ceeding to a more
serious topic, can you tell me, sir, why a cook's
brain-pan is like an overwound clock?

LIEUT. A truce to this fooling-- follow me.

POINT Just my luck; my best conundrum wasted!

[Exeunt LIEUTENANT and POINT. Enter ELSIE from Tower, led
by WILFRED, who removes the bandage from her eyes, and
exits.

No. 10. 'Tis done! I am a bride!
(RECITATIVE AND SONG)
Elsie

ELSIE 'Tis done! I am a bride! Oh, little ring,
That bearest in thy circlet all the gladness
That lovers hope for, and that poets sing,
What bringest thou to me but gold and sadness?
A bridegroom all unknown, save in this wise,
To-day he dies! To-day, alas, he dies!

Though tear and long-drawn sigh
Ill fit a bride,
No sadder wife than I
The whole world wide!
Ah me! Ah me!
Yet maids there be
Who would consent to lose
The very rose of youth,
The flow'r of life,
To be, in honest truth,
A wedded wife,
No matter whose!
No matter whose!

Ah me! what profit we,
O maids that sigh,
Though gold, though gold should live
If wedded love must die?

Ere half an hour has rung,
A widow I!
Ah, heaven, he is too young,
Too brave to die!
Ah me! Ah me!
Yet wives there be
So weary worn, I trow,
That they would scarce complain,
So that they could
In half an hour attain
To widowhood,
No matter how!
No matter how!

O weary wives
Who widowhood would win,
Rejoice, rejoice, that ye have time
To weary in.

O weary wives
Who widowhood would win