DON AL.My young friend, a Grand Inquisitor is always up to date.(To Cas.) His mother is at present the wife of a highly respectable and old-established brigand, who carries on an extensive practice in the mountains around Cordova.Accompanied by two of my emissaries, he will set off at once for his mother's address.She will return with them, and if she finds any difficulty in making up her mind, the persuasive influence of the torture chamber will jog her memory.
RECITATIVE--CASILDA and DON ALHAMBRA.
CAS.But, bless my heart, consider my position!
I am the wife of one, that's very clear;
But who can tell, except by intuition, Which is the Prince, and which the Gondolier?
DON AL.Submit to Fate without unseemly wrangle:
Such complications frequently occur--
Life is one closely complicated tangle:
Death is the only true unraveller!
QUINTET--DUKE, DUCHESS, CASILDA, LUIZ, and GRAND INQUISITOR.
ALL.Try we life-long, we can never Straighten out life's tangled skein, Why should we, in vain endeavour, Guess and guess and guess again?
LUIZ.Life's a pudding full of plums,DUCH.Care's a canker that benumbs.
ALL.Life's a pudding full of plums, Care's a canker that benumbs.
Wherefore waste our elocution On impossible solution?
Life's a pleasant institution, Let us take it as it comes!
Set aside the dull enigma, We shall guess it all too soon;Failure brings no kind of stigma--Dance we to another tune!
LUIZ.String the lyre and fill the cup,DUCH.Lest on sorrow we should sup.
ALL.Hop and skip to Fancy's fiddle, Hands across and down the middle--Life's perhaps the only riddle That we shrink from giving up!
(Exeunt all into Ducal Palace except Luiz, who goes off in gondola.)(Enter Gondoliers and Contadine, followed by Marco, Gianetta, Giuseppe, and Tessa.)CHORUS.
Bridegroom and bride!
Knot that's insoluble, Voices all voluble Hail it with pride.
Bridegroom and bride!
We in sincerity Wish you prosperity, Bridegroom and bride!
SONG--TESSA.
TESS.When a merry maiden marries, Sorrow goes and pleasure tarries;Every sound becomes a song, All is right, and nothing's wrong!
From to-day and ever after Let our tears be tears of laughter.
Every sigh that finds a vent Be a sigh of sweet content!
When you marry, merry maiden, Then the air with love is laden;Every flower is a rose, Every goose becomes a swan, Every kind of trouble goes Where the last year's snows have gone!
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TESS.When a merry maiden marries, Sorrow goes and pleasure tarries;Every sound becomes a song, All is right, and nothing's wrong.
Gnawing Care and aching Sorrow, Get ye gone until to-morrow;Jealousies in grim array, Ye are things of yesterday!
When you marry, merry maiden, Then the air with joy is laden;All the corners of the earth Ring with music sweetly played, Worry is melodious mirth, Grief is joy in masquerade;CHORUS.Sullen night is laughing day--All the year is merry May!
(At the end of the song, Don Alhambra enters at back.The Gondoliers and Contadine shrink from him, and gradually go off, much alarmed.)GIU.And now our lives are going to begin in real earnest!
What's a bachelor? A mere nothing--he's a chrysalis.He can't be said to live--he exists.
MAR.What a delightful institution marriage is! Why have we wasted all this time? Why didn't we marry ten years ago?
TESS.Because you couldn't find anybody nice enough.
GIA.Because you were waiting for us.
MAR.I suppose that was the reason.We were waiting for you without knowing it.(Don Alhambra comes forward.) Hallo!
DON AL.Good morning.
GIU.If this gentleman is an undertaker it's a bad omen.
DON AL.Ceremony of some sort going on?
GIU.(aside).He is an undertaker! (Aloud.) No--a little unimportant family gathering.Nothing in your line.
DON AL.Somebody's birthday, I suppose?
GIA.Yes, mine!
TESS.And mine!
MAR.And mine!
GIU.And mine!
DON AL.Curious coincidence! And how old may you all be?
TESS.It's a rude question--but about ten minutes.
DON AL.Remarkably fine children! But surely you are jesting?
TESS.In other words, we were married about ten minutes since.
DON AL.Married! You don't mean to say you are married?
MAR.Oh yes, we are married.
DON AL.What, both of you?
ALL.All four of us.
DON AL.(aside).Bless my heart, how extremely awkward!
GIA.You don't mind, I suppose?
TESS.You were not thinking of either of us for yourself, Ipresume? Oh, Giuseppe, look at him--he was.He's heart-broken!
DON AL.No, no, I wasn't! I wasn't!
GIU.Now, my man (slapping him on the back), we don't want anything in your line to-day, and if your curiosity's satisfied--you can go!
DON AL.You mustn't call me your man.It's a liberty.Idon't think you know who I am.
GIU.Not we, indeed! We are jolly gondoliers, the sons of Baptisto Palmieri, who led the last revolution.Republicans, heart and soul, we hold all men to be equal.As we abhor oppression, we abhor kings: as we detest vain-glory, we detest rank: as we despise effeminacy, we despise wealth.We are Venetian gondoliers--your equals in everything except our calling, and in that at once your masters and your servants.
DON AL.Bless my heart, how unfortunate! One of you may be Baptisto's son, for anything I know to the contrary; but the other is no less a personage than the only son of the late King of Barataria.
ALL.What!
DON AL.And I trust--I trust it was that one who slapped me on the shoulder and called me his man!
GIU.One of us a king!
MAR.Not brothers!
TESS.The King of Barataria! [Together]
GIA.Well, who'd have thought it!
MAR.But which is it?
DON AL.What does it matter? As you are both Republicans, and hold kings in detestation, of course you'll abdicate at once.
Good morning! (Going.)
GIA.and TESS.Oh, don't do that! (Marco and Giuseppe stop him.)GIU.Well, as to that, of course there are kings and kings.
When I say that I detest kings, I mean I detest bad kings.
DON AL.I see.It's a delicate distinction.