The Pirates of Penzance/Act 2

Act II

A ruined chapel by moonlight. Ruined Gothic windows at back. Major-General discovered seated pensively, surrounded by his daughters.

Chorus

Oh, dry the glistening tear

That dews that martial cheek;

Thy loving children hear,

In them thy comfort seek.

With sympathetic care

Their arms around thee creep,

For oh, they cannot bear

To see their father weep!

Enter Mabel.

Solo — Mabel.

Dear father, why leave your bed

At this untimely hour,

When happy daylight is dead,

And darksome dangers lower?

See, heaven has lit her lamp,

The twilight hour is past,

And the chilly night air is damp,

And the dews are falling fast!

Dear father, why leave your bed

When happy daylight is dead?

Chorus

LOh, dry the glistening tear, etc.

Frederic enters.

Mabel

Oh, Frederic, cannot you, in the calm excellence of your wisdom, reconcile it with your

|-conscience to say something that will relieve my father's sorrow?

Frederic

I will try, dear Mabel. But why does he sit, night after night, in this draughty old ruin?

Major-General

Why do I sit here? To escape from the pirates' clutches, I described myself as an orphan; and, heaven help me, I am no orphan! I come here to humble myself before the tombs of my ancestors, and to implore their pardon for having brought dishonour on the family escutcheon.

Frederic

But you forget, sir, you only bought the property a year ago, and the stucco on your baronial castle is scarcely dry.

Major-General

Frederic, in this chapel are ancestors: you cannot deny that. With the estate, I bought the chapel and its contents. I don't know whose ancestors they were, but I know whose ancestors they are, and I shudder to think that their descendant by purchase (if I may so describe myself) should have brought disgrace upon what, I have no doubt, was an unstained escutcheon.

Frederic

Be comforted. Had you not acted as you did, these reckless men would assuredly have called in the nearest clergyman, and have married your large family on the spot.

Major-General

I thank you for your proffered solace, but it is unavailing. I assure you, Frederic, that such is the anguish and remorse I feel at the abominable falsehood by

which I escaped these easily deluded pirates, that I would go to their simple-minded chief this very night and confess all, did I not fear that the consequences would be most disastrous to myself. At what time does your expedition march against these scoundrels?

Frederic

At eleven, and before midnight I hope to have atoned for my involuntary association with the pestilent scourges by sweeping them from the face of the earth — and then, dear Mabel, you will be mine!

Major-General

Are your devoted followers at hand?

Frederic

They are, they only wait my orders.

Recitative — Major-General.

Then, Frederic, let your escort lion-hearted

Be summoned to receive a General's blessing,

Ere they depart upon their dread adventure.

Frederic

Dear, sir, they come.

Enter Police, marching in single file. They form in line, facing audience.

Song — Sergeant, with Police.

When the foeman bares his steel,

Tarantara! tarantara!

We uncomfortable feel,

Tarantara!

And we find the wisest thing,

Tarantara! tarantara!

Is to slap our chests and sing,

Tarantara!

For when threatened with emeutes,

Tarantara! tarantara!

And your heart is in your boots,

Tarantara!

There is nothing brings it round

Like the trumpet's martial sound,

Like the trumpet's martial sound

All

Tarantara! tarantara!, etc.

Mabel

Go, ye heroes, go to glory,

Though you die in combat gory,

Ye shall live in song and story.

Go to immortality!

Go to death, and go to slaughter;

Die, and every Cornish daughter

With her tears your grave shall water.

Go, ye heroes, go and die!

Girls

Go, ye heroes, go and die!

Sergeant, with Police.

Though to us it's evident,

Tarantara! tarantara!

These attentions are well meant,

Tarantara!

Such expressions don't appear,

Tarantara! tarantara!

Calculated men to cheer,

Tarantara!

Who are going to meet their fate

In a highly nervous state.

Tarantara! tarantara! tarantara!

Still to us it's evident

These attentions are well meant.

Tarantara! tarantara! tarantara!

Edith

Go and do your best endeavour,

And before all links we sever,

We will say farewell for ever.

Go to glory and the grave!

Girls

Go to glory and the grave!

For your foes are fierce and ruthless,

False, unmerciful, and truthless;

Young and tender, old and toothless,

All in vain their mercy crave.

Sergeant

We observe too great a stress,

On the risks that on us press,

And of reference a lack

To our chance of coming back.

Still, perhaps it would be wise

Not to carp or criticise,

For it's very evident

These attentions are well meant.

