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diff --git a/27265-h/27265-h.htm b/27265-h/27265-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1edbe6a --- /dev/null +++ b/27265-h/27265-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,14261 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN"> +<html> +<head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"> + <title>The Wagnerian Romances</title> + <style type="text/css"> + <!-- + body { background: white; color: black; + margin-left: 12%; margin-right: 12%; } + h1 { text-align: center; margin-top: 4em; } + h2 { text-align: center; margin-top: 2em; } + h3 { text-align: center; font-size: medium; + font-weight: normal; } + p { margin-top: 0.4em; margin-bottom: 0.4em; } + p.indent { text-indent: 1em; text-align: justify; } + p.gap { margin-top: 2em; } + p.center { text-align: center; } + p.contents { font-variant: small-caps; line-height: 1.5em; + margin: 0px; } + p.subtitle { font-size: larger; text-align: center; } + p.bigtitle { text-align: center; font-size: x-large; + margin-top: 2em; font-weight: bold; } + p.author { text-align: center; + margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em; } + table.image { margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; + margin-top: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em; } + td.center { text-align: center; } + span.page { position: absolute; left: 92%; right: auto; + text-align: right; text-indent: 0em; + color: gray; background: white; + font-size: 9px; font-weight: normal; } + --> + </style> +</head> + +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Wagnerian Romances, by Gertrude Hall + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Wagnerian Romances + +Author: Gertrude Hall + +Release Date: November 15, 2008 [EBook #27265] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WAGNERIAN ROMANCES *** + + + + +Produced by Robert J. Hall + + + + + +</pre> + + +<table class="image" style="width: 480px;"> +<tr><td> + <img src="images/last_wagner_photo.png" width="480" height="622" + alt="Last Wagner Photo"> +</td></tr><tr><td class="center"> +THE LAST PHOTOGRAPH OF RICHARD WAGNER +</td></tr> +</table> + +<h1>THE WAGNERIAN ROMANCES</h1> + +<p class="center" style="font-size: smaller;">BY</p> + +<p class="author">GERTRUDE HALL</p> + +<p class="center"> +NEW YORK: JOHN LANE COMPANY, MCMVII<br> +LONDON: JOHN LANE, THE BODLEY HEAD +</p> + +<p class="center" style="margin-top: 2em;"> +<i>To<br> +My Friend</i><br> +JOHN SANBURN PHILLIPS<br> +<i>this book<br> +is<br> +gratefully dedicated.</i> +</p> + +<h2>INTRODUCTION</h2> + +<p class="indent"> +The attempt has been made in the following to give an idea of the +charm and interest of the original text of the Wagner operas, of +Wagner's extraordinary power and fertility as a dramatist. It is +not critique or commentary, it is presentation, picture, narrative; +it offers nothing that is not derived directly and exclusively +from the Wagner libretti and scores. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The stories of the operas are widely known already, of course. +As literature, however, one may almost say they are not known at +all, unless by students of German. The translators had before them +a task so tremendous, in the necessity to fit their verse-rendering +of the master's poetry to extremely difficult music, that we respect +them for achieving it at all. None the less must the translations +included in our libretti be pronounced painfully inadequate. To +give a better, more complete knowledge of the original poems is +the object of these essays. The poems form, even apart from the +music, a whole beautiful, luminous, romantic world. One would not +lose more by dropping out of literature the Idylls of the King +than the Wagnerian romances. +</p> + +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + +<p class="contents"> + <a href="#page_1">Parsifal</a><br> + The Ring of the Nibelung<br> +</p> + +<p class="contents" style="margin-left: 2em;"> + <a href="#page_35">The Rhine-Gold</a><br> + <a href="#page_69">The Valkyrie</a><br> + <a href="#page_103">Siegfried</a><br> + <a href="#page_147">The Twilight of the Gods</a><br> +</p> + +<p class="contents"> + <a href="#page_193">The Master-Singers of Nuremberg</a><br> + <a href="#page_263">Tristan and Isolde</a><br> + <a href="#page_315">Lohengrin</a><br> + <a href="#page_357">Tannhaeuser</a><br> + <a href="#page_387">The Flying Dutchman</a> +</p> + +<p class="bigtitle"><a name="page_1"><span class="page">Page +1</span></a> PARSIFAL</p> + +<h2><a name="page_3"><span class="page">Page 3</span></a> +PARSIFAL</h2> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The story of the Holy Grail and its guardians up to the moment +of Parsifal's appearance upon the scene, is—we gather it +from Gurnemanz's rehearsal of his memories to the youthful +esquires,—as follows: At a time when the pure faith of Christ +was in danger from the power and craft of His enemies, there came +to its defender, Titurel, angelic messengers of the Saviour's, +and gave into his keeping the Chalice from which He had drunk at +the Last Supper and into which the blood had been gathered from +His wounds as He hung upon the Cross; likewise the Spear with which +His side had been pierced. Around these relics Titurel built a +temple, and an order of knighthood grew. The temple, Monsalvat, +stood upon the Northern slope of mountains overlooking Gothic Spain. +No road led to its doors, and those only could find their way to +it whom the Holy Spirit guided; and those only could hope to be +so guided, and could belong to the brotherhood, who were pure in +heart and clean of the sins of the flesh. The knights were mystically +fed and strengthened by the vision of the Chalice—which is +called the Grail; the duties of the Order were "high deeds of +salvation," comprehending warfare upon Christ's enemies, at home +and in distant lands. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +On the southern slope of the mountain, facing Moorish or heathen +Spain. Klingsor had gone into hermitage, in an <a name="page_4"><span +class="page">Page 4</span></a> attempted expiation of evil committed +down in the heathen world. What his sin had been, Gurnemanz says, +he knows not; but he aspired to become a holy man, he wished to +join the brotherhood of the Grail. Finding it impossible to subdue +sin in himself by the spirit, he sought, as it were, a mechanical +substitute for virtue, by which, however, he failed to attain his +object, for his sacrifice called forth from Titurel only contempt, +and he was rejected from the Order. He turned all the strength of +his rage then to acquiring black arts by which to ruin the detested +brotherhood. On the southward mountainside, he created by sorcery a +wonderful pleasure-palace and garden, in which uncannily beautiful +women grew. This lay in the path of the knights of the Grail, a +temptation and a trap, and one so effectual that he who permitted +himself to be lured into it was lost; there had been no exception, +safety lay singly in avoidance. Titurel having reached so great +an age that he had no longer strength to perform the service of +the Grail, invested with the kingly office Amfortas, his son. The +latter undertook at once the removal of the standing danger to his +knights, the destruction of Klingsor. Armed with the Sacred Spear, +he fared forth.... Alas! even before the walls of the enchanted +castle had been reached, his followers, among whom Gurnemanz, missed +him. A woman of dreadful beauty had ensnared him. In her arms he +forgot everything, he let the Spear drop from his hand.... A great +cry, as of one mortally hurt, Gurnemanz relates, was suddenly heard. +He rushed to the rescue, and caught sight of Klingsor, laughing +as he disappeared carrying the Spear, with which he had wounded +Amfortas. And now, possessed of the Spear, it was Klingsor's boast +that he should soon be in possession of the Chalice likewise, the +Holy Grail itself. And the wound of Amfortas would not heal, and an +apprehension was that never <a name="page_5"><span class="page">Page +5</span></a> could it heal, save at the touch of the Spear which made +it. And this, who could conquer it back? Yet the knights were not +wholly without hope, for, Amfortas once praying before the despoiled +sanctuary, and imploring a sign of pardon, a holy dream-face had +appeared to him and delivered the dim but comforting oracle: "Wise +through compassion.... The immaculate Fool.... Await him.... My +appointed one...." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Thus matters stand when the curtain rises for us upon the forest +surrounding the Castle of the Grail. The introductory music is +wholly religious, composed principally of the so moving phrase +of the Last Communion, the Grail-motif and the Faith-music. The +latter opens with what has the effect of a grand declaration, as +if it might be understood to say: "I believe in God the Father! +I believe in God the Son! I believe in God the Holy Ghost!" and +fell to worshipping prayer. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The grey-haired Gurnemanz and two young boys of the Order are discovered +sleeping. At the clarion-call from the Castle, they start awake +and kneel at their morning devotions. The lake is near where the +sick King is carried daily for the bath. Forerunners of his +cortège pass, and are questioned by Gurnemanz concerning +his condition. No, the healing herb, obtained at such price of +courage and cunning, has not helped him. (For, though their drugs +prove still and ever useless, the devoted followers will not give +up the search for earthly relief.) This discouraged answer is hardly +given, when another appears who has been ranging afar in search +of a remedy—Kundry, arriving like the whirlwind, on a mare +that staggers reaching the goal. Spent with speed, the strange +wild woman totters to Gurnemanz and presses on him a crystal phial: +Balsam! If this does not help, Arabia holds nothing more from which +<a name="page_6"><span class="page">Page 6</span></a> health can +be hoped! Felled by fatigue, she drops on the ground, refusing +any further speech. When the king is now brought in upon a litter +and halts on his way to the lake for a moment's rest, receiving +from Gurnemanz the balsam, he thanks the woman, as one who has +often before done him such service. She rejects his thanks roughly, +as if almost they hurt: "No thanks! No thanks! What good will it +do? Away! Away! To the bath!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The young esquires, lingering after the king has been borne onward, +eye her as she lies on the ground like a wild beast, and voice +their suspicion of her, founded, after the fashion of youth's +judgements, upon her looks. They believe those potions of hers +will finally destroy the king altogether. Gurnemanz checks them, +reminding them heatedly of her services, beyond all that any other +could perform. "Who, when we are at loss how to send tidings to +brethren warring in distant lands, we scarcely even know +where,—who, before we have come to any resolve, flies to +them and returns, having acquitted herself of the task aptly and +faithfully?..." "But," they object, "she hates us! See how malignantly +she glowers at us! She is a heathen, a sorceress!" "One she may +be, perhaps, labouring under a curse," Gurnemanz goes thus far +with them; "she lives here, it may be, a penitent, to expiate some +unforgiven sin of her earlier life." He tells how, so long ago as +at the time of the building of the temple, Titurel first found +her among the tangled growth of the forest, rigid in death-like +sleep. "I myself," he continues, "discovered her but recently in +the like condition. It was soon after the calamity had befallen, +brought upon us by the evil one over the mountain." And turning +to Kundry, as if the thought had but just occurred: "Hey! Tell +me, you! Where were you roaming when our master lost the Spear?" +The woman gazes gloomily, <a name="page_7"><span class="page">Page +7</span></a> and preserves a silence which we afterwards see to +be significant. "Why did you not help us at that time?" "I never +help!" she exclaims darkly, and turns away. "If she is as faithful +as you say, and as daring, and full of resource," suggests ironically +one of the young esquires, "why not send her after the lost Spear?" +"That!" Gurnemanz replies sadly, "is another matter. That nobody +can achieve!" And, the memory of the past rising strong within him, +he relates to the questioning young fellows, new in the brotherhood +and ignorant of its history, the events set down in their order a +little way back. He has repeated to them the mysterious promise of +help: "Wise through compassion.... The immaculate Fool.... Await +him.... My appointed one...." And they, impressed, are saying it +after him, when, at the words "<i>Der reine Thor</i>," the +pure—the clean-lived—the immaculate Fool, a commotion +develops in the direction of the lake-side, cries of "Woe! A pity! +A shame! Who did it?" A great wild swan flies in sight, sinks to +earth hurt to death by an arrow, and the king's esquires bring +in, chiding and accusing him, a tall, innocent-eyed, fresh-cheeked +boy, armed with bow and arrows,—Parsifal. Rustic enough is +his outfit, but his bearing unmistakably that of the high-born, +as Gurnemanz does not fail to remark. A sturdy, brave, gay-hearted +strain has ushered him in, and for just a moment he stands quite +like a brother of Siegfried's, fearless, unconscious of himself, +as ignorant of the world as he is unspotted by it, but engagingly +wide-awake, serene in watching its mysterious actions. "Are you +the one who killed the swan?" Gurnemanz asks him sternly. And he +answers, unabashed, quite as Siegfried might have done: "Certainly! +Whatever flies I shoot on the wing!" But at once after this the +difference between the two is manifest. To both whole regions of +emotion are unknown, <a name="page_8"><span class="page">Page +8</span></a> but certain emotions which are outside the nature of +one, are potentially the very strongest in the other. Siegfried is +not pitiful. The strong, radiant being is incomplete on that side, +so that the Christian heart winces a little, here and there, at the +bright resoluteness with which he pursues his course when it involves, +for instance, death to the little foster-father, unrighteous imp +though he be, or horror to Brünnhilde, captured by violence +and offered to his friend. Whereas Parsifal, when Gurnemanz now +makes plain to him the cruelty of his thoughtless action, when he +points out the glazing eye, the blood dabbling the snowy plumage +of the noble swan, faithful familiar of the lake, killed as he +circled in quest of his mate, is seized with a passion of realizing +pity, impulsively breaks and flings from him his bow, and hides his +eyes from the work of his hands. "How—how could you commit +such a wrong?" Gurnemanz pursues unrelenting, even after these +expressions of contrition. "I did not know," Parsifal answers. +Then to the amazement of all are revealed the most extravagant +ignorance and simplicity ever met. "Where do you come from?" "I +do not know." "Who is your father?" "I do not know." "Who directed +you here?" "I do not know." "What is your name?" "I have had many, +but no longer remember any of them." "Truly," grumbles Gurnemanz, "I +have so far never in my life met with any one so stupid—except +Kundry." Very sagely, he leaves off questioning the fool; but when +the others, after reverently taking up the dead swan, have departed +with it for burial, he addresses him: "Of all I have asked you, you +know nothing. Now tell me what you do know! For it can hardly be +but that you know something." Whereupon very simply and obediently +the boy begins: "I have a mother. Her name is Herzeleide. +(Heart's-sorrow.) We lived in the woods and on the wild moor...." +And it <a name="page_9"><span class="page">Page 9</span></a> appears +from his own ingenuous narrative and the additions of Kundry, who +in her rangings has seemingly had opportunities to watch him, that +he is the son of the hero Gamuret, slain in battle before his birth, +and that, in terror of a like early death for him, his mother has +reared him in solitude, far from arms and reports of war, in absolute +ignorance of the world. One day, he tells in joyous excitement, +bright-gleaming men passed along the forest's edge, seated upon +splendid animals; his instant wish was to be like them, but they +laughed and galloped away. He ran after them, but could not overtake +them. Up hill and down dale he travelled, for days and nights. With +his bow he was compelled to defend himself against wild beasts +and huge men.... "Yes!" throws in Kundry eagerly, as if at the +recollection of splendid fights witnessed, "he made his strength +felt upon miscreants and giants. They were all afraid of the truculent +boy!" He turns upon her a vaguely pleased wonder: "Who is afraid of +me? ... Tell me!" "The wicked!" He seems trying to grasp a wholly +new idea presented to him. "Those who threatened me were wicked? +Who is good?" Gurnemanz in reply reminds him of his mother, who +is good, and from whom he has run away; she no doubt is seeking +him in sorrow. Kundry brusquely interrupts: "Her sorrow is ended. +His mother is dead!" And, at his incredulous cry of horror: "I was +riding past and saw her die. She bade me take to you, fool, her +last blessing." Parsifal springs upon this bearer of evil tidings +with the instinctive attempt to shut off the breath that could +frame such terrible words. Gurnemanz forcibly disengages her, and, +overpowered by the shock and weight of his pain, Parsifal sinks +in a swoon. Tenderly at once both servants of the Grail care for +him. Kundry hastens for water with which to wet his temples, and, +as he revives, offers him drink. Gurnemanz is struck by <a +name="page_10"><span class="page">Page 10</span></a> the magnanimity +of her action. "That is right," he nods his approval, "that is in +accordance with the gracious spirit of the Grail. We banish evil +when we return good for it." Kundry turns sadly away: "I never +do good! ... All I desire is rest!... Rest!" And while Gurnemanz +is still occupied with restoring Parsifal, she slowly walks, as if +powerfully drawn and intensely resisting, toward a tangled copse. +She appears struggling with inexpressible weariness; the music gives +a hint of something unnatural and evil in the spell of sleep falling +leadenly upon her, expressing at the same time an irresistible +element in it of attraction. The dark, wild-haired messenger of the +Grail, the despised subordinate, suddenly assumes to our sense +a much greater importance than up to this moment. Her personality +looms large with an unexplained effect of tragedy. "Only rest! +Rest for the weary one!" she murmurs yearningly; "sleep! Oh, let +nobody wake me!" Terror checks her for a moment: "No! No! I must not +sleep!" she shudders, "I am afraid!" She falls to violent trembling. +But whatever it is compelling her is too strong at last. Her arms +fall unnerved, her head bows languidly, and she moves feebly whither +she is drawn. "Useless resistance! ... The hour is come. Sleep.... +Sleep.... I must!" Having reached the thicket she drops on the +earth among the bushes. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The sun is now high, the king is borne homeward from the bath. The +thought has struck Gurnemanz that here under his hands is surely +as exquisite a <i>Thor</i> as could well be, and the experiment +suggests itself of taking him to the temple, where, as he tells +him, if he be pure, the Grail will be to him meat and drink. He +places the arm of the still strengthless youth about his neck, +and gently upholds him as they start on their way. "Who is the +Grail?" asks Parsifal, as they walk. "That may not be put into +words," replies Gurnemanz, "but, if you are of <a name="page_11"><span +class="page">Page 11</span></a> the chosen, you cannot fail to +learn. And, see now! I believe I know who you are. No road leads +through the land to the Grail, and no one could find the way except +Itself guided him...." "I am scarcely moving," says the wondering +boy, "yet it seems to me we have already gone a long way...." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +And, indeed, the forest has been miraculously gliding past. It ends +before a granite wall in which a great portal stands open. This +gives entrance into ascending rocky galleries; sounds of clarions +come stealing to the ear; church-bells are heard—and we are +presently translated into the interior of the Castle of the Grail, +the great domed hall. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Parsifal entering with Gurnemanz stops still beside the threshold, +spell-bound in presence of all the lofty beauty: "Now watch with +attention," his guide instructs him, before leaving him where he +stands, "and let us see, if you are a simple soul and pure, what +light shall be vouchsafed you." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The scene now enacting itself before him is well calculated to +strike the imagination of the boy from the lonely moors. The knights +of the Grail, beautiful in their clear robes, enter in procession, +chanting. When they cease, the singing is taken up by younger voices, +of personages unseen up in the dome, and, after them, by children's +voices from the airy summit of the dome, floating, angelic. The +wounded king is brought in on his litter, and laid upon the high +canopied seat before the altar, upon which the shrine is placed +enclosing the Grail. The knights have ranged themselves along tables +prepared with silver goblets. In the silence of recollection which +falls upon all, a voice is heard, as if from the grave: "My son +Amfortas, are you at your post?" It is the aged Titurel, whose +resting-place is a recess behind the altar and the raised seat. There +he is kept alive solely by the contemplation of the Grail, mystical +means of life and strength. "Are you at <a name="page_12"><span +class="page">Page 12</span></a> your post? Shall I look upon the Grail +once more and live?" But long-gathering despair to-day reaches its +climax in Amfortas, at the necessity to perform the rite required. The +torture to him cannot be measured of the vision which creates ecstasy +in the others. "Woeful inheritance fallen to me!" he complains, in +his passion of revolt against this divine infliction, "that I, +the only sinner among all, should be condemned to be keeper of +holiest holies, and call down blessings upon those purer than I!" +But the worst of his anguish is still that when the holy blood +glows in the Cup, and, in sympathy, the blood gushes forth anew +from the wound in his side—the wound made by the same +Spear—the consciousness ever returns to burning life that, +whereas those holy drops were shed in a heavenly compassion for +the misery of man, these are unregenerate blood, hot with sinful +human passion and longing, which no chastening has availed to drive +out. The wretched king is praying for the mercy of deliverance +through death, when, from the high dome, the words rain softly +of the promise of redemption—through the Fool. Recovering +courage, Amfortas proceeds with the rite. While he kneels in prayer +before the Chalice, which young acolytes have taken from the shrine +and reverently uncovered, a mysterious darkness gathers over all. A +ray of light suddenly falls through this, upon the Chalice, which +begins softly to glow, and brightens to a deep luminous purple-red. +Amfortas lifts it and waves it over the kneeling people. The words +of the Last Communion are heard, sung by the soaring voices in +the dome: "Take my body—Take my blood—For the sake +of our love! Take my blood—Take my body—And remember +me!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The ceremony accomplished, Amfortas sets down the Cup, which begins to +pale; as it fades, the twilight lightens. When <a name="page_13"><span +class="page">Page 13</span></a> the common light of day has completely +returned, the knights sit down to the repast of consecrated Bread +placed for them, and Wine poured, by the acolytes. At the end of +it, they earnestly grasp one another's hands in renewal of their +bond of brotherhood. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Amfortas is perceived to be suffering from the renewed bleeding +of his wound. He is laid upon the litter once more and borne away. +The knights depart in orderly procession, the hall is gradually +deserted. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Parsifal remains standing on the same spot. He has hardly moved, +except, when Amfortas's anguished cry rang out, to clutch at his +heart. Gurnemanz, when he sat down at the table with the other +knights, signed to him to come and share in the holy feast, but +he did not stir. The impression can be apprehended of the solemn +scene upon the white page of the boy's mind. A spirit of religion +has breathed through it all, so exalted, so warm, so personal; +the passionate mediæval Christianity which expressed itself +in crusades and religious orders and knight-errantry. The cry of +the Saviour (<i>Erlösung's Held</i>, Hero of Redemption, the +poet characteristically calls him) has rung so piercingly, there +seems but one answer from a humanly constituted simple heart: "Did +you indeed suffer so much and die for love of me and my brothers? +How then can I the most quickly spend and scatter all my strength +and blood in gratitude to you?" Parsifal has brought to these things +a consciousness not blurred and overscored by worldly knowledge +and desires, a native capacity for love of others uninterfered +with by the developed consideration of self. His fresh instinct +has gathered the meaning of what he sees, novel to him as it is; +"wise through compassion," he has gotten the measure and character +perfectly of Amfortas's sufferings, foreign as they are to his +experience; he has gotten the spirit of <a name="page_14"><span +class="page">Page 14</span></a> the facts of Christ. One especial +message, over and above the rest, he has received to himself, shot +into his heart upon a ray from the glowing Grail held before his +gaze by Amfortas: that the Saviour embodied in the Grail must be +delivered from the sin-sullied hands now holding it. He has seemed +to hear the appeal of the Saviour, poignant, to be so delivered. +He is left, when the vision fades, with the sense of this +necessity—involving for himself, though he knows not how, +a duty and a quest: Amfortas must be healed, the Sacred Treasure +must be taken into keeping by purer hands. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Gurnemanz approaches him hopefully: "Well, did you understand what +you saw?" But Parsifal, still in his trance of wonder, only shakes +his head. It is too deep for words, what he has felt. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +To Gurnemanz he now seems a hopeless and unprofitable fool, who +has no place in the noble company. "You are a fool, it is a fact, +and you are nothing else!" he declares. Opening a side-door, he +without further ceremony pushes him out by the shoulders, with a +sour little joke: "Take my advice: Let the swans alone hereafter, +and, gander that you are, find yourself a goose!" As he turns from +the door, there falls from above, as if some echo of it had clung +to the high dome after all the singers had left, the strain: "Wise +through compassion.... The immaculate fool...." +</p> + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The next change of scene shows the interior of the tower where +Klingsor practises his dark arts. A strain already known catches our +attention (the Sorcery-motif), and we become aware what influences were +at work in Kundry when her weariness succumbed to the lure of sleep, +what mesmeric <a name="page_15"><span class="page">Page 15</span></a> +call from Klingsor's hotly blooming, godless pleasure-seat. The +Klingsor-music introducing the second act stands in picturesque +contrast to the tender and thoughtful music opening the first; curiously +suggesting, as it does, lawlessness, cold evil passions riding the +soul hideously at a gallop. It has something vaguely in common +with portions of the Venus-music in Tannhäuser,—perhaps +its effect at once unbridled and joyless. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The sorcerer has from the battlements seen Parsifal approaching, +who, thrust out from the Castle of the Grail, had, by the peculiar +magic of the place, found the path to it obliterated. He had come +forth with the exalted but undefined sense of a great task to perform. +But, even as the road to the Castle of the Grail was difficult to +find, the road to Klingsor's castle was easy and overeasy; it would +seem that for the feet of a votary of the Grail all roads led to +it. Parsifal had seen it shining afar, and with childish shouts of +delight is drawing near. Klingsor, divining in him an enemy more +than usual dangerous, resorts, to make his ruin altogether sure, +to what are his supreme methods. He calls to his assistance once more +the ally by whose help the great Amfortas had been vanquished. With +mysterious passes and burning of gums, he summons that Formidable +Feminine: "Nameless one!... Most ancient of Devils!... Rose of +Hell!... Herodias!..." and amid the blue smoke-wreathes, uttering +the wail of a slave haled to the market-place, rises the form of +Kundry. She appears like one but half roused from the torpour of +sleep, and struggling with a terrible dream, or resisting some +terrible reality. All the answer she can give to his first words +of ironical congratulation, is in broken exclamations: "Oh! Oh! +Deep night.... Madness... Oh, wrath! Oh, misery!... Sleep! Sleep! +Deep sleep!... Death!..." and, in a <a name="page_16"><span +class="page">Page 16</span></a> subsequent outburst: "The curse!... +Oh, yearning!... Yearning!..." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Her history and hints of her extraordinarily complex personality +are to be gathered from the scene following and the scene later, +with Parsifal. The mysterious messenger of the Grail was anciently +Herodias, and meeting with the Man of Sorrows, she laughed. "Then," +she herself relates, "He turned His eyes upon me...." Under the +curse involved in her action and the remorse generated by that +divine look, she cannot die, but goes, as she describes it, seeking +Him from world to world, to meet His eyes again. She tries in every +manner to expiate her sin, by service to others, by subjugation of +self, but the old nature is still not well out of her, the nature +of Herodias, and, at intervals, an infinite weariness of welldoing +overtakes her, a revival of the passions of her old life, and with +the cessation of struggle against them she falls into a death-like +sleep. In this condition, as if it represented a laying-off of the +armour of righteousness, her spirit is at the mercy of the powers +of evil. The necromancer Klingsor can conjure it up and force it +to his own uses. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +In the centuries she has lived, she has borne many names. She has +but recently been the temptress of Amfortas, and at the reassumption +of the higher half of her dual nature, has, as the servant and +messenger of the Grail, striven to make amends, as far as she might, +for the mischief done by her in her other state. The curse under +which she lives has peculiar laws of its own, of which we just +vaguely feel the moral basis. In her character of temptress, while +desiring with intensity, in her Herodias part, the surrender of +the man to whose seduction she applies herself, yet with the other +side of her, the side of the penitent, which never quite slumbers, +she even more ardently and fundamentally desires his victory over +her arts, for, with <a name="page_17"><span class="page">Page +17</span></a> her own frustration, she would be delivered from her +curse, she could die; from the enormous fatigue of centuries of +tormented earthly existence, find rest. Which is to say, perhaps, +that if once more she could meet and look into the eyes of complete +strength and purity, see an adequate approach to the Christ-spirit +shining out of whatsoever eyes, her redemption, so painfully worked +toward through centuries of alternate effort and relapse, would +be consummated; at that encounter, renewing, or confirming, faith +in the existence of perfect goodness, the evil within her, so long +vainly fought, would die, and her long trial be at end. So she +approaches every new adventure with, under her determined wiles, +the hope of failure; and when her subject is still and ever found +weak in her hands, experiences despair. And when a hero such as +Amfortas, undertaken with the undercurrent sense that he perhaps is +the unconquerable, whose resistance shall make him her deliverer, +vulgarly falls in her arms, the triumph of one side of her nature, +and the despair of the other, express themselves in terrible laughter. +The fruit of her experience with man is, as it affects the two +sides of her, a mixture of sinister cynicism and ineffable pity. +"Woe! Woe!" she laments, at Klingsor's mocking mention of Amfortas. +"Weak, he too! Weak—all of them! Through me, to my curse, all +lost as I am lost! Oh, eternal sleep, only balm, how, how shall +I win you?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +One can suppose in this Kundry, setting aside all details of personal +history, an intended personification of the +abstraction—(<i>Namenlose</i>,—Nameless One,) Eternal +Feminine, with, set in the high light, two of her broad traits, +the best perhaps and the worst: the passion for serving, tending, +protecting, mothering, and the passion for subduing man, proving +herself more powerful than the stronger, by remorseless practice +upon his point of least strength. This inveterate spirit of <a +name="page_18"><span class="page">Page 18</span></a> seduction it +must be which Klingsor apostrophises as "Most Ancient of Devils," +and "Rose of Hell." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The character of Kundry has many aspects, exhibited here and there +by a flash, but, when all is said, and before all else, what we are +watching is an upward-struggling human soul, whose storm-beaten +progress could never move us as it does did we not feel in her +simply our sister. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +We saw her, forspent, crawl into the thicket to sleep. Now, Klingsor +who can command her while in that state, has compelled her to him to +accomplish the undoing of Parsifal. The idea is to her, all heavy +and clogged with sleep, the personality of the <i>Gralsbotin</i> +still in the ascendant, one of horror only. With wails of protest +at having been waked, and lamentation over what is proposed, she +refuses to obey, rejecting Klingsor's claim to be her master. Even +when he puts his request in the form of the suggestion: "He who +should defy you would set you free. Try it then with the boy at +hand!" she stubbornly refuses. "He is even now climbing the rampart!" +Klingsor persists. Kundry wrings her hands. "Woe! Woe! Have I waked +for this? Must I, indeed?... Must I?" At which first intimation +of weakening, Klingsor ceases to press his authority, and adopts +a different method of persuasion. Climbing to the battlement, he +describes the approaching figure: "Ha! He is beautiful, the boy!" +"Oh! Oh!" moans Kundry, "woe is me!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Klingsor blows his horn, to warn the garrison of the palace—the +host of the victims of folly, the lost knights—of the approaching +enemy. A commotion is heard of arms caught up in haste and of fighting; +Klingsor from his post follows the contest, with glee in the daring +of the beautiful boy, who has snatched the sword from one of his +assailants and with it, one against the swarm, is cutting his way +through them. Kundry, <a name="page_19"><span class="page">Page +19</span></a> ceasing from her moans, has begun to laugh, and as +Klingsor continues his report of the skirmish laughs more and more +uncontrollably. "They yield, they flee, each of them carries home +his wound! Ha! How proudly he stands upon the rampart! How the +roses bloom and smile in his cheeks, as, in childlike amazement, +he gazes down upon the solitary garden! ... Hey! Kundry!" But with +her laughter ending in a scream, Kundry has abruptly vanished. +"What? Already at work?" muses Klingsor. "Ha ha! I knew the charm +which will always bring you back into my service!" Then turning +his attention once more to the youthful intruder filling his eyes +with the unimagined glories of the garden: "You there, fledgling! +Whatever prophecy may have had to say concerning you, too young +and green you have fallen into my power. Purity wrested from you, +you will become my willing subject!