The Hippopotamus Song

Now you really have been tremendously nice, we do thank you
Posterity will be proud of you
And perhaps you'd like to help us even more now by joining in
The last chorus of this next song
You don't have to if you don't want to, you know, if it embarrasses you
Would be rather a pity if you don't sing tonight I think because

Tonight by way of encouragement, the tenders will be passing among you with rawhide whips
This is, mm, one of the first songs that Donald and I ever wrote together
Turned out to be a very lucky day for us (oh, almost fortunate by the attempt)
Certainly was, wasn't?

Today, of course, is also another rather splendid day
Is the 50th anniversary, that marvellous day
When Alyoykin, the Russian chess master played King's Pawn to Knight shape
This caused quite a stir as they were playing bridge at the time

But, mm, in, in honor of this, because I can't think of any other way to get around it
Donald is going to sing the second chorus of this song in Russian
This is the very first of the animal songs
Some people think the title of this song is "Irrelevant"
But it's not "Irrelevant", it's a "Hippopotamus"

A bold hippopotamus was standing one day
On the banks of the cool Shalimar
He gazed at the bottom as he peacefully lay
By the light of the evening star

Away on the hilltop sat combing her hair
His fair hippopotami maid
The hippopotamus was no ignoramus
And sang her this sweet serenade

Mud, mud, glorious mud
Nothing quite like it for cooling the blood
So follow me, follow down to the hollow
And there let us wallow in glorious mud
The fair hippopotama he aimed to entice
From her seat on that hilltop above

As she hadn't got a ma to give her advice
Came tiptoeing down to her love
Like thunder the forest re-echoed the sound
Of the song that they sang as they met
His inamorata adjusted her garter
And lifted her voice in duet, in Russian

Грязь, грязь, чудная грязь
Лучшее средство, как кожная мазь
Так возьми свою даму (follow me, follow) и поведи её в яму (down to the hollow)
И там мы окунемся в чудную грязь
(That will prove our cultural relations)

Now more hippopotami began to convene
On the banks of that river so wide
I wonder now what am I to say of the scene
That ensued by the Shalimar side

They dived all at once with an ear-splitting sposh
Then rose to the surface again
A regular army of hippopotami
All singing this haunting refrain

That you

(Mud, mud, glorious mud)
(Nothing quite like it for cooling the blood)
(So follow me, follow down to the hollow) love it, beautiful

And there let us wallow in glorious mud