章节正文
More Bab Ballads
by W. S. Gilbert
Contents:
Mister William
The Bumboat Woman's Story
The Two Ogres
Little Oliver
Pasha Bailey Ben
Lieutenant-Colonel Flare
Lost Mr. Blake
The Baby's Vengeance
The Captain And The Mermaids
Annie Protheroe. A Legend of Stratford-Le-Bow
An Unfortunate Likeness
Gregory Parable, LL.D.
The King Of Canoodle-Dum
First Love
Brave Alum Bey
Sir Barnaby Bampton Boo
The Modest Couple
The Martinet
The Sailor Boy To His Lass
The Reverend Simon Magus
Damon v. Pythias
My Dream
The Bishop Of Rum-Ti-Foo Again
A Worm Will Turn
The Haughty Actor
The Two Majors
Emily, John, James, And I. A Derby Legend
The Perils Of Invisibility
Old Paul And Old Tim
The Mystic Selvagee
The Cunning Woman
Phrenology
The Fairy Curate
The Way Of Wooing
Hongree And Mahry. A Recollection Of A Surrey Melodrama
Etiquette
Ballad: Mister William
Oh, listen to the tale of MISTER WILLIAM, if you please,
Whom naughty, naughty judges sent away beyond the seas.
He forged a party's will, which caused anxiety and strife,
Resulting in his getting penal servitude for life.
He was a kindly goodly man, and naturally prone,
Instead of taking others' gold, to give away his own.
But he had heard of Vice, and longed for only once to strike -
To plan ONE little wickedness - to see what it was like.
He argued with himself, and said, "A spotless man am I;
I can't be more respectable, however hard I try!
For six and thirty years I've always been as good as gold,
And now for half an hour I'll plan infamy untold!
"A baby who is wicked at the early age of one,
And then reforms - and dies at thirty-six a spotless son,
Is never, never saddled with his babyhood's defect,
But earns from worthy men consideration and respect.
"So one who never revelled in discreditable tricks
Until he reached the comfortable age of thirty-six,
May then for half an hour perpetrate a deed of shame,
Without incurring permanentdisgrace, or even blame.
"That babies don't commit such crimes as forgery is true,
But little sins develop, if you leave 'em to accrue;
And he who shuns all vices as successive seasons roll,
Should reap at length the benefit of so much self-control.
"The common sin of babyhood - objecting to be drest -
If you leave it to accumulate at compound interest,
For anything you know, may represent, if you're alive,
A burglary or murder at the age of thirty-five.
"Still, I wouldn't take advantage of this fact, but be content
With some pardonable folly - it's a mere experiment.
The greater the temptation to go wrong, the less the sin;
So with something that's particularly tempting I'll begin.
"I would not steal a penny, for my income's very fair -
I do not want a penny - I have pennies and to spare -
And if I stole a penny from a money-bag or till,
The sin would be enormous - the temptation being NIL.
"But if I broke asunder all such pettifogging bounds,
And forged a party's Will for (say) Five Hundred Thousand
Pounds,
With such an irresistibletemptation to a haul,
Of course the sin must be infinitesimally small.
"There's WILSON who is dying - he has wealth from Stock and
rent -
If I divert his riches from their natural descent,
I'm placed in a position to indulge each little whim."
So he diverted them - and they, in turn, diverted him.
Unfortunately, though, by some unpardonable flaw,
Temptation isn't recognized by Britain's Common Law;
Men found him out by some peculiarity of touch,
And WILLIAM got a "lifer," which annoyed him very much.
For, ah! he never reconciled himself to life in gaol,
He fretted and he pined, and grew dispirited and pale;
He was numbered like a cabman, too, which told upon him so
That his spirits, once so buoyant, grew uncomfortably low.
And sympathetic gaolers would remark, "It's very true,
He ain't been brought up common, like the likes of me and
you."
So they took him into hospital, and gave him mutton chops,
And chocolate, and arrowroot, and buns, and malt and hops.
Kind Clergymen, besides, grew interested in his fate,
Affected by the details of his pitiable state.
They waited on the Secretary, somewhere in Whitehall,
Who said he would receive them any day they liked to call.
"Consider, sir, the hardship of this interesting case:
A prison life brings with it something very like disgrace;
It's telling on young WILLIAM, who's reduced to skin and bone
-
Remember he's a gentleman, with money of his own.
"He had an ample income, and of course he stands in need
Of sherry with his dinner, and his customary weed;
No delicacies now can pass his gentlemanly lips -
He misses his sea-bathing and his continental trips.
