JACK: Then I was christened! That is settled. Now, what name was I given? Let me know the worst.

LADY BRACKNELL (after a pause): Being the eldest son you were naturally christened after your father.

JACK (irritably): Yes, but what was my father’s Christian name? Pray don’t be so calm, Aunt Augusta. This is a terrible crisis and everything hangs on the nature of your reply. What was my father’s Christian name?

LADY BRACKNELL (meditatively): I cannot at the present moment recall what the General’s Christian name was. Your poor dear mother always addressed him as ‘General’. That I remember perfectly. Indeed, I don’t think she would have dared to have called him by his Christian name. But I have no doubt he had one. He was violent in his manner, but there was nothing eccentric about him in any way. That was rather the result of the Indian climate, and marriage, and indigestion, and other things of that kind. In fact he was rather a martinet about the little details of daily life. Too much so, I used to tell my sister.

JACK: Algy! Can’t you recollect what our father’s Christian name was?

ALGERNON: My dear boy, we were never even on speaking terms. He died before I was a year old.

JACK: His name would appear in the Army Lists of the period, I suppose, Aunt Augusta?

LADY BRACKNELL: The General was essentially a man of peace, except in his domestic life. But I have no doubt his name would appear in any military directory.

JACK: The Army Lists for the last forty years are here. (Rushes to the book-case and tears the books out. Distributes them rapidly.) Here, Dr. Chasuble – Miss Prism, two for you – Cecily, Cecily, an Army List. Make a precis of it at once. Algernon, pray search English history for our father’s Christian name if you have the smallest filial affection left. Aunt Augusta, I beg you to bring your masculine mind to bear on this subject. Gwendolen – no, it would agitate you too much. Leave these researches to less philosophic natures like ours.

GWENDOLEN (heroically): Give me six copies of any period, this century or the last. I do not care which!

JACK: Noble girl! Here are a dozen. More might be an inconvenience to you. (Brings her a pile of Army Lists – rushes through them himself, taking each one from her hands as she tries to examine it.) No, just let me look. No, allow me, dear. Darling, I think I can find it out sooner. Just allow me, my love.

CHASUBLE: What station, Mr. Moncrieff, did you say you wished to go to?

JACK (pausing in despair): Station! Who on earth is talking about a station? I merely want to find out my father’s Christian name.