The role of women is well-defined:
CHORUS Woman's lot is to serve and suffer;
Ask not why, for God's ordained it.
Learned men have well explained it:
Sorrow purifies the soul...
MUSTAFA I abhor the modern woman!
No absurd extreme is past her.
All would play the prima donna
And forget who's lord and master.
How they strut, they
Swagger, but -- they
Do not sway the Bey!
Lindoro is offered a wife:
LINDORO Were I planning, sir, to marry,
My requirements are so many,
So diverse and so contrary,
I could not accept just any.
Though you offer girls aplenty,
Scarcely one in five times twenty
Would begin to qualify.
Were I bent on matrimony,
There are certain stipulations:
Beauty, wit and good vibrations --
Many more than meet the eye.
Granted I were feeling matey
And you found the perfect lady,
There is barely one in eighty
That should bother to apply...
Oh, confound it! Just my luck! Oh,
I would speak but only stammer,
While within me like a hammer
Love is pounding at my heart.
MUSTAFA Are you made of stone or stucco?
Blind to beauty, cold to glamour?
Stop the stalling, love is calling...
The Italian girl, encountering pirates on a foreign shore,
for a moment is taken aback:
ISABELLA Fate is cruel, and love tyrannic.
Is it thus my love's repaid?
With despair, dismay and panic,
For in truth, I'm much afraid...
No more tears of self-indulgence!
Danger thrives because we fear it.
I have still a spark of spirit.
After all, they're only men...
Not exactly...a lion's den...
A woman's arsenal
Can topple nations,
And I have weaponry
For all occasions...
Afric or Ottoman,
Greek, Turk or Tuscan,
There's not a man can do
What one of us can...
Isabella and her aged but still hopeful escort
come dangerously close to a quarrel:
ISABELLA Freaks of fortune, frowns and favors,
Drastic ups and downs of chance do nothing to me.
But the thing that does undo me
Is the grumbling of a fool...
TADDEO Soberminded, serene and placid,
You could never find a man of sweeter temper.
Hardly prone to whine and whimper,
I'm the one that's calm and cool...
Isabella meets the Bey:
ISABELLA (What a tiger! What a donkey!
And he fancies himself a roué.
Here's a street not one but two-way;
When we meet the sparks will fly.)
TADDEO (She's a dish to serve a sultan!
What a figure! She's enchanting!
She's enthralling! I am panting!
I am fall...
Like a serpent, shrewd and sly,
Subtle methods I'll apply.)
ISABELLA Lost at sea and tossed by tempest,
Taken captive, beset by danger,
At your feet a hapless stranger
Begs a friend to take her part.
MUSTAFA (If my pulse beats any faster
I shall perish on the spot.)
ISABELLA (The noose is drawn and fastened;
This fox shall not go free.)
MUSTAFA (They're more than I imagined --
These girls from Italy.)
Isabella wraps the Turk around her little finger:
ISABELLA Darling Turk, you start to totter
And will topple with a tap.
(Not a tiger but a kitten,
Oh, the rugged Turk is smitten.)
The Turk has a moment of resistance:
MUSTAFA You dance me round a circle!
But pushed too far, a Turk'll
Stand up and show some spunk; he
Will not be made a monkey.
You think you're so much smarter,
But these are my domains;
The fire of Turk and Tartar
Is burning in my veins.
Mustafa is initiated into the glorious order of Pappatacis:
LINDORO Mid the banter of light flirtation,
Mid the game of love and kiss of tender greeting,
He says nothing but goes on eating;
Eats and drinks, and like the Sphinx
Says not a word.
Pappataci only eats,
Pappataci only sleeps...
Then the sign says "Do not disturb"...
MUSTAFA Sounds delightful! Nice and simple.
It's the life, the very life I've long preferred.
LINDORO If the girl runs off with us --
TADDEO Guess what Pappataci does.
Never thinks, eats and drinks,
And like the Sphinx
Says not a word.
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