THE SULTAN OF SULU " The Sultan of Sulu," a musical satire with lyrics and dialogue by George Ade and music by Alfred G. Wathall was produced at the Studebaker Theatre, Chicago, March 11, 1902.
Ki-Ram, the Sultan of Sulu.
Col. Jefferson Budd, of the Volunteers. Lieut. William Hardy, of the Regulars.
Hadji Tantong, the Sultan's private secretary. Datto Mandi, of Parang.
Wakeful M. Jones, agent and salesman. Dingbat, captain of the guards.
Rastos, Didymos, Nubian slaves.
Henrietta Budd, the Colonel's daughter.
Miss Pamela Frances Jackson, judge advocate. Chiquita, wife number one.
Galula, the faithful one.
Ki-Ram's other wives.
The four Boston schoolma'ams.
United States soldiers, marines, imperial guards, Ameri can girls, slaves, natives and attendants.
Sulu, or Jolo, is the largest of the southerly islands in the Philippine group. The Sultan, whose real name is Hadji Mohammed Jamulul Ki-Ram, has hitherto found his rule undisputed save by certain chiefs with whom he has kept up a running warfare, one feature of which has been the abduction of women. The natives of Sulu are Mohammedans, polygamists and slaveholders. In 1899, after the Spanish-American war, the American troops land in Sulu and after some parleying, come to a peaceable agree ment with the Malay ruler, who retains his title of Sultan and becoines governor at a fixed salary. " The Sultan of Sulu " shows what might have happened.
When the curtain rises the natives are celebrating in song the majesty of the Sultan and his brother, the Sun, with the Sultan somewhat in the lead. Six of Ki-Ram's wives appear for the morning round-up and Hadji, the private secretary, calls the roll. He also informs them that their uncle, the Datto Mandi of Parang, is encamped near the city, having come for the purpose of recapturing them. They express their entire willingness to be recaptured and remind him that it was only because they were offered their choice between an ignominious death and Ki-Ram that they hesitated and chose Ki-Ram.
The next important event is the arrival of Lieut. William Hardy of the United States Regulars, with a company of soldiers. He announces their mission, which is as follows : We want to assimilate, if we can Our brother who is brown; We love our dusky fellow man And we hate to hunt him down. So, when we perforate his frame, We want him to be good, We shoot at him to make him tame, If he but understood.
While the Sultan is closeted in his palace, sending out word that he will die before he surrenders, there arrives Colonel Budd, a military hero, his eye fixed on Con gress, with his daughter Henrietta Budd, Wakeful M. Jones, Pamela Frances Jackson and the four schoolma'ams. Learning that the Sultan is within making his will, Mr.
Jones unheeding Chiquita's warning that death is the pun ishment for entering the majestic presence unheralded, rushes into the palace to talk life insurance.
" Poor man," sighs Chiquita. " Don't worry about Mr. Jones," returns Hardy, reassuringly. " He's from Chicago." Ki-Ram comes out in funereal black, the picture of woe. He expects to die and enumerates the reasons of regret for leaving the smiling isle of Sulu. Budd interrupts his farewell speech to tell him that they have only come to take possession of the island and to teach the benighted people the advantage of free government. " We hold that all government derives its just power from the consent of the governed," he continues. " Now, the question is, do you consent to this benevolent plan?" " Are all the guns loaded? " inquires Ki-Ram, looking carefully around.
" They are." " I consent," says Ki-Ram.
His attention being called to the luscious quartet of schoolma'ams, he is visibly impressed with the new scheme of education. The next step is to change him from a sultan to a governor, that noblest work of the campaign committee. While Ki-Ram and Budd are left together talking politics, the former feels a draught and looking around finds his worst suspicions confirmed. Galula, the charter member of the bevy of wives, is fanning him. Reminded by him that absence makes the heart grow fonder, she sadly departs. Ki-Ram, under the influence of several cocktails (Colonel Budd has given him the glad information that the cocktail, as well as the constitution, follows the flag) suppresses his jubilant desire to climb a tree and instead proposes to Miss Pamela Frances Jackson, who, when she learns that she is merely wanted to com plete a set of wives, threatens in her capacity as judge advocate to make him give up all of them. He consoles himself with the idea that he will thus get rid of Galula, while the wives are delighted with the prospect of being grass-widows, as they are getting on famously with the soldiers.