Jon Johanning wrote: >I'm not sure whether this is just my personal reaction, or that of other >Americans, but I tend to rate the words in these works much higher than the >music. Your point that the librettos have many affinities with modern >American English is a quite interesting one that I was not aware of. But not in *Trial by Jury*, where, coming up w/ a rhyme for "Chancellor of the Exchequer" the defendant replies "Be firm, be firm, my [British slang expression for "heart" which rhymes and is, in American English, a slang expression for something else]. Walter Meyer