FREDERIC: More than that, he never was one!
KING: Am I to understand that, to save his contemptible life, he dared to practice 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--
KING: Not a word! He is doomed!
TRIO
KING and RUTH: FREDERICAway, away! my heart's on fire; Away, away! ere I expire--I burn, this base deception toI find my duty hard to do to-repay.day!
This very night my vengeance dire My heart is filled with anguish dire, Shall glut itself in gore.It strikes me to the core.
Away, away! Away, away!
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, To-night the traitor dies.
ALL: Yes, yes! to-night the traitor dies!
Yes, yes! to-night the traitor dies!
RUTH: To-night he dies!
KING: Yes, or early to-morrow.
FREDERIC: His girls likewise?
RUTH: They will welter in sorrow.
KING: The one soft spot RUTH: In their natures they cherish--FREDERIC: And all who plot KING: To abuse it shall perish!
ALL: To-night he dies, etc.
(Exeunt KING and RUTH.FREDERIC throws himself on a stone in blank despair.Enter MABEL.)RECIT--MABELAll 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.
DUET--MABEL and FREDERIC
MABEL:Stay, Fred'ric, stay!
They have no legal claim, No shadow of a shame Will fall upon thy name.
Stay, Frederic, stay!
FREDERIC: Nay, Mabel, nay!
To-night I quit these walls, The thought my soul appalls, But when stern Duty calls, I must obey.
MABEL:Stay, Fred'ric, stay!
FREDERIC: Nay, Mabel, nay!
MABEL:They have no claim--
FREDERIC: But Duty's name.
The thought my soul appalls, But when stern Duty calls, MABEL:Stay, Fred'ric, stay!
FREDERIC: I must obey.
BALLAD--MABEL
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.
He loves thee-- he is here.
Fa-la, la-la, Fa-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.
He loves thee-- he is gone.
Fa-la, la-la, Fa-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.
Oh, here is love, etc.
(FREDERIC rushes to window and leaps out)MABEL:(almost fainting) No, I am 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, 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; but if it was his duty to constitute himself my foe, it is likewise my duty to regard him in that light.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!
SERGEANT: It is too late now!
POLICE: It is!
SOLO AND CHORUS
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.
