The Pirates of Penzance

“ Men who stick at no offences Will anon be here! Piracy their dreadful trade is; Pray you, get you hence, young ladies, While the coast is clear! Frederic and Mabel retire. Girls No, we must not lose our senses, If they stick at no offences We should not be here! Piracy their dreadful trade is — Nice companions for young ladies! Let us disappear. During this chorus the Pirates have entered stealthily, and formed in a semicircle behind the Girls. As the Girls move to go off, each Pirate seizes a Girl. Pirate King seizes Edith and Isabel, Samuel seizes Kate. Girls Too late! ”

“ Pirates kneel, Police stand over them triumphantly. Pirate King We yield at once, with humbled mien, Because, with all our faults, we love our Queen. Police Yes, yes, with all their faults, they love their Queen. All Yes, yes, with all their faults, they love their Queen. Police holding Pirates by the collar, take out handkerchiefs and weep. Major-General Away with them, and place them at the bar! Enter Ruth Ruth One moment! let me tell you who they are. They are no members of the common throng; They are all noblemen who have gone wrong. All They are all noblemen who have gone wrong. ”

“ Mabel Frederic, save us! Frederic Beautiful Mabel, I would if I could, but I am not able. Pirates He's telling the truth, he is not able. Pirate King With base deceit You worked upon our feelings! Revenge is sweet, And flavours all our dealings! With courage rare And resolution manly, For death prepare, Unhappy General Stanley. Mabel (wildly) Is he to die, unshriven — unannealed? Girls Oh, spare him! Mabel Will no one in his cause a weapon wield? Girls Oh, spare him! Police (springing up) Yes, we are here, though hitherto concealed! Girls Oh, rapture! Police So to Constabulary, pirates yield! ”

“ They made it a point of honour never to attack a weaker party, and whenever they attempted to fight a stronger one they invariably got thrashed. Orphans themselves, they shrank from ever laying a molesting hand on an orphan, and many of the ships they captured had to be released because they were found to be manned entirely by orphans. Little wonder was it that these Pirates of Penzance could not make the grim trade of piracy pay.
The curtain rises on a scene of revelry. Frederic has just completed his pirate apprenticeship and is being hailed as a fully-fledged member of the gang. ”

“ The pirate, on whose side luck had been from the first, got half a broadside to bear at long musket-shot, killed a midshipman by Dodd's side, cut away two of the Agra's mizen shrouds, wounded the gaff, and cut the jib-stay. Down fell that powerful sail into the water, and dragged across the ship's forefoot, stopping her way to the open sea she panted for. The mates groaned; the crew cheered stoutly, as British tars do in any great disaster: the pirates yelled with ferocious triumph, like the devils they looked.
But most human events, even calamities, have two sides. ”

“ A life of constant alertness, constant danger, constant escape! An ocean Ishmaelite, he wanders forever aimlessly, homelessly; now unheard of for months, now careening his boat on some lonely uninhabited shore, now appearing suddenly to swoop down on some merchant vessel with rattle of musketry, shouting, yells, and a hell of unbridled passions let loose to rend and tear. What a Carlislean hero! What a setting of blood and lust and flame and rapine for such a hero!
Piracy, such as was practiced in the flower of its days—that is, during the early eighteenth century—was no sudden growth. ”

“ Frederic Hush, hush! not a word; I see a light inside! The Major-General comes, so quickly hide! Pirates Yes, yes, the Major-General comes! Pirates conceal themselves. Exeunt Pirate King, Frederic, Samuel, and Ruth. Police Yes, yes, the Major-General comes! Major-General (entering in dressing-gown, carrying a light) Yes, yes, the Major-General comes! Solo — Major-General. Tormented with the anguish dread Of falsehood unatoned, I lay upon my sleepless bed, And tossed and turned and groaned. The man who finds his conscience ache No peace at all enjoys ”

“ In the dictionary a pirate is defined as "a sea-robber, marauder, one who infringes another's copyright"; while a buccaneer is described as "a sea-robber, a pirate, especially of the Spanish-American coasts." This seems explicit, but a pirate was not a pirate from the cradle to the gallows. He usually began his life at sea as an honest mariner in the merchant service. He perhaps mutinied with other of the ship's crew, killed or otherwise disposed of the captain, seized the ship, elected a new commander, and sailed off "on the account." ”

“ But the men who had first landed were surrounded by the others of Black's company, and were being driven towards the hills at the back; and so to the great desolate plain of snow where no human being could long retain life. From my open window, I could hear the words of anger, the loud oaths, the shouts, could see the blows which were received, and the blows which were given. Anon the fight became very general. The pirates hit lustily with the butt-ends of their pistols; the honest fellows used their fists, and many a man they laid his length upon the rock. ”

“ With the name of pirate is also associated ideas of rich plunder, caskets of buried jewels, chests of gold ingots, bags of outlandish coins, secreted in lonely, out of the way places, or buried about the wild shores of rivers, and unexplored sea coasts, near rocks and trees bearing mysterious marks, indicating where the treasure was hid. And as it is his invariable practice to secrete and bury his booty, and from the perilous life he leads, being often killed or captured, he can never re-visit the spot again ”

“ Having procured a vessel, perhaps little more than a fishing-boat, sometimes only an open row-boat, the embryo pirates would paddle along some coast until they came across an unsuspecting craft, one not too big for the desperadoes to attack. Hiding their arms, they would row alongside, and then suddenly, with shouts and curses, board the vessel, kill any who resisted, and start a cruise in their new ship, their number being increased by volunteers or forced men from amongst the prize's crew. ”

