600 Hon. Maurice Baring [June 2, 



In Gilbert's world the impossible is always happening. The Arcadian 

 shepherd does marry the ward in Chancery. Private AVillis, of the 

 Grenadier Guards, does sprout little red wings, and the Fairy Queen 

 sees to it that he is properly dressed. The pictures come down from 

 their frames in Ruddigore, and the picture that hangs at the end of the 

 nailery in a bad light, comes to life in obedience to Gilbert's inflexible 

 and impossible logic, and marries his old love. Even in the operas 

 where there are no actual fairies and no element of the supernatural, 

 no pictures coming to life, no dapper salesman brewing love-philtres 

 as in the Sorcerer ; even in a plain satire such as Patience, we look 

 at things through a coloured glass, or a glass that reveals hidden 

 colours, such as that which the wizard gave to the Prince in the fairy 

 tale, and through which, when he looked at the stars, he saw that 

 they were many-coloured instead of all of them being white. They 

 would be many-coloured looked at through such a glass, of course. 

 And constantly throughout this opera we hear the horns of elfland 

 faintly blowing, especially when the twenty lovesick maidens languish 

 vocal in the valley, or when they lead Bunthorne like a heathen 

 sacrifice with music and with fatal yokes of flowers to his (and to 

 their) eternal ridicule. 



Or, again, when the Gondoliers embark on board the Xebeque and 

 set sail for the shores of Barataria : — 



"Away we go 



To a balmy isle, 

 Where the roses blow 

 All the winter while." 



That is one of the most important factors in the power of Gilbert, who 

 here again was able to find a purveyor of fairy music in Sullivan, and 

 I think that The Mikado has, perhaps, more than all the other operas, 

 the quality of a fairy tale, although there are no fairies in it. 



Another important factor in Gilbert's work is the quality of his 

 satire. Some people detest it. It affects them like bitter aloes. But 

 it owes its enduring permanence, not to bitterness, for it is never 

 really bitter, but to a certain breadth and force which has two 

 cardinal merits. Firstly, that of being dramatic, of getting over the 

 footlights, of appealing to the component parts of a large and mixed 

 audience, so that the stalls will smile at one line and the gallery be 

 convulsed at another, and all will be pleased ; and, secondly, of being 

 general enough to apply to the taste and understanding of succeeding 

 generations. Gilbert's satire, although directed at the phenomena of 

 his own time, had a Moliere-like quality of broad generalisation, 

 which applied not only to the fashions and follies of one epoch, but 

 to the eternal weaknesses of unchanging human nature. 



So that when the First Lord in Pinafore sings : — 



1 Stick close to your desks and never go to sea, 

 An3 you may all be rulers of the Queen's Navee," 