Police

Yes, it's very evident

These attentions are well meant, etc.

Ensemble

Chorus of all but Police	Chorus of Police
Go ye heroes, go to glory, etc.	When the foeman bears his steel, etc.

Major-General

Away, away!

Police

(without moving) Yes, yes, we go.

Major-General

These pirates slay.

Police.

Tarantara!

Major-General

Then do not stay.

Police

Tarantara!

Major-General

Then why this delay?

Police

All right, we go.

Yes, forward on the foe!

Major-General

Yes, but you don't go!

Police

We go, we go

Yes, forward on the foe!

Major-General

Yes, but you don't go!

All

At last they really go!

Exeunt Police. Mabel tears herself from Frederic and exit, followed by her sisters, consoling her. The Major-General and others follow. Frederic remains alone.

Recitative — Frederic.

Now for the pirates' lair! Oh, joy unbounded!

Oh, sweet relief! Oh, rapture unexampled!

At last I may atone, in some slight measure,

For the repeated acts of theft and pillage

Which, at a sense of duty's stern dictation,

I, circumstance's victim, have been guilty!

Pirate King and Ruth appear, armed.

Pirate King

Young Frederic! (Covering him with pistol)

Frederic

Who calls?

Pirate King

Your late commander!

Ruth

And I, your little Ruth! (Covering him with pistol)

Frederic

Oh, mad intruders,

How dare ye face me? Know ye not, oh rash ones,

That I have doomed you to extermination?

Pirate King and Ruth hold a pistol to each ear.

Pirate King

Have mercy on us! hear us, ere you slaughter!

Frederic

I do not think I ought to listen to you.

Yet, mercy should alloy our stern resentment,

And so I will be merciful — say on!

Trio — Ruth, Pirate King, and Frederic.

Ruth

When you had left our pirate fold,

We tried to raise our spirits faint,

According to our custom old,

With quip and quibble quaint.

But all in vain the quips we heard,

We lay and sobbed upon the rocks,

Until to somebody occurred

A startling paradox.

Frederic

A paradox?

Ruth (laughing)

A paradox!

A most ingenious paradox!

We've quips and quibbles heard in flocks,

But none to beat this paradox!

All

A paradox, a paradox, etc.

Pirate King

We knew your taste for curious quips,

For cranks and contradictions queer;

And with the laughter on our lips,

We wished you there to hear.

We said, "If we could tell it him,

How Frederic would the joke enjoy!"

And so we've risked both life and limb

To tell it to our boy.

Frederic (interested)

That paradox?

Pirate King (laughing)

That most ingenious paradox!

We've quips and quibbles heard in flocks,

But none to beat that paradox!

All

A paradox, a paradox, etc.

Chant — Pirate King

For some ridiculous reason, to which, however, I've no desire to be disloyal,

Some person in authority, I don't know who, very likely the Astronomer Royal,

Has decided that, although for such a beastly month as February, twenty-eight days as a rule are plenty,

One year in every four his days shall be reckoned as nine and twenty.

Through some singular coincidence — I shouldn't be surprised if it were owing to the agency of an ill-natured fairy —

You are the victim of this clumsy arrangement, having been born in leap-year, on the twenty-ninth of February;

And so, by a simple arithmetical process, you'll easily discover,

That though you've lived twenty-one years, yet, if we go by birthdays, you're only five and a little bit over!

Ruth and Pirate King

Ha! ha! ha! ha!

Ho! ho! ho! ho!

Frederic

Dear me!

Let's see! (counting on fingers)

Yes, yes; with yours my figures do agree!

All

Ha! ha! ha! ho! ho! ho! ho!

Frederic (more amused than any)

How quaint the ways of Paradox!

At common sense she gaily mocks!

Though counting in the usual way,

Years twenty-one I've been alive,

Yet, reckoning by my natal day,

I am a little boy of five!

Ruth and Pirate King

He is a little boy of five!

Ha! ha! ha!

All

A paradox, a paradox,

A most ingenious paradox!

Ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha!, etc.

Ruth and Pirate King throw themselves back on seats, exhausted with laughter.

Frederic

Upon my word, this is most curious — most absurdly whimsical. Five-and-a-quarter! No one would think it to look at me!

Ruth

You are glad now, I'll be bound, that you spared us. You would never have forgiven yourself when you discovered that you had killed two of your comrades.

Frederic

My comrades?

Pirate King (rises)

I'm afraid you don't appreciate the delicacy of your position: You were apprenticed to us —

Frederic

Until I reached my twenty-first year.