“ Helpless they lie amid the wrath of the storm, and the darkened face of Heaven, for the first time, strikes terror on their guilty hearts. Death is before them, but not with a merciful quickness does he approach; hour after hour the frightful vision glares upon them, and at length disappears only to come upon them again in a more dreadful form. The tempest abates, and the sinners were spared for the time.
As the daylight broke they took to their boats, and abandoned the vessel to preserve their lives. But there was no repentance in the pirates ”

“ Astonished at the intrepidity which could lead men to leave their entrenchments and meet them hand to hand, and pressed by the suddenness of the charge, which was made with the recklessness, skill and rapidity of practised boarders bounding upon the deck of an enemy's vessel, they began to give way, while one after another, two British officers fell before the cutlass of the pirate, as they were bravely encouraging their men. All the energies of the British were now concentrated to scale the breastwork, which one daring officer had already mounted. ”

“ To capture a great treasure ship, after the Spaniards had been at so much trouble to load it, was a grand thing, according to the pirate's point of view, and although it often required reckless bravery and almost superhuman energy to accomplish the feats necessary in this dangerous vocation, these were qualities which were possessed by nearly all the sea-robbers of our coast ”

“ Our provisions nearly gone; our mouths parched extremely with thirst; our strength wasted; our spirits broken, and our hopes imprisoned within the circumference of this desolate island in the midst of an unfrequented ocean; all these things gave to the scene around us the hue of death. In the midst of this dreadful despondence, a sail hove in sight bearing the white flag! Our hopes were raised, of course--but no sooner raised than darkened, by hearing a gun fired. Here then was another gang of pirates. ”

“ Well, if you can get three good fellows to go with you—boys that you know are not blackguards, but are the kind of boys that your father would be willing to have you associate with—I'll give you a boat and a tent, and you shall have a better cruise than any pirate ever had; for no real pirate ever found any fun in being a thief and a murderer. You go and see Tom and the Sharpe boys, and tell them about it. I'll see about the boat as soon as you have shipped your crew. ”

“ They have a deal of bluster and make a deal of noise, but when you seize them and hold them with a strong hand, there’s naught of fight left in them. ’Tis like enough there’ll not be so much as a musket fired to-day. I’ve had to do with ’em often enough before to know my gentlemen well by this time.” Nor, as was said, was it until the very last that the lieutenant could be brought to believe that the pirates had any stomach for a fight.
The two vessels had reached perhaps within a mile of the pirate sloop before they found the water too shoal to venture any farther with the sail. ”

“ This ship, having by this time cleared away one of its guns, was able to fire a parting shot against the vice-admiral, striking her somewhere forward, as our hero could see by a great shower of splinters that flew up in the moonlight.
At the sound of the shot all the vessels of the flota not yet disturbed by the alarm were aroused at once, so that the pirates had the satisfaction of knowing that they would have to run the gantlet of all the ships between them and the open sea before they could reckon themselves escaped. ”

“ They know that pirates are wicked men, that, in fact, they are sea-robbers or maritime murderers, but their bold and adventurous method of life, their bravery, daring, and the exciting character of their expeditions, give them something of the same charm and interest which belong to the robber knights of the middle ages. The one mounts his mailed steed and clanks his long sword against his iron stirrup, riding forth into the world with a feeling that he can do anything that pleases him, if he finds himself strong enough. ”

“ By far the largest number of pirate captains were Englishmen, for, from the days of good Queen Bess, English sea captains seemed to have a natural turn for any species of venture that had a smack of piracy in it, and from the great Admiral Drake of the old, old days, to the truculent Morgan of buccaneering times, the Englishman did the boldest and wickedest deeds, and wrought the most damage.
First of all upon the list of pirates stands the bold Captain Avary, one of the institutors of marooning. Him we see but dimly, half hidden by the glamouring mists of legends and tradition. ”

“ But as Mainwaring, streaming with blood, rushed out upon the deck, the pirates became immediately aware that their own captain must have been overpowered, and in an instant their desperate energy began to evaporate. One or two jumped overboard; one, who seemed to be the mate, fell dead from a pistol shot, and then, in the turn of a hand, there was a rush of a retreat and a vision of leaping forms in the dusky light of the lanthorns and a sound of splashing in the water below. ”

“ Jewelers were turning out stun-gun pins for ornaments, Darthian knives for brooches, and the song writers had eight new tunes on the air about pirate lovers, pirate queens, and dark ships that roam the lanes of night. Three new vision-play series were to start that same night with space-piracy as their theme, and one of them claimed to be based on your life. Better make them pay for that, Hoddan! In short, Walden had rediscovered the pleasure to be had by taking pains to make a fool of one's self. People who watched that raid on visionscreens had thrills they'd never swap for tranquilizers! ”

“ Yet, however great had been their sufferings, their lives had been spared only to endure still greater torments. Being strongly pinioned they were forced into a small leaky boat and rowed on shore, which we having reached and a division of the plunder having been made by the Pirates, a scene of the most bloody and wanton barbarity ensued, the bare recollection of which still chills my blood. Having first divested them of every article of clothing but their shirts and trousers, with swords, knives, axes, etc., they fell on the unfortunate crew of the Eliza Ann with the ferocity of cannibals. ”

“ We had hoped for a play upon the sea, with a tall mast rocking from wing to wing and a tempest roaring at the rail. Alas! Our pirates grow old and stiff. They have retired, as we say, from active practice and live in idle luxury on shore. ”

“ Percy, quick as thought, drew a pistol from his belt and fired into his face! He fell heavily to the deck, and the combatants closed around him, as tempest-waves close over a foundering ship!
The pirates, now that their leader was slain, fought with less spirit, and the victory was soon decided in our favor. Sooth to say, it was dearly earned; and many [53] who sought the battle with a quickened pulse, and eager for the strife, were that evening consigned to the waves. Of all the pirate's crew, consisting of nearly a hundred men, but thirteen remained unharmed. ”