New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1881-09-23
MUSIC.
STANDARD NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS..

For the last few years the readers of Punch have
been familiar with company Of strange beings,
"nerceptively intense and cOnsummately utter"
who are addicted 60 posturing in staned-glass att
sudes to arraying themselves in medieval cos
fumes and to utterng high-souading platitudes OF
delightful absurdty the subject of art.
"Jellaby Postlethwaite,7 the hgh-priest of the
sect, sitting up all night with an Edelweiss and
hnchng On the contemplation Of lily " Mrs,
Cimabue Brown J" the young couple whose highest
aspiration was to liveup to their six-mark teapot:
"Maude and his friends who, surleted with cult
chah" go in for excess of simplicity, and pro-
nounce the words of Little Bo-Peep freshah love
liah and more subtitle than anything Shelly ever
wrote" these, ard many another. have become our
familiar friends, thanks to Mr. DuMaurieT's deb ght
fnl drawings. and we look with eagerness into each
new number of Punch for their temperance. 1t
was evident from the first that these clever sketches
were satiros on the aesthetic craze which has been
aroused in England by the Pre-Raphaehte move
nent and which is supposed to have taken possession
of a large part of the British public, and bye and
bye the originals of some of the characters became
known, 'Postlethwaite," for instance being
Oscar Wilde poet aud professional aesthetic.
How far the state of things exists
In, England which Mr.. DuMaurier portrays
OF how far his characters are the fruit of his own
fertile fancy, need not be discussed here. The draw
ings took" immensely with the English public,
and we have had too many hearty laughs over them
to Quarrel with the artist about that. The mania
for peacock feathers, blue china and spder-egged
tables has not spread to any alarming extent in this
country and it is matt r of small moment whether
OF not all England is given up to the worship of
Botticelh and Fra Angelica, believes that art
stopped short with the Court Of the Empress jose
phine. Mr.. Gilbert himself says that he has never
met any of these queer people that Punch tells
about, but SAYS that if there is such thing as
sestheticism, then Patience ought to be about
that thing.
Hsth~ticism or not, Patience" is delightful
application of the ideas with which Punch has
famiarized us, and in it the follies which Du
Maurer has pilioried are 50 good-humoredly
satirzed that the aesthetics themselves could hardly
be angry Several of our old friends are here, and
easy of recognition Bunthorne. the heshly poet"
who finds everything hollow. and is - cursed
thing" being the while hyst rical somewhat after
the FASH nof Swinburn land still more after that OF
Oscar Wilde. is Postlethwaite." GrosreaOy the "idyl
lie poet" OF daisylke simplicity. is ''Maudle." The
twenty lOve-sick maidens who form the chorus are
so many Mrs. Cimabue Browns -; aud the dear old
Colonel, honest and manly, lives again in the Off
GERS OF the Dragon Guards And besides these
familiar types, Mr. Gilbert laughs gently at another
set of enthusiasts the young people. who have ex-
aggerated ideas of the seriousness Of life and the
exalted character of its duties; who believe that
their achievements must be heroic and that virtue
cannot exist without suffering. These last are en-
bodied in the person of Patience the heroine herself
But though Mr.. Gilbert seems to write with
more serious purpose than is his wont, Patience
is the less funny for tlat. There is need for
those who do not care for It to look below the sur
face for the neral and the libretto is as full of wild
absurlities and preposerous incongruities as any
other of his books There is the same familiar air
of intense seriousness IN extravagant situations.
and the curious bit of reasoning which convinces
Patience that is wrong for her to love GrOsrenOr
as genious paradox that which prevented
young Frederick, in 1.-The Pirates of Penzance'
from leaving his blooathirsty masters and leading
life of respectability and virtue. 1t will make
little difference hat We have seen so little OF
mstheticsln here. The fun of the piece, the wit
of the Dialogue and songs. are perfectly
obvious and one does not need to know the orgi
nal to be able to laugh at a clever carcature.
Briefly told, the story OF the opera is this: At the
rise of the curtain twenty love-sick Inadens clad
in classical garments, and accompanying themselves
on antique Observation-Disclosures lutrs and the like
bewail their hopeless love For they all adore Bum
thorRe the feshly poet" who nothing for any
of them, but is in love with Patience, the village
milkmaid. Patience comes upon the stage finds
them in tears and thanks her stars that she has
never been in love. "Oh! Patience" says one "if
You have never loved, you have never known true
happinessw But" says Patience, " the truly hap
by seem 10 have so much on their minds! The
truly happy quite wellp There
is" explains Lady JGRe, with dignity
g there is transcendentaty of delirun, an
acute accentuation of supremest ecstasy. which the
earthly mi ght easily mistake for indigestion. But it
is not indgeston it Is aesthetic TRANSPORTATION :"
They about to go, when Patience tells them that
the Thrty-ffth Dragon Guards, with when they
in love year ago, have just halted in the viii
1age. But now they nothing for theu-mere
feshly men of full habit. Their tastes have heen
etheriaLzed ard their perceptions exalted and they
go Oft to lift mp their voices in morning carol to their
BuRthorpe. The Dragons on, and the Colonel
has just sung receipt for making that popular
mystery, Heavy Dragon, when they are sur
prised by the of the maidens who come
out of the castle with BmlfaOrne, writl-
ing in the throes of composition, at
their head. The poet pays atten-
ton the ladies, who in turn nctce the dr-
goons and the latter express their disgust at this
neglect III very forcible terms the madens, kneeling
10 BuathOrRe, pray him to turn look upon them.
At last, with dreadful pang the last word is found,
the poem finished and the pet reads it to them.
q 1t Isl, says he, "a Wild, weird, 1eshly thing yet
very tender very yearnng, very precious. it is
called oh, Hollow! Hollow! Holowp TO under
stand it cling passonately to one another and think
OF fart lilies"
OIL HoILowi HOLLOW HOLLOW!
What time the poet hath hymned
The writing maid, lithe-limbed,
Quiyerirg on amaranthine ssphodc,
How he paint her woes,
Knowing, as well he knows,
That all can De set right with caomeli
When from the poets plinth
The amOrOus cOlOcynth