Pirate King

No, until you reached your twenty-first birthday (producing document), and, going by birthdays, you are as yet only five-and-a-quarter.

Frederic

You don't mean to say you are going to hold me to that?

Pirate King

No, we merely remind you of the fact, and leave the rest to your sense of duty.

Ruth

Your sense of duty!

Frederic (wildly)

Don't put it on that footing! As I was merciful to you just now, be merciful to me! I implore you not to insist on the letter of your bond just as the cup of happiness is at my lips!

Ruth

We insist on nothing; we content ourselves with pointing out to you your duty.

Pirate King

Your duty!

Frederic (after a pause)

Well, you have appealed to my sense of duty, and my duty is only too clear. I abhor your infamous calling; I shudder at the thought that I have ever been mixed up with it; but duty is before all — at any price I will do my duty.

Pirate King

Bravely spoken! Come, you are one of us once more.

Frederic

Lead on, I follow. (suddenly) Oh, horror!

Ruth and Pirate King

What is the matter?

Frederic

Ought I to tell you? No, no, I cannot do it; and yet, as one of your band —

Pirate King

Speak out, I charge you by that sense of conscientiousness to which we have never yet appealed in vain.

Frederic

General Stanley, the father of my Mabel —

Ruth and Pirate King

Yes, yes!

Frederic

He escaped from you on the plea that he was an orphan?

Pirate King

He did.

Frederic

It breaks my heart to betray the honoured father of the girl I adore, but as your apprentice I have no alternative. It is my duty to tell you that General Stanley is no orphan!

Ruth and Pirate King

What!

Frederic

More than that, he never was one!

Pirate King

Am I to understand that, to save his contemptible life, he dared to practise on our credulous simplicity? ('Frederic nods as he weeps) Our revenge shall be swift

and terrible. We will go and collect our band and attack Tremorden Castle this very night.

Frederic

But stay —

Pirate King

Not a word! He is doomed!

Trio.

Ruth and Pirate King	Frederic
Away, away! my heart's on fire;	Away, away! ere I expire —
I burn, this base deception to repay.	I find my duty hard to do today!
This very night my vengeance dire	My heart is filled with anguish dire,
Shall glut itself in gore. Away, away!	It strikes me to the core. Away, away!

Pirate King

With falsehood foul

He tricked us of our brides.

Let vengeance howl;

The Pirate so decides.

Our nature stern

He softened with his lies,

And, in return,

Tonight the traitor dies.

All

Yes, yes! tonight the traitor dies!

Ruth

Tonight he dies!

Pirate King

Yes, or early tomorrow.

Frederic

His girls likewise?

Ruth

They will welter in sorrow.

Pirate King

The one soft spot —

Ruth

In their natures they cherish —

Frederic

And all who plot —

Pirate King

To abuse it shall perish!

All

Tonight he dies, etc.

Exeunt Pirate King and Ruth. Enter Mabel.

Recitative — Mabel.

All is prepared, your gallant crew await you.

My Frederic in tears? It cannot be

That lion-heart quails at the coming conflict?

Frederic

No, Mabel, no. A terrible disclosure

Has just been made. Mabel, my dearly-loved one,

I bound myself to serve the pirate captain

Until I reached my one-and-twentieth birthday —

Mabel

But you are twenty-one?

Frederic

I've just discovered

That I was born in leap-year, and that birthday

Will not be reached by me till nineteen forty!

Mabel

Oh, horrible! catastrophe appalling!

Frederic

And so, farewell!

Mabel

No, no! Ah, Frederic, hear me.

Stay, Frederic, stay!

They have no legal claim,

No shadow of a shame

Will fall upon thy name.

Stay, Frederic, stay!

Frederic

Nay, Mabel, nay!

Tonight I quit these walls,

The thought my soul appalls,

But when stern Duty calls,

I must obey.

Duet — Mabel and Frederic.

Ah, leave me not to pine

Alone and desolate;

No fate seemed fair as mine,

No happiness so great!

And Nature, day by day,

Has sung in accents clear

This joyous roundelay,

"He loves thee — he is here.

Fa-la, la-la, Fa-la, la-la".

Frederic

Ah, must I leave thee here

In endless night to dream,

Where joy is dark and drear,

And sorrow all supreme —

Where nature, day by day,

Will sing, in altered tone,

This weary roundelay,

"He loves thee — he is gone.

Fa-la, la-la, Fa-la, la-la."

