598 



Hon. Maurice Baring [June 



the Guard. This is such a beautiful tune that the public, when 

 Mr. Derek Oldham sang it during the recent revival, never even 

 encored it. They were too greatly moved to do so, too satisfied 

 hardly even to applaud. 



Sullivan has another gift which is the hallmark of great art, the 

 gift of discretion, of leading up to an effect in such a way that the 

 effect when it comes seems as sudden as an April shower and yet as 

 inevitable as a flower opening. 



For instance, the way a famous song is led up to in Pinafore : — 



" I am an Englishman, behold me. 

 He is an Englishman : 

 For he himself has said it," etc. 



Or more striking still, in The Mikado, the music that precedes the 

 phrase : — 



" For he's going to marry Yum- Yum." 



Gilbert's favourite opera is said to have been The Yeomen of the 

 Guard, and certainly he never wrote more beautiful words than : — 



"Is life a boon? 



If so, it must befall 



That Death, whene'er he call, 

 Must call too soon. 



Though fourscore years he give, 



Yet one would pray to live 

 Another moon ! 



What kind of plaint have I 



Who perish in July ? 



I might have had to die, 

 Perchance, in June ! 



" Is life a thorn? 



Then count it not a whit ! 



Man is well done with it ; 

 Soon as he's born 



He should all means essay 



To put the plague away ; 

 And I, war-worn, 



Poor captured fugitive, 



My life most gladly give — 



I might have had to live 

 Another morn ! " 



And Sullivan never wrote anything more exquisite than the 

 music to this, nor than the duet, " I have a song to sing, 0," and 

 the unaccompanied quartette, " Strange adventure," in the same 

 opera. Bnt here both the poet and the composer enter into success- 

 ful rivalry with other composers of the past. The lyric " Is life a 

 boon ? " might have come from an Elizabethan song-book ; the duet, 

 " I have a song to sing, 0," from an Italian opera. I would like to 

 give one instance of something which only Gilbert could have written 



