Lyrics Oh, Men of Dark and Dismal Fate - The Pirates Of Penzance

Oh, Men of Dark and Dismal Fate

Oh, men of dark and dismal fate,
Forgo your cruel employ,
Have pity on my lonely state,
I am an orphan boy!
Samuel & King:
An orphan boy?
An orphan boy!
How sad, an orphan boy.
These children whom you see
Are all that I can call my own!
Poor fellow!
Take them away from me,
And I shall be indeed alone.
Poor fellow!
If pity you can feel,
Leave me my sole remaining joy —
See, at your feet they kneel;
Your hearts you cannot steel
Against the sad, sad tale
Of the lonely orphan boy!
Pirates: (sobbing)
Poor fellow!
See at our feet they kneel;
Our hearts we cannot steel
Against the sad, sad tale of the lonely orphan boy!
Samuel & King:
The orphan boy!
The orphan boy!
See at our feet they kneel;
Our hearts we cannot steel
Against the sad, sad tale of the lonely orphan boy!
Poor fellow!
General: (aside)
I’m telling a terrible story,
But it doesn’t diminish my glory;
For they would have taken my daughters
Over the billowy waters,
If I hadn’t, in elegant diction,
Indulged in an innocent fiction;
Which is not in the same category
As telling a regular terrible story.
Girls:(aside)
He is telling a terrible story
Which will tend to diminish his glory;
Though they would have taken his daughters
Over the billowy waters.
It is easy, in elegant diction,
To call it an innocent fiction;
But it comes in the same category
As telling a regular terrible story.
Pirates: (aside)
If he’s telling a story
He shall die by a death that is gory,
Yes, one of the cruellest slaughters
That ever were known in these waters;
It is easy, in elegant diction,
To call it an innocent fiction;
But it comes in the same category
As telling a regular terrible story.
It is easy, in elegant diction,
To call it an innocent fiction;
But it comes in the same category
As telling a regular story.
Although our dark career
Sometimes involves the crime of stealing,
We rather think that we’re
Not altogether void of feeling.
Although we live by strife,
We’re always sorry to begin it,
For what, we ask, is life
Without a touch of Poetry in it?
All: (kneeling)
Hail, Poetry, thou heav’n-born maid!
Thou gildest e’en the pirate’s trade.
Hail, flowing fount of sentiment!
All hail!
All hail!
Divine emollient!
(All rise.)
You may go, for you’re at liberty,
Our pirate rules protect you,
And honorary members of our band
We do elect you!
For he is an orphan boy!
He is!
Hurrah for the orphan boy!
And it sometimes is a useful thing
To be an orphan boy.
It is!
Hurrah for the orphan boy!
Hurrah for the orphan boy!
Mabel, Edith, Kate, Frederic, Samuel & King:
Oh, happy day, with joyous glee
We/They will away and married be!
Oh, happy day, with joyous glee
They will away and married be!
Mabel, Edith, Kate, Frederic, Samuel & King:
Should it befall auspiciously,
My/Her sisters all will bridesmaids be!
Should it befall auspiciously,
Her sisters all will bridesmaids be!
Oh, happy day, with joyous glee
We/They will away and married be!
Should it befall auspiciously,
My/Her sisters all will bridesmaids be!
Should it befall auspiciously,
My/Her sisters all will bridesmaids be!
RUTH enters and comes down to FREDERIC.
Oh, master, hear one word, I do implore you!
Remember Ruth, your Ruth, who kneels before you!
Yes, yes, remember Ruth, who kneels before you!
Away, you did deceive me!
Pirates: (Threatening RUTH.)
Away, you did deceive him!
Oh, do not leave me!
Oh, do not leave her!
Away, you grieve me!
Away, you grieve him!
I wish you’d leave me!
(FREDERIC casts RUTH from him.)
We wish you’d leave him!
Frederic, Samuel, King, General & Pirates:
Pray observe the magnanimity
They/We display to lace and dimity!
Never was such opportunity
To get married with impunity!
But they/we give up the felicity
Of unbounded domesticity,
Though a doctor of divinity
Is located in this vicinity
Mabel, Edith, Kate & Girls:
Pray observe the magnanimity
They display to lace and dimity!
Never was such opportunity
To get married with impunity!
But they give up the felicity
Of unbounded domesticity,
Though a doctor of divinity
Is located in this vicinity
But they/we give up the felicity
Of unbounded domesticity,
But they/we give up the felicity
Of unbounded domesticity,
Though a doctor of divinity,
A doctor of divinity,
A doctor, a doctor of divinity,
Is located in this vicinity.
Though a doctor of divinity
Resides in this vicinity,
Though a doctor, a doctor,
Resides in this vicinity,
This vicinity.
Girls and MAJOR-G ENERAL go up rocks,
while PIRATES indulge in a wild dance of delight on stage.
The MAJOR-GENERAL produces a British flag, and the PIRATE KING,
produces a black flag with skull and crossbones.
Enter RUTH,
who makes a final appeal to FREDERIC, who casts her from him.