Frederic

In 1940 I of age shall be,

I'll then return, and claim you — I declare it!

Mabel

It seems so long!

Frederic

Swear that, till then, you will be true to me.

Mabel

Yes, I'll be strong!

By all the Stanleys dead and gone, I swear it!

Ensemble

Oh, here is love, and here is truth,

And here is food for joyous laughter:

He/She will be faithful to his/her sooth

Till we are wed, and even after.

Frederic rushes to window and leaps out.

Mabel

(almost fainting) No, I'll be brave! Oh, family descent,

How great thy charm, thy sway how excellent!

Come one and all, undaunted men in blue,

A crisis, now, affairs are coming to!

Enter Police, marching in single file.

Sergeant

Though in body and in mind,

Police

Tarantara! tarantara!

Sergeant

We are timidly inclined,

Police

Tarantara!

Sergeant

And anything but blind —

Police

Tarantara! tarantara!

Sergeant

To the danger that's behind.

Police

Tarantara!

Sergeant

Yet, when the danger's near,

Police.

Tarantara! tarantara!

Sergeant

We manage to appear —

Police

Tarantara!

Sergeant

As insensible to fear

As anybody here.

Police

Tarantara! tarantara!, etc.

Mabel

Sergeant, approach! Young Frederic was to have led you to death and glory.

Police

That is not a pleasant way of putting it.

Mabel

No matter; he will not so lead you, for he has allied himself once more with his old associates.

Police

He has acted shamefully!

Mabel

You speak falsely. You know nothing about it. He has acted nobly.

Police

He has acted nobly!

Mabel

Dearly as I loved him before, his heroic sacrifice to his sense of duty has endeared him to me tenfold. He has done his duty. I will do mine. Go ye and do yours.

Exit Mabel.

Police

Right oh!

Sergeant

This is perplexing.

Police

We cannot understand it at all.

Sergeant

Still, as he is actuated by a sense of duty —

Police

That makes a difference, of course. At the same time, we repeat, we cannot understand it at all.

Sergeant

No matter. Our course is clear: we must do our best to capture these pirates alone. It is most distressing to us to be the agents whereby our erring fellow-creatures are deprived of that liberty which is so dear to us all — but we should have thought of that before we joined the force.

Police

We should!

ergeant

It is too late now!

Police

It is!

Song — Sergeant.

Sergeant

When a felon's not engaged in his employment —

Police

His employment,

Sergeant

Or maturing his felonious little plans —

Police

Little plans,

Sergeant

His capacity for innocent enjoyment —

Police

'Cent enjoyment

Sergeant

Is just as great as any honest man's —

Police

Honest man's.

Sergeant

Our feelings we with difficulty smother —

Police

'Culty smother

Sergeant

When constabulary duty's to be done —

Police

To be done.

Sergeant

Ah, take one consideration with another —

Police

With another,

Sergeant

A policeman's lot is not a happy one.

Police

Ah, when constabulary duty's to be done, to be done,

A policeman's lot is not a happy one, happy one.

Sergeant

When the enterprising burglar's not a-burgling —

Police

Not a-burgling.

Sergeant

When the cut-throat isn't occupied in crime —

Police

'Pied in crime,

Sergeant

He loves to hear the little brook a-gurgling —

Police

Brook a-gurgling,

Sergeant

And listen to the merry village chime —

Police

Village chime.

Sergeant

When the coster's finished jumping on his mother —

Police

On his mother,

Sergeant

He loves to lie a-basking in the sun —

Police

In the sun.

Sergeant

Ah, take one consideration with another —

Police

With another,

Sergeant

A policeman's lot is not a happy one.

Police

Ah, when constabulary duty's to be done, to be done,

A policeman's lot is not a happy one, happy one.

(pianissimo)

Chorus of Pirates without, in the distance.

A rollicking band of pirates we,

Who, tired of tossing on the sea,

Are trying their hand at a burglaree,

With weapons grim and gory.

Sergeant

Hush, hush! I hear them on the manor poaching,

With stealthy step the pirates are approaching.

Chorus of Pirates, resumed nearer

We are not coming for plate or gold —

A story General Stanley's told —

We seek a penalty fifty-fold,

For General Stanley's story.

Police

They seek a penalty

Pirates

Fifty-fold!

We seek a penalty

Police

Fifty-fold!

All

They/We seek a penalty fifty-fold,

For General Stanley's story.

Sergeant

They come in force, with stealthy stride,

Our obvious course is now — to hide.