"He says the other prisoners are commonplace and rude;
He says he cannot relish uncongenial prison food.
When quite a boy they taught him to distinguish Good from Bad,
And other educationaladvantages he's had.
"A burglar or garotter, or, indeed, a common thief
Is very glad to batten on potatoes and on beef,
Or anything, in short, that prison kitchens can afford, -
A cut above the diet in a common workhouse ward.
"But beef and mutton-broth don't seem to suit our WILLIAM'S
whim,
A boon to other prisoners - a punishment to him.
It never was intended that the discipline of gaol
Should dash a convict's spirits, sir, or make him thin or
pale."
"Good Gracious Me!" that sympathetic Secretary cried,
"Suppose in prison fetters MISTER WILLIAM should have died!
Dear me, of course! Imprisonment for LIFE his sentence saith:
I'm very glad you mentioned it - it might have been For Death!
"Release him with a ticket - he'll be better then, no doubt,
And tell him I apologize." So MISTER WILLIAM'S out.
I hope he will be careful in his manuscripts, I'm sure,
And not begin experimentalizing any more.
Ballad: The Bumboat Woman's Story
I'm old, my dears, and shrivelled with age, and work, and
grief,
My eyes are gone, and my teeth have been drawn by Time, the
Thief!
For terrible sights I've seen, and dangers great I've run -
I'm nearly seventy now, and my work is almost done!
Ah! I've been young in my time, and I've played the deuce
with men!
I'm speaking of ten years past - I was barely sixty then:
My cheeks were mellow and soft, and my eyes were large and
sweet,
POLL PINEAPPLE'S eyes were the standing toast of the Royal
Fleet!
A bumboat woman was I, and I faithfully served the ships
With apples and cakes, and fowls, and beer, and halfpenny
dips,
And beef for the generous mess, where the officers dine at
nights,
And fine fresh peppermint drops for the rollicking
midshipmites.
Of all the kind commanders who anchored in Portsmouth Bay,
By far the sweetest of all was kind LIEUTENANT BELAYE.'
LIEUTENANT BELAYE commanded the gunboat HOT CROSS BUN,
She was seven and thirty feet in length, and she carried a
gun.
With a laudable view of enhancing his country's naval pride,
When people inquired her size, LIEUTENANT BELAYE replied,
"Oh, my ship, my ship is the first of the Hundred and Seventy-
ones!"
Which meant her tonnage, but people imagined it meant her
guns.
Whenever I went on board he would beckon me down below,
"Come down, Little Buttercup, come" (for he loved to call me
so),
And he'd tell of the fights at sea in which he'd taken a part,
And so LIEUTENANT BELAYE won poor POLL PINEAPPLE'S heart!
But at length his orders came, and he said one day, said he,
"I'm ordered to sail with the HOT CROSS BUN to the German
Sea."
And the Portsmouth maidens wept when they learnt the evil day,
For every Portsmouth maid loved good LIEUTENANT BELAYE.
And I went to a back back street, with plenty of cheap cheap
shops,
And I bought an oilskin hat and a second-hand suit of slops,
And I went to LIEUTENANT BELAYE (and he never suspected ME!)
And I entered myself as a chap as wanted to go to sea.
We sailed that afternoon at the mystic hour of one, -
Remarkably nice young men were the crew of the HOT CROSS BUN,
I'm sorry to say that I've heard that sailors sometimes swear,
But I never yet heard a BUN say anything wrong, I declare.
When Jack Tars meet, they meet with a "Messmate, ho! What
cheer?"
But here, on the HOT CROSS BUN, it was "How do you do, my
dear?"
When Jack Tars growl, I believe they growl with a big big D-
But the strongest oath of the HOT CROSS BUNS was a mild "Dear
me!"
Yet, though they were all well-bred, you could scarcely call
them slick:
Whenever a sea was on, they were all extremely sick;
And whenever the weather was calm, and the wind was light and
fair,
They spent more time than a sailor should on his back back
hair.
They certainly shivered and shook when ordered aloft to run,
And they screamed when LIEUTENANT BELAYE discharged his only
by W. S. Gilbert
Contents:
Mister William
The Bumboat Woman's Story
The Two Ogres
Little Oliver
Pasha Bailey Ben
Lieutenant-Colonel Flare
Lost Mr. Blake
The Baby's Vengeance
The Captain And The Mermaids
Annie Protheroe. A Legend of Stratford-Le-Bow
An Unfortunate Likeness
Gregory Parable, LL.D.