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The tower, with Klingsor, vanishes from sight; there lies outspread +before us the enchanted garden, glowing, tropical, displaying the +last luxuriance of flowers; and we see for ourselves Parsifal standing +upon the wall, calmly gazing. A swarm of beautiful young creatures, +waked by the clash of arms have, even as their lovers turned and fled +to cover, rushed forth to discover what is the matter. With confused +cries they pour from the palace and, recognising in Parsifal the +whole of the enemy, assail him with abuse scarcely more unendurable +than a pelting with thorny rose-buds. "You there! You there! Why +did you do us this injury? A curse upon you! A curse upon you!" As +Parsifal undismayed leaps down into the garden, they fall to twittering +like angry sparrows: "Ha! You bold thing! Do you dare to brave us? +Why did you beat our beloved?" And the raw boy, acquitting himself +rather neatly for such a beginner: "Ought I not to have beaten them? +They were barring my passage to you!" "You <a name="page_20"><span +class="page">Page 20</span></a> wanted to come to us? Had you ever +seen us before?" "Never had I seen anything so pretty. I speak +rightly, do I not, in calling you lovely?" A rapid change takes +place in the attitude toward him of the exceedingly pretty persons. +They adorn themselves in haste, fantastically, to charm him, with the +flowers of the garden; singing a wooing song, of the most melting, +persuasive, irresistible, they weave around him, circling as in a +child's game of ring-a-rosy, sweeping the heady perfumes of their +garlands under his nostrils. They do not appear wholly human, but +rather like strange tall-stemmed animated flowers, swaying and +jostling in the wind, and whose odor should have turned into music; +or, better still, like incarnate emanations from the intoxicating +flower-beds of this magical Garden of the Senses. Parsifal stands in +their midst, pleased and watchful, fleetingly again like Siegfried, +with his cheerful calm and poise. "How sweet you smell! ... Are +you flowers?" They close around him more and more smotheringly, +with caresses more and more pressing. He gently pushes them away. +"You wild, lovely, crowding flowers! If I am to play with you, +let me have room!" As they do not obey, and in addition fall to +quarrelling among themselves over him, half-vexed, he repels them +and is turning for retreat, when a voice is heard from a blossoming +thicket near-by: "Parsifal! Stay!..." The flowers, startled, at once +hold still. The youth stands still, too, struck. <i>Parsifal</i>.... +He remembers that as one of the names his mother had called him +by, once, as she lay asleep and dreaming. The voice continues: +"Here remain, Parsifal.... You simple light-o'-loves, depart from +him. Early withering flowers, he is destined to other things than +dalliance with you!" The flock of flowers, reluctantly, lingering +as long as they dare, withdraw, their last word one of derision: +"You beautiful one! You proud one! You... <a name="page_21"><span +class="page">Page 21</span></a> fool!" With whispered laughter they +vanish into the house, and Parsifal, in the once more solitary +garden, asks himself: "Was it all a dream?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +For the first time touched with timidity, he turns towards the +blossoming bower from which the voice had come. The branches part, +and reveal Kundry, youthful, gorgeously apparelled and superlatively +beautiful, lying upon a flowery bank. "Did you mean the name you +spoke for me, who have no name?" Parsifal asks, standing shyly +apart. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"I called you, guileless Innocent, Parsifal.... By this name your +father Gamuret, expiring in Arabian land, called his unborn son. +I have sought you here to tell you this...." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Never had I seen," sighs Parsifal, "never dreamed, such a thing +as I now see and am filled with awe!... Are you, too, a flower +in this garden of flowers?" "No, Parsifal. Far, far away is my +home. I came here only that you might find me. I came from distant +lands where I witnessed many things...." With the calm notes of the +Arch-enchantress, perfectly sure of her power, she unfolds to him +the story of his own past further back than he can remember, which +is of the things she professes to have ocularly witnessed,—his +life with Herzeleide; she relates the death of the latter from grief +over his loss. She takes him in hand with easy masterliness in +the art of reducing a youthful heart. She does not stint to appear +to one so boyish much older and very wise. Not one discomposing word +does she utter about love,—but she brings his heart to a state +of fusion by the picture of his mother's sorrowful end, and when, +overcome by anguish and remorse, he sinks at her feet with the cry: +"What have I done?... Sweetest, loveliest mother! Your son, your +son must bring about your death!..." she gently places her arm about +his <a name="page_22"><span class="page">Page 22</span></a> neck and +administers needed comfort: "Never before had you known sorrow, and +so have not known either the sweetness of consolation. Let sorrow +and regret be washed away in the consolation proffered to you by +Love!" But Parsifal, the compassionate, cannot so soon be diverted +from the rending thought of his mother, and continues despite the +fair arm on his neck and the balmy breath in his hair, with his +passionate self-reproach: "My mother! I could forget my mother! Ha! +What else have I forgotten? What, indeed, have I ever remembered? +Naught but utter folly dwells in me!" Kundry again attempts setting +him right with himself and offers the cheer: "Acknowledgment of your +fault will place a term to remorse. Consciousness of folly will turn +folly into sense...." Then, not quite relevantly, "Learn to know the +love which enfolded Gamuret when Herzeleide's affection burningly +overflowed,..." With the assurance that she who gave him life now +sends him as a mother's last blessing the First Kiss of Love, she +bends over him and places her lips upon his in a prolonged Wagnerian +kiss. The sorcery-motif is heard weaving its unholy snare. Of a +sudden, with an abruptness as unexpected as it is disconcerting, +Parsifal tears himself from her embrace, leaps to his feet, and +pressing his hands to his heart, as if there were the seat of an +intolerable pain, "Amfortas!" he cries, staring like one who sees +ghosts, "the wound! the wound!..." That has been the effect of her +kiss upon his innocence, to give him sudden clairvoyance into her +nature, to cast a lightning flash upon the past. He feels himself +for a moment identified with Amfortas, whom the woman had kissed as +she kissed him. Amfortas's wound burns in his own side. Not only +that: the sinful, disorderly, unsubduable passion torturing Amfortas, +for a moment tortures equally Parsifal, <a name="page_23"><span +class="page">Page 23</span></a> whose nature is thrown by it into +a horror of self-hatred, and casts itself upon frenzied prayer for +deliverance and pardon. Pardon, for although this experience can +be thought an effect of mysterious insight, Parsifal recognises +as a crime that he should be in these circumstances at all. He +remembers that he had known himself as one marked for a sacred +mission. He remembers the vision of the Grail, and that the Saviour +had seemed to speak from it to his inmost soul: "Deliver me! Save +me from sin-polluted hands!" "And I," he groans, "the fool! the +coward! I could rush to the insensate exploits of a boy!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Kundry has been amazed and somewhat alarmed, but for a moment still, +as it appears, has not understood. She leaves her flowery couch +and approaches Parsifal, where he is kneeling in supplication to +the Lord of Mercy; with soft arts she attempts to reconquer his +attention, but with an effect wide of her expectation, for, while +she plies him with caresses, he is thinking, and we hear him think: +"Yes, that voice, even thus it fell upon his ear.... And that glance, +I recognise it clearly, which smiled away his peace.... So the +lip trembled for him. ... So the throat arched.... So the tresses +laughingly gleamed!... So the soft cheek pressed close against +his own,... and so, in league with all the sorrows, so her mouth +kissed away his soul's salvation!" As if the reinforcements from +Heaven, which he prayed, had suddenly reached him, he rises in +inspired strength, frees himself and thrusts her resolutely from +him: "Destroyer, away from me! Forever and ever away!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +From this onward he is a different Parsifal, not in the least a +boy any more. It is as if in the storm which swept him he had found +himself, his anchorage and his strength. And now we gather that Kundry +really has had an inkling of what is at <a name="page_24"><span +class="page">Page 24</span></a> work in him. She drops at once +the fairly simple methods she has up to this used, and, it is not +quite clear at first whether still as a mighty Huntress, discarding +one weapon and taking another better adapted to bring down the +quarry, or at last in true earnest, she invokes—pressing, +not to be denied—his pity. She reveals—and it is as +if beauty and splendour should lift the veil from a hidden +ulcer—her strange history, the ancient sin, the curse upon +her, the despair that is denied tears and can only voice itself in +laughter. "Since your heart is capable only of feeling the sorrows +of others," she pleads, "feel mine!" In him, as he has become within +the hour, she recognises a deliverer, but, illogically, thirsts the +more for his love. From this figure with the firm, compassionate +eyes and the exalted self-possession, something breathes which +associates him to her sense with the figure, sought by her through +the centuries, of the derided Victim. She feels herself face to +face once more with the Christ-spirit. But the blind desire of +her dual personality is that pardon should wear the form of love. +Parsifal, with every moment more firmly established in his strength +and purpose, replies to her madness with a calm homily,—his +theme, how from the springs of passion flow waters of thirst. Words +of wisdom, eternal truths, drop from the so young lips of the fool. +Kundry, who has listened in wonder, exclaims: "So it was my kiss +which gave you universal vision! The full cup of my love then would +make you to a god!" and coming back eagerly to her point: "Deliver +the world, if such is your mission. If an hour can make you to a +god, let me, for that hour, suffer damnation...." "For you, too, +sinner, I will find salvation," is Parsifal's mild reply. "Let me +love you in your godlikeness, that shall be salvation for me!" +"Love and salvation both shall reward you, if you will show me +the way to Amfortas!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_25"><span class="page">Page 25</span></a> It will +have been remarked that Kundry in her singular rôle has been +playing fair; that, though life for her (which paradoxically is +death) depends upon failure, she has put forth her whole strength +in the temptation. But it is not at this juncture the penitent who +is in the ascendant, it is the evil side of Kundry, and at that +last request of Parsifal's, proving the vanity of her effort, a +great anger seizes her: "Never!" she cries, "never shall you find +him! The fallen king, let him perish! The wretch whom I laughed +and laughed and laughed at! Ha ha! Why—he was wounded with +his own spear.... And against yourself," she follows this, "I will +call to aid that weapon, if you give that sinner the honour of your +pity!" But, at the sound of her own words, her anger dropping: +"Ah, madness!... Pity! On me, do you have pity! One single hour +mine... and you shall be shown on your way!" With a renewal of +tenderness she attempts to clasp him; but at his abhorrent, "Unhappy +woman, away!" furious beside all bounds, she falls to shouting for +help against him, help to prevent his going. "Help! Here! Hold +the audacious one! Bar the roads against him! Bar the paths!..." +Then, addressing him in the blaze of her revengeful wrath: "And +though you should escape from here—and though you should +find all the roads in the world, the road which you seek you shall +not find! For all roads and paths which lead you away from me, I +place a curse upon them. Hopelessly—hopelessly shall you +wander and stray!..." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At her wild summoning the women have come running into the garden; +Klingsor has appeared on the threshold, armed with the Spear. This, +with the words: "The Fool shall be transfixed with his Master's +Spear!" he hurls at Parsifal. But the Spear stands miraculously +poised above the youth's head. He grasps it, with a face of ecstasy, +and draws in the air a great <a name="page_26"><span class="page">Page +26</span></a> figure of the Cross. "By this sign I dispel your +sorceries! As this Spear shall close the wound it made, let this +lying splendour fall to wreck and desolation!" As if shaken by +an earthquake, the palace crumbles to ruin; the garden withers +away and turns to a barren waste; like broken and wilted flowers +the women are seen bestrewing the ground; Kundry falls to earth +with a great cry. And Parsifal, departing, turns on the ruined +wall for a last word to her,—painfully she lifts her head +for a last look—"You know where, only, you may see me again!" +meaning, we are left to feel, a plane sooner than a place. +</p> + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +Again the Domain of the Grail, where, on the outskirts of the forest, +beside a spring, the old-grown Gurnemanz has built himself a hermit's +cell. It is long after and much is changed. There is sadness in +the air, but it is of an unfretful gentle sort, almost sweet; the +sadness of a solitude visited by high thoughts, memories of calamity +softened in retrospect, present crosses made supportable by faith +and the light cast on the path already of an approaching event +which is to mark a new epoch in the life of the Order. A sadness +in the air and a something holy. It is Spring-time and it is +Good-Friday; the trees are in blossom and the meadow at the forest's +edge is spotted with new flowers. We are never, through the first +part of the act, left unconscious for long of the sweetness of +surrounding nature and the hour; it comes like whiffs of perfume, +every now and then, reminding us that the earth has renewed herself +and the day is holy, until at last these stray intimations have +led to a clear and rounded statement in the Good-Friday Charm. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Forth from his cell comes Gurnemanz, to be recognized as a <a +name="page_27"><span class="page">Page 27</span></a> knight of +the Grail only by the straight under-tunic of the Order. He has +heard a groan, not to be mistaken for the cry of a hurt animal. +As it is repeated, it strikes his ear as a sound known to him of +old. Anxiously searching among the matted thorn-trees, he discovers +Kundry, as once before, rigid and to all appearance dead. He chafes +and calls and brings her back to consciousness. She is the Kundry +of the first act, but so changed,—pale with the strained +pallor of one lately exorcised; the wildness and roughness all +gone out of her face, and in its place a strange rapt fixity; in +her bearing an unknown humility. In silence she recovers remembrance +of the facts of her existence; mechanically orders her hair and +garments, and without a word leaves Gurnemanz to set about the +work of a servant. As she is moving towards the hut, he asks: "Have +you no word for me? Is this my thanks for having waked you once +more out of the sleep of death?" And she brings forth brokenly +the last words she is heard to utter: "To serve!... To serve!..." +the only need now of her being. "How different her bearing is," +Gurnemanz muses, "from what it used to be! Is it the influence of +the holy day?" She brings from the cell a water-jar, and, gazing +off into the distance while it fills, sees among the trees some one +approaching, to which, by a sign, she calls Gurnemanz's attention. +He marvels at the figure in sable armour; but we, saddened and slowed +as it is, have recognized the Parsifal-motif heralding it. The +sable knight is faring slowly on his way, with closed helmet, bowed +head and lowered spear, unconscious of his observers, until, when he +drops on a grassy knoll to rest, Gurnemanz greets and addresses +him: "Have you lost your way? Shall I guide you?" Receiving no +answer to this or the questions which follow, save by signs of +the head, he with the bluffness we remember offers a reprimand: +"If your vow binds you not to speak to <a name="page_28"><span +class="page">Page 28</span></a> me, my vow obliges me to tell you +what is befitting. You are upon a consecrated spot, it is improper +here to go in armour, with closed helmet, with shield and spear. +And of all days upon this one! Do you not know what holy day it +is?" The knight gently shakes his head. "Among what heathen have +you lived, not to be aware that this is the most holy Good-Friday? +Lay down, forthwith, your arms! Do not offend the Lord, who on this +day, unarmed in very truth, offered His sacred blood in atonement +for the sins of the world!" The knight upon this, still without +a word, drives the haft of his spear into the ground, lays down +his arms and sinks upon his knees in prayer before the Spear. The +removal of his helmet has revealed the face of Parsifal, but another +Parsifal, even as Kundry is another. The stage-directions have no +word concerning it, but it must be in accordance with the custom +of Bayreuth that the latter Parsifal presents a resemblance to the +traditional representations of the Saviour; the idea being, we +must think, to indicate, stamped on the exterior man, this soul's +aspiration towards likeness with the Divine Pattern; or, perhaps, +visibly to state that here, too, is a gentle and selfless lover +of men, all of whose forces bent on a mission of deliverance. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Gurnemanz, watching him attentively, recognises the slayer, long +ago, of the swan, the stupid boy whom he had turned out of the +temple. Then he recognises, too, the Spear. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Parsifal, rising from his prayer, gazes quietly around him and +recognises Gurnemanz. To the question of the latter, how and whence +he comes, he replies: "I am come by ways of wandering and pain. Can +I believe myself at last delivered from them, since I hear once +more the rustle of this forest, and behold you, worthy elder? Or +am I still baffled in my search for the right road? Everything looks +changed...." <a name="page_29"><span class="page">Page 29</span></a> +"What road is it you seek?" Gurnemanz inquires. "The road to him +whose profound wail I heard of yore in wondering stupidity, and +the instrument of whose healing I now dare believe myself elected +to be...." All this long time he has vainly sought the road back +to the Grail, whether hindered by Kundry's curse, or cut off by +some stain left upon his nature from his brief hour in the deadly +garden, which must be cleansed by such prolonged ordeal. He relates +the desperate battle in all his wanderings to keep safe the Sacred +Spear,—which, behold, he is now bringing home! Gurnemanz's +joy bursts forth unbounded. Then he, too, makes his friend even +over the past. Since the day of his presence among them, the trouble +then revealed to him has increased to the last point of distress. +Amfortas, revolting against the torments of his soul, and desiring +naught but death, refuses to perform the office of the Grail, by +which his life would be prolonged. The knights, deprived of their +heavenly nourishment, deprived of a leader, have lost their old +strength and courage. They seek their sustenance of herbs and roots, +like the animals, in the forest. No longer are they called to holy +warfare in distant lands. Titurel, unrenewed by the vision of the +Grail, is dead.... At the relation of these mournful events, grief +assails Parsifal, who holds himself responsible for all this +wretchedness, by reason of his long-delayed return, which he must +regard as a consequence of sins and folly of his own,—grief +beyond what the human frame is fitted to endure, and he is again +swooning, as at the evil news in the first act. Kundry hurries with +water from the cell, but Gurnemanz stops her; he has in thought +larger purifications for the pilgrim in whom his prophetic mind +discerns one ordained to fulfill this very day a sacred office. +"So let him be made clean of all stain, let the dust be washed +from <a name="page_30"><span class="page">Page 30</span></a> him +of his long wandering." They ease him upon the moss beside the +consecrated spring, remove his greaves and coat of mail. As he +revives a little, he asks faintly: "Shall I be taken to-day to +Amfortas?" Gurnemanz assures him that he shall, for on this day +the burial of Titurel takes place, which Gurnemanz must attend, and +Amfortas has pledged himself, in honour of his father, to uncover +once more the Grail. Kundry during this, on her knees, has been +bathing the pilgrim's feet. He watches her, at her devoted lowly +task, in wonder: "You have washed my feet," he speaks; "let now +the friend pour water on my head!" Gurnemanz obeys, besprinkling +him with a baptismal intention. Kundry takes from her bosom a golden +phial, and, having poured ointment on his feet, dries them, in +the custom of the day when she was Herodias, with her long hair; +by this repetition of a famous act intending perhaps to signify +that she is a sinner and that he has raised her from sin. "You +have anointed my feet," speaks Parsifal again; "let now the +brother-at-arms of Titurel anoint my head, for on this day he shall +hail me as king." Whereupon Gurnemanz anoints him as king. Kundry +has been gazing with a devout hushed face. There is no sign that +he recognises her, but, as if his soul recognised some quality of +her soul, as if some need in her called to him, he dips water from +the sacred well and sprinkles her head: "My first ministration shall +be this: I baptize thee! Have faith in the Redeemer!" And Kundry, +the curse being lifted which had dried up in her the fountain of +tears, bows to the earth abundantly weeping. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At this point it is that the vague waftures of sweetness which have +been fitfully soliciting us all through these scenes, concentrate +themselves and make their call irresistible. Parsifal becomes aware +of it. With his sense of the absolution <a name="page_31"><span +class="page">Page 31</span></a> from sin for both of them, in baptism, +invaded by deep peace, he gazes around him in soft enchantment: +"How more than usual lovely the meadows appear to me to-day! True, +I have known wonder-flowers, clasping me with eager tendrils so +high as my head; but never had I seen blades, blossoms, flowers, +so mild and tender, nor ever did, to my sense, all nature give +forth a fragrance so innocently sweet, or speak to me with such +amiable confidence!" "That," explains Gurnemanz, "is Good-Friday's +Charm...." "Alas!" wails Parsifal, "that day of supreme agony! +Ought not on this day everything which blooms and breathes to be +steeped in mourning and tears?" "You see," replies Gurnemanz, "that +it is not so. They are the sinners' tears of repentance which today +bathe meadow and plain with a holy dew; that is why they look so +fresh and fair. To-day all created things rejoice upon the earth +once trodden by the Saviour's feet, and wish to offer Him their +prayers. Beyond them it is to see Him upon the Cross, wherefore +they turn their eyes to redeemed man. Man feels himself delivered +from the burden and terror of sin, through God's sacrifice of love +made clean and whole. The grasses and flowers become aware of this, +they mark that on this day the foot of man spares to trample them, +that, even as God with a heavenly patience bears with man and once +suffered for his sake, man in pious tribute treads softly to avoid +crushing them. All creation gives thanks for this, all the short-lived +things that bloom; for to-day all Nature, absolved from sin, regains +her day of Innocence." The exquisiteness of this passage, the +Good-Friday Spell (<i>Charfreitag's Zauber</i>), can hardly be +conveyed; if one says the music is worthy of the theme, one has +but given a hint of the overearthly quality of its sweetness. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Kundry has slowly raised her head and fixed upon Parsifal <a +name="page_32"><span class="page">Page 32</span></a> her prayerful +wet eyes. Either from his recent contemplation of the flowery lea, +or some occult association of her personality with the past, the +flowers of Klingsor's garden come into his mind. "I saw them wither +who had smiled on me. May they not also be hungering for redemption +now?... Your tears, too, are turned to blessed dew.... You weep, +and see, the meadow blooms in joy!" He stoops and kisses her gently +upon the forehead. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Bells are heard summoning the knights to the Castle. Gurnemanz +brings from the cell the mantle of a knight of the Grail, and places +it upon Parsifal's shoulders. Parsifal grasps the Spear, and the +three vanish from sight among the trees. Again, but from the opposite +direction, we approach the Castle; the sound of bells increases +as we pass through the granite portal and the vaulted corridors. +We are once more in the domed hall. All is as we left it, save +for the tables, which, become useless, are no longer there. Again +the doors open at the back and from each issues forth a company of +knights, the one bearing the bier of Titurel, the other carrying +the litter of Amfortas and the shrine of the Grail, while they chant, +in question and response, a song of reproachful tenor. "Whom do you +bring, with tokens of mourning, in the dark casket?" "The funereal +casket holds the hero into whose charge the very God entrusted +Himself. Titurel we bring." "Who slew him, whom God Himself held in +His care?" "The killing burden of age slew him, when he no longer +might behold the Grail." "Who prevented him from beholding the +glory of the Grail?" "He whom you carry, the sinful Keeper." The +latter they now urge to fulfill his promise of exposing the Grail, +and, deeply moved by the sight of his father's face and the outburst +of lamentation which follows the folding back of the pall from +it, he appears on the point of satisfying <a name="page_33"><span +class="page">Page 33</span></a> them; but, as in their eagerness +they hem him around with injunctions almost threatening, he is +seized with a revulsion once more against the task imposed on him. +He springs from his high seat and stands among them begging that +rather they will kill him. "Already I feel the night of death closing +around me, and must I be forced back into life? You demented! Who +shall compel me to live? Death alone it is in your power to give!" +He tears open his garment and offers his breast. "Forward, heroes! +Slay the sinner with his affliction! The Grail perchance will glow +for you then of Itself!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +But the knights shrink away. Then it is that Parsifal, who with +Gurnemanz and Kundry has entered unnoticed, advances and with the +point of the Sacred Spear touches Amfortas's wound. "One weapon +alone avails. The wound can be closed only by the Spear which made +it. Be whole, pardoned and absolved, for I now hold the office in +your stead!" Amfortas's countenance of holy ecstasy proclaims the +instant virtue of the remedy. As Parsifal holds up to the enraptured +gaze of the knights the Spear which he has brought back to them, +the Parsifal-motif is heard again, for the last time, triumphant, +broad, and glorious. He proceeds to perform the rite which had +been the duty of Amfortas. A glory rains upon the altar. At the +glowing of the Grail, Titurel, returning for a moment to life, +lifts himself on his bier with a gesture of benediction. As Parsifal +moves the Chalice softly above the kneeling assembly, a white dove +descends from on high and floats above his head. Kundry, with her +eyes turned toward all these luminous things, sinks softly upon +the altar-steps, the life-giving Grail having given her life too, +in the form of desired death. With the interwoven Grail and Faith +and Spear music letting down as if a curtain of silver and azure +and gold, the poem closes. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_34"><span class="page">Page 34</span></a> One has +heard it objected, as at least strange, that when the search after +knowledge is so unquestionably meritorious, and study, as we count +it, one of the conditions of progress, and learning a lamp to our +feet, an ideal should be made of total ignorance, such as Parsifal's. +But surely the point is a different one. The point is not Parsifal's +ignorance—except, perhaps, in so far as it made for +innocence—but the qualities which he possessed, and which one +may possess, in spite of ignorance. It is a comparison of values +which is established. Through the object-lesson of Parsifal, Wagner +is saying, after his fashion and inversely, what Saint Paul says: +"Though I speak with the tongues of men and angels,... though I +have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all +knowledge,... and have not charity, I am nothing;... it availeth +me nothing." The supremacy of charity, love of others, is the point +illustrated. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +One tributary to the mighty stream of our interest in the opera +of Parsifal has its spring in the date of its appearance. It comes +as the poet's last word. What a procession of heroes has passed +before us—beautiful, brave, romantic,—how fit, every +one, to capture the imagination! Towering a little above the rest, +Siegfried, the <i>Uebermensch</i>, the Overman. But finally, with +the effect of a conclusion reached, a judgement, the hero whose +heroism differs in quality from that of the others, the lowly of +heart, whose dominant trait is <i>Mitleid</i>, compassion, sympathy +with the woes of others, who pities swans and women and the sinful +and the suffering, and gives his strength to helping them, and +sanctifies himself for their sake. +</p> + +<p class="bigtitle"> +<a name="page_35"><span class="page">Page 35</span></a> +THE RHINE-GOLD</p> + +<h2><a name="page_37"><span class="page">Page 37</span></a> +THE RHINE-GOLD</h2> + +<p class="indent"> +In the beginning was the Gold,—beautiful, resplendent, its +obvious and simple part to reflect sunlight and be a joy to the eyes; +containing, however, apparently of its very nature, the following +mysterious quality: a ring fashioned from it would endow its possessor +with what is vaunted as immeasurable power, and make him master of +the world. This power shows itself afterwards undefined in some +directions and circumscribed in others, one never fully grasps +its law; one plain point of it, however, was to subject to the +owner of the ring certain inferior peoples and reveal to him the +treasures hidden in the earth, which he could force his thralls +to mine and forge and so shape that they might be used to buy and +subject the superior peoples, thus making him actually, if successful +in corruption, master of the world. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +But this ring could by no possibility be fashioned except by one +who should have utterly renounced love. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +For these things no reason is given: they were, like the Word. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +One feels an allegory. As the poem unfolds, one is often conscious +of it. It is well to hold the thread of it lightly and let it slip +as soon as it becomes puzzling, settling down contentedly in the +joy of simple story. The author himself, very much a poet, must +be supposed to have done something of the sort. He does not follow +to any trite conclusion the thought he has started, he has small +care for minor consistencies. Large-mindedly he drops what has +become inconvenient, and <a name="page_38"><span class="page">Page +38</span></a> prefers simply beauty, interest, the story. Thus his +personages have a body, and awaken sympathies which would hardly +attach to purely allegorical figures; a charm of livingness invests +the world he has created. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The Gold's home was in the Rhine, at the summit of a high, pointed +rock, where it caught the beams of the sun and shed them down through +the waves, brightening the dim water-world, gladdening the water-folk. +That was its sole use, but for thus making golden daylight in the +deep it was worshipped, besung, called adoring names, by nixies +swimming around it in a sort of joyous rite. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The mysterious potentiality of the gold was known to the Rhine-god; +three of his daughters had been instructed by him, and detailed +to guard the treasure. Some faculty of divination warned him of +danger to it, and of the quarter from whence this danger threatened. +But nixies—even when burdened by cares of state—are +just nixies; those three seem to have lived to laugh before all +else—to laugh and chase one another and play in the cool +green element, singing all the while a fluent, cradling song whose +sweetness might well allure boatmen and bathers. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Below the Rhine lay Nibelheim, the kingdom of mists and night, +the home of the Nibelungs,—dark gnomes, dwarfs, living in +the bowels of the earth, digging its metals, excelling in cunning +as smiths. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The Rhine did not continue flowing water quite down to its bed; +the boundary-line of Nibelheim seems to have been just above it; +the water there turned to fine mist; among the rough rocks of the +river-bed were passages down into the Under-world. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Up through one of these, one day before sunrise, while the Rhine +was melodiously thundering in its majestic course—they <a +name="page_39"><span class="page">Page 39</span></a> are the +Rhine-motifs which open the piece,—came clambering, by some +chance, the Nibelung Alberich. His night-accustomed eyes, as he blinked +upward into the green light, were caught by a silvery glinting of +scales, flashes of flesh-pink and floating hair. The Rhine-maidens, +guardians of the gold, were frolicking around it; but this did not +appear, for the sun had not yet risen to wake it into radiance. +The dwarf saw just a shimmering of young forms, was touched with +a natural desire, and called to them, asking them to come down +to him, and let him join in their play. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At the sound of the strange voice and the sight of the strange +figure, Flosshilde, a shade more sensible than her sisters, cries +out to them: "Look to the gold! Father warned us of an enemy of +the sort!" and the three rally quickly around the treasure. But it +soon appears that the stranger is but a dark, small, hairy, ugly, +harmless-seeming, amorous creature, uttering his wishes very simply. +The watch over the gold is relinquished, and a little amusement +sought in tantalizing and befooling the clumsy wooer. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Alberich, later a figure touched with terror and followed with +dislike, is likeable in this scene, almost gentle, one's sympathies +come near being with him. The music describes him awkward and heavy, +slipping on the rocks, sneezing in the wet; a note of protest is +frequent in his voice. All the music relating to him, now or later, +is joyless, whatever beside it may be. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The sisters have their fun with the poor gnome, whose innocence of +nixies' ways is apparent in the long time it is before all reliance +in their good faith leaves him. Woglinde invites him nearer. With +difficulty he climbs the slippery rocks to reach her. When he can +nearly touch her—he is saying, "Be my sweetheart, womanly +child!"