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                           (Exit Fitzbattleaxe. Manet Zara.)

(Enter King.)

King:     My daughter!  At last we are alone together.

Zara:     Yes, and I'm glad we are, for I want to speak to you very
          seriously.  Do you know this paper?

King:     (aside)  Da--!  (Aloud)  Oh yes--I've--I've seen it.  Where
          in the world did you get this from?

Zara:     It was given to me by Lady Sophy--my sisters' governess.

King:     (aside)  Lady Sophy's an angel, but I do sometimes wish
          she'd mind her own business!  (Aloud)  It's--ha! ha!--it's
          rather humorous.

Zara:     I see nothing humorous in it.  I only see that you, the des-
          potic King of this country, are made the subject of the most
          scandalous insinuations.  Why do you permit these things?

King:     Well, they appeal to my sense of humor.  It's the only
          really comic paper in Utopia, and I wouldn't be without it
          for the world.

Zara:     If it had any literary merit I could understand it.

King:     Oh, it has literary merit.  Oh, distinctly, it has literary
          merit.

Zara:     My dear father, it's mere ungrammatical twaddle.

King:     Oh, it's not ungrammatical.  I can't allow that.  Unpleas-
          antly personal, perhaps, but written with an epigrammatical
          point that is very rare nowadays--very rare indeed.

Zara:     (looking at cartoon)  Why do they represent you with such a
          big nose?

King:     (looking at cartoon)  Eh?  Yes, it is a big one!  Why, the
          fact is that, in the cartoons of a comic paper, the size of
          your nose always varies inversely as the square of your
          popularity.  It's the rule.

Zara:     Then you must be at a tremendous discount just now!  I see a
          notice of a new piece called "King Tuppence," in which an
          English tenor has the audacity to personate you on a public
          stage.  I can only say that I am surprised that any English
          tenor should lend himself to such degrading personalities.

King:     Oh, he's not really English.  As it happens he's a Utopian,
          but he calls himself English.

Zara:     Calls himself English?

King:     Yes.  Bless you, they wouldn't listen to any tenor who
          didn't call himself English.

Zara:     And you permit this insolent buffoon to caricature you in a
          pointless burlesque!  My dear father--if you were a free
          agent, you would never permit these outrages.

King:     (almost in tears)  Zara--I--I admit I am not altogether a
          free agent. I--I am controlled.  I try to make the best of
          it, but sometimes I find it very difficult--very difficult
          indeed.  Nominally a Despot, I am, between ourselves, the
          helpless tool of two unscrupulous Wise Men, who insist on my
          falling in with all their wishes and threaten to denounce me
          for immediate explosion if I remonstrate!  (Breaks down
          completely)

Zara:     My poor father!  Now listen to me.  With a view to remodel-
          ling the political and social institutions of Utopia, I have
          brought with me six Representatives of the principal causes
          that have tended to make England the powerful, happy, and
          blameless country which the consensus of European civiliza-
          tion has declared it to be.  Place yourself unreservedly in
          the hands of these gentlemen, and they will reorganize your
          country on a footing that will enable you to defy your
          persecutors.  They are all now washing their hands after
          their journey.  Shall I introduce them?

King:     My dear Zara, how can I thank you?  I will consent to any-
          thing that will release me from the abominable tyranny of
          these two men.  (Calling)  What ho!  Without there!  (Enter
          Calynx)  Summon my Court without an instant's delay!
                                                         (Exit Calynx)

                                FINALE
           Enter every one, except the Flowers of Progress.

                                CHORUS
               Although your Royal summons to appear
                    From courtesy was singularly free,
               Obedient to that summons we are here--
                         What would your Majesty?

                       RECITATIVE -- King

          My worthy people, my beloved daughter
          Most thoughtfully has brought with her from England
          The types of all the causes that have made
          That great and glorious country what it is.

Chorus:             Oh, joy unbounded!

Sca., Tar., Phan (aside).     Why, what does this mean?
	
                       RECITATIVE -- Zara

          Attend to me, Utopian populace,
               Ye South Pacific island viviparians;
          All, in the abstract, types of courtly grace,
          Yet, when compared with Britain's glorious race,
               But little better than half clothed Barbarians!

                             CHORUS

                    Yes!  Contrasted when
                    With Englishmen,
          Are little better than half-clothed barbarians!

       Enter all the Flowers of Progress, led by Fitzbattleaxe.