The King Of Canoodle-Dum
First Love
Brave Alum Bey
Sir Barnaby Bampton Boo
The Modest Couple
The Martinet
The Sailor Boy To His Lass
The Reverend Simon Magus
Damon v. Pythias
My Dream
The Bishop Of Rum-Ti-Foo Again
A Worm Will Turn
The Haughty Actor
The Two Majors
Emily, John, James, And I. A Derby Legend
The Perils Of Invisibility
Old Paul And Old Tim
The Mystic Selvagee
The Cunning Woman
Phrenology
The Fairy Curate
The Way Of Wooing
Hongree And Mahry. A Recollection Of A Surrey Melodrama
Etiquette
Ballad: Mister William
Oh, listen to the tale of MISTER WILLIAM, if you please,
Whom naughty, naughty judges sent away beyond the seas.
He forged a party's will, which caused anxiety and strife,
Resulting in his getting penal servitude for life.
He was a kindly goodly man, and naturally prone,
Instead of taking others' gold, to give away his own.
But he had heard of Vice, and longed for only once to strike -
To plan ONE little wickedness - to see what it was like.
He argued with himself, and said, "A spotless man am I;
I can't be more respectable, however hard I try!
For six and thirty years I've always been as good as gold,
And now for half an hour I'll plan infamy untold!
"A baby who is wicked at the early age of one,
And then reforms - and dies at thirty-six a spotless son,
Is never, never saddled with his babyhood's defect,
But earns from worthy men consideration and respect.
"So one who never revelled in discreditable tricks
Until he reached the comfortable age of thirty-six,
May then for half an hour perpetrate a deed of shame,
Without incurring permanentdisgrace, or even blame.
"That babies don't commit such crimes as forgery is true,
But little sins develop, if you leave 'em to accrue;
And he who shuns all vices as successive seasons roll,
Should reap at length the benefit of so much self-control.
"The common sin of babyhood - objecting to be drest -
If you leave it to accumulate at compound interest,
For anything you know, may represent, if you're alive,
A burglary or murder at the age of thirty-five.
"Still, I wouldn't take advantage of this fact, but be content
With some pardonable folly - it's a mere experiment.
The greater the temptation to go wrong, the less the sin;
So with something that's particularly tempting I'll begin.
"I would not steal a penny, for my income's very fair -
I do not want a penny - I have pennies and to spare -
And if I stole a penny from a money-bag or till,
The sin would be enormous - the temptation being NIL.
"But if I broke asunder all such pettifogging bounds,
And forged a party's Will for (say) Five Hundred Thousand
Pounds,
With such an irresistibletemptation to a haul,
Of course the sin must be infinitesimally small.
"There's WILSON who is dying - he has wealth from Stock and
rent -
If I divert his riches from their natural descent,
I'm placed in a position to indulge each little whim."
So he diverted them - and they, in turn, diverted him.
Unfortunately, though, by some unpardonable flaw,
Temptation isn't recognized by Britain's Common Law;
Men found him out by some peculiarity of touch,
And WILLIAM got a "lifer," which annoyed him very much.
For, ah! he never reconciled himself to life in gaol,
He fretted and he pined, and grew dispirited and pale;
He was numbered like a cabman, too, which told upon him so
That his spirits, once so buoyant, grew uncomfortably low.
And sympathetic gaolers would remark, "It's very true,
He ain't been brought up common, like the likes of me and
you."
So they took him into hospital, and gave him mutton chops,
And chocolate, and arrowroot, and buns, and malt and hops.
Kind Clergymen, besides, grew interested in his fate,
Affected by the details of his pitiable state.
They waited on the Secretary, somewhere in Whitehall,
Who said he would receive them any day they liked to call.
"Consider, sir, the hardship of this interesting case:
A prison life brings with it something very like disgrace;
It's telling on young WILLIAM, who's reduced to skin and bone
-
Remember he's a gentleman, with money of his own.
"He had an ample income, and of course he stands in need
Of sherry with his dinner, and his customary weed;
No delicacies now can pass his gentlemanly lips -
He misses his sea-bathing and his continental trips.
"He says the other prisoners are commonplace and rude;
He says he cannot relish uncongenial prison food.
When quite a boy they taught him to distinguish Good from Bad,
And other educationaladvantages he's had.
"A burglar or garotter, or, indeed, a common thief
Is very glad to batten on potatoes and on beef,
Or anything, in short, that prison kitchens can afford, -
A cut above the diet in a common workhouse ward.
"But beef and mutton-broth don't seem to suit our WILLIAM'S
whim,
A boon to other prisoners - a punishment to him.
It never was intended that the discipline of gaol
Should dash a convict's spirits, sir, or make him thin or
pale."