—she darts from him. And the sisters laugh their delicious +inhuman laugh. <a name="page_40"><span class="page">Page 40</span></a> +Woglinde then plunges to the river-bed, calling to Alberich, "Come +down! Here you surely can grasp me!" He owns it will be easier for +him down there, and lets himself down, when the sprite rises, light +as a bubble, to the surface. He is calling her an impudent fish +and a deceitful young lady, when Wellgunde sighs, "Thou beautiful +one!" He turns quickly, inquiring naïvely, "Do you mean me?" +She says, "Have nothing to do with Woglinde. Turn sooner to me!" He +is but too willing, vows that he thinks her much the more beautiful +and gleaming, and prays she will come further down. She stops short +of arm's-length. He pours forth his elementary passion. She feigns +a wish to see her handsome gallant more closely. After a brief +comedy of scanning his face, with insulting promptness she appears +to change her mind, and with the unkindest descriptive terms slipping +from his grasp swims away. And again rings the chorus of malicious +musical laughter. Then the cruellest of the three, Flosshilde, takes +the poor swain in hand. She not only comes down, she allows herself +to be held, she wreathes her slender arms around him, presses him +tenderly and flatters him in music well calculated to daze with +delight. He is not warned by her words, as, while they sit embraced, +she says, "Thy piercing glance, thy stubborn beard, might I see +the one, feel the other, forever! The rough locks of thy prickly +hair, might they forever flow around Flosshilde! Thy toad's shape, +thy croaking voice, oh, might I, wondering and mute, see and hear +them exclusively for ever!" It is the sudden mocking laughter of the +two listening sisters which draws him from his dream—when +Flosshilde slips from his hold, and the three again swim merrily +around, and laugh, and when his angry wail rises call down to him +to be ashamed of himself! But not even then do they let him rest; +they hold forth new hopes, inviting and exciting him to chase them, +till fairly aflame with <a name="page_41"><span class="page">Page +41</span></a> love and wrath he begins a mad pursuit, climbing, +slipping, falling to the foot of the rocks, starting upwards again, +clutching at this one and that, still eluded with ironical laughter, +until, realizing his impotence, breathless and quaking with rage, +he shakes his clenched hand at them, foaming, "Let me catch one +with this fist!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He is glaring upward at them, speechless with fury, when his eyes +become fixed upon a brilliant point, growing in size and radiance +until the whole flood is illumined. There is an exquisite hush of +a moment. The sun has risen and kindled its reflection in the gold. +The music describes better than words the spreading of tremulous +light down through the deep. Through the wavering ripples of water +and light cuts the bright call of the gold, the call to wake up +and behold. Again and again it rings, regularly a golden voice. +The Rhine-daughters have quickly forgotten their victim. They begin +their blissful circumswimming of their idol, with a song in ecstatic +celebration of it, so penetratingly, joyously sweet, that you readily +forgive them their naughtiness: "Rhine-gold! Rhine-gold! Luminous +joy! How laugh'st thou so bright and clear!"... +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Alberich cannot detach his eyes from the vision. "What is it, you +sleek ones," he asks in awed curiosity, "glancing and gleaming +up there?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Now where have you barbarian lived," they reply, "never to have +heard of the Rhine-gold?" They mock his ignorance; returning to +their teasing mood, they invite him to come and revel with them +in the streaming light. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"If it is no good save for you to swim around, it is of small use +to me!" is Alberich's dejected observation. As if their treasure had +been disparaged, Woglinde informs him that he would hardly despise +the gold if he knew all of its wonder! And Wellgunde follows this +part-revelation with the whole secret: <a name="page_42"><span +class="page">Page 42</span></a> The whole world would be his inheritance +who should fashion out of the Rhine-gold a magic ring. Vainly Flosshilde +tries to silence her sisters. Wellgunde and Woglinde laugh at her +prudence, reminding her of the gold's assured safety in view of the +condition attached to the creation of the ring. This is described +in a solemn phrase, serious as the pronouncing of a vow: "Only he +who forswears the power of love, only he who casts from him the +joys of love, can learn the spell by which the gold may be forced +into a ring."—Wherefore, they hold, the gold is safe, "for +all that lives wishes to love, no one will give up love," least +of all this Nibelung, the heat of whose sentiments had come near +scorching them! And they laugh and swim around the gold with their +light-hearted Wallalaleia, diversified with mocking personalities +to the gnome down in the gloom. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +But they have miscalculated. Without suspecting it, they have gone +too far. The dwarf stands staring at the gold, dreaming what it +would be to own the world. He is hardly at that moment, thanks +to them, in love with love. His resolution is suddenly taken. He +springs to the rock, shouting: "Mock on! Mock on! The Nibelung is +coming!" With fearful activity, hate-inspired strength, he rapidly +climbs the rock on which he had so slipped and floundered before. +The foolish nymphs, though they see his approach, are still far from +understanding. They still believe it is themselves he seeks to seize. +They now not only laugh—they laugh, as the stage-directions +have it, "<i>im tollsten Uebermuth</i>," the craziest towering +insolence of high spirits. "Save yourselves, the gnome is raving! +He has gone mad with love!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He has reached the summit of the rock, he has laid hands on the +gold. He cries, "You shall make love in the dark!... I quench your +light, I tear your gold from the reef. I shall <a name="page_43"><span +class="page">Page 43</span></a> forge me the ring of vengeance, +for, let the flood hear me declare it: I here curse love!" Tearing +from its socket their splendid lamp, which utters just once its +golden cry, all distorted and lamentable, he plunges with it into +the depths, leaving sudden night over the scene in which the wild +sisters, shocked at last into sobriety, with cries of Help and Woe +start in pursuit of the robber. His harsh laugh of triumph drifts +back from the caves of Nibelheim. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Then occurs a gradual transformation-scene both to the eye and +the ear. The rocks disappear, black waves flow past, the whole +all the while appearing to sink. Clouds succeed the water, mist +the clouds. This finally clears, revealing a calm and lovely scene +on the mountain-heights. The music has during this been painting +the change, too: Sounds of running water, above which hovers a +moment, a memory of the scene just past and a foreboding of its +sorrowful consequences, the strain signifying the renunciation +of love; when this dies away, the motif of the ring, to be heard +so many times after, its fateful character plainly conveyed by the +notes, which also literally describe its circular form. By what +magic of modulation the uninitiated cannot discern, the ring-motif, +as the water by degrees is translated into mist, slides by subtle +changes into a motif which seems, when it is reached, conspicuously +different from it, the motif of the Gods' Abode. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +There in the distance it stands, when the mists have perfectly +cleared, bathed in fresh morning light, the tall just-completed +castle, with shimmering battlements, crowning a high rocky mountain, +at whose base, far down out of sight, flows the Rhine. For the +Rhine is the centre of the world we are occupied with: under it, +the Nibelungs; above it, the Gods; beside it, the giants and the +insignificant human race. The music itself here, while the dwelling +of the gods is coming into <a name="page_44"><span class="page">Page +44</span></a> sight, seems to build a castle: story above story +it rises, topped with gleaming pinnacles, one, lighter and taller +than all the rest, piercing the clouds. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +In the foreground lie sleeping side by side, on a flowery bank, +the god and goddess Wotan and Fricka. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He lies dreaming happily of the abode from which the world is to +be commanded by him, to the display of immeasurable power and his +eternal honour. His wife's sleep is less easy. For the situation +is not as free from complications as his untroubled slumbers might +lead one to suppose. Wotan has employed to build him this stronghold +the giants Fasolt and Fafner, formerly his enemies, but bound to +peace by treaties, and has promised them the reward stipulated +for, Freia, goddess of beauty and youth, sister of Fricka. And +this he has done without any serious thought of keeping his word. +"<i>Nie sann es ernstlich mein Sinn</i>," he assures Fricka, when, +starting in dismay from her sleep and beholding the completed burg, +she reminds him that the time is come for payment, and asks what +shall they do. Loge, he enlightens her, counselled the compact and +promised to find the means of evading it. He relies upon him to +do so. This calm frankness in the god, with its effect of personal +clearness from all sense of guilt, suggests the measure of Wotan's +distinguishing simplicity. Referring later to the dubious act which +so effectually laid the foundation of sorrows, he says, "Unknowingly +deceitful, I practised untruth. Loge artfully tempted me." He explains +himself to Fricka, when she asks why he continues to trust the crafty +Loge, who has often already brought them into straits: "Where frank +courage is sufficient, I ask counsel of no one. But slyness and +cunning are needed to turn to advantage the ill-will of adversaries, +and that is the talent of Loge." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Strong and calm is Wotan; music of might and august beauty, <a +name="page_45"><span class="page">Page 45</span></a> large music, +supports everyone of his utterances. There is no departure from +this, even when his signal fallibility is in question. Waftures +of Walhalla most commonly accompany his steps; the close of his +speech is frequently marked by the sturdy motif of his spear, the +spear inseparable from him, cut by him from the World-Ash, carved +with runes establishing the bindingness of compacts, by aid of +which he had conquered the world, subdued the giants, the Nibelungs, +and Loge, the Spirit of Fire. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Athirst for power he is, before all: in this trait lie the original +seeds of his destruction; it is for the sake of the tokens of power, +the castle and later the ring, that he commits the injustices which +bring about ruin. Athirst, too, for wisdom: he has given one of his +eyes for Wisdom, in the person of Fricka, who combines in herself law +and order and domestic virtue. And athirst for love,—something +of a grievance to Fricka. "<i>Ehr ich die Frauen doch mehr als dich +freut</i>," "I honour women more than pleases you," he retorts +to her reproach of contempt for woman's love and worth, evidenced +in his light ceding of Freia. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He calls himself and all call him a god, adding "eternal" even +when the gods' end is glaringly at hand. The other gods look to +him as chief among them. But he is ever acknowledging the existence +of something outside and above himself, a law, a moral necessity, +which it is no use to contend against; through which, do what he +may, disaster finally overtakes him for having tried to disregard it. +There is a stray hint from him that the world is his very possession +and that he could at will destroy it; but this which so many facts +contradict we may regard as a dream. Yet he feels toward the world +most certainly a responsibility, such as a sovereign's toward his +people; a duty, part of which is that for its sake he must not allow +his spear <a name="page_46"><span class="page">Page 46</span></a> to +be dishonoured. Compacts it must sacredly guard. All his personal +troubles come from this necessity, this constant check to him: +he must respect covenants, his spear stands for their integrity. +Alberich in a bitter discussion declares his knowledge of where +the god is weak, and reminds him that if he should break a covenant +sanctioned by the spear in his hand, this, the symbol of his power, +would split into spray! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He is perhaps best understood, on the whole, with his remorse and +despair, the tortures of his heart and his struggle with his soul, +if one can conceive him as a sort of sublimated aristocrat; a +resplendent great personage—just imaginable in the dawn of +history, when there were giants upon earth—lifted far above the +ordinary of the race by superior gifts, "reigning through beauty," +as Fasolt describes; possessing faculties not shared by common +mortals, but these rudimentary or else in their decline: the power +of divination, not always accurate or clear; the power of miracle, +not altogether to be relied upon; remaining young indefinitely, +yet not wholly enfranchised from time and circumstance; living +indefinitely, but recognising himself as perishable, and passing +at last, swallowed in twilight. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A great warrior and leader of heroes, inciter of men to bold actions +and novel flights; some of his titles: Father of Hosts, Father +of Battles, Father of Victory; riding in the storm-clouds on his +<i>Luft-ross</i>, his air-horse, whose hoof-beats and neigh fill +us with excited delight. But his air-horse cannot overtake +Brünnhilde's air-horse, in his pursuit of her, and Grane reaching +the goal falls exhausted.... +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A great reveller: reference is repeatedly made to the light-minded, +light-hearted, careless humour of the gods, their glorious feasts +and joyous life in the light up there. Their tribe is qualified as +"laughing." Wotan's unshakable dignity indeed <a name="page_47"><span +class="page">Page 47</span></a> does not prevent a quick easy laugh. +And he shows the true aristocratic temper in being little moved +by the sorrows of those beneath and unrelated to him: one of his +laughs, which we witness, is for the howls of a poor wee dwarf +who had been savagely beaten. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +And so this powerful clan-chief had had a fancy for a house to +live in worthy of their greatness. Fricka had fallen in with his +desire, but for reasons of her own. To him the citadel was a fresh +addition to his power. But Fricka had been "<i>um des Gatten Treu' +besorgt</i>," "ill at ease with regard to her consort's fidelity," +and had thought the beautiful dwelling might keep him at home. With +her words, "<i>Herrliche Wohnung, wonniger Hausrath</i>," "Beautiful +dwelling, delectable household order," first occurs the winning +strain which afterward stands for Fricka in her love of domesticity, +or, separate from her, for the pure charm of home. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +When the giants, however, had been subsidised for the great work +of building the house, the narrow-conscienced women had been kept +out of the way while an agreement was reached with the builders; +a grievance which Fricka remembers, and does not let her spouse +forget, when the evil consequences of his act are upon them. Fricka +constitutes something of a living reproach to her husband, though +a certain tender regard still exists between them through the +introductory Opera. A thankless part is Fricka's, like that of Reason +in opposition to Feeling and Genius. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Now Loge, who had been tamed by the conquering spear, hated his +tamer. He craved back his liberty, and, as the Norn tells us later +in <i>Goetterdaemmerung</i>, "tried to free himself by gnawing at +the runes on the shaft of the spear." He gave counsel to Wotan +which followed must create difficulties from which the god could +deliver himself only by an injustice; and <a name="page_48"><span +class="page">Page 48</span></a> this injustice Loge seems clearly +to have recognised from the first as the beginning of the end of +the strength of the gods. The subtle Loge is more widely awake than +Wotan to the "power not ourselves which makes for righteousness." +He counselled him to buy the giants' labor by the promise of Freia, +knowing that the gods could never endure to let the amiable goddess +go. He led them to believe that when the time came he would give +them further counsel by which to retain her. And his word Wotan +chose to trust, and gave his heart over to the untroubled enjoyment +of his plans' completion. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +And now Freia comes running to him in terror, crying that one of +the giants has told her he is come to fetch her. With her entrance +we first hear the slender sweet phrase, delicately wandering upward, +which after for a time denoting Freia, comes to mean for us just +beauty. Wotan calms the maiden in distress, and asks, as one fancies, +a little uneasily, "Have you seen nothing of Loge?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The arrival of the giants is one of the great comedy moments of +the play. Their colossally heavy tread, musically rendered, never +fails to call forth laughter from some corner in us of left-over +childhood. It is like the ogre's Fee-faw-fum. Fasolt is a good +giant, his shaggy hair is blond, his fur-tunic white, and his soft +big heart all given over to the touchingly lovely Freia. Fafner is +a bad giant and his hair and furs are black. He is much cleverer +than his brother. They carry as walking-sticks the trunks of trees. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +They make it known that they have come for their wages. Wotan bids +them, with a sturdy aplomb worthy of his godhead, state their wishes. +What shall the wages be? Fasolt, a shade astonished, replies, "That, +of course, which we settled upon. Haye you forgotten so soon? Freia.... +It is in the bond that she shall follow us home." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_49"><span class="page">Page 49</span></a> "Have you +taken leave of your senses... with you bond?" asks Wotan, with +a quick flash. "You must think of a different recompense. Freia +is far too precious to me." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The giant is for a moment still, unable to speak for indignation; +but recovering his voice he makes to the "son of light" a series +of observations eminently to the point. Wotan to these makes no +more retort than as if the words had not been spoken; but—to +gain time till Loge shall arrive—when the giant has quite +finished, he inquires, "What, after all, can the charm of the amiable +goddess signify to you clumsy boors?" Fasolt enlarges, "You, reigning +through beauty, shimmering lightsome race, lightly you offer to +barter for stone towers woman's loveliness. We simpletons labour +with toil-hardened hands to earn a sweet woman who shall dwell with +us poor devils.... And you mean to call the bargain naught?..." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Fafner gloomily checks him: Words will not help them. And the possession +of Freia in itself is to his mind of little account. But of great +account to take her from the gods. In her garden grow golden apples, +she alone has the art of tending these. Eating this fruit maintains +her kinsmen in unwaning youth. Were Freia removed, they must age +and fade. Wherefore let Freia be seized! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Wotan frets underbreath, "Loge is long acoming!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Freia's cries, as the giants lay hands upon her, bring her brothers +Donner and Froh—the god of Thunder and the god of the +Fields—quickly to her side. A combat between them and the +giants is imminent, when Wotan parts the antagonists with his spear, +"Nothing by violence!" and he adds, what it might be thought he +had lost sight of, "My spear is the protector of bargains!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +And then finally, finally, comes in sight Loge. Wotan lets out his +breath in relief: "Loge at last!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_50"><span class="page">Page 50</span></a> The music +has introduced Loge by a note-painting as of fire climbing up swiftly +through airiest fuel. There is a quick flash or two, like darting +tongues of flame. A combination of swirling and bickering and pulsating +composes the commonest Loge-motif, but the variety is endless of +the fire's caprices. Fantastical, cheery, and light it is mostly, +sinister sometimes, suggestive of treachery, but terrible never; its +beauty rather than its terror is reproduced. So characteristic are +the fire-motifs that after a single hearing a person instinctively +when one occurs looks for some sign or suggestion of Loge. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He stands now upon the rock, a vivid, charming, disquieting apparition, +with his wild red hair and fluttering scarlet cloak. The arch-hypocrite +wears always a consummately artless air. He comes near winning +us by a bright perfect good-humour, which is as of the quality +of an intelligence without a heart. The love of mischief for its +own sake, which is one of his chief traits, might be thought to +account easily for his many enemies. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He is related to the gods, a half-god, but is regarded coldly by +his kin. Wotan is his single friend in the family, and with Wotan +he preserves the attitude of a self-acknowledged underling. He +stands in fear of his immediate strength, while nourishing a hardly +disguised contempt for his wit, as well as that of his cousins +collectively. A secret hater of them all, and clear-minded in estimating +them. A touch of Mephistophelian there is in the pleasure which he +seems to find in the contemplation of the canker-spot in Wotan's +nature, drawing from the god over and over again, as if the admission +refreshed him, that he has no intention of dealing justly toward +the Rhine-maidens. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Is this your manner of hastening to set aright the evil bargain +concluded by you?" Wotan chides, as he appears from the valley. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_51"><span class="page">Page 51</span></a> "How? What +bargain concluded by me?..." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Pinned down to accounting for himself, "I promised," he says, "to +think over the matter, and try to find means of loosing you from +the bargain.... But how should I have promised to perform the +impossible?" Under the pressure of all their angers, he finally +airily delivers himself: "Having at heart to help you, I travelled +the world over, visiting its most recondite corners, in search +of such a substitute for Freia as might be found acceptable to +the giants. Vainly I sought, and now at last I plainly see that +nothing upon this earth is so precious that it can take the place +in man's affection of the loveliness and worth of woman." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Struck and uplifted by this thought, the gods, moved, look in one +another's faces, and the music expresses the sweet expansion of +the heart overflowing with thoughts of beauty and love. It is one +of the memorable moments of the Prologue. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Everywhere," proceeds Loge, "far as life reaches, in water, earth, +and air, wherever is quickening of germs and stirring of nature's +forces, I investigated and inquired what there might be in existence +that a man should hold dearer than woman's beauty and worth? Everywhere +my inquiry was met with derision. No creature, in water, earth, or +air, is willing to renounce love and woman." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +As he pauses, the gods again gaze at one another, with tender tearful +smiles, in an exalted emotion over the recognition of this touching +truth; and the music reexpresses that blissful expansion of the +heart. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Only one did I see," Loge says further—the light fading +out of the music—"who had renounced love; for red gold he +had forsworn the favor of woman." He relates Alberich's theft of +the gold, as it had been told him by the Rhine-daughters, <a +name="page_52"><span class="page">Page 52</span></a> who had made +him their advocate with Wotan, to procure its restitution. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +But their plea meets with a deaf ear. "You are stupid, indeed, +if not perverse," the god answers Loge, when he delivers their +appeal. "You find me in straits myself, how should I help others?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The giants have been listening to this talk about Alberich, an +ancient enemy of theirs. The cleverer brother asks Loge, "What +great advantage is involved in the possession of the gold, that +the Nibelung should find it all-sufficient?" Loge explains. There +drift back to Wotan's memory runes of the Ring, and the thought +readily arises that it would be well he possessed the ring himself. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"But how, Loge, should I learn the art to shape it?" At the reply +that he who would practise the magic by which it could be shaped +must renounce love, the god turns away in conclusive disrelish. +Loge informs him that he would in any case have been too late: +Alberich has already successfully forged the ring. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +This alters the face of things. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"But if he possesses a ring of such power," says simple Donner, "it +must be taken from him, lest he bring us all under its compulsion!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Wotan hesitates no more. "The ring I must have!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Yes, now, as long as love need not be renounced, it will be easy +to obtain it," says simple Froh. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Easy as mocking—child's-play!" sneers Loge. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Then do you tell us, how?..." Wotan's fine majestic simplicity +has no false pride. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The Serpent gleefully replies, "By theft! What a thief stole, you +steal from the thief! Could anything be easier? Only, Alberich is on +his guard, you will have to proceed craftily <a name="page_53"><span +class="page">Page 53</span></a> if you would overreach the robber... in +order to return their treasure to the Rhine-daughters, who earnestly +entreat you." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"The Rhine-daughters?" chafes Wotan. "What do you trouble me with +them?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +And the goddess of Wisdom,—more sympathetic on the whole in this +exhibition of weakness than in her hard justice later—exposing +the core of her feminine being, breaks in: "I wish to hear nothing +whatever of that watery brood. Many a man, greatly to my vexation, +have they lured under while he was bathing, with promises of love." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The giants have been listening and have taken counsel together. +Fafner now approaches Wotan. "Hear, Wotan.... Keep Freia.... We +have fixed upon a lesser reward. We will take in her stead the +Nibelung's gold." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Wotan comes near losing his temper. "What I do not own, I shall +bestow upon you shameless louts?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Fafner expresses a perfect confidence in Wotan's equipment for obtaining +the gold. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"For you I shall go to this trouble?" rails the irritated god, +"For you I shall circumvent this enemy? Out of all measure impudent +and rapacious my gratitude has made you clowns!..." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Fasolt who has only half-heartedly accepted his brother's decision +in favor of the gold, stays to hear no more, but seizes Freia. With +a warning that she shall be regarded as a hostage till evening, +but that if when they return the Rhinegold is not on the spot as +her ransom, they will keep her forever, the giants hurry her off. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Her cry for help rings back. Her brothers, in the act of rushing +to the rescue, look at Wotan for his sanction. No encouragement +is to be gathered from his face. He stands motionless, steeped +in perplexity, in conflict with himself. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_54"><span class="page">Page 54</span></a> Loge has +now a few moments' pure enjoyment in safely tormenting his superiors. +He stands, with his fresh, ingenuous air, on a point overlooking +the valley, and describes the giants' progress, as does the music, +too. "Not happy is Freia, hanging on the back of the rough ones +as they wade through the Rhine...." Her dejected kindred wince. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The heavy footsteps die away. Loge returning his attention to the +gods, voices his amazement at the sight which meets him: "Am I +deceived by a mist? Am I misled by a dream? How wan and fearful and +faded you do look! The glow is dead in your cheeks, the lightening +quenched in your glances. Froh, it is still early morning! Donner, +you are dropping your hammer! What ails Fricka? Is it chagrin to +see the greyness of age creeping over Wotan?" Sounds of woe burst +from all, save Wotan, who with his eyes on the ground still stands +absorbed in gloomy musing. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The solution of the puzzle suddenly, as he feigns, flashes upon +Loge: This is the result of Freia's leaving them! They had not yet +that morning tasted her apples. Now, of necessity, those golden +apples of youth in her garden, which she alone could cultivate, will +decay and drop. "Myself," he says, "I shall be less inconvenienced +than you, because she was ever grudging to me of the exquisite +fruit, for I am only half of as good lineage as you, Resplendent +Ones. On the other hand, you depended wholly upon the rejuvenating +apples; the giants knew that and are plainly practising against +your lives. Now bethink yourselves how to provide against this. +Without the apples, old and grey, a mock to the whole world, the +dynasty of the gods must perish!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +With sudden resolution, Wotan starts from his dark study. "Up, Loge! +Down with me to Nibelheim! I will conquer the gold!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_55"><span class="page">Page 55</span></a> "The +Rhine-daughters, then," speaks wicked Loge, "may look to have their +prayer granted?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Wotan harshly silences him. "Be still, chatterer!... Freia the good, +Freia must be ransomed!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Loge drops the subject and offers his services as guide. "Shall +we descend through the Rhine?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The Rhine, with its infesting nymphs?... +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Not through the Rhine!" says Wotan. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Then through the sulphur-cleft slip down with me!" And Loge vanishes +down a cleft in the rock, through which Wotan, after bidding his +family wait for him where they are until evening, follows. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Thick vapour pours forth from the sulphur-cleft, dimming and shortly +blotting out the scene. We are travelling downward into the earth. +A dull red glow gradually tinges the vapour. Sounds of diminutive +hammers upon anvils become distinct. The orchestra takes up their +suggestion and turns it into a simple monotonous strongly rhythmical +air—never long silent in this scene—which comes to +mean for us the little toiling Nibelungs, the cunning smiths. A +great rocky subterranean cave running off on every side into rough +shafts, is at last clearly visible, lighted by the ruddy reflection +of forge-fires. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +This is where Alberich reigns and by the power of the ring compels +his enslaved brothers to labour for him. Renouncing love has not been +good for the disposition of Alberich. It is not only the insatiable +lust of gold and power now darkening the soul-face of the earlier +fairly gentle-natured Nibelung, it is a savage gloating cruelty, +bespeaking one unnaturally loveless; it is a sanguinary hatred, too, +of all who still can love, of love itself, a thirst and determination +to see it completely done away with in the world, exterminated—a +sort of fallen angel's <a name="page_56"><span class="page">Page +56</span></a> sin against the Holy Ghost. A state, beneath the +incessant excitement of slave-driving and treasure-amassing, of +inexpressible unhappiness, lightened by moments of huge exaltation +in the sense of his new power. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +We find him, when the cavern glimmers into sight, brutally handling +his crumb of a gnome brother. Mime, like Alberich, wins some part of +our heart on first acquaintance, which he later ceases to deserve; +but in the case of Mime I think it is never wholly withdrawn, even +when he is shown to be an unmitigated wretch; he is, to begin with, +so little, and he has a funny, fetching twist or quaver in his voice, +indicated by the notes themselves of his rather mean little sing-song +melodies. Alberich's nominal reason for indulging his present passion +for hurting—he is haling Mime by the ear—is that the latter +is overslow with certain piece of work which, with minute instructions, +he has been ordered to do. Mime, under pressure, produces the article, +which he had in truth been trying to keep for his own, suspecting +in it some mysterious value. It is the <i>Tarnhelm</i>, a curious +cap of linked metal. Its uncanny character is confided to us even +before we see it at work, by the motif which first appears with +its appearance: a motif preparing for some unearthly manifestation +the mind pricked to disquieted attention by the weirdness of the +air. Alberich places it upon his head, utters a brief incantation, +and disappears from sight. A column of vapour stands in his place. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Do you see me?" asks Alberich's disembodied voice. Mime looks +around, astonished. "Where are you? I see you not!" "Then feel +me!" cries the power-drunken tyrant, and Mime winces and cowers +under blows from an unseen scourge, while Alberich's voice laughs. +Out of measure exhilarated by his successful new device for ensuring +diligence and inspiring fear, he storms out of hearing with the +terrible <a name="page_57"><span class="page">Page 57</span></a> +words, "Nibelungs all, bow to Alberich!... He can now be everywhere +at once, keeping watch over you. Rest and leisure are done and over +with for you! For him you must labour.... His conquered slaves +are you forever!" The moment of his overtaking the Nibelungs is +indicated by their sudden distant outcry. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Mime has been left crouching and whimpering on the rocky floor. +Thus Wotan and Loge find him. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Loge is in all the following scene Wotan's very active vizier, +furnishing the invention and carrying out the stratagems. Wotan, +except to the eye, takes the background and has little to say; +but as the blue of his mantle and the fresh chaplet on his locks +strike the eye refreshingly in the fire-reddened cave, so his voice, +with echoes in it of the noble upper world, comes like gusts of +sweet air. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Loge sets the cowering dwarf on his feet and by artful questions +gets the whole story from him of the ring and the Nibelungs' woe. +About the Tarnhelm, too, Mime tells Loge. At the recollection of +the stripes he has suffered, he rubs his back howling. The gods +laugh. That gives Mime the idea that these strangers must be of the +great. He is in his turn questioning them, when he hears Alberich's +bullying voice approaching. He runs hither and thither in terror and +calls to the strangers to look to themselves, Alberich is coming! +Wotan quietly seats himself on a stone to await him. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Alberich enters driving before him with his scourge a whole army of +little huddling, hurrying Nibelungs, groaning under the weight of +great pieces of gold and silver smithwork, which, while he threatens +and urges them, they heap in a duskily glimmering mound. In the +fancy that they are not obeying fast or humbly enough, he takes +the magic ring from his finger, kisses and lifts it commandingly +over them, whereupon with <a name="page_58"><span class="page">Page +58</span></a> cries of dismay they scramble away, scattering down +the shafts, in feverish haste to be digging and delving. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Heavy groans are in the music when it refers to the oppression +of the Nibelungs; groans so tragic and seriously presented that +they bring up the thought of other oppressions and killing labours +than those of the Nibelungs. The music which later depicts the +amassing of riches, indicates such horror of strain, such fatigue, +such hopeless weariness of heart and soul, that the hearer must +think with sharpened sympathy of all that part of humanity which +represents the shoulder placed against the wheel. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Alberich turns an angry eye upon the intruders: "What do you want?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +It is then most especially that the calm notes of Wotan fall healingly +upon the sense: They have heard tales of novel events in Nibelheim, of +mighty wonders worked there by Alberich, and are come from curiosity +to witness these. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +After this simple introduction from the greater personage, his +light-foot, volatile, graceful minister takes Alberich in hand and +practising confidently upon his intoxicated conceit of power, his +pride in the cleverness which had contrived ring and wishing-cap, +uses him like a puppet of which all the strings should be in his +hand. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Alberich recognises in Loge an old enemy. Loge's reply to Alberich's, +"I know you well enough, you and your kind!" is perhaps, with its +cheerful dancing flicker, his prettiest bit of self-description. +"You know me, childish elf? Then, say, who am I, that you should +be surly? In the cold hollow where you lay shivering, how would +you have had light and cheering warmth, if Loge had never laughed +for you?..." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +But Alberich seems to remember too many reasons for distrusting him. +"I can now, however," he boasts, "defy you <a name="page_59"><span +class="page">Page 59</span></a> all!" and he calls to their notice +the heaped riches,—the <i>Hort</i>. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"But," remarks Wotan, "of what use is all that wealth in cheerless +Nibelheim, where there is nothing to buy?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Nibelheim," replies Alberich, "is good to furnish treasures and +to keep them safe. But when they form a sufficient heap, I shall +use them to make myself master of the world!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"And how, my good fellow, shall you accomplish this?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Alberich has apprehended in this guest one of the +immortals,—which, taken into consideration a speech suggestive +every time it resounds of calm heights and stately circumstances, +is not strange. Alberich hates him, hates them all. This is his +exposition of his plan: "You who, lapped in balmy airs, live, laugh, +and love up there, with a golden fist I shall catch you all! Even +as I renounced love, all that lives shall renounce it! Ensnared +and netted in gold, you shall care for gold only! You immortal +revellers, cradling yourselves on blissful heights in exquisite +pastimes, you despise the black elf! Have a care!... For when you +men have come to be the servants of my power, your sweetly adorned +women, who would despise the dwarf's love, since he cannot hope +for love, shall be forced to serve his pleasure. Ha ha! Do you +hear? Have a care, have a care, I say, of the army of the night, +when the riches of the Nibelungs once climb into the light!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Wotan, whose Olympian self-sufficiency is usually untroubled by what +any mean other-person may say, at this cannot contain himself, but +starting to his feet cries out a command for the blasphemous fool's +annihilation! Before Alberich, however, has caught the words—his +deafness perhaps it is which saves his life—Loge has called +Wotan back to his reason. Practising on Alberich's not completely +outlived simplicity, he by the ruse of feigning himself very stupid +and greatly impressed <a name="page_60"><span class="page">Page +60</span></a> by his cleverness, now induces him to show off for +their greater amazement the power of the Tarnhelm, which it appears +has not only the trick of making the wearer at will invisible, but +of lending him whatever shape he may choose. Later we find that +it has also the power to transport the wearer at pleasure to the +ends of the earth in a moment of time. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +To put Loge's incredulity to shame, Alberich, Tarnhelm on head, +turns himself into a dragon, drawing its cumbersome length across +the stage to a fearsome tune which gives all of its uncouthness, +and never fails to call forth laughter, like the giants' tread. As +a further exhibition of his power, after full measure of flattery +in Loge's pretended fright, he at the prompting of the same changes +himself into a toad, which has but time for a hop or two, before +Wotan places his calm foot upon it. Loge snatches the Tarnhelm +off its head and Alberich is seen in his own person writhing under +Wotan. Loge binds him fast, and the gods, with their struggling +prey between them, hurry off through the pass by which they came. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Then reoccurs, but reversed, the transformation between Nibelheim +and the upper world. The region of the stithies is passed, the little +hammers are heard. At last Wotan and Loge with Alberich reappear +through the sulphur-cleft. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Look, beloved," says Loge to the unhappy captive, "there lies +the world which you think of conquering for your own. Tell me now, +what little corner in it do you intend as a kennel for me?" And he +dances around him, snapping his fingers to the prettiest, heartlessly +merry fire-music. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Alberich replies with raving insult. Wotan's cool voice reminds +him of the vanity of this and calls him to the consideration of +his ransom. When Alberich, after a time, grumblingly inquires what +they will have, he says, largely and frankly, "The treasure, your +shining gold." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_61"><span class="page">Page 61</span></a> If he can +only retain the ring, reflects Alberich, the loss of the treasure +may be quickly repaired. At his request they free his right hand; +he touches the ring with his lips and murmurs the spell by which +after a moment the swarm of little smoke-grimed Nibelungs arrives +groaning and straining under the weight of the Hort; again they +pile it in a heap, and at Alberich's command scurry home. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Now I have paid, now let me go," says the humbled Nibelung-lord, +"and that helmet-like ornament which Loge is holding, have the +kindness to give it me back." But Loge flings the Tarnhelm on the +heap as part of the ransom. Hard to bear is this, but Mime can +after all forge another. "Now you have gotten everything; now, +you cruel ones, loose the thongs." But Wotan remarks, "You have a +gold ring upon your finger; that, I think, belongs with the rest." +At this, a madness of terror seizes Alberich. "The ring?..." "You +must leave it for ransom." "My life—but not the ring!" With +that bitter coldness of the aristocrat which in time brings about +revolutions, Wotan replies, "It is the ring I ask for—with +your life do what you please!" The dull Nibelung pleads still after +that, and his words contain thorns which he might reasonably expect +to tell: "The thing which I, anguish-harried and curse-crowned, +earned through a horrible renunciation, you are to have for your +own as a pleasant princely toy?... If I sinned, I sinned solely +against myself, but against all that has been, is, or shall be, +do you, Immortal, sin, if you wrest this ring from me...." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Wotan without further discussion stretches out his hand and tears +from Alberich's finger the ring, which gives once more, under this +violence, the golden call, saddened and distorted. "Here, the +ring!—Your chattering does not establish your right to it!" +Alberich drops to earth, felled. Wotan places <a name="page_62"><span +class="page">Page 62</span></a> the ring on his hand and stands +in gratified contemplation of it. "I hold here what makes me the +mightiest lord of the mighty!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Loge unties Alberich and bids him slip home. But the Nibelung is +past care or fear, and rising to insane heights of hatred lays upon +the ring such a curse as might well shake its owner's complacency. +"As it came to me through a curse, accursed be this ring! As it +lent me power without bounds, let its magic now draw death upon +the wearer! Let no possessor of it be happy.... Let him who owns +it be gnawed by care and him who owns it not be gnawed by envy! Let +every one covet, no one enjoy it!... Appointed to death, fear-ridden +let its craven master be! While he lives, let his living be as +dying! The ring's master be the ring's slave,—until my stolen +good return to me!... Now keep it! Guard it well! My curse you +shall not escape!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Did you hear his affectionate greeting?" asks Loge, when Alberich +has vanished down the rocky cleft. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Wotan, absorbed in the contemplation of the ring, has heard the +curse with the same degree of interest he might have bestowed upon +the trickle of a brook. He replies magnanimously, "Grudge him not +the luxury of railing!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Fricka, Donner, and Froh hasten to welcome the returning gods. +The approach of Freia, whom the giants are bringing between them, +is felt before she appears, in a subtle sweetening of the air, a +simultaneous lightening of all the hearts and return of youth to +the faces, which Froh's daintily expansive greeting describes. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Fricka is hurrying toward her. Fasolt interposes: Not to be touched! +She still belongs to them until the ransom have been paid. Fasolt +does not fall in willingly with the arrangement which shall give them +the gold in place of the <a name="page_63"><span class="page">Page +63</span></a> woman; he has been overpersuaded by the black brother; +his regret at losing Freia is so great, he tells the gods, that +the treasure, if she is to be relinquished, will have to be piled +so high as completely to hide the blooming maid. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Let it be measured according to Freia's stature!" decrees Wotan, +and the giants drive their great staves into the earth so that +they roughly frame the figure of Freia. Helped by Loge and Froh, +they begin stopping the space between with the treasure. Wotan's +fastidiousness cannot endure the visible sordid details of his +bargain; he turns from the sight of the incarnate rose, as she +stands drooping in a noble shame, to be valued against so much +gold. "Hasten with the work!" he bids them, "it sorely goes against +me!" When Fafner's rough greed orders the measure to be more solidly +pressed down, and he ducks spying for crevices still to be stopped +with gold, Wotan turns away, soul-sick: "Humiliation burns deep +in my breast!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The Hort is exhausted, when Fafner looking for crannies exclaims, +"I can still see the shining of her hair," and demands, to shut +it from view, the Tarnhelm which Loge has attempted to retain. +"Let it go!" commands Wotan, when Loge hesitates. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The affair, it now would seem, must be closed; but Fasolt, in his +grief over the loss of the Fair one, still hovers about, peering +if perchance he may still see her, and so he catches through the +screen of gold the gleam of her eye, and declares that so long +as the lovely glance is visible he will not renounce the woman. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"But can you not see, there is no more gold?" remonstrates Loge. +Fafner, who has not failed to store in his brain what he earlier +overheard, replies, "Nothing of the kind. There is a gold ring +still on Wotan's finger. Give us that to stop the cranny." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_64"><span class="page">Page 64</span></a> "This ring?..." +cries Wotan, like Alberich before him. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Be advised," Loge says to the giants, as if in confidence. "That +ring belongs to the Rhine-maidens. Wotan intends to return it to +them." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +But Wotan has no subterfuges or indirections of his own—not +conscious ones; when he needs their aid, he uses another, as he +had told Fricka. "What are you prating?" he corrects Loge; "what I +have obtained with such difficulty, I shall keep without compunction +for myself." Loge amuses himself with probing further the grained +spot in his superior. "My promise then stands in bad case, which I +made to the Rhine-daughters when they turned to me in their trouble." +Wotan, with the coldness of the Pharisee's "Look thou to that," +replies, "Your promise does not bind me. The ring, my capture, +I shall keep." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"But you will have to lay it down with the ransom," Fafner insists. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Ask what else you please, you shall have it; but not for the whole +world will I give up the ring." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Fasolt instantly lays hands again upon Freia and draws her from +behind the Hort. "Everything then stands as it stood before. Freia +shall come with us now for good and all." An outcry of appeal goes +up from all the gods to Wotan. He turns from them unmoved. "Trouble +me not. The ring I will not give up." And the idleness of further +appeal, howsoever eloquent, cannot be doubted. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +But now unaccountable darkness invades the scene; from the hollow +alcove in the rocks, letting down to the interior earth, breaks a +bluish light; while all, breathless, watch the strange phenomenon, +the upper half of a woman becomes discernible in it, wrapped in +smoke-coloured veils and long black locks. It is the Spirit of the +Earth, the all-knowing Erda, <a name="page_65"><span class="page">Page +65</span></a> whose motif describes the stately progression of +natural things, and is the same as the Rhine-motif, which describes +a natural thing in stately progression. She lifts a warning hand +to Wotan. "Desist, Wotan, desist! Avoid the curse on the ring... +The possession of it will doom you to dark ruin...." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Wotan, struck, inquires in awe, "Who are you, warning woman?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The one who knows all that was, is, and shall be, she tells him; +the ancestress of the everlasting world, older than time; the mother +of the Norns who speak with Wotan nightly. Gravest danger has brought +her to seek him in person. Let him hear and heed! The present order +is passing away. There is dawning for the gods a dark day.... At +this prophesied ruin, the music reverses the motif of ascending +progression, and paints melancholy disintegration and crumbling +downfall, a strain to be heard many times in the closing opera of +the trilogy, when the prophecy comes to pass and the gods enter +their twilight. The apparition is sinking back into the earth. +Wotan beseeches it to tarry and tell him more. But with the words, +"You are warned.... Meditate in sorrow and fear!" it vanishes. The +masterful god attempts to follow, to wrest from the weird woman +further knowledge. His wife and her brothers hold him back. He +stands for a time still hesitating, uncertain, wrapped in thought. +With sudden resolve at last he tosses the ring with the rest of the +treasure, and turns heart-wholly to greet Freia returning among +them, bringing back their lost youth. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +While the gods are expressing tender rapture over the restoration of +Freia, and she goes from one to the other receiving their caresses, +Fafner spreads open a gigantic sack and in this is briskly stuffing +the gold. Fasolt, otherwise preoccupied, <a name="page_66"><span +class="page">Page 66</span></a> had not thought to bring a sack. He +attempts to stay Fafner's too active hand. "Hold on, you grasping +one, leave something for me! An honest division will be best for +us both!" Fafner objects, "You, amorous fool, cared more for the +maid than the gold. With difficulty I persuaded you to the exchange. +You would haved wooed Freia without thought of division, wherefore +in the division of the spoil I shall still be generous if I keep +the larger half for myself." Fasolt's anger waxes great. He calls +upon the gods to judge between them and divide the treasure justly. +Wotan turns from his appeal with characteristic contempt. Loge, the +mischief-lover, whispers to Fasolt, "Let him take the treasure, +do you but reserve the ring!" Fafner has during this not been idle, +but has sturdily filled his sack; the ring is on his hand. Fasolt +demands it in exchange for Freia's glance. He snatches at it, Fafner +defends it, and when in the wrestling which ensues Fasolt has forced +it from his brother, the latter lifts his tree-trunk and strikes him +dead. Having taken the ring from his hand, he leisurely proceeds +to finish his packing, while the gods stand around appalled, and +the air shudderingly resounds with the notes of the curse. A long, +solemn silence follows. Fafner is seen, after a time, shouldering the +sack, into which the whole of the glimmering Hort has disappeared, +and, bowed under its weight, leaving for home. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Dreadful," says Wotan, deeply shaken; "I now perceive to be the +power of the curse!" Sorrow and fear lie crushingly upon his spirit. +Erda, who warned him of the power of the curse, now proven before his +eyes, warned him likewise of worse things, of old order changing, +a dark day dawning for the gods. He must seek Erda, learn more, +have counsel what to do. He is revolving such thoughts when Fricka, +who believes all their trouble now ended, approaches him with sweet +<a name="page_67"><span class="page">Page 67</span></a> words, and +directs his eyes to the beautiful dwelling hospitably awaiting +its masters. "An evil price I paid for the building!" Wotan replies +heavily. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Mists are still hanging over the valley, clinging to the heights; +nor have the clouds yet wholly lifted from their spirits. Donner, +to clear the atmosphere, conjures a magnificent storm, by the blow +of his hammer bringing about thunder and lightning. When the black +cloud disperses which for a moment enveloped him and Froh on the +high rock from which he directs this festival of the elements, +a bright rainbow appears, forming a bridge between the rock and +the castle now shining in sunset light. A bridge of music is here +built, too; the tremulous weaving of it in tender and gorgeous +colours is seen through the ear, and its vaulting the valley with +an easy overarching spring. Froh, architect of the bridge, bids +the gods walk over it fearlessly: It is light but will prove solid +under their feet. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Wotan stands sunk in contemplation of the castle; his reflections, +still upon the shameful circumstances of his bargain, are not happy. +In the midst of them he is struck by a great thought, and recovers +his courage and hardihood. The sharp, bright, resolute motif which +represents his inspiration is afterward indissolubly connected +with the Sword,—a sword aptly embodying his idea, which is +one of defence for his castle and clan. A suggestion of his idea +is contained, too, in the word which he gives to Fricka as the +castle's name, when he now invites her to accompany him thither: +Walhalla, Hall of the Slain in Battle, or, Hall of Heroes. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Headed by Wotan and Fricka, the gods ascend toward the bridge. +Loge looks after them in mingled irony and contempt. "There they +hasten to their end, who fancy themselves so firmly established in +being. I am almost ashamed to have anything to do with them...." And +he revolves in his mind a <a name="page_68"><span class="page">Page +68</span></a> scheme for turning into elemental fire again and +burning them all up, those blind gods. He is nonchalantly adding +himself to their train, when from the Rhine below rises the lament +of the Rhine-daughters, begging that their gold may be given back +to them. Wotan pauses with his foot on the bridge: "What wail is +that?" Loge enlightens him, and, at Wotan's annoyed, "Accursed +nixies! Stop their importunity!" calls down to them, "You, down +there in the water, what are you complaining about? Hear what Wotan +bids: No longer having the gold to shine for you, make yourselves +happy basking in the sunshine of this new pomp of the gods!" Loud +laughter from the gods greets this sally, and they pass over the +bridge, Walhalla-ward, followed by the water-nymphs' wail for their +lost gold, closing with the reproach, "Only in the pleasant water-depths +is truth; false and cowardly are those making merry up there!" With +Walhalla and rainbow shedding a radiance around them of which we +are made conscious through the delighted sense of hearing, the +curtain falls. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +So we lose sight of them, moving into their new house; in spite +of their glory a little like the first family of the county. But +while to triumphant strains they seek their serene stronghold, we +know that the lines have been laid for disaster. The Ring is in the +world, with its terrific power; and there is in the world one whom +wrong has turned into a deadly enemy, whose soul is undividedly bent +upon getting possession of the Ring, which Wotan may not himself +attempt to get—stopped, if not by Erda's warning or by terror +of the curse, by the fact that he finally gave it to the giants in +payment of an acknowledged debt, and that his spear stands precisely +for honor in relations of the sort. +</p> + +<p class="bigtitle"> +<a name="page_69"><span class="page">Page 69</span></a> +THE VALKYRIE</p> + +<p class="center"> +(DIE WALKUERE) +</p> + +<h2><a name="page_71"><span class="page">Page 71</span></a> +THE VALKYRIE</h2> + +<p class="center"> +(DIE WALKUERE) +</p> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +Wotan's idea, from which the abode of the gods received its name +of Walhalla, had been to people his halls with hordes of heroes +who should defend it from Alberich and his "army of the night." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Erda's prophecy of a dark day dawning for the gods had destroyed +Wotan's peace. The craving to know more of this drove him to seek +her in the depths of the earth. He cast upon her the spell of love +and constrained her to speak. It does not appear that he gained +from her any clear knowledge of the future; he learned chiefly, as +we gather, what were the dangers besetting him. The end threatened +through Alberich's forces, which, however, could not prevail against +the heroic garrison of Walhalla unless Alberich should recover the +Ring; through the power of the Ring he would be able to estrange +the heroes from Wotan and, turning their arms against him, overcome +him. "When the dark enemy of love (Alberich) in wrath shall beget +a son," so ran Erda's warning, "the end of the Blessed shall not +be long delayed!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +From Erda was born to Wotan a daughter, so near to her father's heart +that she seemed an incarnation of his most intimate wish, his very +will embodied; so part of himself she knew his unspoken thought. This +was Brünnhilde (from <i>Brünne</i>, <a name="page_72"><span +class="page">Page 72</span></a> corslet). With eight other +daughters,—born to Wotan from "the tie of lawless love," as +we learn from Fricka in her tale of wrongs—Brünnhilde, +the dearest to him of all, followed her father to battle, serving him +as Valkyrie. These warlike maidens hovered over the battle-field, +directing the fortune of the day according to Wotan's determination, +protecting this combatant and seeing his death-doom executed upon +the other; they seized the heroes as they fell, and bore them to +Walhalla to form part of Wotan's guard. From these "Slain in Battle" +it was that Walhalla had its name. To make great their number, +Wotan, who earlier had by laws and compacts tried to bind men to +peace, now breathed into them a rough, bellicose spirit, goaded +them on to quarrel and revolt. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +That the end of the gods, if prophecy must fulfill itself, should +not be a contemptible or pitiful one, that was Wotan's +preoccupation,—to save, if nothing more, the dignity of the +Eternals; with this in view, to keep Alberich from recovering the +Ring, by which he might work such really disgusting havoc. The +Ring was in the possession of Fafner, who had turned himself into +a dragon, and in a lonely forest-girt cave guarded it and the rest +of the treasure of the Nibelungen, for the sake of which he had +killed Fasolt, his brother. Wotan, as we have seen, could not wrest +from him the Ring which he himself had given in payment for the +building of Walhalla: for the honour of his spear he must not attempt +it. Alberich, not bound as he was to keep his hands off it, must +infallibly and indefatigably be devising means to regain possession +of it. It was plain to Wotan that he must find some one to do that +which he himself could not, some one, who, unprompted by him, should +yet accomplish his purposes, some one free as he was not. This tool +who was yet not to be his tool, since a god's good faith demanded +that neither directly nor indirectly he <a name="page_73"><span +class="page">Page 73</span></a> should meddle with the Ring, Wotan +supposed he had created for himself in Siegmund, born to him, with +a twin sister, Sieglinde, of a human mother. This boy with whom, in +human disguise, under the names of Wälse and Wolf,—Wolf +for his enemies, Wälse for his kindred,—he lived in the +wild woods, he reared in a spirit of lawlessness, wild courage, +disregard of the gods. We must suppose it to have been for the sake +of preventing association with women from softening his disposition +that, while Siegmund was a child, Wotan, sacrificing to the hardness +of fibre it was his object to produce, permitted the catastrophe +which deprived the boy of mother and sister. Returning home from a +day's wild chase,—hunters and hunted alike human,—father +and son found their dwelling burned to the ground, the mother slain, +the sister gone. They lived for years together after that, in the +woods, always in conflict with enemies, of whom their peculiar +daring and strength raised them an infinite number. In time, when +the son was well grown, Wotan forsook him, left him to complete +his development alone, under the harsh training of the calamities +and sorrows fatally incident to the temper and manner of viewing +things which that father had bred in him. The lad received the usage +of a sword in the forging, extremes of furnace and ice-brook. So he +stood at last, Wotan's pupil and finished instrument, an embodied +defiance of the law and the gods, proper to do the work which the +law of the gods forbade. Some defence against the wrath which he +must inevitably rouse, his father could not but feel impelled to +provide, yet could he not, without violating the honour which in +his simple-minded way he was striving to preserve intact, give +it to him directly. He could not bestow upon him outright a +<i>Sieges-schwert</i>—magical sword which ensured victory. +But he placed one where the young man should find it. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_74"><span class="page">Page 74</span></a> The piece +opens with the blustering music of a storm, whose violence is rapidly +dying down. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The curtain rises upon the interior of Hunding's very primitive +dwelling, built about a great ash-tree whose trunk stands in view. +Siegmund, predestined to be ever at strife with his fellow-man, in +circumstances of peculiar distress seeks the shelter of Hunding's +roof. We see him burst into the empty hall, staggering and panting. +His spear and shield have splintered beneath the enemies' strokes; +deprived of arms, he has been forced to flee; he has been so hotly +pursued, so beaten by the storm, that upon reaching this refuge he +can no more than drop beside the hearth and lie there, exhausted. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +It is his sister's house to which fate has led him, where, ill-starred +and unhappy like himself, this other child of Wälse's lives, +in subjection to Hunding, her lord, who has come by her through +some obscure commerce, and to whom she is no more than part of +the household baggage. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Hearing the rustle of Siegmund's entrance, Sieglinde hurries in, +and, beholding a stranger outstretched upon the ground, stops short +to observe him. The strength of the prostrate body cannot fail to +strike her. At his gasped call for water, she hurries to fetch it +from the spring out of doors. His perishing need is shown in the +devotion with which he drains the horn she hands him. His eyes, +as he returns it, are arrested by her face, and dwell upon it with +fearless lingering scrutiny—while the strain for the first +time trembles upon the air which, singing the love of Siegmund and +Sieglinde, is to caress our hearing so many times more. His fatigue +has magically vanished. He asks to whom he owes the refreshment +afforded him. When, at her reply and request that he shall await +Hunding's return, he refers to himself as an unarmed and wounded +guest, she eagerly inquires of his wounds. But he jumps up, shaking +<a name="page_75"><span class="page">Page 75</span></a> off all +thought of wounds or weariness. His succinct narrative of the +circumstances which have brought him to her hearth, he brings to +a close: "But faster than I vanished from the mob of my pursuers, +my weariness has vanished from me. Night lay across my +eyelids,—the sun now smiles upon me anew!" She offers the +guest mead to drink, at his prayer tasting it before him. As he +returns the emptied horn, again his eyes dwell upon her face, with +an emotion ever increasing. Both gaze in simple undisguised intensity +of interest. There is a long moment's silence between them. Then, +at the love he feels surging in his bosom, remembrance comes to +Siegmund of what he is,—a man so ill-fated that it may well +be feared his ill-fortune shall infect those with whom he comes +into contact. "You have relieved an ill-fated man," he warns her, +his voice unsteady with the pang of this recognition, "may his +wish turn ill-fortune from you! Sweetly have I rested.... I will +now fare further on my way!" As he turns to the door she detains +him with the quick cry: "What pursues you, that you should thus +flee?" He answers, slowly and sadly: "Misfortune pursues me wherever +I flee. Misfortune meets me wherever I go. From you, woman, may +it remain afar! I turn from you my footsteps and my glance." His +hand is on the latch, when her sharp involuntary exclamation stops +him: "Stay, then! You cannot bring sorrow into a house where sorrow +is already at home!" Deeply shaken by her words, he fixes his eyes +questioningly upon her. She meets them for a moment, then drops +her own, sad and half-ashamed. The motif of the Wälsungen +well expresses the nobility in misfortune of these poor children +of Wälse. Siegmund returns quietly to the hearth: "Wehwalt is +my name for myself. I will await Hunding." (<i>Weh</i>: woe, sorrow, +calamity, pain; <i>wallen</i>: to govern. <i>Wehwalt</i>: lord of +sorrows.) There is no <a name="page_76"><span class="page">Page +76</span></a> further exchange of words while they wait, but in +complete unashamed absorption they gaze at each other, and the +music tells beautifully how it is within their hearts. Hunding's +horn is heard. (<i>Hund:</i> hound. It was, as we learn later, +this amiable personage's custom to hunt his enemies with a pack +of dogs.) Startled from her trance, Sieglinde listens, and hastens +to open. Hunding appears in the doorway, a dark figure, in helmet, +shield and spear. At sight of the stranger, he questions his wife +with a look. "I found the man on the hearth, spent with weariness. +Necessity brings him to our house," she explains. There is some +sternness apparently in Hunding's tone as he inquires: "Have you +offered him refreshment?" for Siegmund, rash and instantaneous in +the woman's defence, speaks, hard on the heels of her answer: "I +have to thank her for shelter and drink. Will you therefor chide +your wife?" But Hunding, at his best in this moment, without retort +welcomes the guest: "Sacred is my hearth, sacred to you be my house!" +and orders his wife to set forth food for them. Catching Sieglinde's +eyes unconsciously fixed upon Siegmund, he glances quickly from +one to the other, and is struck by the resemblance between them; +but the luminous look they have in common he defines, with the +constitutional dislike of his kind to that freer, more generous +type: "The selfsame glittering serpent shines out of his eyes!" He +inquires of the circumstances which have brought this stranger to +his house, and finding that Siegmund has no idea whither his wild +flight has led him, introduces himself with a dignity which commends +to us, while he is doing it, the narrow-natured, unimaginative man: +"He whose roof covers you and whose house shelters you,—Hunding +your host is called. If you should from here turn your footsteps +eastward, there, in rich courts, dwell kinsmen, protectors of Hunding's +honour!" <a name="page_77"><span class="page">Page 77</span></a> They +seat themselves at table; the host asks for this guest's name, and +as Siegmund, plunged in thought, does not at once reply, Hunding, +remarking the interest with which his wife waits for the stranger's +words, sardonically encourages him: "If you are in doubt about +trusting me, yet give the information to the lady here. See how +eagerly she questions you!" And Sieglinde, too deeply interested, +verily, to mind the thrust, proceeds further to give it point: +"Guest, I should be glad to know who you are!" Whereupon Siegmund, +as little constrained by the husband's presence as the wife herself, +with his eyes upon hers, addressing her directly, tells his story: +of Wolf, his father, of the twin sister lost to him in infancy, the +enmity of the Neidingen clan, who in the absence of the men burned +down their house, slew the mother, abducted the sister; of his life +in the forest with Wolf, their numberless foes and perpetual warfare. +Hunding recalls vaguely wild dark tales he has heard of the mighty +pair, the Wölfingen. The disappearance of his father, Siegmund +further relates, from whom he had been separated in a fight, and +whom he could never, long though he sought, find again, nor any +trace of him save an empty wolf-skin. "Then,—" follow the +strange cruel fortunes this father had arranged for him, "then I +was impelled to forsake the woods, I was impelled to seek men and +women. As many as I found, and wherever I found them,—whether +I sought for friend, or wooed for woman, always I met with denial, +ill-fortune lay upon me!" With ingenuous wonder he describes the +natural fruits of the education bestowed on him by Wotan: "What +I thought right, others held to be wrong; what had ever seemed +to me abominable, others considered with favour. I fell into feud +wherever I was, anger fell upon me wherever I went. If I reached +out toward happiness, I never failed to bring about calamity! <a +name="page_78"><span class="page">Page 78</span></a> For that reason +it is I named myself Wehwalt, I command calamity alone!