How It's Done



Bold-faced ranger
(Perfect stranger)
Meets two well-behaved young ladies
He's attractive,
Young and active -
Each a little bit afraid is.
Youth advances,
At his glances
To their danger they awaken;
They repel him
As they tell him
He is very much mistaken.
Though they speak to him politely,
Please observe they're sneering slightly,
Just to show he's acting vainly.
This is Virtue saying plainly,
"Go away, young bachelor,
We are not what you take us for!"
(When addressed impertinently,
English ladies answer gently,
"Go away, young bachelor,
We are not what you take us for!")

As he gazes,
Hat he raises,
Enters into conversation.
Makes excuses -
This produces
Interesting agitation.
He, with daring,
Undespairing,
Gives his card - his rank discloses -
Little heeding
This proceeding,
They turn up their little noses.
Pray observe this lesson vital -
When a man of rank and title
His position first discloses,
Always cock your little noses.
When at home, let all the class
Try this in the looking-glass.
(English girls of well-bred notions
Shun all unrehearsed emotions,
English girls of highest class
Practise them before the glass.)

His intentions
Then he mentions,
Something definite to go on -
Makes recitals
Of his titles,
Hints at settlements, and so on.
Smiling sweetly,
They, discreetly,
Ask for further evidences:
Thus invited,
He, delighted,
Gives the usual references.
This is business.  Each is fluttered
When the offer's fairly uttered.
"Which of them has his affection?"
He declines to make selection.
Do they quarrel for his dross?
Not a bit of it - they toss!
Please observe this cogent moral -
English ladies never quarrel.
When a doubt they come across,
English ladies always toss.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

1:26 min read
43

Quick analysis:

Scheme aaxbbcdceffeggggAHggAH ddecdeiiciicjjcckkllkk llmnnmggdoocppeeqqjjqq
Closest metre Iambic trimeter
Characters 1,644
Words 287
Stanzas 3
Stanza Lengths 22, 22, 22

William Schwenck Gilbert

Sir William Schwenck Gilbert was an English dramatist librettist poet and illustrator best known for his fourteen comic operas produced in collaboration with the composer Sir Arthur Sullivan of which the most famous include HMS Pinafore The Pirates of Penzance and one of the most frequently performed works in the history of musical theatre The Mikado These as well as most of their other Savoy operas continue to be performed regularly throughout the English-speaking world and beyond by opera companies repertory companies schools and community theatre groups Lines from these works have become part of the English language such as short sharp shock What never Well hardly ever and Let the punishment fit the crime Gilbert also wrote the Bab Ballads an extensive collection of light verse accompanied by his own comical drawings His creative output included over 75 plays and libretti numerous stories poems lyrics and various other comic and serious pieces His plays and realistic style of stage direction inspired other dramatists including Oscar Wilde and George Bernard Shaw According to The Cambridge History of English and American Literature Gilberts lyrical facility and his mastery of metre raised the poetical quality of comic opera to a position that it had never reached before and has not reached since Source - Wikipedia more…

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