"Good Gracious Me!" that sympathetic Secretary cried,
"Suppose in prison fetters MISTER WILLIAM should have died!
Dear me, of course! Imprisonment for LIFE his sentence saith:
I'm very glad you mentioned it - it might have been For Death!
"Release him with a ticket - he'll be better then, no doubt,
And tell him I apologize." So MISTER WILLIAM'S out.
I hope he will be careful in his manuscripts, I'm sure,
And not begin experimentalizing any more.
Ballad: The Bumboat Woman's Story
I'm old, my dears, and shrivelled with age, and work, and
grief,
My eyes are gone, and my teeth have been drawn by Time, the
Thief!
For terrible sights I've seen, and dangers great I've run -
I'm nearly seventy now, and my work is almost done!
Ah! I've been young in my time, and I've played the deuce
with men!
I'm speaking of ten years past - I was barely sixty then:
My cheeks were mellow and soft, and my eyes were large and
sweet,
POLL PINEAPPLE'S eyes were the standing toast of the Royal
Fleet!
A bumboat woman was I, and I faithfully served the ships
With apples and cakes, and fowls, and beer, and halfpenny
dips,
And beef for the generous mess, where the officers dine at
nights,
And fine fresh peppermint drops for the rollicking
midshipmites.
Of all the kind commanders who anchored in Portsmouth Bay,
By far the sweetest of all was kind LIEUTENANT BELAYE.'
LIEUTENANT BELAYE commanded the gunboat HOT CROSS BUN,
She was seven and thirty feet in length, and she carried a
gun.
With a laudable view of enhancing his country's naval pride,
When people inquired her size, LIEUTENANT BELAYE replied,
"Oh, my ship, my ship is the first of the Hundred and Seventy-
ones!"
Which meant her tonnage, but people imagined it meant her
guns.
Whenever I went on board he would beckon me down below,
"Come down, Little Buttercup, come" (for he loved to call me
so),
And he'd tell of the fights at sea in which he'd taken a part,
And so LIEUTENANT BELAYE won poor POLL PINEAPPLE'S heart!
But at length his orders came, and he said one day, said he,
"I'm ordered to sail with the HOT CROSS BUN to the German
Sea."
And the Portsmouth maidens wept when they learnt the evil day,
For every Portsmouth maid loved good LIEUTENANT BELAYE.
And I went to a back back street, with plenty of cheap cheap
shops,
And I bought an oilskin hat and a second-hand suit of slops,
And I went to LIEUTENANT BELAYE (and he never suspected ME!)
And I entered myself as a chap as wanted to go to sea.
We sailed that afternoon at the mystic hour of one, -
Remarkably nice young men were the crew of the HOT CROSS BUN,
I'm sorry to say that I've heard that sailors sometimes swear,
But I never yet heard a BUN say anything wrong, I declare.
When Jack Tars meet, they meet with a "Messmate, ho! What
cheer?"
But here, on the HOT CROSS BUN, it was "How do you do, my
dear?"
When Jack Tars growl, I believe they growl with a big big D-
But the strongest oath of the HOT CROSS BUNS was a mild "Dear
me!"
Yet, though they were all well-bred, you could scarcely call
them slick:
Whenever a sea was on, they were all extremely sick;
And whenever the weather was calm, and the wind was light and
fair,
They spent more time than a sailor should on his back back
hair.