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Hunding has listened attentively. His small superstitious heart has +taken alarm. "Fortune was not fond of you, who appointed for you +so miserable a lot. The man can hardly welcome you with gladness, +whom, a stranger to him, you approach as a guest." With a vivacity +which cannot have been the common habit of her intercourse with +her husband, Sieglinde pronounces judgment aloud and at once upon +this ungenerous speech and speaker, whose prudence must certainly, +in contrast with the Wälsung's frank magnificence of courage, +seem to her unspeakably bourgeois: "Only cowards fear one going his +way unarmed and alone!" And turning again eagerly to the guest: "Tell +further, guest, how you lately lost your arms in battle!" Siegmund +as eagerly satisfies her. The circumstances which he describes +further exemplify the disposition fostered in him by his father, +his non-recognition or acceptance of established law and custom, +however sacred, his pursuit of an ideal unattached to any convention: +He had lost his arms in the attempt to defend a damsel against +her own immediate family, bent upon marrying her against her +inclination. He had slain her brothers, whereupon the maiden, as +another perhaps would have foreseen, had cast herself upon their +bodies, sorrow annulling her resentment. He had stood over her, +shielding her from the vengeance of her kindred pressing around. His +armour had been shattered; the girl lay dead on her dead brothers. +Wounded and weaponless, he had been chased by the infuriate horde. +"Now you know, inquiring woman," he closes his narrative, "why +I do not bear the name of Friedmund!" (<i>Frieden:</i> peace.) +With this simple sally, whose bitterness is not enough to crumple +the serene forehead, he rises and walks to the hearth, striding +to <a name="page_79"><span class="page">Page 79</span></a> the +noble march-measure we know as the motif of the heroism of the +Wälsungen,—proud in its first bars, with Siegmund's +pride, tender in the last, with Sieglinde's tenderness, loftily +mournful throughout. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"I know a wild race of men," now speaks Hunding, "to whom nothing +is holy of all that is revered by others; hated are they of all +men—and of me!" He then reveals how he himself had that day +been called out for vengeance with his clan against this officious +champion of damsels. He had arrived too late for action, and returning +home, behold, discovers the fugitive miscreant in his own house! +As he granted the stranger hospitality for the night, his house +shall shelter him for that length of time; but "with strong weapons +arm yourself to-morrow," he grimly warns him; "it is the day I +choose for combat; you shall pay me a price for the dead!" When +Sieglinde in alarm places herself between the two men, Hunding +orders her roughly: "Out of the room! Loiter not here! Prepare my +night-drink and wait for me to go to rest!" Siegmund, smothering +his anger, stands in contemptuous composure beside the hearth; his +eyes frankly follow every movement of the woman as she prepares +Hunding's drink. On her way out of the room, she pauses at the +threshold of the inner chamber, and seeking Siegmund's eyes with +her own, tries by a long significant glance to direct his glance +to a spot in the ash-tree. The sword-motif, distinct and sharp, +accompanies her look. Hunding, becoming aware of her lingering, with +a peremptory gesture orders her again to be gone; and gathering up +his own armour, with a warning to the Wölfing that on the morrow +he will strike home,—let him have a care!—withdraws, +audibly bolting the door behind him. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Left alone, Siegmund lies down beside the dying fire. To remove +himself during the night as far as possible from Hunding's <a +name="page_80"><span class="page">Page 80</span></a> reach is not +the solution suggesting itself naturally to him. Yet there he stands, +pledged to meet an enemy, and not a weapon to his hand of offence +or defence. The difficulty of his position is certainly as great +as could be, and, reaching the full consciousness of it, he recalls +to mind that his father had promised him a sword, which he should +find in the hour of his greatest need. "Unarmed I am fallen in +the house of the enemy; here I rest, devoted to his vengeance. +A woman I have seen, gloriously fair.... She to whom my longing +draws me, who with a rapturous charm constrains me, is held in +thraldom by the man who mocks my unarmed condition...." Could need, +indeed, be greater? With the whole strength of that need, in a +cry, long, urgent, fit to pierce the walls of Walhalla, he calls +upon his father for the promised sword: "Wälse! Wälse! +Where is your sword?..." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A flame leaps from the embers and illuminates the ash-tree, bringing +into view, at the spot Sieglinde had indicated to him with her +eyes, a sword-hilt. But though his eyes are caught by the glitter, +he does not recognise it for what it is; he watches it, without +moving, as it shines in the firelight, and, lover-like, soon lapsing +into undivided dreaming of the "flower-fair woman," plays tenderly +with the conceit of the gleam on the ash-tree being the trace of +her last bright glance. Forgetting his swordlessness and altogether +unpromising plight, he goes on weaving poetry about her until the +fire is quite out and he so nearly dozes that when a white form +comes gliding through the door bolted by Hunding, he does not stir +until addressed: "Guest, are you asleep?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Sieglinde has mixed narcotic herbs in her husband's drink, and +bids the stranger make use of the night to provide for his safety. +"Let me advise you of a weapon.... Oh, might you obtain it! The +most splendid of heroes I must call you, <a name="page_81"><span +class="page">Page 81</span></a> for it is destined to the strongest +alone." And she relates how at the marriage-feast of Hunding, while +the men drank, and the woman who "unconsulted had been offered +him for wife by ignoble traffickers" sat sadly apart, a stranger +appeared, an elderly man in grey garb, whose hat-brim concealed +one of his eyes. But the brilliant beam of the other eye created +terror in the bystanders,—all save herself, in whom it aroused +an aching longing, sorrow and comfort in equal measure. The sword +in his hand he swung, and drove into the ash-tree up to the hilt, +leaving it there, a prize to whomsoever should be able to draw +it out. The men present had all made the essay in vain; guests +coming and going since then had tried, equally without success. +"There in silence waits the sword." There in the ash-tree. "Then +I knew," Sieglinde concludes, "who it was had come to me in my +sorrow. I know, too, who it is alone can conquer the sword. Oh, +might I find him here and now, that friend; might he, from the +unknown, come to me, most wretched of women! All I have ever suffered +of cruel woe, all the shame and indignity under which I have +bowed,—sweetest amends would be made for it all! All I ever +lost, all I ever mourned, I should have recovered it all,—if +I might find that supreme friend, if my arm might clasp that hero!" +Siegmund, to whom it could not occur for the fraction of a second +to doubt his strength to draw any sword from any tree, at these +words catches her impetuously to his breast: "The friend now clasps +you, fairest of women, for whom weapon and woman were meant! Hot in +my breast burns the oath which, noble one, weds me to you!" and, +in her very strain: "All I ever yearned for, I met in you! In you +I found all I ever lacked. If you suffered ignominy and I endured +pain, if I was outlawed and you were dishonoured, a joyful revenge +now calls to us happy ones! I laugh aloud in a holy elation, as I +hold you, <a name="page_82"><span class="page">Page 82</span></a> +radiant one, embraced, as I feel the throbbing of your heart!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The great door of the hall, silently, without apparent reason, +swings wide open, like a great curious eye unclosing to watch this +beautiful marvel of their love, expanded so suddenly, like a huge +aloe-flower. It lets in a flood of moonlight, and the glimmering +vision of the vapourous green-lit nocturnal Spring-world. "Who +went out?... Who came in?" cries Sieglinde, starting in alarm. +"No one went," Siegmund reassures her, "but some one came: See, +the Spring laughing in the room!" And he pours forth poetry of +adorable inspiration, in explanation of the singular action of +the door: Spring was outside, and Love, his sister, inside; Spring +burst open the severing door, and now, brother and sister, Love +and the Spring, are met! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +It is touching, the capacity for happiness the two have accumulated +in the long, thwarted years. An ecstatic joy marks this hour of +forgetting all the world outside themselves; the love-music is +all of a fine free sustained rapture. One poignant and subtle and +profound thing she says to him: "Foreign and unrelated to me seemed +until now everything I saw, hostile everything which approached +me. As if I had never known them were always the things that came +to me.... But you I knew at once, clearly and distinctly; my eye +no sooner beheld you, than you belonged to me; and all that lay +concealed within my breast, the thing which I verily am, bright +as the day it rose to the surface; like a ringing sound it smote +my ear, when in the cold lonesome strange world for the first time +I beheld my Friend!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Seated in the light of the full moon, they have freedom at last +each to pore over the other's winning beauty. She is struck, fondly +peering into his features, with the sense of having <a +name="page_83"><span class="page">Page 83</span></a> seen him before; +and trying to think when and where reaches the assurance that it was +on the surface of the pool which reflected her own image. Again, +when he speaks, she is struck by the assurance that she has heard his +voice before. She thinks, for a moment, that it was in childhood,... +but corrects the impression by a second: she has heard it recently, +when the echo in the woods gave back her own voice. His luminous +eyes she has seen before: thus shone the glance of the grey guest +at the wedding-feast, whom his daughter recognised by that token. +Earnestly she asks this other guest: "Is your name in very truth +Wehwalt?" "That is no longer my name since you love me!" he replies +exuberantly, "I command now the sublimest joys!... Do you call me +as you wish me to be called: I will take my name from you!" "And +was your father indeed Wolf?" "A Wolf he was to cowardly foxes. +But he whose eye shone with as proud an effulgence as, Glorious +One, does yours, Wälse was his name!" Beside herself with +joy, Sieglinde springs up: "If Wälse was your father—if +you are a Wälsung, for you it was he drove his sword into the +tree-trunk. Let me give you the name by which I love you: Siegmund +shall you be called!" Siegmund leaps to seize the sword-handle: +"Siegmund is my name, and Siegmund am I! (<i>Sieg</i>: victory.) +Let this sword bear witness, which fearlessly I seize! Wälse +promised me that I should find it in my greatest need. I grasp +it now...." Very characteristically, this greatest need, as he +feels it, is not the need of a weapon with which to defend his +life against Hunding; it is, in his soaring words: "Highest need +of a holiest love, devouring need of a love full of longing, burns +bright in my breast, drives me onward to deeds and to death.... +Nothung! Nothung! So do I name you, sword! (<i>Noth</i>: need. +<i>Nothung</i>: sword-in-need.) Nothung! Nothung! Out of the <a +name="page_84"><span class="page">Page 84</span></a> scabbard, to +me!" With a mighty tug he draws it forth and holds it before the +marvelling eyes of Sieglinde: "Siegmund the Wälsung stands +before you, woman! As a wedding-gift he brings you this sword. +Thus he wooes the fairest of women; from the enemy's house thus he +leads you forth. Far from here follow him now, out in the laughing +house of the Spring. There Nothung, the sword, shall protect you, +when Siegmund lies overthrown, in the power of love!" "If your are +Siegmund," cries the woman, "I am Sieglinde, who have so longed for +you! Your own sister you have won at the same time as the sword!" +Siegmund is given no pause by this revelation. At the realisation of +this double dearness, the joy flares all the higher of the lawless +pupil of Wotan. "Bride and sister are you to your brother. Let the +blood of the Wälsungen flourish!" And with arms entertwined, +forth they take their madly exulting hearts out into the "laughing +house of the Spring." +</p> + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The rising of the curtain for the second act reveals a wild +mountain-pass where Wotan, in a vast good-humour, is giving instructions +to Brünnhilde with regard to the impending meeting between the +injured husband and the abductor of his wife. Victory is allotted to +Siegmund; Hunding, "let them choose him to whom he belongs; he is not +wanted in Walhalla!" In Wotan's complacency the satisfaction speaks +of this thought: At last, at last, a change of fortune,—victory +to the Wälsung, after a trial of his mettle so severe and +prolonged it must have broken a spirit less admirably tempered. The +Valkyrie, in delight over the charge to her, breaks into her jubilant +war-cry, checking herself as she perceives Fricka approaching in +the chariot drawn by rams, and judges from the goddess's merciless +<a name="page_85"><span class="page">Page 85</span></a> urging of +the panting beasts that she comes for a <i>Zank</i>, a "scold," with +her husband. "The old storm!" murmurs Wotan, at sight of his liege +lady dismounting and coming toward him with ultramajestic gait, "the +old trouble! But I must stand and face her!" The scene following has +a touch of comical in its resemblance to domestic scenes among less +high-born characters, as, for instance, when Fricka says, "Look me in +the eye! Do not think to deceive me!" or "Do you imagine that you +can deceive me, who night and day have been hard upon your heels?" +Fricka, the guardian of marriage, has come to demand justice for +Hunding, vengeance upon the "insolently criminal couple." "What," +asks Wotan, an unguarded and tender indulgence in his tone, "what +have they done that is so evil, the couple brought into loving +union by the Spring?..." "Do you feign not to understand me?" is in +effect Fricka's return; "for the holy vow of marriage, the deeply +insulted, I raise my voice in complaint...." "I regard that vow as +unholy," says Wotan,—and the source is flagrant from which +Siegmund has drawn his unpopular rules of conduct,—"which +binds together those who do not love each other." But the case in +question, Fricka protests, is not one simply of broken marriage-vow, +"When—when was it ever known that brother and sister might +stand toward each other in the nuptial relation?" "This day you +have known it!" the worthy teacher of Siegmund meets her; and, all +his paternal affection finding its imprudent way into his accents: +"That those two love each other is clear to you. Wherefore, take +honest advice: if blessed comfort is to reward your blessing, do +you bless, laughing with love, the union of Siegmund and Sieglinde!" +Upon this, as is hardly unnatural, the furious storm breaks over the +indiscreet god; a storm of reproach, in part for personal wrongs, +which the outraged goddess details, in part for his failure as +<a name="page_86"><span class="page">Page 86</span></a> ruler of +the earth to maintain law and right, to observe the boundaries +established by himself. At the end of it, rather feebly, he tells +her, in defence of his position, the thing which he had not confided +to her before, plain enough indication that the goddess, to win +whom he had given an eye, is not of his bosom's counsel any more. +"This know! There is need of a hero who without aid from the gods +should cast off the law of the gods. Such a one alone can compass +the act which, however much the gods may need it done, no god can +himself do." "And what may the great thing be," the dull august +shrew inquires, "that a hero can do which the gods cannot, through +whose grace alone a hero acts?... What makes men brave? Through +your inspiration alone they are strong. With new falsehoods you +are trying to elude me, but this Wälsung you shall not be +able to save. Through him I strike at you, for it is through you +alone he defies me!" "In wild sorrows," Wotan ventures, with deep +emotion, "he grew up, by himself. My protection never helped him!" +"Then do not protect him to-day!" she pursues, hatefully righteous, +"take away from him the sword you gave him." "The sword?..." Her +suggestion is a very sword for Wotan's heart. "Yes, the sword, +strong with a charm, which you bestowed on your son." "Siegmund +conquered it for himself in his need." The deep strain here shudders +out its passion of repressed resentment and grief, which after this +darkly underlines Wotan's misery. "You created the need, as you +created the sword," she follows him up with clear-sighted accusation, +almost voluble. "For him you drove it into the tree-trunk. You +promised him the goodly weapon. Will you deny that it was your +own stratagem which guided him to the spot where he should find +it?" The effect of her words upon Wotan—to whom this mirror +held up to him reveals the weakness of his scheme to create a hero +who <a name="page_87"><span class="page">Page 87</span></a> should +act for himself, unprompted, against the gods, yet in the very +manner the case of the gods demanded—still increases his +wife's assurance. "What do you require?" asks Wotan at last, in +gloom, heart-struck. "That you should sever from the Wälsung!" +"Let him go his way!" Wotan acquiesces, smothered by this horrible, +yet so clear, necessity. "But you, protect him not, when the avenger +calls him out to fight!" "I—protect him not!" "Turn from him +the Valkyrie!" "Let the Valkyrie determine as she will!" "Nay, +she solely carries out your wishes.... Forbid her the victory of +Siegmund!" "I cannot deal him defeat!" protests Wotan, in anguish, +"he found my sword!" "Withdraw the charm from the sword. Let it +snap in the knave's hand. Let the adversary behold him without +defence!... Here comes your warlike maid.... This day must her +shield protect the sacred honour of your wife. My honour demands +the fall of the Wälsung. Have I Wotan's oath?" The unhappy +god casts himself upon a rocky seat, in helpless loathing, and the +terrible consent falls forced from his lips: "Take the oath!" Fricka, +with proud tread turning from him to remount her chariot, stops to +address Brünnhilde: "The Father of Armies is waiting for you. +Let him tell you how he has appointed the fortune of battle." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Wotan sits with his head in his hands, like any humblest mortal +hard put to it. It has been brought home to him sharply enough +that the thing is not to be done, on the accomplishment of which he +had so fondly built. It is not that an angry wife has interfered; +it is that her argument has been sound, and that for the sake of +his world a god cannot trespass against the laws he has himself +made for it. It is, in fact, that kings less than others can do as +they choose; that if in this he should follow his desire, it would, +as Fricka has pointed out, <a name="page_88"><span class="page">Page +88</span></a> "be all over with the everlasting gods!" But, to +sacrifice the Wälsung, "brought up in wild sorrows" for this +very purpose which is to be relinquished; the Wälsung who +in his young life has had but one draught at the cup of joy!... +It is no wonder that Wotan utters his lamentation: "Oh, divine +ignominy! Oh, woful disgrace! Distress of the gods! Distress of the +gods! Immeasurable wrath! Eternal regret! The saddest am I among +all!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The darling of his heart, Brünnhilde, torn by his cry, casts +from her all her Valkyrie accoutrements, and, woman merely and +daughter, kneels at his feet, presses her cheek against him, begging +to be trusted: "Confide in me! I am true to you. See, Brünnhilde +pleads!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He hesitates, while sorely yearning for the comfort. "If I utter +it aloud, shall I not be loosing the grasp of my will?" "To Wotan's +will you speak in speaking to me. Who am I, if not your will?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +With the assurance to himself: "With myself solely I take counsel, +in talking to you,..." he relates to Brünnhilde all the events +which have brought about this intolerable position, a long story: +the first mistake in trusting Loge; the mistake in possessing himself +of the Ring; what he has since done to obviate the effect of his +mistakes, and done, as is now shown, in vain. "How did I cunningly +seek to deceive myself! So easily Fricka exposed my fallacies! To +my deepest shame she looked through me. I must yield to her will." +"You will take away then the victory from Siegmund?" "I touched +Alberich's Ring," Wotan replies, "covetously I held the gold. The +curse which I fled from, flees not from me! What I love I must +desert, murder what from all time I have held dear, treacherously +betray him who trusts me!..." Again, it is no wonder his tormented +soul breaks forth in lamentation. <a name="page_89"><span +class="page">Page 89</span></a> The mighty groan of Wotan has, +if ever groan had, adequate cause, and his longing for "the end! +the end!" With grim comfort he recalls at this moment that the +end cannot be far,—not if there be truth in the prophecy of +Erda: "When the dark enemy of love shall in wrath beget a son, the +end of the Immortals will not be long delayed." For the loveless +Alberich, as Wotan knows, has by means of gold won the favour of a +woman, and the "fruit of hatred" is on its way toward the light. +"Take my blessing, son of the Nibelung!" cries Wotan in his dark +mood; "the thing which sickens me with loathing, I bestow it upon +you for an inheritance: the empty splendour of the gods!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Oh, tell me, what shall your child do?" entreats the daughter, +shaken by the sight of her father's passion. "Fight straightforwardly +for Fricka," he orders her, in the excess of bitterness; "what +she has chosen I choose likewise; of what good to me is a will +of my own?" "Oh, retract that word!" she beseeches, "you love +Siegmund.... Never shall your discordant dual directions enlist +me against him. For your own sake, I know it, I will protect the +Wälsung!" At this first intimation of rebellion in his +child,—this incipient treachery of his own will,—Wotan +becomes stern, lays down his command irrevocably, with threats of +crushing retribution if this child of his shall dare to palter +with his expressed will. "Keep a watch over yourself! Hold yourself +in strong constraint! Put forth all your valour in the fight!... +Have well in mind what I command: Siegmund is to fall! This be +the Valkyrie's task!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Brünnhilde gazes after him in wonder and fear as he storms +up over the rocky ascent out of sight: "I never saw Sieg-vater +like that!" Sadly she resumes her armour, woe-begone at the thought +of the Wälsung, given over to death. Becoming aware <a +name="page_90"><span class="page">Page 90</span></a> of the approach +of Siegmund and Sieglinde, she hastens from sight. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Sieglinde enters, fleeing in distraction from Siegmund, anxious +in pursuit. The presumption of those seeing her action without +understanding her words, is commonly, I suppose, that remorse has +overtaken her for her breach of the moral law. Remorse, indeed, has +assailed her, but not for having followed the "luminous brother." +It is for having ever belonged to Hunding, whom she neither loved +nor was loved by. The new sentiment of love so completely possessing +her places her former union in the light of unspeakable pollution, +and she adjures the "noble one" to depart from the accursed who +brings him such a dowry of shame. Siegmund with sturdy tenderness +assures her that whatever shame there is shall be washed away in +the blood of him who is responsible for it, whose heart Nothung +shall cleave. An insanity of terror seizes Sieglinde at the thought +of the meeting between the two men, the vision besetting her of +Siegmund torn by Hunding's dogs, against the multitude of which +his sword is of no use. At the picture painted by her delirium +of Siegmund's fall, shocked as if at the actual sight of it, she +sinks unconscious in his arms. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Having ascertained that she has not ceased to breathe, almost glad +perhaps for her of this respite from self-torment, he lets her +gently down on to the ground, and seats himself so as to make an +easy resting-place for her head. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Thus the Valkyrie finds them. At her approach, three solemn notes +are heard which intimate as if something awful and not to be +escaped—whose solemn awfulness consists in great part of +the fact that it cannot be escaped,—like Fate. "Siegmund!" +she calls him, with firm voice, "look upon me! I am that one whom +in short space you must follow!" Siegmund lifts his eyes from the +sleeping face upon which they have <a name="page_91"><span +class="page">Page 91</span></a> been fondly brooding, and beholds +the shining apparition. "Who are you, tell me, appearing to me, so +beautiful and grave?" "Only those about to die can see my face. +He who beholds me must depart from the light of life. On the field +of battle I appear to the noble alone. He who becomes aware of +me, has been singled out for my capture!" Siegmund gazes quietly +and long and inquiringly into her eyes, and: "The hero who must +follow you, whither do you take him?" "To the Father of Battles +who has elected you, I shall lead you. To Walhalla you shall follow +me." "In the hall of Walhalla shall I find none but the Father of +Battles?" "The glorious assemblage of departed heroes shall gather +around you companionably, with high and holy salutation." "Shall I +in Walhalla find Wälse, my own father?" "The Wälsung shall +find his father there." "Shall I in Walhalla be greeted gladsomely +by a woman?" "Divine wish-maidens there hold sway; the daughter +of Wotan shall trustily proffer you drink." "Unearthly fair are +you; I recognise the holy child of Wotan; but one thing tell me, +you Immortal! Shall the bride and sister accompany the brother? +Shall Siegmund clasp Sieglinde there?" "The air of earth she still +must breathe. Siegmund shall not find Sieglinde there!" The hero +bends over the unconscious woman, kisses her softly on the brow, +and turns quietly again to Brünnhilde: "Then bear my greeting +to Walhalla! Greet for me Wotan, greet for me Wälse and all +the heroes; greet for me likewise the benign wish-maidens: I will +not follow you to them!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +In this strangely impressive and moving dialogue, the +Brünnhilde-part is upborne on the stately, high and cold Walhalla +theme; the Siegmund-part gives over and over one urgent heartful +questioning phrase, filled with human yearning and sorrow: the motif +of love and death. "Where Sieglinde lives <a name="page_92"><span +class="page">Page 92</span></a> in joy or sorrow, there will Siegmund +likewise abide,..." he pronounces. When he is informed that he has +no choice but to follow, that he is to fall through Hunding, that +its virtue has been withdrawn from his sword, justly incensed, +he declares that if this be true,—if he, shame to him! who +forged for him the sword, allotted him ignominy in place of victory, +he will not go to Walhalla, Hella shall hold him fast! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"So little do you care for eternal joy?" the Valkyrie asks wistfully; +"all in all to you is the poor woman who, tired and full of trouble, +lies strengthless in your lap? Nothing beside do you deem of high +value?" Inexpressibly moved at the manifestation before her of the +warmth and depth of this human affection, she begs him to place +his wife under her protection. He replies passionately that no +one while he lives shall touch the Stainless One, that if he must +indeed die, he will first slay her in her sleep. Brünnhilde, +in great emotion, begs still more urgently, "Entrust her to me, +for the sake of the pledge of love which she took from you in joy!" +But Siegmund, all the more firmly fixed in his resolve, lifts his +sword, and grimly offering Nothung two lives at one blow, swings +it above the sleeping woman. The Valkyrie at this can no longer +keep in bounds the surging flood of her compassion: "Hold, +Wälsung!" she restrains his arm, "Sieglinde shall live, and +with her Siegmund!... I change about the doom of battle. To you, +Siegmund, I apportion blessed victory...." With injunctions to +place his trust in the sword and the Valkyrie, bidding him farewell +till they shall meet on the field, she disappears. Siegmund, with +heart restored to gladness, bends over Sieglinde again; listens +to her breathing and studies her face, now smiling, as he sees, +in quiet sleep. "Sleep on!" he speaks to her, "till the battle +has been fought and peace shall rejoice you!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_93"><span class="page">Page 93</span></a> Hunding's +horn has already been heard, calling out the adversary. Siegmund +lays Sieglinde gently down, and, Nothung in hand, rushes to the +encounter. A storm has been gathering, a cloud has settled over +the mountain-tops. Sieglinde, left alone, murmurs in her sleep. +Her broken sentences reveal her dream: She is a child again and +the scene is reenacted to her of the conflagration which ended +her life in the forest with father and mother and twin. She starts +awake in affright, calling Siegmund, and finds herself alone. She +hears her husband's horn and his call to Wehwalt to stand and meet +him. She hears Siegmund's arrogant reply. She cannot see them for +the black storm-scud, but calls on them to stop, to kill her first. +A flash of lightning shows Hunding and Siegmund fighting on a high +point of the rocky pass. Sieglinde is rushing toward them, when +a sudden glare blinds her. In the light, Brünnhilde is seen +hard at Siegmund's side, defending him with her shield. "Strike +home, Siegmund! Trust to the victorious sword!" Siegmund raises his +sword for a deathblow to Hunding, when a fiery beam drops through +the storm-cloud; in the red glow of it is distinguished the form of +Wotan at Hunding's side, holding his spear between the combatants. +His voice is heard, terrible: "Back from the spear! To pieces, +the sword!" Nothung snaps against the spear, and, run through the +body by his adversary, Siegmund falls. Sieglinde hears his dying +sigh—the strong heart stops on a brief snatch, pathetic, of +the motif of the heroism of the Wälsungen—She drops to +earth, stunned. In the gloom, Brünnhilde, who has retreated +before the angry father's spear, is seen lifting Sieglinde and +hurrying off: "To horse! that I may save you!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Long and mournfully Wotan gazes upon the fallen +Siegmund—best-beloved perhaps of all the Wagner heroes. Taking +account suddenly of the presence of Hunding, "Begone, slave!" <a +name="page_94"><span class="page">Page 94</span></a> he orders, "kneel +before Fricka, inform her that Wotan's spear has taken vengeance of +that which brought mockery upon her!... Begone!... Begone!..." +But at the gesture with which the command is emphasised, Hunding +drops dead, crushed out of life by the god's contempt. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Abruptly recalled to the thought of his child's contumacy, Wotan +starts up in terrific wrath: "But Brünnhilde! Woe to that +offender! Dreadful shall be the punishment meted to her audacity, +when my horse overtakes her in her flight!" Amid lightning and +thunder, aptly symbolising the state of his temper, the god vanishes +from sight. +</p> + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The third act shows the scene, a high rocky peak rising from among +great pine-trees, where the Valkyries assemble for their return +together to the hall of Wotan. On the clouds they come riding, +each with a dead warrior laid across her steed. Over the neighing +and hoof-beats, the music develops of a lightly thundering +cavalry-charge, suggestive of the rocking in the saddle of horsemen +borne over billowing expanses—glorious with the glory of +the hosts which fancy sees among the crimson and gold banners of +the sunset. The eight are at last arrived; their war-cries, their +hard laughter, and the shrill neighing of the battle-steeds mingle +in harsh harmony. The shrieks of an autumn gale, exulting in its +freedom to drive the waves mountain-high and scatter all the leaves +of the forest, have the same quality of wildness and force and +glee. The steel-corseleted figures clustered on the peak make one +think a little of gleaming dragon-flies seen in summer, swarming +as they do around some point of mysterious interest. The laughter +of the Valkyries is for grim jests they exchange over the conduct +<a name="page_95"><span class="page">Page 95</span></a> of their +horses, who fall to fighting with one another, because the dead +warriors on their backs were enemies in life. Brünnhilde only +is wanting, to complete their number, but they dare not start for +Walhalla without her, lest Walvater, not seeing his favourite, +should receive them with a frown. They are amazed, when they finally +see her coming, to descry on the back of her horse no warrior, +but a woman—amazed, likewise, at the wild speed of Grane's +flight, and to see him stagger and drop on reaching the goal. They +hurry to Brünnhilde's assistance. She comes in, breathless +with terror and haste, supporting Sieglinde. Wotan, she informs +the wondering sisters, is hot in pursuit of her. She begs one of +them to keep lookout for him from the top of the peak. The black +storm-cloud on which he rides is perceived sweeping toward them +from the north. To the questioning Valkyries Brünnhilde gives +in quick outline the story of her disobedience, and implores their +help to save Sieglinde,—for the Wälsungen all Wotan has +threatened with destruction. She conjures them, too, to conceal +herself, who has not the hardihood to face her father in the extremity +of his indignation. But the sisters are appalled at the revelation +of her misdeed, and no less at the suggestion that they should +join in her act of rebellion. Her prayer for the loan of one of +their horses on which the woman may escape, meets with obtuse looks, +headshakes, uncompromising denial. She is appealing urgently, hurriedly, +to one after the other, when Sieglinde who, stony, death-struck, +dazed with grief, has appeared unconscious, up to this moment, of +all taking place around her, stops her, stating dully that there +is no need to trouble about her, since her only wish is to die. +She indeed reproaches Brünnhilde for her care, and bids her +now, if she is not to curse her for their flight, to end her life +by a thrust of the sword. In the next moment the face of this same +<a name="page_96"><span class="page">Page 96</span></a> woman sheds +the very radiance of joy: the Valkyrie has revealed to her that of +her a Wälsung shall be born. Then, oh, "Save me, you valiant +one!" she cries. "Save my child! Protect me, you maidens, with +your mightiest protection! Save me! Save the mother!" She kneels +to them. The cool-blooded spinsters are moved by this, but not +to the point of braving Wotan's ire. "Then fly in haste, and fly +alone!" Brünnhilde with sudden resolve bids Sieglinde: "I will +remain behind and draw upon me, delaying him, Wotan's anger." "In +what direction shall I go?" asks the woman eagerly. Eastward, one +of the sisters tells her, lies a forest. Fafner there, in the shape +of a dragon, guards the treasure of the Nibelungen. An unsuitable +place for a helpless woman, yet one where she will be safe from +Wotan, for the god, it has been observed, shuns it. "Away then to +eastward," Brünnhilde instructs Sieglinde; "with undaunted +courage bear every trial. Hunger and thirst, thorns and stony +roads—do you laugh at want and sorrow, for one thing know, +and keep it ever in mind: the most exalted hero in the world, O +woman, shall be born of you!" A great melodious phrase describes him, +the future Siegfried, as if with one magnificent stroke outlining +a form of heroic beauty and valour. Brünnhilde gives Sieglinde +the pieces of Siegmund's sword, gathered up from the field after +the ill-fated encounter. "He who one day shall swing this sword +newly welded together, let him take his name from me: As Siegfried +let him rejoice in victory!" From the soul of Sieglinde rises a +soaring song of gratitude and praise, a song of purest, highest +joy. Her last words to Brünnhilde, as clasping to her breast +the broken sword she hastens away, are, interpreted: "My gratitude +shall one day reward you, smiling at you in human form!... Farewell! +Sieglinde in her woe calls down blessings upon you!