Police conceal themselves. As they do so, the Pirates are seen appearing at ruined windows. They enter cautiously, and come down stage. Samuel is laden with burglarious tools and pistols, etc.

Chorus — Pirates (very loud)

With cat-like tread,

Upon our prey we steal;

In silence dread,

Our cautious way we feel.

No sound at all,

We never speak a word,

A fly's foot-fall

Would be distinctly heard —

Police (pianissimo)

Tarantara, tarantara!

Pirates

So stealthily the pirate creeps,

While all the household soundly sleeps.

Come, friends, who plough the sea,

Truce to navigation;

Take another station;

Let's vary piracee

With a little burglaree!

Police (pianissimo)

Tarantara, tarantara!

Samuel (distributing implements to various members of the gang)

Here's your crowbar and your centrebit,

Your life-preserver — you may want to hit!

Your silent matches, your dark lantern seize,

Take your file and your skeletonic keys.

Enter Pirate King, Frederic and Ruth.

Pirates (fortissimo)

With cat-like tread, etc.

Police (pianissimo)

Tarantara! tarantara!

Recitative.

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;

And as I lay in bed awake,

I thought I heard a noise.

Men

He thought he heard a noise — ha! ha!

Major-General

No, all is still

In dale, on hill;

My mind is set at ease —

So still the scene,

It must have been

The sighing of the breeze.

Ballad — Major-General.

Sighing softly to the river

Comes the loving breeze,

Setting nature all a-quiver,

Rustling through the trees.

Men

Through the trees.

Major-General

And the brook, in rippling measure,

Laughs for very love,

While the poplars, in their pleasure,

Wave their arms above.

Men

Yes, the trees, for very love,

Wave their leafy arms above.

River, river, little river,

May thy loving prosper ever!

Heaven speed thee, poplar tree,

May thy wooing happy be.

Major-General(springing up)

Yet, the breeze is but a rover,

When he wings away,

Brook and poplar mourn a lover

Sighing, "Well-a-day!"

Men

Well-a-day!

Major-General

Ah! the doing and undoing,

That the rogue could tell!

When the breeze is out a-wooing,

Who can woo so well?

Men

Shocking tales the rogue could tell,

Nobody can woo so well.

Pretty brook, thy dream is over,

For thy love is but a rover;

Sad the lot of poplar trees,

Courted by a fickle breeze!

Enter the General's daughters, led by Mabel, all in white peignoirs and night-caps, and carrying lighted candles.

Girls

Now what is this, and what is that, and why does father leave his rest

At such a time of night as this, so very incompletely dressed?

Dear father is, and always was, the most methodical of men!

It's his invariable rule to go to bed at half-past ten.

What strange occurrence can it be that calls dear father from his rest

At such a time of night as this, so very incompletely dressed?

Enter Pirate King, Samuel, and Frederic.

Pirate King

Forward, my men, and seize that General there!

They seize the Major-General.

Girls

The pirates! the pirates! Oh, despair!

Pirates (springing up)

Yes, we're the pirates, so despair!

Major-General

Frederic here! Oh, joy! Oh. rapture!

Summon your men and effect their capture!

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!

Girls

Oh, rapture!

A struggle ensues between Pirates and Police, Eventually the Police are overcome and fall prostrate, the Pirates standing over them with drawn swords.

Chorus or Pirates and Police

We/You triumph now, for well we trow

Your/Our mortal career's cut short;

No pirate band will take its stand

At the Central Criminal Court.

Sergeant

To gain a brief advantage you've contrived,

But your proud triumph will not be long-lived.

Pirate King

Don't say you are orphans, for we know that game.

Sergeant

On your allegiance we've a stronger claim —

We charge you yield, we charge you yield,

In Queen Victoria's name!

Pirate King (baffled)

You do?

Police

We do!

We charge you yield,

In Queen Victoria's name!

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.

Major-General

No Englishman unmoved that statement hears,

Because, with all our faults, we love our House of Peers.

I pray you, pardon me, ex-Pirate King!

Peers will be peers, and youth will have its fling.

Resume your ranks and legislative duties,

And take my daughters, all of whom are beauties.

Act II Finale

Poor wandering ones!

Though ye have surely strayed,

Take heart of grace,

Your steps retrace,

Poor wandering ones!

Poor wandering ones!

If such poor love as ours

Can help you find

True peace of mind,

Why, take it, it is yours!

All

Poor wandering ones! etc.