Whereof our world is but the bounding shore.
Awfully deep, my boy, awfully deep,
With this ninth moon that sends the hidden sun
Down yon dark sea, thou comest, darling boy."
The Princess Ida; or, Castle Adamant, by Mr. W. S. Gilbert, which was produced at the Savoy Theatre, on January 5th, 1884, though a humorous adaptation of Tennyson's Princess, is not strictly a burlesque, and is styled by the author "A Respectful Operatic Per-version" of the Laureate's poem. It is altered from an earlier piece by Mr. Gilbert on the same theme. Almost the only passage which can be considered an actual parody of Tennyson's diction is the speech of the Princess Ida to the Neophytes, which is modelled on the Lady Psyche's harangue in the original poem:—
"Women of Adamant, fair Neophytes—
Who thirst for such instruction as we give,
Attend, while I unfold a parable.
The elephant is mightier than Man,
Yet Man subdues him. Why? The elephant