1922] on Gilbert and Sullivan 605 



Or words to that effect. I don't pretend that they are correct. That 

 tune, when Patience was first produced, was whistled in the streets 

 and taken for granted as one of the popular airs of the day ; but 

 how few people at the time recognised its rarity as a gem. 



You have only to look at the back numbers of Punch to see how 

 niggardly critical opinion of all shades was of its praise of these 

 masterpieces when they were first produced. And I remember myself 

 hearing grown-up people talking of them as if they were so much 

 scaffolding for the display of the actors of the day, who, we must not 

 forget, were then, as they still are now, quite exceptionally remarkable. 



It is seldom that one cast •included two such exceptional artists 

 as George Grossmith and the great baritone who has just left us, 

 Rutland Barrington. They did more than perfectly fill their parts. 

 They inspired Gilbert and Sullivan to create new characters : Grossmith 

 with his perfectly natural fantasy, and Barrington with his suave 

 imperturbable gravity. 



It must be a comforting thought for modern musicians to think 

 that it takes about thirty years for people to appreciate their music 

 at its true value, even when, as not always happens, it wins 

 instantaneous popularity. But when Princess Ida was first produced 

 the verdict of Punch and of the public was : " No Grossmith part," 

 just as they now might say : " No Leslie Henson or no Nelson Keys 

 part." 



Sometimes, as in the case of Bizet, a masterpiece, and what was 

 to prove one of the most popular of operas, namely, Carmen, was 

 kept for years, unacted, in the drawer of a manager. 



I remember once during Holy Week at Moscow, when there was a 

 fair going on at the Kremlin, seeing a little old man hawking about 

 some gold-fish in a very small bottle. 



He kept on piping out in a high falsetto : — 



" Fish, fish, fish, fish, little gold-fish, 

 Who will buy ? " 



" Who will buy ? " he piped, as he walked up and down between 

 the bookstalls and the booths. But the people bought toys and 

 sugarplums, cloths and books, boots and old odd volumes of Punch 

 and John Stuart Mill and Mrs. Humphry Ward — but no gold-fish. 



No one would buy the little gold-fish ; for men do not recognise 

 the gifts of Heaven, the magical gifts, when they see them. In the 

 case of Gilbert and Sullivan they bought at once ; but they thought 

 .that the gold-fish were as common as dirt. It was only when the 

 sellers were dead that they recognised that what they had been buying 

 so easily and so cheaply was magical merchandise from fairyland ; 

 that there was nothing to match it and nobody else to provide 

 anything of that kind any more. 



Even now, it is doubtful whether Sullivan's music has received 

 the serious recognition it deserves. Critical people, the serious that 



