Sounds are heard that indicate the pirates' approach. The police conceal themselves, and soon the intruders enter, armed with all kinds of burglarious tools, and with a cat-like tread (they say so, at least, though they are singing their loudest). They are interrupted, not by the police, but by the appearance of General Stanley. He has had a sleepless night, the effect of a tortured conscience, and he comes in in a dressing-gown and carrying a light. Soon his daughters also appear in their night-caps. The General is seized and ordered to prepare for death. Frederic, even on Mabel's entreaties, cannot save him, for is he not himself a pirate again?
Eventually the police, having passively watched the situation so long, summon up courage and tackle the pirates, but they are soon overcome. The sergeant, who with the rest of his men is held prostrate under drawn swords, then calls upon the ruffians to surrender in the name of the Queen. The command acts like magic. Loyally the pirates kneel to their captives, for it transpires from Ruth's lips that they are really "no members of the common throng; they are all noblemen who have gone wrong." All ends happily. The Pirates of Penzance promise to return forthwith to their legislative duties in the House of Lords and, in doing so, they are to share their coronets with the beautiful daughters of old General Stanley.
"PATIENCE."
Produced April 23rd, 1881.
There is satire in the very name of this opera. The craze for æstheticism against which it was directed must have placed a strain on the patience of so brilliant an exponent of British commonsense as Sir William Gilbert.
Shortly before the play opens, twenty of the maidens of the village adjoining Castle Bunthorne had fallen in love with the officers of the 35th Heavy Dragoons. But when Reginald Bunthorne, a fleshly poet and a devotee of the æsthetic cult, arrived at the castle, they had fallen out of love with their Dragoons and united with Lady Jane (of uncertain age) in worshipping him. When the curtain rises the "twenty love-sick maidens" are lamenting that Bunthorne is "ice-insensible." Lady Jane tells them that he loves Patience, the village milkmaid, who is seen regarding them with pity. Lady Angela tells Patience that if she has never loved she can never have known true happiness. Patience replies that "the truly happy always seem to have so much on their minds," and "never seem quite well." Lady Jane explains that it is "Not indigestion, but æsthetic transfiguration." Patience informs the ladies that the 35th Dragoon Guards have arrived. Lady Ella declares, "We care nothing for Dragoon Guards." "But," exclaims Patience, "You were all engaged to them." "Our minds have been etherealised, our perceptions exalted," answers Lady Angela, who calls on the others to lift up their voices in morning carol to "Our Reginald."
The 35th Dragoons arrive and the Colonel gives us in song:—
"A receipt for that popular mystery
Known to the world as a Heavy Dragoon."
One of them who arrives later looks miserable, but declares "I'm as cheerful as a poor devil can be, who has the misfortune to be a Duke with a thousand a day." His wretchedness is not relieved by the entrance of Bunthorne, followed by the maidens, who ignore the Dragoons. The Poet pretends to be absorbed in the composition of a poem, but he slyly observes, "I hear plainly all they say, twenty love-sick maidens they." Lady Jane explains to the soldiers that Bunthorne has idealised them. Bunthorne meanwhile is to be seen writhing in the throes of composition. "Finished!" he exclaims and faints in the arms of the Colonel. When he recovers, the love-sick maidens entreat him to read the poem. "Shall I?" he asks. Fiercely the Dragoons shout "No!" but bidding the ladies to "Cling passionately to one another," he recites "Oh, Hollow! Hollow! Hollow!" When the Colonel reminds the ladies that they are engaged to the Dragoons, Lady Saphir says, "It can never be. You are not Empyrean," while Lady Jane sneers at the crudity of their red and yellow uniforms. The Dragoons resent this "insult" to a uniform which has been "as successful in the courts of Venus as in the field of Mars," and lament that "the peripatetics of long-haired æsthetics" should have captured the ladies' fancy. Angrily they return to their camp.
Bunthorne, left "alone and unobserved," confesses to being an "æsthetic sham." "In short," he says, "my mediævalism's affectation, born of a morbid love of admiration." Then Patience enters, and he makes love to her. She repulses him, and tragically he bids her farewell. Lady Angela implores her to "Try, try, try to love." She dilates upon the "Ennobling and unselfish passion" until Patience declares, "I won't go to bed until I'm head over ears in love with somebody." Patience soliloquises, "I had no idea love was a duty. No wonder they all look so unhappy. I'll go at once and fall in love with—" but stops, startled by a figure almost as grotesque as Bunthorne, and exclaims, "A stranger!" The stranger is Archibald Grosvenor, an idyllic poet, who plunges boldly into a declaration of love with his "Prithee pretty maiden, will you marry me." Patience replies, "I do not know you and therefore must decline." He reveals that he was her sweetheart in childhood's days. Grosvenor begs Patience imagine "The horror of his situation, gifted with unrivalled beauty, and madly loved at first sight by every woman he meets." When Patience enquires why he does not disfigure himself to escape such persecution, he replies, "These gifts were given to me for the enjoyment and delectation of my fellow creatures. I am a trustee for beauty." Grosvenor and Patience plight their troth, but as she remembers that love must be unselfish, and that Grosvenor is so beautiful that there can be no unselfishness in loving him, they bid each other "Farewell." Just as they are parting it occurs to Patience that it cannot be selfish for Grosvenor to love her, and he promises, "I'll go on adoring."