They certainly shivered and shook when ordered aloft to run,
And they screamed when LIEUTENANT BELAYE discharged his only
- unfortunate [ʌn´fɔ:tʃunit]
a.不幸的，运气差的 (初中英语单词) - modest [´mɔdist] a.谦虚的；朴素的 (初中英语单词)
- bishop [´biʃəp] n.主教 (初中英语单词)
- cunning [´kʌniŋ] a.&n.狡猾(诡诈)的 (初中英语单词)
- anxiety [æŋ´zaiəti] n.挂念；渴望；焦虑的事 (初中英语单词)
- wicked [´wikid] a.邪恶的；不道德的 (初中英语单词)
- worthy [´wə:ði] a.有价值的；值得的 (初中英语单词)
- consideration [kən,sidə´reiʃən] n.考虑；原因；体谅 (初中英语单词)
- permanent [´pə:mənənt] a.永久的；不变的 (初中英语单词)
- disgrace [dis´greis] n.耻辱 vt.玷辱；贬黜 (初中英语单词)
- commit [kə´mit] vt.犯(罪)；把...判处 (初中英语单词)
- accumulate [ə´kju:mjuleit] n.积累；积聚；堆积 (初中英语单词)
- compound [kəm´paund] n.&a.混合(的) v.合成 (初中英语单词)
- advantage [əd´vɑ:ntidʒ] n.优势；利益 (初中英语单词)
- enormous [i´nɔ:məs] a.巨大地，很，极 (初中英语单词)
- wealth [welθ] n.财富，财产 (初中英语单词)
- riches [´ritʃiz] n.房地产；丰富 (初中英语单词)
- sympathetic [,simpə´θetik] a.同情的，有同情心的 (初中英语单词)
- income [´inkʌm] n.收入，所得 (初中英语单词)
- distinguish [di´stiŋgwiʃ] v.区分；识别；立功 (初中英语单词)
- punishment [´pʌniʃmənt] n.罚，刑罚 (初中英语单词)
- discipline [´disiplin] n.纪律；训练 (初中英语单词)
- gracious [´greiʃəs] a.和蔼可亲的；任慈的 (初中英语单词)
- sentence [´sentəns] n.判决 vt.宣判；处刑 (初中英语单词)
- barely [´beəli] ad.公开地；仅仅 (初中英语单词)
- standing [´stændiŋ] n.持续 a.直立的 (初中英语单词)
- generous [´dʒenərəs] a.慷慨的；丰盛的 (初中英语单词)
- lieutenant [lef´tenənt] n.陆军中尉；代理；副手 (初中英语单词)
- learnt [lə:nt] learn 的过去式(分词) (初中英语单词)
- second-hand [,sekənd´hænd] a.用过的；间接的 (初中英语单词)
- extremely [ik´stri:mli] ad.极端地；非常地 (初中英语单词)
- whenever [wen´evə] conj.&ad.无论何时 (初中英语单词)
- reverend [´revərənd] a.可尊敬的 (高中英语单词)
- haughty [´hɔ:ti] a.傲慢的，高傲的 (高中英语单词)
- recollection [,rekə´lekʃən] n.回忆；追想；记忆力 (高中英语单词)
- naughty [´nɔ:ti] a.顽皮的；下流的 (高中英语单词)
- goodly [´gudli] a.适意的；漂亮的 (高中英语单词)
- respectable [ri´spektəbəl] a.可敬的；有身价的 (高中英语单词)
- successive [sək´sesiv] a.相继的；接连的 (高中英语单词)
- temptation [temp´teiʃən] n.引诱，诱惑(物) (高中英语单词)
- divert [dai´və:t] vt.转移注意力；消遣 (高中英语单词)
- indulge [in´dʌldʒ] v.(使)沉迷；沉溺；放任 (高中英语单词)
- peculiarity [pi,kju:li´æriti] n.特色；特性；怪癖 (高中英语单词)
- mutton [´mʌtn] n.羊肉 (高中英语单词)
- hardship [´hɑ:dʃip] n.受苦，吃苦；苦难 (高中英语单词)
- customary [´kʌstəməri] a.通常的；惯例的 (高中英语单词)
- continental [,kɔnti´nentl] a.大陆的，大陆性的 (高中英语单词)
- relish [´reliʃ] n.滋味；风味 v.品尝 (高中英语单词)
- educational [,edju´keiʃənəl] a.教育(上)的 (高中英语单词)
- imprisonment [im´priznmənt] n.监禁，下狱 (高中英语单词)
- mellow [´meləu] a.芳醇的 v.(使)成熟 (高中英语单词)
- faithfully [´feiθfəli] ad.忠实地；诚恳地 (高中英语单词)
- beckon [´bekən] v.召唤 (高中英语单词)
- mister [´mistə] n.先生 vt.称...先生 (英语四级单词)
- tempting [´temptiŋ] a.引诱人的，吸引人的 (英语四级单词)
- asunder [ə´sʌndə] a.分开地；零散地 (英语四级单词)
- irresistible [,iri´zistəbəl] a.不可抵抗的 (英语四级单词)
- buoyant [´bɔiənt] a.能漂浮的；快活的 (英语四级单词)
- commonplace [´kɔmənpleis] a.平凡的；常见的 (英语四级单词)
- burglar [´bə:glə] n.(入室行窃的)盗贼 (英语四级单词)
- mystic [´mistik] a.神秘的；难以理解的 (英语六级单词)
- servitude [´sə:vitju:d] n.奴隶状态；苦役 (英语六级单词)
- taking [´teikiŋ] a.迷人的 n.捕获物 (英语六级单词)
- speaking [´spi:kiŋ] n.说话 a.发言的 (英语六级单词)
- tonnage [´tʌnidʒ] n.吨位，吨数 (英语六级单词)
文章标签:名著
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