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_97"><span class="page">Page 97</span></a> The storm-cloud +has reached the rock, Wotan's voice is heard: "Brünnhilde, +stand!" At the sound of it, Brünnhilde's heart fails her; +the hearts of the sisters, too, soften. Crowding together on the +rocky peak, they let the culprit cower out of sight among them. +But Wotan is not deceived; he addresses to the hidden daughter +such sharp and searching reproaches that, her fear for herself +losing all importance as these strike her heart, she steps forth +from among the sister-Valkyries and meekly stands before her father, +awaiting condemnation. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Not I," he speaks, "punish you. Yourself you have framed your +punishment!" And he exposes how by forgetting the whole duty of +a Valkyrie—to deal victory or defeat according to Wotan's +decree—she had made herself in effect no longer a Valkyrie. +"No more shall I send you from Walhalla.... No longer shall you +bring warriors to my hall.... From the tribe of the gods you are +cut off, rejected from the eternal line.... Our tie is severed.... +You are banished from my face!" The sisters break into lamentation. +"Upon this mountain I banish you. In undefended sleep I shall seal +you. Let the man then capture the maid who finds her upon his road +and wakes her." The sisters endeavour to restrain him, pointing out +that their own honour will suffer from such a scandal. He rejects +this on the ground that they have nothing more whatever to do with the +faithless sister. "A husband is to win her feminine favor; masterful +man is henceforth to have her duty. By the fireside she shall sit +and spin, an object of scorn to all beholders!" Brünnhilde +drops at his feet, overwhelmed. Cries of horror and protest break +from the others; he drives them from his presence with the threat +of a similar fate to Brünnhilde's if they do not forthwith +depart from her, and keep afar from the rock where she suffers her +sentence. In a confusion of terror, which is not without the slightest +point of <a name="page_98"><span class="page">Page 98</span></a> +humour, the strong girls flee like leaves in the blast before Wotan's +menace,—and Brünnhilde is left alone to plead her poor +cause with the stern incensed father. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +She conjures him first to silence his anger, and define to her +the dark fault which has impelled him to reject the most loyal +of his children. "I carried out your order," she protests. "Did I +order you to fight for the Wälsung?" he inquires. "You did," +she reminds him. "But I took back my instructions." "When Fricka +had estranged you from your own mind.... Not wise am I, but this +one thing I knew, that the Wälsung was dear to you. I was aware +of the conflict which compelled you to turn from the remembrance of +this.... I kept in sight for you that which, painfully divided in +feeling, you must turn your back upon. Thus it was that I saw what +you could not see. I saw Siegmund. I stood before him announcing +death. I met his eye, I heard his voice, I apprehended the hero's +ineffable distress.... I witnessed that which struck the heart +in my bosom with awe and trembling. Timid and wondering I stood +before him, in shame. I could think only how I might serve him.... +And confidently counting upon an intimate understanding of him +who had bred that love in my heart,—of that will which had +attached me to the Wälsung,—I disobeyed your command!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Wotan, in meeting this, shows how he is not merely a father dealing +with a disobedient child, but a man in strife with himself, with +his own will which has betrayed him into following affection, +inclination, when duty called for an opposite course. "If thy right +hand offend thee, cut if off and cast it from thee." Brünnhilde +is to Wotan that offending flesh and blood, and the safety of the +future depends, it seems, upon his breaking his own heart by cutting +her off from himself. She has done what his heart would have had +him do; but for interests whose claim <a name="page_99"><span +class="page">Page 99</span></a> upon him is in his estimation greater +than that of affection (<i>einer Welt zu Liebe</i>: for the sake +of a world), he had elected not to follow his heart's impulse. And +this delinquent, daughter at once and his own will, must not only +be punished for the example of all the disobedient, but cut off +from himself, to provide absolutely against any possible repetition +of the so lovable and forgivable offence. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Brünnhilde, when she has heard him out, has no word further +of argument or defence, but acquiesces with sad submissiveness. +"Certainly the foolish maiden is no fit helpmate for you, who, +confused by your amazing counsel, did not understand your mind, +when her own mind prompted one thing only: to love that which you +loved!" She accepts the punishment as just, only: "If you are to +sever that which was bound together," she pleads, "to keep apart +from yourself the very half of yourself, that I was once completely +one with you, O god, forget it not! Your immortal part you cannot +wish to dishonour. You cannot intend an ignominy which involves +you.... Yourself you would be degraded, if you gave me over to +insult!" "You followed, light of heart, the call of love," Wotan +replies unconcedingly: "follow now him whom you must love!" "If I +must depart from Walhalla, if I am to be your companion and servant +no more," Brünnhilde pressingly continues, "if my obedience is +to be given to masterful man, not of a coward and braggart let me +be the prize! Let him not be worthless who shall win me!" "You cut +yourself off from Walvater," he repulses her; "he cannot choose for +you!" "A noble generation there is, having its origin in you—" +Brünnhilde suggests, still unquelled, the point is so vital +to her; "the most admirable of heroes, I know it, is to spring +from the line of the Wälsungen...." "Not a word of the +Wälsungen!" Wotan fiercely interrupts. "When I severed from +you, I severed from <a name="page_100"><span class="page">Page +100</span></a> them. Doomed to destruction is that line!" Sieglinde +has been saved, Brünnhilde informs him, who shall give birth +to the Wälsung of whom she speaks. Wotan sternly silences +her: let her not seek to shake his firmness. He cannot choose for +her! He has loitered too long already. He cannot stop to consider +what her wishes are, nothing further has he to do with her but +to see his sentence executed. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +What has he devised for her punishment, she asks. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He repeats his earlier sentence: "In deep sleep I shall seal you. +He who awakes the defenceless sleeper, shall have her to wife." +Brünnhilde falls on her knees to him. "If I am to be bound +in fast sleep, an easy prey to the most ignoble of men, this one +prayer you shall grant which a noble terror lifts to you: Let the +sleeper be protected by a barrier of fright-inspiring things, that +only a fearless and great-hearted hero may be able to reach me +on my mountain-peak!" "Too much you demand! Too much of favour!" +She clasps his knees, and with the wildest inspiration of terror: +"This one prayer you must—must listen to! At your command +let a great fire spring up. Let the summit be surrounded by fierce +flames, whose tongues shall lick up and whose teeth shall devour +any caitiff venturing near to the formidable place!" So is her +whole soul heard to cry aloud in this prayer, as she pleads for +so much more than her life, that all by which Wotan had fortified +himself against her, and which had been subjected to an assault so +prolonged, suddenly gives way, his weary heart is pierced. Overcome +by emotion, he lifts her to her feet; he gazes long into her eyes, +reading her soul there,—then amply, fully, with the whole of +his overflowing heart, grants her prayer: "Farewell, O dauntless, +glorious child! Holy pride of my heart, farewell! Farewell! Farewell! +If I must shun you, if I am never more fondly to greet you, if +you are no more to <a name="page_101"><span class="page">Page +101</span></a> ride at my side, or reach me the cup of mead; if I am +to lose you whom I so have loved, O laughing joy of my eyes—a +bridal bonfire shall blaze for you such as never yet blazed for +a bride! A flaming barrier shall girdle the rock; with burning +terror-signals it shall frighten away the coward. The fainthearted +shall keep afar from Brünnhilde's rock. That one alone shall +win the bride, who is freer than I—the god!" In a speechless +ecstasy of gratitude, Brünnhilde sinks on his breast, and he +holds her long silently clasped, while there floats heavenward +as if the very voice of their relieved, pacified, uplifted hearts. +Supporting her in his arms, gazing tenderly in her upturned face, he +takes his last leave of her. There is a passage in Wotan's farewell +which seems to contain, compressed into it, all the yearning ache +of all farewells, with all the sweetness of the love which makes +parting bitter. "For the last time.... Farewell.... The last kiss...." +These words occur upon it. The motif it seems of the tragedy of +last times; one wonders could custom ever so harden him to it that +he should feel no clutch at the heart in hearing it. "For the last +time I appease myself with the last kiss of farewell.... Upon a +happier mortal the star of your eye shall beam. Upon the unhappy +Immortal it must, in parting, close. For thus does the god turn +away from you, thus does he kiss away your divinity!" He presses +a long kiss upon each of her eyes, and the first languor of sleep +falling at once upon her, she leans, without strength, against him. +He supports her to a mossy knoll beneath a spreading pine-tree, +and lays her gently upon it; after a long brooding look at her +face, closes her helmet; after a long look at her sleeping form, +covers it with the great Valkyrie shield; places her spear beside +her, and with a last long sad look at the slumbering motionless +figure, turns away,—having effectually desolated himself +of the three dearest of his children. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_102"><span class="page">Page 102</span></a> Resolutely +striding from the sleeper, he summons Loge, and commands him in his +original form of elemental fire to surround the mountain-summit. +At the shock of his spear against the rock, a flame flashes and +rapidly spreads. With his spear Wotan traces the course the fire +is to follow, girdling the peak. Nimbly it leaps from point to +point, till the whole background is fringed with flame. At Wotan's +words, "Let no one who is afraid of my spear ever break through +the fiery barrier!" there falls, prophetic, across the dream of +Brünnhilde's charmed sleep, the great shadow of the Deliverer, +so distant yet in time, Siegfried, who when the hour came of test +was found to fear Wotan's spear as little as he feared anything +else. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +With that firm spell placed upon his magnificent and adequate fence, +Wotan departs; and, guarded by the singing flames, which weave +into the rhythm of their bright dance the tenderest of lullabies, +Brünnhilde is left to her long rest. +</p> + +<p class="bigtitle"> +<a name="page_103"><span class="page">Page 103</span></a> +SIEGFRIED</p> + +<h2><a name="page_105"><span class="page">Page 105</span></a> +SIEGFRIED</h2> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +Fafner, when he had become possessor of the Nibelungen treasure, +conveyed it, as we have seen, to a cave in a lonesome forest, and +there in the shape of a dragon mounted guard over it. Mime, the dwarf, +in order to keep the same treasure under some sort of oversight, +took up his abode in the forest, at a respectful distance from the +flame-breathing monster. Alberich haunted the immediate neighbourhood +of the cave. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Thus it happened that Sieglinde, directed by the Valkyries to that +region, where she should be safest from Wotan's anger, was overheard +by Mime, out in the lonesome wood, moaning in her trouble. He assisted +her into his cave. There Siegfried was born, and there Sieglinde +died. Mime reared the "Wälsungen-shoot" with solicitous care, +in the ulterior view that this scion of a strong race when grown +to man's size should kill Fafner for him and get him the Ring. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At the rise of the curtain we see Mime at his anvil, struggling with +a heavy difficulty. He is fashioning a sword for Siegfried,—still +another sword, after ever so many,—realising even as he works +that no sword he can forge but will break in the lad's strong hands. +"The best sword I ever forged, which in the hands of a giant would +stand stiff, the insignificant stripling for whom it was shaped +he whacks and snaps it in two, as if I had made him a child's +plaything!" It is sober fact to Mime that he cannot use Siegfried for +his purposes until he have <a name="page_106"><span class="page">Page +106</span></a> equipped him with a sword. "A sword there is," he +continues his meditation, "which he could not break. The fragments +of Nothung he never could shatter, could I weld the strong pieces +together, which all my art cannot compass! Nothung alone could +be of use,... and I cannot weld it, Nothung, the sword!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Half-heartedly he has resumed his toil, when a joyous shout is +heard from the forest, of which a sun-shot patch glimmers through +the cave's mouth, and there storms in, driving before him a tethered +bear, a magnificent youth, clad in skins, a silver horn at his side. +The splendour of Siegfried's appearance is constantly referred +to, the qualifications applied to him suggesting most frequently an +effect he shed of light. This child of the unhappy Wälsungen +seems to have been indelibly stamped with the joy of their one +golden hour. Of Siegmund's tragic consciousness of frustration, +of Sieglinde's sufferings, there is no trace in their vigorous +offspring; but the superabundant vitality of joy which lifted them +to the lovers' seventh heaven for one triumphant hour is all in his +young blood. He is big, strong, sane, comely, fearless, simple, +ignorant of all mean passions and interests; pensive for moments, +gay for hours-nearly boisterous; frank and outspoken to the point +of brutality; unmannerly at times to the point of ruffianism; but +the dice are loaded to secure our cherishing him right through his +bright course, by that irresistible, ingrain joyousness of his, +born of strength, balance, fearlessness. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Laughing immoderately, he urges the bear against Mime, who flees +hither and thither to elude the fearful pair. "I am come in double +force, the better to corner you.... Brownie, ask for the sword!" +When assured by the trembling Mime that the sword is in readiness, +he releases and sends home his shaggy ally. But when Mime hands +him the newly finished <a name="page_107"><span class="page">Page +107</span></a> sword, and he strikes it on the anvil, it flies to +bits. The angry boy expresses his wish that he had smashed the +sword on the disgraceful bungler's skull. "Shall such a braggart go +on bragging? He prates me of giants and lusty fighting; of gallant +deeds and solid armour; he will forge weapons for me, provide me with +swords; he vaunts his art as if he could do something of account; +but let me take hold of the thing he has hammered, with a single +grip I crush flat the idle rubbish! If the creature were not so +utterly mean, I would drop him into the forge-fire with all the +stuff of his forging, the old imbecile hobgoblin! There might be +an end then to vexation!" He casts himself fuming on a stone seat +and turns his face toward the wall. The dwarf, who has kept his +distance from the storming youth, tries to quiet him, reminds him +of his benefits, of his teachings on the subject of gratitude. +Ingratiatingly he brings him food. Siegfried without turning dashes +spit and pipkin from his hands. The little man affects a deeply +hurt sensibility. He rehearses at length all Siegfried has to thank +him for, material necessities, education,—"With clever counsel +I made you clever, with subtle wisdom I taught you wit...." This +tale of benefactions has been gone over so often that the dwarf has +reached a fine glibness in it; the smooth air on which he enumerates +the instances of his kindness has a peculiar cast of hypocrisy. He +is so touched by the contemplation finally of his own goodness +and Siegfried's hardness of heart that he falls to weeping. "And +for all I have borne this is now the reward, that the hot-tempered +boy torments and hates me!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Siegfried has been calmly gazing into Mime's eyes; trying through +these to get at the truth of him. Mime expresses surprise that after +so many unquestionable services the boy should hate him; and the boy +is not himself without a touch of wonder at the invincible antipathy +with which this creature <a name="page_108"><span class="page">Page +108</span></a> inspires him, to whom yet he is actually indebted +for many good offices. "Much you have taught me, Mime, and many +a thing have I learned of you; but that which you have most cared +to teach me, never have I succeeded in learning: how I could bear +the sight of you! If you bring me food and drink, disgust takes +the place of dinner; if you spread an easy couch for me, sleep on it +becomes difficult; if you endeavour to teach me wise conversation, I +prefer to be dumb and dull. Whenever I set eyes on you, I recognise +as ill-done everything you do; whether I watch you stand, or waggle +and walk, ducking, nidnodding, blinking with your eyes, my impulse +is to catch the nidnodder by the scruff of the neck, to hurl out of +the way for good and all the odious blinker! That is my manner, +Mime, of being fond of you. Now, if you are wise, help me to know a +thing which I have vainly reflected upon: I run into the woods to +be rid of you; how does it happen that I come back? All animals are +dearer to me than you, trees and birds, the fish in the stream, I +am fonder of them all than I am of you; then how does it happen that +I still come back? If you are wise, make clear to me this thing!" +"My child," replies Mime, "you are informed by that circumstance how +near I lie to your heart!" "I tell you I cannot bear you! Forget +it not so soon!" Mime argues that such a thing is impossible, is +out of nature; that what to the young bird is the old bird, which +feeds it in the nest until it is fledged, that is to Siegfried, +inevitably, Mime! This simile of Mime's suggests to Siegfried a +further question. In asking it he has one of those brief accesses +of pensiveness which endear him, disclosing the existence of a +common human tenderness, after all, under that sturdy wrapping of +joy befitting the child of demigods. "Now, since you are so wise, +tell me still another thing: When the birds were singing so blithely +in Spring, the one luring the other, you told me, as I wished to +<a name="page_109"><span class="page">Page 109</span></a> know, +that they were male and female. They billed and cooed so engagingly, +and would not leave each other; they built a nest and brooded in +it; there was a fluttering presently of young wings, and the two +cared for the young. I saw how, in the same way, the deer rested +in the forest, in pairs; how even wild faxes and wolves did this. The +male brought food to the lair, the female nursed the cubs. I learned +from seeing this what love is—I never robbed the mother of her +young...." The music has been heaving and falling, as if with the +warm palpitation of a vast breast, Nature's own, blissful with love +and happy creative force. "Now, where, Mime, is your loving mate, +that I may call her mother?" Mime becomes cross: "What has come +over you, mad boy? Now, what a numbskull it is! Are you a bird or +a fox?" And at Siegfried's next question he chafes: "You are to +believe what I tell you: I am your father and mother at the same +time!" But Siegfried vigorously objects: "There you lie, unspeakable +gawk! How the young resemble their parents I have luckily observed +for myself. More than once I have come to a clear stream: I have +seen the trees and animals mirrored in it; the sun and clouds, +exactly as they are, appear repeated on the shining surface. My own +image, too, I have seen. Altogether different from you I seemed +to myself: there is as much likeness between a toad and a gleaming +fish, but never yet did a fish crawl out of a toad!" This latter bit +in its short extent gives an amusing, characteristic illustration +of Wagner's method of painting with notes. With the first phrase, +Siegfried's impatient exclamation, comes the motif of Siegfried's +impetuosity; then, as he is describing it, a representation of +the clear stream; upon this is sketched the image of Siegfried, +in the notes of his proper motif, to which is added a bar of the +heroism-of-the-Wälsungen motif, indicating his resemblance +to the father before <a name="page_110"><span class="page">Page +110</span></a> him. At his mention of the toad, his metaphor for +Mime, we hear the hammer of the Nibelung; and at his mention of +the gleaming fish, the swimming phrase that accompanies the watery +evolutions of the Rhine-maidens. The ingeniousness of all this +would not perhaps of itself especially recommend the piece, were +it not that the scheme is worked out to such beautiful purpose +that the whole thing is lovely, and that, though one should know +nothing whatever of the motifs, his ear must be charmed. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Satisfied by his own logic that Mime cannot be his progenitor, +Siegfried now himself answers his earlier question: "When I run +into the woods in the thought of forsaking you, how does it happen +that I still return home? It is because from you I am to learn who +are my father and mother!" Mime evades him: "What father! What +mother! Idle question!" But Siegfried catches him by the throat, +and the terrified dwarf communicates, grudgingly, a scant fact or +two of his history. "Oh, ungrateful and wicked child! now hear +for what it is you hate me. I am neither your father nor any kin +of yours, and yet to me you owe your life...." Making his own part +in the story as meritorious as possible, he relates his taking +into shelter the woman whom he had found moaning out in the wild +woods. Siegfried, for once penetrated with sadness, wonder, and +awe, breathes forth softly, when the sorrowful story is ended, +"My mother—died then—of me?" He tries by questions to +complete the dwarf's bare account: "Whence am I named Siegfried?" +"Thus did your mother bid me call you." "What was my mother's name?" +Mime feigns to have forgotten, but, roughly pressed, recalls it. +"Then, I ask you, what was my father's name?" "Him I never saw!" +"But my mother spoke the name?" "She only said that he had been +slain." Siegfried is smitten with the suspicion that Mime <a +name="page_111"><span class="page">Page 111</span></a> may be lying +to him, and demands some proof of all this which he has heard. +Mime, after a moment's resistance, in terror of the boy's rising +wrath, fetches from its hiding and shows him the pieces of a broken +sword. "This was given me by your mother. For trouble, cost and +care, she left it as paltry remuneration. Behold it! A broken sword! +Your father, she said, carried it in the last battle, when he was +slain." Siegfried's strong good spirits have already returned. +"And these fragments," he cries, with enthusiasm, "you are to weld +together for me. Then I shall swing my proper sword! Hurry, Mime! +Quick to work!... Cheat me not with trumpery toys! In these fragments +alone I place my faith. If I find you idle, if you join them +imperfectly, if there are flaws in the hard steel, you shall learn +burnishing from me! For this very day, I swear it, I mean to have +the sword!" "What do you want this very day of the sword?" Mime +inquires in alarm. Siegfried, his heart inexpressibly lightened +by the positive knowledge that Mime is neither father nor any kin +to him, bursts into merry singing: "To go away, out of the woods +into the world. Never shall I come back!... As the fish gaily swims +in the flood, as the finch freely flies afar, so shall I fly, so +shall I dart... that I may never, Mime, see you more!" Off he storms +into the forest, leaving Mime shouting after him, a prey to the +utmost anxiety. The dwarf's difficulty is now twofold: "To the +old care I have a new one added!" How to retain the wild fellow +and guide him to Fafner's nest, and how to mend those pieces of +stubborn steel. "No forge is there whose glow can soften the +thorough-bred fragments. No dwarf's hammer can compel the hard +pieces...." In unmitigated despair, void of counsel, he drops on +his seat behind the anvil and weeps. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Ushered by great calm chords, measured and dignified as the gait of a +god on his travels, a wayfarer appears at the <a name="page_112"><span +class="page">Page 112</span></a> entrance of the cave. He wears +an ample deep-blue mantle, and for staff carries a spear. On his +head is a broad hat, the brim of which dips so as to conceal one +of his eyes. It is Wotan. Since parting from Brünnhilde he +has had no heart for warfare, no heart to ride to battle without +the "laughing joy of his eyes." Alone, unresting, he has wandered +all over the wide earth in search of counsel and, very likely, +distraction. A spectator he is in these days and not an actor. His +spirit has reached a state of philosophic calm. He has learned +better certainly than to meddle any more with anything that concerns +the accursed Ring. He is brought into the neighbourhood of the +still interested actors in that old drama in part by curiosity; in +part, no doubt, by the wish to watch the actions of Siegfried, his +beloved children's child. But in some faintest degree, at least, it +would seem, he is brought here by the invincible need to influence +these fortunes just a little, though it be firmly fixed that he +is not to try directly or indirectly to divert the Ring into any +channel which shall bring it eventually to himself. All else being +equal, he had a little rather strengthen Mime's chances of getting +the Ring, through Siegfried, than inactively see it fall to the +inveterate enemy, Alberich. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At the greeting he speaks from the threshold to the "wise smith," +Mime starts up in affright: "Who is it, pursuing me into the forest +wilderness?" "Wanderer is the world's name for me. Far have I wandered, +much have I bestirred myself on the back of the earth." "Then bestir +yourself now! and do not loiter here, if Wanderer is the world's name +for you!" Mime, with his head full of his dark little projects, has +a deep dread of spies and interference. At every step the Wanderer +takes further into his dwelling, he utters a sharper protest; and at +every protest the Wanderer calmly advances a step further. "Through +much research, much have I learned," speaks <a name="page_113"><span +class="page">Page 113</span></a> Wanderer, "I could impart to many +a one things of importance to him; I could deliver many a one from +that which troubles him—from the gnawing care of the heart." +And after still another irritated dismissal from Mime: "Many a +one has imagined himself to be wise, but the thing which he most +needed to know, he knew not. I gave him leave to ask me what should +help him, and enlightened him by my word." And after again being +nervously shown the door: "Here I sit by the fireside," speaks +blandly Wanderer, suiting the action to the word, "and I set my +head as stake in a match of wits. My head is yours, you have won +it, if you do not, by questioning me, succeed in learning what shall +profit you; if I do not, by my instructions, redeem the pledge." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +It is plain enough that if Mime would now expose to the Wanderer +the source of the gnawing care at his heart, and ask him how Nothung +might be welded, he would receive the information. Wotan is clearly +eager to give it, yet cannot do so directly, or he would be too +crudely meddling again in the Ring affair: he cannot press on him +his counsel, but, at his old trick of ingenuous double-dealing, +might by means of this guessing-game make shift to convey it to +him. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Mime, old and wise as he is, has yet in certain directions a dwarfed +understanding; certainly not enough generosity to trust anybody, +or conceive of a disinterested desire to do him a good turn. His +whole concern now is how to be rid of this large tactless personage. +"I must question him in such a manner as to trap him," he says to +himself. It is agreed that he shall have three questions. He sits +brooding a moment, trying to find something very difficult indeed. +The motif of Mime's cogitations, which has already been frequently +heard in this act, gives amusingly the unheroic colour of the sordid +little mind's workings. He fixes upon questions concerning things +which <a name="page_114"><span class="page">Page 114</span></a> +might be supposed little known to a wanderer of human descent, +even such a much-travelled and conceited one. First: What race +reigns in the depths of the earth? Second: What race rests upon the +back of the earth? Third: What race dwells on the cloudy heights? +Wotan readily answers all these, giving bits of the histories of +the races in question, the Nibelungen, the Giants, and the Gods. +As he describes the spear of Wotan, whose lord all must eternally +obey, he with an involuntary gesture of command brings his spear +hard down on the stone floor. Faint thunder results. Terror falls +upon Mime, who by the light shining for a moment from his countenance, +has recognised the god. "You have solved the questions and saved your +head," he says hurriedly, without looking Wotan in the face. "Now, +Wanderer, go your way!" But the Wanderer declares that according to +custom in such contests, it is the dwarf's turn now to answer three +questions or lose his head. "It is a long time," Mime ventures timidly, +"since I left my native place; a long time since I departed from the +bosom of earth, my mother; I once saw the gleam of Wotan's eye as +he looked into the cave; my mother-wit dwindles before him...." +But the wee fellow has no mean conceit of his wisdom, and is really +not as uneasy as might be expected of one in his position. "Perhaps +I shall be so lucky," he suggests, not without complacency, "as, +under this compulsion, to deliver the dwarf's head!" Wotan asks +him, for the first question,—and the pain of the memories +oppressing him is translated to us by the motif of parting, the +motif of "last times," while the god's tones are infinitely +tender—"What race is it to which Wotan shows himself stern, +and which yet he loves the best of all living?" Glibly Mime answers, +showing a full acquaintance with the circumstances, "The +Wälsungen." Wotan passes on to the second question: "A wise +Nibelung keeps watch over Siegfried. <a name="page_115"><span +class="page">Page 115</span></a> He is to kill Fafner for him, +that he may get the Ring and become lord of the Hort. What sword +now must Siegfried wield, if he is to deal death to Fafner?" Mime, +delighted with himself, readily replies: "Nothung is the name of +a notable sword.... The fragments of it are preserved by a wise +smith, for he knows that with the Wotan-sword alone an intrepid +stupid boy, Siegfried, shall destroy the dragon." He rubs his hands +in goblin glee. "Am I, dwarf, in the second instance still to retain +my head?" Wanderer, with a laugh for his antics, felicitates him: +"The most keen-witted are you among the wise; who can equal you +in acuteness? But seeing you are so cunning as to use the boyish +hero for your dwarf-purposes, with the third question I now make +bold: Tell me, wise armourer, who, out of the strong fragments, +shall forge Nothung anew?" Consternation falls upon the dwarf. +Who, indeed? Was not that question the very hub around which turned +all his troubled reflections? Had it not been that which was forcing +tears from him at the moment of the Wanderer's arrival? He runs +hither and thither distracted, in broken exclamations admitting +that he himself cannot forge the sword, and how should he know who +can perform the miracle? The Wanderer rises from his seat beside +the hearth. "Three questions you were free to ask. Three times I +was open to consultation. You inquired of things idle and remote, +but that which was closest to you, that which might profit you, +did not enter your mind. Now that I have guessed it, you lose your +senses with fright. I have won the witty head. Now, brave conqueror +of Fafner, hear, doomed dwarf: Only one who has never known fear +can forge Nothung anew." On his way to the mouth of the cave, he +turns for another word to the chap-fallen Mime: "Look out for your +wise head from this day forth: I leave it in forfeit to him who +has never learned fear!" With a laugh for the double-horned <a +name="page_116"><span class="page">Page 116</span></a> dilemma +in which he leaves the "honest dwarf," he passes forth into the +woods. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +As Mime gazes after him, violent trembling seizes the poor little +smith. The flashing among the leaves of Wotan's winged horse his +terror mistakes for the flaming of Fafner's gaping jaws; and the +sound of a rushing approach for the monster crashing toward him +through the underbrush. With the cry: "The dragon is upon me! Fafner! +Fafner!" he cowers behind the anvil. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The alarming noise proves to have been only Siegfried coming with +characteristic impetuosity to ask for his sword. "Hey, there! +Lazy-bones! Have you finished? Quick! What success with the sword?" +Mime is not in sight. His voice is heard, faint, from his hiding-place: +"Is it you, child? Are you alone?" Siegfried for some time can draw +no satisfactory answer from him, no matter how roughly pressed. +The dwarf is caught between two difficulties, and must first of all +things try to think out for himself the safest course of action. +Only by one who has never known fear can Nothung, the indispensable, +be forged. "Too wise am I for such work!" he soliloquizes. On the +other hand, his wise head is forfeit to one who has never learned +fear. Of the two difficulties, the latter is obviously the one to +be first attended to. Siegfried fills the description dangerously +well of the foretold fatal enemy. "How shall I contrive to teach +him fear?" is Mime's nearest interest. Siegfried, irritated by +his continued hesitation, finally catches hold of him. "Ha? Must +I lend a hand? What have you forged and furbished to-day?" "With +no care but for your welfare," answers Mime, "I was sunk in thought +as to how I should instruct you in a thing of great importance." +"You were sunk quite under the seat," laughs Siegfried; "what of +great importance did you discover there?" "I there learned fear for +your sake, that I might teach it to you, <a name="page_117"><span +class="page">Page 117</span></a> dunce." "What about fear?" Siegfried +asks. "You know nothing about it, and you are thinking of going +from the woods out into the world? Of what use to you would be +the strongest sword, if you had no knowledge of fear?... Into the +crafty world I shall not let you fare before you have learned fear." +"If it is an art, why am I unacquainted with it? Out with it! What +about fear?" "Have you never felt,"—asks Mime, in a voice +which at the suggestion of his own words falls to quaking, "have +you never felt, in the dark woods, at twilight,... when there are +sounds in the distance of rustling, humming and soughing, when +wild muttering gusts sweep past, disorderly fire-wisps flicker +around you, a swelling confused sound surges toward you,—have +you not felt a shuddering horror seize upon your limbs? A burning +chill shakes your frame, your senses swim and fail; the alarmed +heart trembling in your breast hammers to the point of bursting? +If you have never felt these things, fear is unknown to you!" The +music of fear is a darkened and discoloured fire-music through +which we recognise, as if under a disguise veiling something of +its beauty, the motif of Brünnhilde's sleep. If one looks +for reasons, one can suppose the reference to be, as to a type +of fearful things, to the terror-inspiring barrier surrounding +Brünnhilde; and imagine a jesting intimation that fear, as +Siegfried should eventually learn it, is the sensation suspending +the heart-beats at sight of a beautiful woman in her sleep. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Siegfried has listened to Mime in amused wonder: "Strange exceedingly +must that be! My heart, I feel, stands firm and hard in its place. +That creeping and shuddering, glowing and shivering, turning hot +and turning dizzy, hammering and trembling, I wish to feel the +terror of it, I long for that delight! But how can you, Mime, bring +it about?" "Just follow me. I will guide you to some purpose. I +have thought it all out. <a name="page_118"><span class="page">Page +118</span></a> I know a dreadful dragon; he has slain already and +swallowed many; Fafner will teach you fear, if you follow me to +his lair." "Where is his lair?" "Neidhöhle it is called. +(<i>Neid:</i> envy; <i>Höhle:</i> cavern.) Eastward it lies +at the end of the wood." "Then it is not far from the world?" "The +world is close by." "You are to take me there, and when I have +learned fear, away, into the world! So quick! Give me my sword! +I will swing it out in the world!" Mime confesses that he neither +has mended, nor ever can mend, the sword in question. "No dwarf's +strength is equal to it. More likely," he suggests, "one who knows +no fear may discover the art!" Siegfried, heartily weary of Mime's +paltering, snatches up the fragments of Nothung: "Here, the pieces! +Away with the bungler! My father's steel doubtless will let itself +be welded by me. Myself I will forge the sword!" And he falls to +work. "If you had taken diligent pains to learn the art, it would +now, of a truth, profit you," remarks Mime; "but you were always +lazy at the lesson. What proper work can you do now?" "What the +master cannot do," Siegfried aptly retorts, "the apprentice might, +if he had always minded him? Take yourself off! Meddle not with +this, or you may tumble with it into the fire!" He heaps fuel on +the hearth, fastens the sword in a vice and starts filing it. Mime +watches him, and at this which looks like folly, cannot restrain +the exclamation: "What are you doing? Take the solder! You are +filing away the file!" But the disposition of the young fellow +without fear shows in his method with the sword. With a brave +thoroughness he reduces the whole blade to steel filings. Mime +follows all his movements. "Now I am as old as this cavern and +these woods, but such a thing have I never seen! He will succeed +with the sword, that I plainly apprehend. In his fearlessness he +will make it whole. The Wanderer knew it well! How, now, shall <a +name="page_119"><span class="page">Page 119</span></a> I hide my +endangered head? It is forfeit to the intrepid boy unless Fafner +shall teach him fear—But, woe's me, poor wretch, how will he +slay the dragon, if he learns fear from him? How will he obtain +the Ring for me? Accursed dilemma! Here am I fast caught, unless I +find me wise counsel how to bring under compulsion the fearless one +himself...." "Quick, Mime!" Siegfried interrupts Mime's meditations; +"what is the name of the sword which I have ground into filings?" +"Nothung is the name of the notable sword; your mother gave me the +information." Siegfried at work falls to lusty singing, a song of +primitive character, of a kind with what one can suppose Tubal-cain +singing at his ancient anvil. We see him pumping the forge-bellows +while the steel melts, pouring the metal into a mould, cooling the +mould in a water-trough, breaking the plaster, heating the sword, +hammering the red blade, cooling it again, riveting the handle, +polishing the whole,—all of which actions his song celebrates: +"Nothung! Nothung! Notable sword! (<i>Neidliches Schwert</i> is +literally "covetable sword") Why must you of old be shattered? To +powder I have ground your sharp magnificence. I now melt the filings +in the crucible. Hoho! Hoho! Hahei! Hahei! Blow, bellows, brighten +the glow! Wild in the forest grew a tree. I hewed it down, I burned +the brown ash to charcoal. It lies heaped now on the hearth. The +coals of the tree, how bravely they burn, how bright and clear they +glow! Upward they fly in a spray of sparks and melt the steel-dust. +Nothung! Nothung! Notable sword! Your powdered steel is melting, +in your own sweat you are swimming, soon I shall swing you as my +sword!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Mime during this has been revolving his own problem, and has hit upon +a plan which seems to him to meet all the difficulties of his case: +Siegfried, beyond a doubt, will forge the <a name="page_120"><span +class="page">Page 120</span></a> sword and kill Fafner. While he is +tired and heated from the encounter, Mime will offer him a drink +brewed from simples of his culling, a few drops of which will plunge +the boy into deep sleep, when, with the weapon he is at this moment +forging, Mime will clear him out of the way and take possession +of Ring and treasure. Enchanted with his inspiration, he sets to +work at once preparing the somniferous drink. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Siegfried is singing at the top of his lungs: "In the water flowed +the stream of fire, it hissed aloud in anger, but the cold tamed +and chilled it; in the water it flows no more, stiff and hard it +is become, the lordly steel—but hot blood will bathe it soon. +Now sweat again that I may forge you, Nothung, notable sword!" He +catches sight of Mime pottering with the cooking utensils. "There +is a wise smith come to shame," the old man answers the youth's +mocking inquiry; "the teacher receives lessons from his pupil; +all is up with art for the old one, he will serve the young one +as cook! While the young one makes iron into broth, the old one +will prepare a dish of eggs!" With impish relish of the inwardness +of the situation, he stirs the mixture in the pot. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Hoho! Hahei! Hoho!" Siegfried proceeds with his work and his singing; +"shape, my hammer, a hard sword! Blood once dyed your pallid blue, +its trickling red brightened you, you laughed coldly, you cooled +off the hot liquid. Now the fire has made you glow red, your soft +hardness yields to the hammer; you dart angry sparks at me, because +I have tamed you, stubborn! The merry sparks, how they delight +me! Anger adorns the brave. You are gaily laughing at me, though +you feign to be angry and sullen. Hoho! Hahei! By means of heat +and hammer I have achieved it, with stalwart blows I have shaped +you; now let the red shame vanish, become as hard and cold as you +can...." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_121"><span class="page">Page 121</span></a> Mime is +meanwhile revelling in dreams of the greatness which is to follow +upon his acquisition of the Ring. He fairly skips up and down as he +thinks of it all: Brother Alberich himself reduced to subjection, +the whole world bowing at the nod of his, Mime's, head. No more +toil, others to toil for him.... "Mime is king, Prince of the +Nibelungen, lord over all! Hei, Mime! who would have thought it +of you?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Nothung! Nothung! Notable sword!" harmoniously bellows Siegfried; +"now you are fast in your hilt. You were in two, I have forced you +into one. No blow after this shall break you. In the dead father's +hand the steel snapped, the living son forged it anew; now its +bright gleam flashes like laughter, its sharp edge cuts clean. +Nothung! Nothung! Young and renewed! I have brought you back to +life. You lay dead there, in fragments; now you flash lightning, +defiant and brave! Show caitiffs your gleam! Strike the traitor! +Fell the villain!" He waves over his head the finished sword: "Look, +Mime, you smith—thus cuts Siegfried's sword!" He brings it +down upon the anvil, which falls apart, cleft from top to bottom. +Mime tumbles over with amazement. +</p> + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The next scene shows the woods before Fafner's cave. It is night. +Alberich is dimly distinguishable, lurking among the rocks, brooding +his dark thoughts, as he keeps covert watch over the treasure. He +is startled by what seems an untimely break of day, accompanied +by a great gust of wind. This defines itself as a galloping +gleam—a shining horse rushing through the forest. "Is it +already the slayer of the dragon?" he wonders; "is it he, already, +who shall kill Fafner?" A moonbeam breaking through the clouds +reveals the form of the Wanderer <a name="page_122"><span +class="page">Page 122</span></a> advancing toward Neidhöhle. +The enemies see and recognise each other. Alberich, though greatly +alarmed at this inopportune presence, breaks into angry vituperation: +"Out of the way, shameless robber.... Your intrigues have done +harm enough!" "I am come to look on, not to act," Wotan replies, +grandly mild and unruffled; "who shall deny me a wanderer's right +of way?" Alberich, as if words of offence were actually missiles, +showers them thick upon the unmoved god. He points out, virulently, +the strength of his own position compared with Wotan's, in whose +hand that spear of his must fly to pieces should he break a covenant +established as sacred by the runes carved on its shaft. Wanderer, a +shade weary of such a berating, yet losing little of his placidity, +retorts: "Not through any runes of truth to covenants did my spear +bind you, malignant, to me; you my spear forces to bow before me +by its strength; I carefully keep it therefore for purposes of +war." "How haughtily do you threaten in your defiant strength," +the rabid Alberich continues, "yet how uneasy is all within your +breast.... Doomed to death through my curse is Fafner, guardian +of the treasure. Who will inherit from him? Will the illustrious +Hort come once more into the possession of the Nibelung? The thought +gnaws you with unsleeping care. For, let me hold it again in this +fist, far otherwise than thick-witted giants shall I employ the +power of the Ring; then let the holy keeper of the heroes tremble; +the heights of Walhalla I shall storm with the hosts of Hella, +the world then will be mine to govern!" Tranquilly Wotan receives +this: "I know your meaning, but it creates in me no uneasiness. He +shall rule through the Ring who obtains it." This calm of Wotan's +gives Alberich the idea that the god must, so to speak, have cards +up his sleeve. "On the sons of heroes," he suggests ironically, +"you place your insolent reliance, fond <a name="page_123"><span +class="page">Page 123</span></a> blossoms of your own blood. Good care +have you taken of a young fellow—not so?—who cunningly +shall pluck the fruit which you dare not yourself break off?" "Not +with me"—Wotan cuts short the discussion, "wrangle with Mime. +Danger threatens you through your brother. He is bringing to this +spot a youth who is to slay Fafner for him. The boy knows nothing +of me. The Nibelung uses him for his own purposes. Wherefore, I +tell you, comrade, do freely as you choose!" Alberich can scarcely +believe that he has heard aright. "You will keep your hand from the +treasure?" Serenely and broadly, Wotan declares—a touch of +that tenderness in his tone which the thought of the Wälsungen +always has power to arouse—"Whom I love I leave to act for +himself: let him stand or fall, his own lord is he. I have no use +save for heroes!" This sounds very fair; to Alberich almost too +fair. He presses Wotan with further questions. The answers are +elusive as oracles, but satisfy Alberich of thus much: that Wotan +is himself out of the struggle for the Ring. To point his personal +disinterestedness, the god even offers to wake the dragon, that +Alberich may warn him of the approaching danger and peradventure +receive in token of gratitude—the Ring! We suspect in this +Wotan's taste for a joke, unless it be an exhibition of that other +trait of the god's, the need to gratify his conscience with a comedy +of fairness. At this moment he is not, it is true, interfering; +but he is confidently watching the play of forces set working by +him long ago. The strong Siegfried armed with the rejuvenated +Sieges-schwert is a force having its impulse originally from him. +At this moment, perhaps because the events immediately impending +have cast their shadows across the sensitive consciousness of an +at times prophet, he is in no uneasiness whatever with regard to +the fate of the Ring. To Alberich's mystification, he actually +<a name="page_124"><span class="page">Page 124</span></a> rouses +Fafner. "Who disturbs my sleep?" comes a hollow roar from the cave. +The Fafner-motif is the old motif of the giants, slightly altered +so that instead of the ponderous tread of the brothers it suggests +the muffled ponderous beat of a gigantic sinister heart. Wotan +and Alberich explain to the dragon his danger and indicate what +may buy him safety. Having heard them out, Fafner, unseen in the +cave, gives a long lazy comfortable yawn. "I lie and possess! Let +me sleep!" Wotan laughs. "Well, Alberich, the plan failed. But +abuse me no more, you rogue! One thing, I further enjoin you, keep +well in mind: Everything is after its kind, and this kind you cannot +alter!" The broad Erda-motif accompanies this maxim. "Take a firm +stand! Put your skill to use with Mime, your brother. He is of the +kind you understand better. What is of a different kind, learn now +to know, too...." When Wotan disappears, the galloping is heard, +through the storm-wind that for a moment agitates the leaves of +the forest, of his rising Luft-ross. His obscure last words have +left Alberich puzzled, sorer and angrier than ever. The air is +full of curse-motif. "Laugh on, you light-minded luxurious tribe of +the gods! I shall still see you all gone to destruction. While the +gold shines in the light there is a wise one keeping watch—His +spite will circumvent you all!" He hides himself among the tumbled +rocks near the cave-mouth from the brightening light of dawn. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Mime enters guiding Siegfried. "This is the spot, go no further!" +Siegfried seats himself under a great tree; they have been travelling +through the woods all night. "This is the place where I am to learn +fear?" he inquires light-heartedly. The excursion, as far as he +knows, has for its single object to teach him that art. He is not +of a suspicious turn and does not ask what interest in his education +has Mime, in whose <a name="page_125"><span class="page">Page +125</span></a> affection he instinctively does not believe. "Now, +Mime," he instructs the dwarf, "you are after this to avoid me. +If I do not learn here what I should learn, I shall fare further +alone, I shall finally be rid of you!" "Believe me, dear boy," +says the dwarf, "if you do not learn fear to-day and here, with +difficulty shall you learn it elsewhere and at another time!" He +directs the youth's eye to the black mouth of the dragon-hole and +describes with griesly detail the monster inhabiting it. Siegfried +listens unimpressed. Hearing, in answer to his inquiry, that the +monster has a heart and that it is in the usual place: "I will +drive Nothung into the overweening brute's heart!" he determines +lightly. He is sceptical with regard to the lesson in fear which +he has been promised. "Just wait!" Mime warns him. "What I said +was empty sound in your ears. You must hear and see the creature +himself.... Remain where you are. When the sun climbs high, watch +for the dragon. He will come out of his cave and pass along this +way to go and drink at the spring." "Mime," says Siegfried, with +a laugh for his foolish big-boy joke, "if you are to be at the +spring I will not hinder the dragon from going there. I will not +drive Nothung into his spleen until he has drunk you up. Wherefore, +take my advice: do not lie down to rest at the water's edge, but +take yourself off as far as ever you can, and never come back!" Mime +is too near, as he thinks, the hour of triumph, to take offence. +May he not be permitted, after the fight, to refresh the victor +with a drink? He will be near. Let Siegfried call him if he needs +advice,... or if he finds the sensation of fear delectable! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +When Siegfried has freed himself of Mime, whose company seems to +become more and more unendurable as he is nearer parting from him +for ever, he stretches out again under the great tree, folding +his arms beneath his head. "That that <a name="page_126"><span +class="page">Page 126</span></a> fellow is not my father," he muses, +"how glad am I of that! The fresh woodland only begins to please +me, the glad daylight to smile to me, now that the offensive wretch +is out of my sight!" He drives away the thought of him and lets +sweeter reflections gradually absorb him. The leaves rustle and +waver; delicate shafts of sunshine drop through them and play over +the forest floor. The exquisiteness of the hour, by its natural +power over the mood, turns the lonely boy's thoughts toward the +only human beings life has so far given him to love,—and in +images so vague and distant! "How did my father look?" he wonders +dreamily, and answers himself: "Like me, of course!" After a longer +spell of gazing up among the trees, while the soft influences of +the fragrant woodland world and lovely summer day still further +overmaster him: "But—how did my mother look?... That I cannot +in the least picture! Like the doe's, I am sure, shone her limpid +lustrous eyes—only, more beautiful by far!" The thought of +her death fills him with boundless sadness, but not sharp or +bitter,—dreamy and sweet from its tenderness. "When she had +born me, wherefore did she die? Do human mothers always die of their +sons? How sad were that! Oh, might I, son, behold my mother!... +My mother—a woman of humankind!" The motif of mother-love +is but a slight, beautiful variation from the motif of love in +nature accompanying Siegfried's reference to the deer paired in +the woods, that strain like the heaving of a great heart oppressed +by its burden of love. The thought of his never-known mother draws +forth sighs from Siegfried's lips. A long time he lies silent. +The Freia-motif, the motif of beauty, clambers upward like a dewy +branch of wild clematis. All is still around, but the little +wind-stirred leaves, which weave and weave as if a delicate green +gold-shot fabric of sound. Against this airy tapestry suddenly +stands forth like a vivid pattern the <a name="page_127"><span +class="page">Page 127</span></a> warbling of a bird. Over and over, +with pretty variations, the bird gives its note. It catches Siegfried's +attention; he listens. "You sweet little bird," he at last addresses +the singer up among the branches, "I never heard you before. Is your +home here in the forest?..." The thought occurs to him, so natural +to the simple: "Could I but understand the sweet babbling, certainly +it would tell me something—perhaps about the dear mother!" +He remembers hearing from Mime that one might come to understand +the language of the birds. Attractive possibility! Pricked by his +desire at once to bring it about, he springs up, cuts one of the +reeds growing around the pool where Fafner goes to drink, and fashions +it into a pipe. He tries upon it to imitate the bird-note. "If I +can sing his language," is his reasoning, "I shall understand, no +doubt, what he sings!" After repeated attempts, charmingly comical, +and much vain mending of the reed with the edge of Nothung, he +grows impatient, is ashamed of his unsuccess before the "roguish +listener." He tosses away the silly reed and takes his silver horn. +"A merry wild-wood note, such as I can play, you shall hear! I +have sounded it as a call to draw to me some dear companion. So +far, nothing better has come than a wolf or a bear. Let us see, +now, what it attracts this time, whether a dear comrade will come +to the call?" He places the horn to his lips and sounds the cheery +<i>Lock-weise</i> (lure-call) over and over, with long sustained +notes between the calls, during which he looks up at the bird, +to see how he likes it. As a variation he plays the motifs which +describe himself, the large heroic Siegfried-motif, and then the +gay, rash, lesser Nothung-Siegfried motif. He has returned to the +Lock-weise, and is repeating it with obstinate persistence, a-mind +not to stop until the companion his lonesomeness yearns for shall +have answered him when a bellowing sound behind him makes him face +<a name="page_128"><span class="page">Page 128</span></a> about. +We had been warned already by the <i>Wurm</i>-motif, heard before +in Nibelheim, when Alberich by the power of the Tarnhelm turned +himself into a dragon. Siegfried at sight of Fafner, whom the loud +Lock-weise has drawn from his slumbers and his cave, laughs aloud: +"My tune has charmed forth something truly lovely! A tidy comrade +you would make for me!" "What is that?" roars Fafner, fixing the +glare of his eyes upon the shapely form of Siegfried, insignificant +in size, as he counts it. "Haha!" cries Siegfried, enchanted to +hear from an animal talk which he can understand. "If you are an +animal that can speak, you very likely can teach me something. +Here is one who does not know fear; can he learn it from you?" +"Is this insolence?" asks the amazed brute. "Call it insolence or +what you please, but I shall fall upon you bodily, unless you teach +me fear." Fafner laughs grimly, as if he licked his chops: "I wanted +drink, I now find meat as well!" He shows the red interior of his +vast jaws fringed with teeth. There is a brief further exchange of +threats and jeers, then Fafner bellows: "Pruh! Come on, swaggering +child!" Siegfried shouts: "Look out, bellower, the swaggerer comes!" +and, Nothung in hand, leaps to the assault. Vainly Fafner spouts +flame to blind and terrify him. The fight ends as it must. The +dragon falls beneath the Wotan-sword, wielded by the hero without +fear. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +With his failing breath, in a tone strangely void of resentment, +the dragon questions his slip of an adversary, so unexpectedly +victorious: "Who are you, intrepid boy, that have pierced my heart? +Who incited the child to the murderous deed? Your brain never conceived +that which you have done...." A motif we have come to know well +punctuates the dying speech of this still another victim of the +curse on the Ring. "I do not know much, as yet," Siegfried replies; +"I do not know even <a name="page_129"><span class="page">Page +129</span></a> who I am. But it was yourself roused my temper to +fight with you." The last of the giants, his hollow voice growing +fainter, tells the "clear-eyed boy," the "rosy hero," who it is he +has slain, and warns him of the treachery surrounding the owner +of the Hort. "Tell me further from whom I am descended," speaks +Siegfried; "wise, of a truth, do you appear, wild one, in dying. +Guess it from my name. Siegfried I am called!" But the Worm sighing, +"Siegfried!..." gives up the breath. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +After a moment's contemplation of the mountainous dead, Siegfried +resolutely drags from his breast the sword which he had driven +in up to the hilt. A drop of the dragon's blood spurts against +his hand. With the exclamation: "The blood burns like fire!" he +lifts his finger to his mouth. At once his attention is arrested +by the voices of the birds. With increasing interest he harkens: +It seems to him almost as if the birds were speaking to him; a +distinct impression he receives of words. "Is it the effect of +tasting the blood?" he wonders. "That curious little bird there, +hark, what is he saying to me?" From the tree-top come clear words +on a bird's warble: "Hei, to Siegfried belongs now the Nibelung's +treasure! Oh, might he find the Hort in the cave! If he should +win the Tarnhelm it would serve him for delightful adventures; +but if he should find the Ring it would make him sovereign of the +world!" Siegfried has listened with bated breath. "Thanks, dear +little bird, for your advice. Gladly will I do as you bid!" He +enters the cave. As he disappears, Mime crawls near to convince +himself ocularly of Fafner's death. At the same moment, Alberich +slips from his hiding-place and throws himself across Mime's path, +to bar his way to the treasure. A bitter quarrel at once springs up +between the brothers; Alberich claims the treasure because it is +rightly his, Mime because he reared the youth who has recovered it +from the dragon. Mime, whom <a name="page_130"><span class="page">Page +130</span></a> Alberich's violence cows still as in the old days, +offers to share, if he may have the Tarnhelm—a sly +proposition,—he will renounce the Ring; but this Alberich +hears with furious scorn, and the wrangle is at its height when +Siegfried reappears at the cave's mouth. In his hands are Tarnhelm +and Ring. Returning into sight after the angry cat-fight between +the ill-conditioned pair, he appears more than ever large, serene, +fair, noble. Mime and Alberich betake themselves quickly back to +their lurking-places. Siegfried stands considering his odd-looking +acquisitions: "Of what use you may be to me I know not; but I took +you from the heaped gold of the treasure because a good adviser +bade me. As ornaments you shall serve, bearing witness to this +day; these baubles shall remind me that in combat I slew Fafner, +but failed still to learn fear!" He places the ring on his finger +and the Tarnhelm at his belt. In the silence that falls, he listens +again for the voice of the bird. It suddenly drops from the tree-top: +"Hei! Siegfried possesses the Tarnhelm and Ring! Oh, let him not +trust Mime the false! If Siegfried should listen closely to the +wretch's hypocritical words, he would penetrate the true meaning of +Mime's heart; such is the virtue of the taste of dragon's blood!" +No sooner has Siegfried heard, than he sees Mime approaching. He +waits for him, leaning on his sword, quietly watchful. The little +man contorts body and face into postures and expressions as humbly +flattering and cajoling as he can; at every few steps he scrapes +and curtseys. "Welcome, Siegfried! Tell me, you soul of courage, +have you learned fear?" "Not yet have I found the teacher!" "But +the Serpent-Worm which you slew, a fearsome fellow, was he not?" +"Grim and malignant though he were, his death verily grieves me, +since miscreants of deeper dye still live at large. The one who bade +me murder him, I hate more than the dragon!" <a name="page_131"><span +class="page">Page 131</span></a> Mime to all appearance takes these +words as if they carried no offence. What he thinks he is saying in +reply we know not; but this is what, spoken in a voice of tenderest +affection, Siegfried hears: "Gently now! Not much longer shall +you see me. I shall soon close your eyes for their eternal sleep. +That which I needed you for you have accomplished; all I wish, +now, is to wrest from you the treasure. I believe I shall effect +this with small trouble. You know you are not difficult to befool!" +"So you are meditating harm to me?" Siegfried asks quietly. Mime +starts in amazement. "Did I say anything of the sort?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Then again, in accents sickly-sweet, with the writhings and grimaces +of an excessive affection: "Siegfried, listen, my son! You and the +like of you I have always hated from my very heart. Out of love +I did not rear you, burdensome nuisance. The trouble I took was +for the sake of the treasure in Fafner's keeping. If you do not +give it to me willingly, Siegfried, my son, it must be plain even +to yourself, you will have to leave me your life!" This formal and +direct declaration of hate, proving the justice of his instinctive +dislike all along of Mime, calls forth from Siegfried's relief +even in this moment the exclamation: "That you hate me, I gladly +hear!" Mime, while giving himself visibly all the pains in the +world to disguise from Siegfried his intentions, to each of the +youth's questions answers, in the supposition that he is telling +his lies, the exact truth. Thus Siegfried learns that the drink +Mime has prepared for his refreshment will plunge him into deep +sleep, upon which, for greater security in his enjoyment of the +treasure, Mime will with Nothung cut off his head. The little monster +chuckles genially while making these revelations. As Mime reaches +him the treacherous drink, Siegfried, moved by an impulse of +overpowering disgust, with a sudden swift blow of Nothung <a +name="page_132"><span class="page">Page 132</span></a> strikes +him down. Alberich's laugh of glee and derision rings out from his +hiding-place. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +After gazing for a moment at the body of the repulsive little +traitor,—with the after-thought, it is possible, that the +flat of Nothung would have been sufficient for anything so small, +though so venomous,—he gives it the obsequies which seem to +him the most fitting. He throws him in the cave, that he may lie +on the heaped gold and have the coveted treasure at last for his +own. He drags Fafner to the cave's mouth, that his bulk may block +it. "Lie there, you too, dark dragon! Guard at once the shining +treasure and the treasure-loving enemy; thus have you both found +rest!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The sun is high; heated with his exertions, Siegfried returns to +his mossy couch under the trees, and is presently again looking +overhead for the friendly bird. "Once more, dear little bird, after +such a troublesome interruption, I should be glad to listen to your +singing. I can see you swinging happily on the bough; brothers +and sisters flutter around you, blithe and sweet, twittering the +while...." A vague sadness touches his mood, and this pensive moment +goes far toward gaining back to him the sympathy which his overgreat +sturdiness in dealing death had perhaps forfeited. He is now a poor +lonesome beautiful boy, completely sweet-blooded and brave—the +hunter that has never robbed the mother of her young—whose +heart full of instinctive affection has never had an object on +which it could spend itself. "But I," he says envyingly to the +bird, "I am so alone! I have neither brother nor sister! My mother +vanished,—my father fell,—their son never saw them...." +In this humour he lets a shade of regret transpire for the necessity +to kill Mime. "My only companion was a loathly dwarf; goodness never +knit the bond of affection between us; artful toils the cunning foe +spread for me. I was at last even forced <a name="page_133"><span +class="page">Page 133</span></a> to slay him!" He stares sorrowfully +at the sky through the trees. "Friendly bird, I ask you now: will +you assist my quest for a good comrade? Will you guide me to the +right one? I have called so often and never found one; you, my +trusty one, will surely hit it better! So apt has been the counsel +given by you already! Now sing! I am listening for your song!" +Readily the bright voice from above answers in a joyous warble: +"Hei! Siegfried has slain the wicked dwarf! I have in mind for him +now the most glorious mate! On a high rock she sleeps, a wall of +flame surrounds her abode. If he should push through the fire, if he +should waken the bride, then were Brünnhilde his own!" With an +instantaneousness touchingly significant of his hard heart-hunger, +an attack of impassioned sighing seizes the young Siegfried. "Oh, +lovely song! Oh, sweetest breath! How its message glows within my +breast, burning me! How it sets my enkindled heart to throbbing! +What is it rushing so wildly through my heart and senses?... It +drives me, exulting, out of the woods to the mountain-rock. Speak +to me again, charming singer: shall I break through the fiery wall? +Can I waken the bride?" "Never," replies the bird, "shall the bride +be won, Brünnhilde wakened, by a faint-heart! Only by one +who knows no fear!" Siegfried shouts with delight: "The stupid boy +who knows no fear—little bird, why, that am I! This very +day I gave myself fruitless pains to learn it from Fafner. I now +burn with the desire to learn it from Brünnhilde! How shall +I find the way to her rock?" The bird forsakes the treetop, flutters +over the youth's head and flies further. Siegfried interprets this +as an invitation. "Thus is the way shown me. Wherever you fly, +I follow your flight!" We see him going hither and thither in his +attempt to follow the erratic flight of a bird. His guide after +a moment bends in a definite direction and Siegfried disappears +after him among the trees. +</p> + +<h3><a name="page_134"><span class="page">Page 134</span></a> +III</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +A wild region at the foot of a rocky mountain, the mountain at +the summit of which Brünnhilde sleeps. In night and storm +Wotan the Wanderer comes to seek Erda, the Wise Woman, the Wala. +He conjures her up from the depths of the earth into his presence. +We see her appear, as before, rising in the gloom of a rocky hollow +up to half her height. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +In all his wandering over the earth, in search of wisdom and counsel, +none has Wotan found so wise as she. The question he proposes is: +How may a rolling wheel be arrested in its course? +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Erda is not willingly waked out of her sleep, nor is it her wont to +communicate directly with the upper world. In her slow and solemn +sleep-weighted tones, she tells him that the Norns spin into their +coil the visions of her illuminated sleep. Why does he not consult +them? Or why, she asks, when that counsel is rejected, why does +he not, still mote aptly, consult Brünnhilde, wise child of +Wotan and Erda? +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +In his reply, Wotan briefly sums Brünnhilde's offence: She +defied the Storm-compeller, where he was practising the utmost +self-compulsion; what the Leader of Battle yearned to do, but refrained +from, his own antagonist,—all too confident, the insolent +maid dared to bring about for herself. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At the indication of Brünnhilde's fate, indignation possesses +the Wala. In view of such high-handed injustice, she wishes and +struggles to return back into the earth and be merged with her wisdom +in sleep. But Wotan will not release her until she has satisfied him +"You, all-knowing one, once drove the thorn of care into Wotan's +daring heart; with the dread of an adverse ignominious ending you +filled him by your foreknowledge, <a name="page_135"><span +class="page">Page 135</span></a> so that his courage was in bondage +to fear. If you are the wisest woman in the world, tell me now: +how shall the god overcome that care?" But the injured mother is +not to be conciliated. "You are not," she startlingly announces, +"what you call yourself!"—Not a god, Wotan?—"What are +you come, wild and turbulent spirit, to disturb the Wala's sleep? +Restless one, release me! Loose the spell!" "You are not" he retorts, +"what you suppose yourself!"—Not the wisest of women! In that +she has not divined what he has really come to impart, rather than +seriously to ask counsel. For his true errand is to show her the +fruits of time in himself, the mood of patience and reconciliation +he has reached, nay, of hope for a future in which he is to have no +part, that Brünnhilde's mother may sleep the more quietly, +and, untroubled, watch the end overtake him through her dream. "Do +you know what it is Wotan wills? I speak it in your ear, unforeseeing +one, that with easy heart you may return to your eternal sleep. +The thought of the end of the gods no longer grieves me, since +it is my desire and my will! The thing which I once, in pain and +conflict, torn by despair, resolved, I now joyfully and freely carry +out: in raging disgust I once devoted the world to the ill-will +of the Nibelung; to the joyous Wälsung I now appoint my +inheritance. He whom I have chosen, but who has never known me, +an intrepid boy, unaided by counsel of mine, has conquered the +Nibelung's Ring. Void of envy, happy and loving, Alberich's curse +falls away crippled when it would light on the noble one, for fear +is unknown to him. She whom you bore to me, Brünnhilde, shall +be tenderly waked by the hero; awake, your wise child shall perform +a world-delivering deed! Wherefore, sleep! Close your eye: dreaming +watch my passing! Whatever works be theirs, to that Eternally Young +One, the god in gladness yields his place. <a name="page_136"><span +class="page">Page 136</span></a> Down, then, Erda! Ancient Fear! +Original Care! To your eternal sleep! Down! Down!..." Erda sinks +into the earth, the glimmering light fades from the cave. