page 2

We have been afflicted with lice,
For a hundred years or so we have lived quietly,
Succeeding in avoiding notice,
Living and partly living.
We have heard the mourning of the tui at nightfall
We have tasted the living pipi, the toheroa, the oyster, and the prawn,
and they have spawned in our bowels, and our bowels, dissolve in the
light of dawn.
Oh, mud, mud, mud, mud, mud!
There is nothing here for us,
Nothing remarkable in any way -
It's the end, girls, the end!
We are lost. We are lost.
We have heard the confabulations of weasels in the china shop,
We have received singular warnings in the cough of the consumptive,
We have seen wisdom in the whorls of the tattoo marks,
Living and partly living.
Our chimneys are smokeless; our implements rust in the fields,
And our tall constructions are felled.
Living and partly living -
It's the end, girls, the end.

Miss Hongi

I suppose no-one's found the key to the city yet?

Dame Smelly

I daren't even look at the city in my present condition.

Maggie

Your condition? (Excitedly) My dear, you don't mean that Dr. Weevilbole -

Dame Smelly

(Coldly) I was referring to my mental condition.

Miss Hongi

Oh well, we always knew there was something wrong with that.

(Enter Dr. Weevilbole. He holds in his arms a basket of apples)

Women

Good morning, Dr. Weevilbole.

Weevilbole

Good morning, girls. It's time for your morning apple.

(The girls sulk) Come on dears, they're full of vitamins and iron.

Maggie

But we hate iron !

Miss Hongi

We're so terribly sick of apples!

Weevilbole

Come now, girls! What do you think it is that's been keeping you alive all those years?

Dame Smelly

Oh, don't think we're not grateful to you, Doctor, for keeping us alive like this. After all the men had been killed off in the last Great War to end war, we women would have died too, if you hadn't come to the rescue.

Weevilbole

A lot of use it was perpetuating a lot of women! I'm reduced to praying for parthogenesis.

Maggie

Oh, what's that? Is it a disease?

Dame Smelly

Why didn't you get killed off in the war, Doctor?

Weevilbole

(Uncomfortable) Well - er - er - I was so busily engaged in, research that I - er - didn't realise there was a war on. Come on, now -eat up your apples like good little girls. (He hands out apples as he sings)