Modern Major General

From the 1879 opera “The Pirates of Penzance”.
words by W. S. Gilbert
music by Arthur Sullivan

The sheet music:

Modern-Major-General – Sheet MusicDownload

Accompaniment by James Pitt-Payne:

Modern_Major_General – MIDIDownload

Lyrics

  1. I am the very pattern of a modern Major-General
    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 many cheerful 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-General

  1. 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 can 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 infernal nonsense Pinafore

Then I can write a washing bill in Babylonic cuneiform
And tell you ev’ry detail of Caractacus’s uniform
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral
I am the very model of a modern Major-General

  1. In fact, when I know what is meant by “mamelon” and “ravelin”
    When I can tell at sight a Mauser 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 elemental 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 matters vegetable, animal, and mineral
I am the very model of a modern Major-General

Sung here by Fred Feild: