Pounds's performance in these roles proved him "the most complete and versatile singing actor of his age." In 1924, his last London role was in the Spanish zarzuela adaptation The First Kiss, and before retiring, he toured in Lilac Time and the French operetta adaptation Just a Kiss. Pounds returned occasionally to variety, including a 1905 appearance at the London Coliseum. In 1910 he returned briefly to production, mounting a musical comedy, A Modern Othello, in Birmingham. He also appeared in a film, The Broken Melody (1916). Family, personal life and death In 1927, Pounds's health gave way, and he was unable to perform. A fund was set up to provide for him, and fellow-artists giving their services in fund-raising included Seymour Hicks and his wife Ellaline Terriss, Evelyn Laye, Huntley Wright, Walter Passmore, Derek Oldham, Gertrude Lawrence, and Geoffrey Toye. More than £3,000 was raised. Four of Pounds' sisters (Lily, Louie – a successful actress in her own right – Nancy, and Rosy) also appeared with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company. Pounds was married to D'Oyly Carte performer Jessie Louise Murray Wilson (1861–1953) in 1883, They had no children. He never divorced his wife, but the W. S. Gilbert scholar Brian Jones states that Pounds "seems to have had a roving eye". He had a long relationship with another former D'Oyly Carte actress, Millicent Pyne (born Millicent Pye, 1873–1965), and in an 1895 divorce case, evidence was introduced that the respondent Mary Hardie Lewis had had an affair with Pounds. Around the turn of the century, he set up home with Irish actress Mary Gertrude Cranfield (1880–1973), with whom he had four children. Pounds died in Surbiton, Kingston upon Thames, in 1927, aged 66, of bronchitis and endocarditis. His funeral at St. Marks Church, Surbiton, was attended by his common-law widow and four children, and representatives of the theatrical profession. Recordings Pounds recorded several discs for HMV during World War I. With Rosina Buckman and Frederick Ranalow, he sang the trio "The first thing to do is to get rid of the body", from The Boatswain's Mate, accompanied by the composer, Dame Ethel Smyth (all three singers had appeared in the world premiere performance of the opera). From the same opera, he recorded the ballad "When rocked on the billows". His other recordings of this period were Balfe's setting of Tennyson's "Come into the garden, Maud", "When a Pullet