William Schwenck Gilbert (Уильям Швенк Гильберт)
Songs of a Savoyard. The Modern Major-General
I am the very pattern of a modern Major-Gineral, I’ve information vegetable, animal, and mineral; I know the kings of England, and I quote the fights historical, From Marathon to Waterloo, in order categorical; I’m very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical, I understand equations, both the simple and quadratical; About binomial theorem I’m teeming with a lot o’ news, With interesting facts about the square of the hypotenuse, I’m very good at integral and differential calculus, I know the scientific names of beings animalculous. In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral, I am the very model of a modern Major-Gineral. I know our mythic history—King Arthur’s and Sir Caradoc’s, I answer hard acrostics, I’ve a pretty taste for paradox; I quote in elegiacs all the crimes of Heliogabalus, In conics I can floor peculiarities parabolous. I tell undoubted Raphaels from Gerard Dows and Zoffanies, I know the croaking chorus from the “Frogs” of Aristophanes; Then I can hum a fugue, of which I’ve heard the music’s din afore, And whistle all the airs from that confounded nonsense “Pinafore.” Then I can write a washing-bill in Babylonic cuneiform, And tell you every detail of Caractacus’s uniform. In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral, I am the very model of a modern Major-Gineral. In fact, when I know what is meant by “mamelon” and “ravelin,” When I can tell at sight a Chassepôt rifle from a javelin, When such affairs as sorties and surprises I’m more wary at, And when I know precisely what is meant by Commissariat, When I have learnt what progress has been made in modern gunnery, When I know more of tactics than a novice in a nunnery, In short, when I’ve a smattering of elementary strategy, You’ll say a better Major-General has never sat a gee— For my military knowledge, though I’m plucky and adventury, Has only been brought down to the beginning of the century. But still in learning vegetable, animal, and mineral, I am the very model of a modern Major-Gineral!
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