When You Had Left Our Pirate Fold

When you had left our pirate fold

We tried to raise our spirits faint

According to our custom old

With quips and quibbles quaint

But all in vain the quips we heard

We lay and sobbed upon the rocks

Until to somebody occurred

A startling paradox

A paradox?

A paradox

A most ingenious paradox!

We've quips and quibbles heard in flocks

But none to beat this paradox!

A paradox, a paradox

A most ingenious paradox

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha

This paradox

We knew your taste for curious quips

For cranks and contradictions queer

And with the laughter on our lips

We wished you there to hear.

We said, "If we could tell it him

How Frederic would the joke enjoy!"

And so we've risked both life and limb

To tell it to our boy

That paradox?

That paradox

That most ingenious paradox!

We've quips and quibbles heard in flocks

But none to beat this paradox

A paradox, a paradox

A most ingenious paradox

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha,

That paradox

For some ridiculous reason, to which, however I've no desire to be disloyal

Some person in authority, I don't know who

Very likely the Astronomer Royal

Has decided that, although for such a beastly month as February

Twenty-eight days as a rule are plenty

One year in every four his days shall be reckoned as nine and twenty

Through some singular coincidence

I shouldn't be surprised if it were owing to the agency of an ill-natured fairy

You are the victim of this clumsy arrangement

Having been born in leap-year

On the twenty-ninth of February

And so, by a simple arithmetical process, you will easily discover

That though you've lived twenty-one years

Yet, if we go by birthdays

You're only five and a little bit over!

Ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha!

Ho! ho! ho! ho!

Dear me

Let's see

Yes, yes; with yours my figures do agree

Ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha!

How quaint the ways of Paradox!

At common sense she gaily mocks

Though counting in the usual way

Years twenty-one I've been alive

Yet, reckoning by my natal day

Yet, reckoning by my natal day

I am a little boy of five!

He is a little boy of five!

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha

A paradox, a paradox

A most ingenious paradox

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha

That paradox

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha,

A curious paradox

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha,

A most ingenious paradox

Oh, on my word

This is most curious indeed

Most absurdly whimsical!

Five and a quarter, eh?

You wouldn't think it to look at me!

You are glad now I'll be bound that you've spared us

You would never have forgiven yourself when you discovered that you had killed two of your comrades

My comrades?

I'm afraid you don't appreciate the delicacy of your position

You were apprenticed to us!

Yes, until I reached my twenty-first year

No, no, no

Until you reached your twenty-first birthday!

And going by birthdays, you are as yet only five and a quarter

Well, you don't mean to say you're going to hold me to this?

No, no, no

We merely remind you of the fact

And leave the rest to your sense of duty!

Your sense of duty

Don't put it on that foot!

As I was merciful to you just now

Be merciful to me!

I implore you not to insist upon the letter of your bond

Just as the cup of happiness is at my lips

We insist on nothing

We content ourselves with pointing out to you your duty

Your duty

Well, you've appealed to my sense of duty

And my duty is only too clear

I abhor your infamous calling

I shudder at the thought I've ever been mixed up with it!

But duty is before all

And at any price, I will do my duty

Bravely spoken! Come, you're one of us once more!

Lead on, I follow