Dramatis Personae
| DR. STAKANHOISER (Tenor) | “Hoyle” | Hurley | |
| CHEVALIER DE TINTAIL (Fiver) | “Johnny” | Hunter | |
| BARON DE BRENT (Basso) | “Joe” | Laseron | |
| COUNT HOOPENKOFF (Barrowtone) | “Little Willie” | Correll | |
| MADAM FUCLOSE (Don’t Sing) | “Also Joe” | Laseron | |
| JEMIMA FUCLOSE (Soprano) | “Dad” | McLean | |
| DR. STAKANHOISER’S Dog | ″ Monkey” | Greenland | Pup |
| VILLAGE IDIOT | “Bick” | Bickerton | |
| ORCHESTRA | “Stillwater Willie” | StillWell |
ACT I
SCENE: Room in poorer part of Berlin: MADAM FUCLOSE in bed dying: JEMIMA at table washing clothes
Song “When Sparrows Build” JEMIMA
[Knock at door.
Enter Dr. STAKANHOISER.
Song: “I vas a Doctor”
[Attends MADAM FUCLOSE, who, when dying, tells him that JEMIMA is not her daughter, but the Princess of Adeliana, whom she has rescued in Paris during the Revolution.
Death Scene and Chorus: “Who Killed my Mother?”
ACT II
SCENE: Beneath JEMIMA’S window
[Enter Dr. STAKANHOISER disguised as organ grinder.
Song: “Vurds der Likum” Dr. S.
[JEMIMA opens window and throws flour on DOCTOR.
[Enter BARON DE BRENT, kicks DOCTOR out.
Song: “Baron of Brent”
[BARON makes love to JEMIMA, who laughs at him.
Duet: “Wilt love me” JEMIMA and BARON
[Enter CHEVALIER DE TINTAIL, who denounces the BARON as already having four wives. The BARON goes off, muttering revenge.
Song: “I’m in love with a wonderful lady” CHEVALIER
[The CHEVALIER makes love to JEMIMA, who loves him in return.
Chorus: “Jemima”
ACT III
SCENE: Conspirators’ Chamber
[Enter DOCTOR, who hides behind a barrel.
[Enter COUNT HOOPENKOFF, who amuses himself playing a piccolo.
[Enter BARON. They discuss plot to kidnap Princess, which is overheard by DOCTOR.
[Enter Ghost, who frightens conspirators away.
Chorus: “Little Willie Smith”
ACT IV
SCENE: JEMIMA’s room
[The CHEVALIER DE TINTAIL is waiting.
Song: “I want you to see my Girl” CHEVALIER
[Enter JEMIMA. Love scene.
[Enter DOCTOR, who discloses the plot he has heard and tells JEMIMA of her high descent. The CHEVALIER and the DOCTOR hide, and the two villains, by means of a ladder, enter the room. The heroes spring from their hiding-place and the villains are ejected.
Chorus: “There is a Wash-House”
ACT V
SCENE: Conspirators’ Chamber
[The BARON and COUNT enter by different doors. They accuse each other of having betrayed the plot. Duel follows in which both are killed.
Duet: “Mort de Botheo” COUNT and BARON
[All the others rush in. The two lovers come together and the DOCTOR says, “God bless you, my children.”
Chorus: “Auld Lang Syne” COMPANY and AUDIENCE
And
GOD SAVE THE KING
Played by the Society for the Prevention of the Blues.
Saturday, October 12, 1912.
ADELIE HALL
Admission Free. Children Half Price.
October 13 was known as Black Sunday. We were all seated at dinner and the Hut was quivering in the tornado-like gusts which followed a heavy “blow” reaching a maximum hourly average of ninety-one miles. One mighty blast was followed by a crack and the sound of a heavy falling body. For a moment it was thought that something had happened to the Hut. Then the messman ran out to the trap-door and saw that the northern wireless mast had disappeared.
The weather showed but meagre signs of improvement, but the penguins came up in great numbers. They were in groups all along the ice-foot in the lee of rocks and icy pinnacles. They climbed up to their old resorts, and in a few days commenced to build nests of small pebbles. Skua gulls mysteriously appeared, snow petrels hovered along the rocky ridges and odd seals landed on the wind-raked harbour ice. Silver-grey and Antarctic petrels flew along the shore with occasional Cape pigeons. If the weather were indifferent to the fact, the birds did not forget that spring had come.
A Weddell seal calved on the bay-ice on October 18. For a week the pup had a miserable time in winds ranging mostly about the seventies, with the temperature below zero Fahrenheit. At last it became so weak that it thawed a hole in the soft, sludgy ice and could not extricate itself. Both it and the mother were killed and skinned for the biological collection.
On all but the worst days a gang of men worked with picks and shovels digging out the Hangar, so that Bickerton could test the air-tractor sledge. The attack was concentrated upon a solid bank of snow and ice into which heaps of tins and rubbish had been compactly frozen. In soft snow enormous headway can be made in a short space of time, but in that species of conglomerate, progress is slow. Eventually, a cutting was made by which the machine could pass out. The rampart of snow was broken through at the northern end of the Hangar, and the sledge with its long curved runners was hauled forth triumphantly on the 25th. From that time onwards Bickerton continued to experiment and to improve the contrivance.
On October 21 there was a marked thaw inside the Hut. The frost along all the cracks dissolved into water and ran down the walls over pictures, on to book-shelves and bunks. The thick caking of ice on the windows dripped continually, coming away in layers at lunch-time and scattering among the diners at both ends of the table. Every available bucket and tub was in use, and small tin-gutters hooked under each window had to be emptied at frequent intervals.
Stillwell came in during the afternoon bearing an albino penguin with a prettily mottled head; a curious freak of which the biologists immediately took possession. The penguins now swarmed along the foreshores, those not settling down in the rookeries wandering about in small crowds, occasionally visiting the Hut and exploring among the rocks or up the slippery glacier. Murphy was heard, at this time, to advance a theory accounting for the fact that Adelie penguins never made their nests on a scale more elaborate than a collection of stones. He submitted that anything else would be blown away. To support the contention, he stated that as soon as the female lays her egg, she places a stone on top to weight it down. The biologists kept a dignified silence during the discussion.
On the 21st an Emperor penguin landed on the harbour ice, and, early in November, two more were captured. These imperial birds are very rare on the coasts of Adelie Land, owing to the fact that their winter breeding-grounds in Antarctica are selected in spots where climatic conditions are comparatively good.
October closed with an average wind velocity of 56.9 miles per hour. Yet the possibility of summer sledging was no longer remote. The sun was high, spells of calm were longer and more frequent, and, with the certain knowledge that we should be on the plateau in November, the sledging parties were chosen, schemes of exploration were discussed, and the last details for an extensive campaign completed.