Alice is at it again - 1860/Noel Coward
In a dear little village remote and obscure, a beautiful maiden resided.
As to whether or not her intentions were pure opinion was sharply divided.
She loved to lie out 'neath the darkening sky
And allow the soft breeze to entrance her.
She whispered her dreams to the birds flying by,
But seldom received any answer.
Over the field and along the lane, gentle Alice would love to stray.
When it came to the end of the day, she would wander away unheeding.
Dreaming her innocent dreams she strolled, quite unaffected by heat or cold.
Frequently freckled or soaked with rain, Alice was out in the lane.
Whom she met there, every day there, was a question answered by none.
But she'd get there, till whatever she did was undoubtedly done.
Over the field and along the lane; when her parents had called in vain,
Sadly, sorrowfully, they'd complain, "Alice is at it again."
Though that dear little village, surrounded by trees, had neither a school nor
a college,
Gentle Alice acquire from the birds and the bees
Some exceedingly practical knowledge.
The curious secrets that nature revealed she refused to allow to upset her.
But she thought when observing the beasts of the field that things might have
been organized better.
Over the field and along the lane, gentle Alice,
one summer's day met a man who was driving a dray, and he whisked her away to
London.
Then, after many a year had passed,
Alice returned to her home at last, wearing some pearls and a velvet train……
bearing a case of champagne.
They received her fairly coldly, but when the wine had lifted the blight,
they believed her when she boldly said the Salvation Army had shown her the light.
When she had left by the evening train,
both her parents in grief and pain, murmured brokenly,
"More champagne – Alice is at it again!"
