WS Gilbert A Mid-Victorian Aristophanes - Haddon Hall

12 W. S. GILBERT A MID-VICTORIAN ARISTOPHANES
But the passage most like the one quoted from Aristophanes is the marching song of
the Police in the Pirates, Act II:
Mabel. Go, ye heroes, go to glory,
Though you die in combat gory,
Ye shall live in song and story.
Go to immortality!
Police. Though to us it’s evident, Tarantara! tarantara!
These attentions are well meant, Tarantara!
Such expressions don’t appear, Tarantara! tarantara!
Calculated men to cheer, Tarantara!
Who are going to meet their fate
In a highly nervous state, Tarantara!
Politicians in Athens and in London seem very much the same. In the Plutus a slave,
Carion, meets one. He asks:
Carion. You’re a good man, a patriot?
Politician. Oh, yes. If ever there was one.
Carion. And as I guess, a farmer?
Politician. I? Lord save us. I’m not mad.
Carion. A merchant then?
Politician. Ah, sometimes I have had to take that trade up — as an alibi.
Carion. You’ve some profession surely.
Politician. No, not I.
Carion. How do you make a living?
Politician. Well, they’re several answers to that. I’m Supervisor General
Of all things here, public and private too.
Carion. A great profession that. What did you do to qualify for it?
Politician. I WANTED it.
So Gilbert in the song of the duke and duchess in the Gondoliers:
To help unhappy commoners, and add to their enjoyment,
Affords a man of noble rank congenial employment;
Of our attempts we offer you examples illustrative:
The work is light, and, I may add, it’s most remunerative.
Small titles and orders, For Mayors and Recorders
I get — and they’re highly delighted.
M. P.’s baronetted, Sham Colonels gazetted,
And second-rate Aldermen knighted.