My Name Is John Wellington Wells

Gilbert And Sullivan

Oh! my name is John Wellington Wells,

I'm a dealer in magic and spells,

In blessings and curses

And ever-filled purses,

In prophecies, witches, and knells.

If you want a proud foe to "make tracks"--

If you'd melt a rich uncle in wax--

You've but to look in

On the resident Djinn,

Number seventy, Simmery Axe!

Walter Passmore played J.W. Wells in the 1898 revival at the Savoy Theatre.



We've a first-class assortment of magic;

And for raising a posthumous shade,

With effects that are comic or tragic,

There's no cheaper house in the trade.

Love-philtre--we've quantities of it!

And for knowledge if any one burns,

We keep an extremely small prophet, a prophet

Who brings us unbounded returns:



For he can prophesy

With a wink of his eye,

Peep with security

Into futurity,

Sum up your history,

Clear up a mystery,

Humour proclivity

For a nativity--for a nativity;

He has answers oracular,

Bogies spectacular,

Tetrapods tragical,

Mirrors so magical,

Facts astronomical,

Solemn or comical,

And, if you want it, he

Makes a reduction on taking a quantity!

Oh!



If any one anything lacks,

He'll find it all ready in stacks,

If he'll only look in

Number seventy, Simmery Axe!



He can raise you hosts

Of ghosts,

And that without reflectors;

And creepy things

With wings,

And gaunt and grisly spectres.

He can fill you crowds

Of shrouds,

And horrify you vastly;

He can rack your brains

With chains,

And gibberings grim and ghastly!



Then, if you plan it, he

Changes organity,

With an urbanity

Full of Satanity,

Vexes humanity

With an inanity

Fatal to vanity--

Driving your foes to the verge of insanity!



Barring tautology,

In demonology,

'Lectro-biology,

Mystic nosology,

Spirit philolog