m ready.”
“I’ll be a curate!” whispers John—
“And I,” exclaimed poetic Freddy.
But while they read for it, these chaps,
The curate booked the maiden bonny—
And when she’s buried him, perhaps,
She’ll marry Frederick or Johnny.
p. 34SIR GUY THE CRUSADER Sir Guy was a doughty crusader,
A muscular knight,
Ever ready to fight,
A very determined invader,
And Dickey De Lion’s delight. ”

“ Now watch yon hardy Hieland man,
So stalwart and ungainly.
“These are the men who chase the roe,
Whose footsteps never falter,
Who bring with them, where’er they go,
A smack of old Sir Walter.
Of such as he, the men sublime
Who lead their troops victorious,
Whose deeds go down to after-time,
Enshrined in annals glorious!
“Of such as he the bard has said
‘Hech thrawfu’ raltie rorkie!
Wi’ thecht ta’ croonie clapperhead
And fash’ wi’ unco pawkie!’
He’ll faint away when I appear,
Upon his native heather;
Or p’r’aps he’ll only scream with fear,
Or p’r’aps the two together.” ”

“ I’ve assisted dear papa in cutting up a little lad,
I’ve planned a little burglary and forged a little cheque,
And slain a little baby for the coral on its neck!”
The worthy pastor heaved a sigh, and dropped a silent tear,
And said, “You mustn’t judge yourself too heavily, my dear:
It’s wrong to murder babies, little corals for to fleece;
But sins like these one expiates at half-a-crown apiece.
“Girls will be girls—you’re very young, and flighty in your mind ”