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A bird-note is heard, light and sharp, approaching. A bird flutters +into sight and Siegfried, following it, appears upon the scene. +The bird, as if at the recognition of danger,—the ravens +of Wotan are hovering near—in all haste flies quite away. +Siegfried resolves to go on alone. He is stopped by the Wanderer's +voice: "Whither, boy, does your way lead you?" Here is some one, +thinks Siegfried, who may show him the way. "I seek a rock," he +replies; "it is surrounded by fire; there sleeps a woman whom I +wish to wake." "Who bade you seek the rock? Who taught you to wish +for the woman?" "A little woodland bird told me about it in his +singing; he gave me good tidings." "A little bird gossips of many +things, but no one can understand him. How did you derive the meaning +of his song?" "That was the effect of the blood of a wild dragon,..." +and so forth. Wotan continues to ply the youth with questions, just +as a kind old grandfather of humankind might lead on a child to +talk, for the simple sake of hearing what he will say, for delight +in his ingenuousness. The utmost tenderness for this joyous Walsung +speaks in the tones of the greybeard. The final object of his +questioning is to lead the youth to some acknowledgment of himself +as a factor in his fortunes. Without discarding his incognito, +he longs to hear on the grandson's lips some name which stands +for himself, some reference to him. So, from the question, "Who +prompted you to attack the strong Worm?" he passes to the question: +"Who shaped the sword, so sharp and hard, that the strongest enemy +should succumb to its stroke?" and when Siegfried replies that +he did this himself, insists further: "But who shaped the strong +pieces, out of which you forged the sword?" The answer to <a +name="page_137"><span class="page">Page 137</span></a> this is, +"Wälse!" It can be nothing else. Siegfried, however, replies: +"What do I know? All I know is that the pieces could be of no use +to me until I forged the sword over again for myself." Wotan breaks +out laughing: "I agree with you!" Siegfried suspecting that he has +been quizzed, loses his patience, becomes curt and rough. "What +are you laughing at me? Old questioner, you had better stop. Do not +keep me chattering here! If you can direct me on my way, speak. +If you cannot, hold your mouth!" Deplorable are the manners learned +in Mime's cave. "Patience, you boy!" Wanderer mildly checks him; +"if I seem old to you, you should offer me reverence!" "That," +jeers Siegfried, "is a fine idea! All my life long an old man has +stood in my way. I have no more than swept him away. If you continue +to stand there stiffly opposing me, beware, I tell you, lest you +fare like Mime!" As, with this threat, he takes a stride nearer to +the stranger, he is struck by his appearance. "What makes you look +like that?" he asks, like a child; "what a great hat you have! Why +does it hang down so over your face?... One of your eyes, beneath +the brim, is missing.... It was put out, I am sure, by some one +whose passage you were stubbornly opposing. Now, take yourself +off, or you might easily lose the other!" The indulgent grandsire +is still not stirred from his patience, though this must strike a +little painfully on his heart. "I see, my son, that, unencumbered +by any knowledge, you are quick at disposing of obstacles. With the +eye which is missing from my other socket, you yourself are looking +at the single eye which I have left for sight." At this riddle, the +brilliant Walsung eyes merely flash mirth, while Siegfried laughs +at the obscure saying. Not a moment does he waste in reflection +upon it, but, with growing impatience to resume his quest, orders +Wanderer to guide him or be thrust out of his road. "If <a +name="page_138"><span class="page">Page 138</span></a> you knew me, +bold stripling," the suffering god speaks, still gently, "you would +spare me this affront. Close to my heart as you are, your threatening +strikes me painfully. Though I have ever loved your luminous race, +my anger has before this brought terror upon them. You, toward +whom I feel such kindness,—you, all-too-bright!—do not +to-day move me to anger.... It might destroy both you and me!" +All that is plain to Siegfried, mad to be off in search of his +sleeper, is that this prattling old personage neither tells him +his way nor will consent to move out of it. As he once more rudely +bids him clear the path to the sleeping woman, Wotan's anger breaks +forth: "You shall not," he exclaims, "go the way the bird pointed!" +"Hoho! You forbidder!..." cries Siegfried, amazed, "who are you, +trying to prevent me?" "Fear the Guardian of the Rock! My power +it is which holds the maid under the spell of sleep. He who awakes +her, he who wins her, makes me powerless for ever!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Wotan, it would seem, is challenging the boy. His anger, justified +though it would be by the stalwart cub's behaviour, is half affected. +He had declared not far from this very spot, some eighteen years +earlier, that no one who feared his spear should ever cross the +barrier of fire. The hour is at hand when the spear must offer +itself to be braved by this incarnate courage bent upon that same +adventure,—when Wotan must take the chances of discovering +that this boy is freer than he—the god. He had declared himself +but a moment ago, in his communication with Erda, willing to yield +his supremacy to the Eternally Young One. Actually to do it must be +a little bitter, after enduring that Young One's cavalier treatment. +Perhaps—the text admits of the interpretation,—Wotan is +sincerely angry; at Siegfried's impertinence he has changed his +mind in respect to yielding his throne to him, and with a real +intention of <a name="page_139"><span class="page">Page 139</span></a> +driving him back from the rock describes the terrors of the mountain: +"A sea of fire surges around the woman; hot flames lick the rock; +the conflagration rages against him who would push through to the +bride. Look up toward the heights! Do you see not the light?... +It is waxing in brightness.... Scorching clouds, wavering flames, +roaring and crackling, stream down toward us. A sea of light shines +about your head, Soon the fire will catch and devour you.... Then, +back! mad child!" "Back yourself, you braggart!" cries Siegfried, +nothing deterred; "up there where the flames flicker, I must hasten +to Brünnhilde!" He is about to push past, when Wotan holds +his spear across the path: "If the fire does not frighten you, +my spear shall stop your way. My hand still holds the staff of +sovereignty. The sword which you swing was once shattered against +this shaft, again let it snap on the eternal spear!" Instead of +appalling him, the majestic threat creates in Siegfried eagerness +and glee: "My father's enemy! Do I find you here? Excellently this +happens for my revenge! Swing your spear! With my sword I will split +it to pieces!" And he immediately does as he has said. Nothing, +it seems, not the spear of the law, can stand against the sword of +perfect courage. A clap of thunder accompanies the sundering of the +spear. The broken pieces roll at the Wanderer's feet. He picks them +quietly up. With godlike calm, the hour having struck, he accepts +inevitable fate. The motif of downfall points this beginning of the +end of the gods. "Go your way! I cannot hold you!" He vanishes in +darkness. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"With broken weapon the coward has fled?" says Siegfried, looking +about for his father's enemy. The magic fire, as if to force the +intruder back, has been pouring further and further down the +mountain-side. But the one whom it should frighten rejoices, glories +in the glory of the flames, jubilates. "Ha! <a name="page_140"><span +class="page">Page 140</span></a> Delightful glow! Beaming brightness! +A radiant road lies open before me! Oh, to bathe in the fire! In +the fire to find the bride! Hoho! Hoho! Hahei! Hahei! Merrily! +Merrily! This time I shall lure a dear companion!" He sets the +silver horn to his lips and gaily blowing the Lock-weise starts up +the mountain and is lost among the swirling sanguine smoke-clouds. +The fire burns bright; the merry call is heard from time to time +from the unseen climber. The fire pales—the barrier has been +past, the region above is reached, the charmed sleeper's domain. +When the veiling smoke completely clears, we see the remembered +scene of the Valkyries' rock, and Brünnhilde lying under the +spreading pine, as Wotan left her. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +It is calm golden daylight. Over the brow of the mountain appears +Siegfried and stands still a moment, outlined against the cloudless +sky, wondering at the peace, the airiness, considering the "exquisite +solitude on the sunny height!" The sweet Fricka-motif speaks aloud +as it were the unconscious language of his blood, voices the vague +instinct toward nest-building which in the Spring lightly turns a +young man's fancy to thoughts of love. He has come in search of +a bride, upon the word of a little bird; but his ideas concerning +the promised "dear companion" are so few, and the novelty of all +he is seeing so takes up his mind, that when his eyes presently +fall upon the recumbent form his first thought is not that here +must be what he has come in search of. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He approaches and marvels at the bright armour. He lifts off the +great shield, again like a child, to see what it covers. A man in +suit of mail! He can see the face in part only, but warms with +instantaneous pleasure in its comeliness. The helmet, he surmises, +must press uncomfortably on the beautiful head. Very gently he +takes it off. Long curling locks, <a name="page_141"><span +class="page">Page 141</span></a> loosed from confinement, gush +abundantly forth. Siegfried is startled by the sight. But the right +words, "How beautiful!" rise to his untaught lips. He remains sunk +in contemplation of the marvel; the tresses remind him of a thing +he has often watched: shimmering clouds bounding with their ripples +a clear expanse of sky. As if drawn by a magnet, he bends lower +over the quiet form and so feels the sleeper's breath. "The breast +heaves with the swelling breath, shall I break the cramping corslet?" +Cautiously he makes the attempt, but, finding his fingers unapt at +the task, solves his difficulty by aid of Nothung. With delicate +care he cuts through the iron and lightly removes the corslet. "This +is no man!" he cries, starting away in amazement. Such emotion +seizes him, with sensations of dizziness and faintness—such +a pressure on the heart, forcing from it burning sigh upon sigh, +that, with a sense of having no resource in himself, he casts about +for help in this all so unfamiliar exquisite distress: "Whom shall I +call on that he may save me? Mother! Mother! Remember me!" Swooning, +he sinks with his forehead against Brünnhilde's breast—to +be roused again by the goad of his desire to see the eyes of the +sleeper unclose. "That she should open her eyes?" He hesitates, in +tender trouble. "Would her glance not blind me? Have I the hardihood? +Could I endure the light?..." He feels the hand trembling with +which he is trying to quiet his agitated heart. "What ails me, +coward? Is this fear? Oh, mother! Mother! Your bold child! A woman +lies folded in slumber,... she has taught him to be afraid!... +How shall I bring this fear to an end? How shall I gain back my +courage? That I may myself awake from this dream I must waken the +maid!" But awe of the so august and quiet sleeper again restrains +him. He does not touch her, but lingeringly gazes at her "blossoming +mouth," bows till the warm fragrance <a name="page_142"><span +class="page">Page 142</span></a> of her breath sweeping his face +forces forth his impulsive cry: "Awake! Awake! Sacred woman!" He +waits with suspended breath. She has not heard. She does not stir. +An infinite weakness overtaking him, a mortal coming less, "I will +drink life," he sighs, "from sweetest lips, though I should swoon to +death in the act!" With closed eyes he bends over Brünnhilde's +lips. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Twelve bars, the tempo of which is marked "<i>Sehr mässig,</i>" +very moderate, sing themselves delicately and gravely to an end. +Brünnhilde opens wide her eyes. Siegfried starts from her, +not guiltily or to move from his place, only to stand erect and, +absorbed, watch her movements. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Slowly she rises to a sitting posture and with beatific looks takes +account of the glorious world to which she has reawakened. Solemnly +she stretches her arms toward the sky: "Hail to thee, sun!" A great +pause, of drinking in further the loveliness of the scene and the +joy of life returned to, then: "Hail to thee, light!" And after +another great pause of wondering ecstasy: "Hail to thee, radiant +day!... Long was my sleep.... I am awake.... Who is the hero that +has awakened me?" Siegfried stands spell-bound, in solemn awe at +the sound of her voice and the superhuman splendour of her beauty. +He answers, in the only way he knows, childlike, direct: "I pressed +through the fire which surrounded the rock; I released you from +the close helmet; Siegfried I am called who have awakened you!" At +the sound of the name, the altogether right one, Brünnhilde +takes up again her song of praise: "Hail to you, gods! Hail to thee, +world! Hail, sumptuously blooming earth!" And Siegfried breaks +forth, in an exalted rapture which inspires his ignorance with +expression befitting the hour: "Oh, hail to the mother who bore +me, hail to the earth which nourished me, that I might behold <a +name="page_143"><span class="page">Page 143</span></a> the eyes +which now shine upon me, blessed!" Brünnhilde, joining in +his hymn of gratitude, blesses, too, the mother who bore him, and +the earth which nourished him, whose eyes alone should behold her, +for whom alone she was destined to awake. The love-scene following +leaves a singular impression of greatness. The wise daughter of +the Wala and the "most splendid hero of the world" are simple as +children, sincere as animals or angels, ardent with honest natural +fire, like stars. When their love finally reaches a perfect +understanding their song is a succession of magnificent shouts, +primitive as they are thrilling. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Oh, if you knew, joy of the world," Brünnhilde exposes her +artless heart to the hero, "how I have loved you from all time! +You were my care, the object of my solicitude! Before you were +shaped, I nurtured you, before you were born, my shield concealed +you,—so long have I loved you, Siegfried!" He believes for a +moment that his mother has not died but has been sleeping and now +speaks to him. In correcting him, Brünnhilde shows herself +tenderly feminine. No sooner has she spoken the words which must fall +with inevitable dreariness on his ear, "Your mother will not come back +to you!" than she hastens to heal his hurt with the sweetest thing +her love has to say: "Yourself am I, if you love me, fortunate...." +She explains the meaning of her earlier words: "I have loved you +from all time, for to me alone Wotan's thought was known. That +thought which I must never speak, which I did not think, but only +felt; for which I strove, struggled, and fought; for which I braved +the one who had framed it; for which I was made to suffer and bound +in punishment; that thought—might you but grasp it!—was +naught but love for you!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +It could hardly be hoped that the young forester should at this +moment be able to grasp anything so subtle, as he helplessly <a +name="page_144"><span class="page">Page 144</span></a> confesses: +"Wonderful sounds what you winningly sing; but the sense of it is +dark to me. I see your eye beam bright; I feel your warm breath; +I hear the sweet singing of your voice; but that which in your +singing you would impart, stupefied, I understand it not! I cannot +grasp the sense of distant things, when all my senses are absorbed +in seeing and feeling only you. With anxious fear you bind me: +you alone have taught me to fear. Whom you have bound in mighty +bonds, no longer withhold from me my courage!" Brünnhilde +at this, with the touch of nature which makes the Valkyrie kin +to the young lady of drawing-rooms, turns her head away and talks +of something else. She talks of Grane, whom she sees grazing a +little way off. As her eyes fall upon the corslet, cut from her +body with a sword, the sight smites upon her saddeningly, as a +symbol. A consciousness of danger and defencelessness oppresses +her, and when Siegfried, made bold in his fear of her by the very +need he feels of overcoming that fear, impetuously seizes her in +his arms, in terror she starts away from him and wrings her hands +with a woful sense of not being any more that Brünnhilde "whom +no god had ever approached, before whom reverently the heroes had +bowed, who holy had departed from Walhalla." She feels her wisdom +forsaking her, her light failing, night and terror closing down upon +her. She appeals to him at last against himself: "Oh, Siegfried, +see my distress!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He stands so still for a time, silent, puzzled by her, unwilling +certainly to frighten her further, that her immediate fear subsides; +her countenance betrays, the stage-directions read, that "a winning +picture rises before her soul." The character of this may be divined +from the melody rippling softly forth, the motif of peaceful love. +A fresh green branch, it makes one think of, with a nest upon it, +swinging in a summer wind. More gently she addresses him, pleading +rather than repelling, <a name="page_145"><span class="page">Page +145</span></a> winning him to give up his way for hers. "Eternal +am I,... but eternal for your weal! Oh, Siegfried, joyous hero! +Renounce me.... Approach me not with ardent approach.... Constrain +me not with shattering constraint.... Have you not seen your own +image in the clear stream? Has it not gladdened you, glad one? +If you stir the water into turmoil, the smooth surface is lost, +you cannot see your own reflection any longer. Wherefore, touch me +not, trouble me not; eternally bright then shall you shine back at +yourself from me. Oh, Siegfried, luminous youth! love—yourself, +and withhold from me. Destroy not what is your own!" His robust +young love to this replies—after the simple outburst: "You +I love, oh, might you love me! No longer have I myself, oh, had +I you!"—that it matters little his image should be broken +in the glorious river before him, for, burning and thirsting, he +would plunge into it himself, that its waves might blissfully engulf +him and his longing be quenched in the flood. It is he who appeals +now, with ancient arguments, simple and telling as his blows at the +dragon. When at the end of them he clasps Brünnhilde again, +she does not as before wrest herself free, but laughs in joy as +she feels her love surging, till it, as it seems to her, more than +matches his own, and he is the one, she judges, who should feel +afraid. She, indeed, asks him, does he not fear?... But the opposite +takes place. With her love, ardent as his own, frankly given him, +all his courage comes back, "And fear, alas!" he observes, a little +disconcerted at the queerness of this new experience, "fear, which I +never learned,—fear, which you had hardly taught me,—fear, +I believe, I, dullard, have already forgotten it!" Brünnhilde +laughs in delight—all of joy and laughter is their love after +this up on the sunny height—and declares to the "mad-cap treasury +of glorious deeds" that laughing she will love him, laughing lose +the light <a name="page_146"><span class="page">Page 146</span></a> +of her eyes, laughing they will accept destruction, laughing accept +death! Let the proud world of Walhalla crumble to dust, the eternal +tribe of the gods cease in glory, the Norns rend the coil of fate, +the dusk of the gods close down,—Siegfried's star has risen, +and he shall be, to Brünnhilde, for ever, everything! In equally +fine and joyous ravings Siegfried's voice has been pouring forth +alongside of hers; reaching at last an identical sentiment and the +same note, the two rush together like flashing mountain torrents, +and are lost to us behind the descending curtain. +</p> + +<p class="bigtitle"> +<a name="page_147"><span class="page">Page 147</span></a> +THE TWILIGHT OF THE GODS</p> + +<h2><a name="page_149"><span class="page">Page 149</span></a> +THE TWILIGHT OF THE GODS</h2> + +<p class="center"> +(DIE GOETTERDAEMMERUNG) +</p> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +In the Prologue of "The Twilight of the Gods" we learn from report +the portion of Wotan's history which belongs between the breaking +of his spear and the final events which bring about the gods' end. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At the rising of the curtain the three Norns are dimly discerned upon +the well-known scene of Brünnhilde's sleep, before the entrance +to the rocky hall where Siegfried and she have their dwelling. The +fiery palisade around their fastness casts a faint glow upon the +night. The Norns, as it were to while away the heavy hour before +dawn, spin and sing. Their "spinning" consists in casting a golden +coil from one to the other, after some peculiar ritual, involving +fastening it to this pine-tree, winding it about that point of +rock, casting it over the shoulder, northward. Their song is of no +frivolous matter, but as if we should entertain ourselves recounting +the Creation, the Fall of Man, the Deluge. Of the World-Ash they +tell, in whose shade a well flowed, murmuring runes of wisdom; of +a daring god who came to drink at the well, paying in toll one +of his eyes. From the World-Ash, he, Wotan, broke a branch and +fashioned it into the shaft of a spear. This he carved with runes +of truth to compacts, and held it as the "haft of the world." An +intrepid hero clove it asunder. Wotan thereupon commanded <a +name="page_150"><span class="page">Page 150</span></a> the heroes +of Walhalla to hew down the World-Ash and cut it to pieces. "High +looms the castle built by giants," sings the youngest of the Norns; +"there in the hall sits Wotan amid the holy clan of the gods and +heroes. Wooden billets heaped to a lofty pile surround the room. +That was once the World-Ash! When the wood shall burn hot and clear, +when the flame shall devour the shining hall, the day of the end +of the gods shall have dawned!" Wotan himself, when the danger is +no longer to be averted of a dishonoured end,—if Alberich, +that is, shall regain possession of the Ring,—will plunge +the splinters of his defeated spear deep into Loge's breast and +himself set the World-Ash ablaze. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +As night begins to yield to dawn, confusion falls on the minds of +the Norns; their visions, they complain, are dim. The strands of +the coil become tangled between their fingers. One of them descries +an angry face—Alberich's—floating before her; another +becomes aware of an avenging curse gnawing at the threads of the +coil. This suddenly snaps—terrific omen! Appalled, with the +cry that "eternal wisdom is at an end," they vanish in search of +their mother, Erda, in the earth's depths. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Day breaks. The reflection of Loge's defence pales. There greets +our ear suddenly a sturdy strain, resembling something we have heard +before. By analysis, we discover in it one of the Siegfried-motifs, +the horn-call, but grown so robust and weighty, so firm, strong, +commanding, that it hardly more than reminds us of the youthful +Lock-weise, fluttering forth hopefully to find a "dear companion." +The dear companion has long been found. Hard upon this motif of +the grown-up Siegfried comes a wholly new motif, the motif of +Brünnhilde Wedded, wonderful for its entwining tenderness, yet +the elevation it combines with its immensely feminine quality. It +is <a name="page_151"><span class="page">Page 151</span></a> given +over and over; the instruments pass it from one to the other, like +a watchword. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The two thus announced come forth into the sunrise from their chamber +in the rock, Siegfried full-armed, Brünnhilde leading Grane. +They are glorious in this scene of parting. A nobler passion we do +not remember hearing expressed than animates them and the music +which interprets their being. It is all a little more than life-size. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"To new exploits, beloved hero, how poor were my love, did I not +let you go! One single care restrains me, fear of the insufficiency +of all I could bestow. What I learned from the gods I have given +you, a rich treasury of holy runes, but the maidenly staff of my +strength the hero took from me, before whom I now bow. Despoiled +of wisdom, though filled with desire to serve; rich in love, but +devoid of power, oh, despise not the poor lover who can only wish +you, not give you, more!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +But not all the wisdom of the Wala's daughter, not the rich treasury +of runes, have availed to change Siegfried from his big incurable +simplicity,—as his answer in effect declares: "More did you +give me, wonder-woman, than I have capacity to retain! Be not angry +that your teaching should have left me still untaught. One knowledge +there is which I, none the less, hold fast: that Brünnhilde +lives and is mine; one lesson I learned with ease: to think ever +of Brünnhilde!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The gift she asks of his love is that he shall think of himself, +think of his great deeds, increase his glory. He bestows on her +in leaving the Ring, in which the virtue is condensed of all great +deeds he ever did. In exchange she gives him Grane. After offering +each other, in their great mood, the consolation that to part is for +them not to be parted, for where he goes there in very truth goes +she, and where she remains there does he too abide, they call upon the +gods to feed their eyes upon the dedicated <a name="page_152"><span +class="page">Page 152</span></a> pair they are, and with jubilant +appellations for each other—Victorious light! Effulgent star! +Radiant love! Radiant life!—the last good words ever exchanged +between them!—they tear apart, without sorrow or foreboding. +She watches him out of sight. The stage-directions say: "From her +happy smile may be divined the appearance of the cheerfully departing +hero." The emphatic phrase is heard, as he descends into the valley, +in which at their first meeting (in the opera "Siegfried") they +vowed that each was to the other "eternally and for ever, his +inheritance and his possession, his only and his all!" The curtain +closes on the Prologue. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +By the music we can follow Siegfried on his journey. We know when +he comes to the fire, when he comes to the Rhine. There floats +to us, with the effect of a folk-song, a legend, the lament of +the Rhine-nymphs for their lost gold. Sounds of warning are in +the air as Siegfried approaches the Hall of the Gibichungen, but +to such the hardy hero, no need to say, is fast sealed. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The curtain unclosing shows the interior of the Hall of the Gibichungen, +open at the further end on the Rhine. Gunther, his sister Gutrune, +and their half-brother Hagen, sit at a table set with drinking-horns +and flagons. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +This Hagen is the Nibelung's son of Erda's prophecy: "When the +dark enemy of Love shall in wrath beget a son, the end of the gods +shall not be long delayed." An allusion of Hagen's there is to +his mother, as having succumbed to the craft of Alberich. On the +other hand, a reference of Gunther's to Frau Grimhild, his mother +and Hagen's, would seem to show that her history, whatever it may +have been, bore no outward blot. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He is early old, this "child of hate," as Wotan long ago called +him, sere and pallid, totally unglad and hating the glad. He <a +name="page_153"><span class="page">Page 153</span></a> is the tool +created by Alberich—even as Siegmund was Wotan's tool,—to +win back for him the Ring. From his Nibelung father he has more than +human powers and knowledge. In the conversation which we overhear +between the brethren, we witness Hagen laying lines for the recapture +of the Ring and Siegfried's destruction, for he, like Mime, understands +that there can be no safety for him who shall unrightfully get from +Siegfried the Ring, while the strong-handed fellow lives. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Gunther—whose motif betrays him, with its little effect of +shallow self-satisfaction, like a jaunty toss of the head,—Gunther +asks Hagen, is he not magnificent, sitting beside the Rhine; to +the glory of Gibich? "It is my habit," remarks Hagen evasively, +"to envy you." "Nay, for me it is to envy you, and not you me," +Gunther in his pleasant humour rejoins; "true, I inherited the +right of the first-born, but wisdom is yours alone, and I am, in +fact, but lauding your good counsel when I inquire of my fame!" +"I blame the counsel then," speaks Hagen, "for indifferent is as +yet the fame. I know of high advantages which the Gibichung has not +yet won...." Gunther's inquiry he satisfies: "In summer ripeness +and vigour I behold the stem of Gibich: you, Gunther, without +wife,—you, Gutrune, still unwed." Gunther and Gutrune, struck, +are silent a moment. Then Gunther inquires whom should he wed that +lustre might be added to the glory of the House? "I know a woman," +Hagen replies, "the most glorious in the world. On a high rock is +her throne; a fire surrounds her abode; only he who shall break +through the fire may proffer his suit for Brünnhilde." Gunther's +mediocrity and his sense of it stand ingenuously confessed in his +question: "Is my courage sufficient for the test?" "The achievement +is reserved for one stronger even than you." "Who is this unparalleled +champion?" "Siegfried, the son of the Wälsungen.... <a +name="page_154"><span class="page">Page 154</span></a> He, grown in +the forest to mighty size and strength, is the man I wish Gutrune +for her lord." Gutrune's motif, sweet and shallow, like Gunther's +betrays her; an innocent admission of mediocrity, too, is in her +exclamation: "You mocker! Unkind Hagen! How should I be able to +attach Siegfried to me?" She is unsure of her feminine charm as her +brother of his manly courage. As he finds nothing repugnant in the +proposition to win his bride through another, so she accepts to win +her love through a magic potion. Gunther, Gutrune, and Hunding are +the only plain human beings in the drama of the Ring, and certainly +they produce the effect of rampant creatures among winged ones. +Acquiescently Gutrune hears Hagen's suggestion: "Remember the drink +in the cupboard; trust me who provided it. By means of it, the hero +whom you desire shall be bound to you by love. Were Siegfried now +to enter, were he to taste the spiced drink, that he ever saw a +woman before you, that ever a woman approached him, he must totally +forget!" Thus they have it planned: Siegfried shall by a love-potion +be won to Gutrune, and, as a task by which to obtain her from her +brother, shall be deputed to fetch Brünnhilde for him from +her flame-surrounded heights. Hagen is alone, of the three, to +know of the tie existing between Siegfried and Brünnhilde. +But, "How shall we find him?" very pertinently asks Gunther. While +storming light-heartedly about the world in search of adventures, it +can hardly be, Hagen judges, but that he shall come too to Gibich's +shore on the Rhine. Even while he is speaking, Siegfried's horn +is heard in the distance. Hagen from the riverside describes the +figure he sees approaching: "In a boat, a hero and a horse: he it +is, so merrily blowing the horn. By an easy stroke, as if with +an idle hand, he drives the craft against the stream." (We hear +that easy stroke of the idle hand,—the power and gaiety of +Siegfried are in it; it <a name="page_155"><span class="page">Page +155</span></a> has a family resemblance to the horn-call.) "So +vigourous a hand at the swinging of the scull he alone can boast +who slew the dragon. It is Siegfried, surely no other!" Hagen makes +a speaking-tube of his hands: "Hoiho! Whither, blithesome hero?" +"To the strong son of Gibich!" comes answer from the river. "Here! +Here come ashore! Hail, Siegfried, beloved hero!" The hero lands. +As he stands at the entrance, holding Grane by the bridle, with the +unconstraint of ancient manners they all quietly before speaking +take one another's measure with their eyes. Siegfried's fame has +preceded him. He is known as the slayer of the dragon, the possessor +of the Hort, and commander of the Nibelungen. "Which is the son +of Gibich?" he inquires. Gunther presents himself. "I heard you +lauded far down the Rhine," Siegfried says; and, with the fresh +directness again of ancient manners: "Either fight with me, or be +my friend!" As we see him for the first time among common mortals, +we perceive the effect of high elegance which pertains to Siegfried's +calm, his careless perfect strength and simplicity. Gutrune who +has not removed her marvelling gaze from him since his entrance, +withdraws—to prepare the drink. As Hagen takes his horse +to stable, Siegfried charges him, while a dear memory sings in +his heart: "Take good care of Grane for me. Never did you hold by +the bridle a horse of nobler breed!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Magnificent is Gunther in expressions of welcome to the great guest: +"Joyfully hail, O hero, the Hall of my fathers! The ground you +tread, all you see, regard as your own. Yours is my inheritance, +yours are my land and my people. To these add my body. I offer +myself as your vassal." Siegfried replies: "I offer neither land +nor people; no father's mansion nor court. My sole inheritance is +my own body, which I expend day by day in living. Nothing have I +but a sword, forged by <a name="page_156"><span class="page">Page +156</span></a> myself.... This I pledge with myself to our alliance." +Hagen, overhearing, ventures; "Yet report calls you possessor of +the Nibelungen-Hort...." And Siegfried; "I had almost forgotten +the treasure, so do I prize its idle wealth! I left it lying in a +cave where it once was guarded by a dragon." (The reason is clear +why the curse must drop away crippled, powerless to blight this +free nature, unenfeebled by covetousness as by fear!) "And you +brought away no part of it?" "This metal-work, unaware of its use." +Hagen recognises the Tarnhelm and explains its virtues. "And you +took from the Hort nothing further?" "A ring." "You have it no +doubt in safe keeping?" "It is in the keeping of a gracious woman," +Siegfried replies dreamily. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Bashful, blushing, tremulous, as different as is well possible +from Brünnhilde, Gutrune approaches, holding a filled +drinking-horn. "Welcome, guest, in Gibich's house! His daughter +offers you drink!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Siegfried holds the cup before him a moment without drinking, his +thoughts flying afar. The words come back to him spoken to +Brünnhilde at parting. An infinite tenderness invades him. +"Though I should forget all you ever taught me," he murmurs, "one +teaching I shall still hold fast. My first draught, to faithful +love, Brünnhilde, I drink to you!" With which secret toast +to the absent beloved he sets the horn to his lips and drains +it—to the motif of Evil Enchantment, the motif of the Cup +of Forgetfulness, closely resembling the Tarnhelm-motif, but +sweeter,—cruel as a treacherous caress. This whole passage, +surpassingly exquisite to the ear, is painful to the heart as hardly +another in the opera, fertile as this is in tragic moments. It +marks the end of so much happiness. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +When Siegfried's eyes, as he returns the cup to Gibich's daughter, +rest upon her, it is, as Hagen had foretold, as if he <a +name="page_157"><span class="page">Page 157</span></a> had never +before beheld a woman. The inflammable heart which suffocated him +of old at sight of Brünnhilde asleep, now makes his voice +falter with instantaneous passion as he exclaims: "You, whose beauty +dazzles like lightning, wherefore do you drop your eyes before me?" +And when shyly she looks up: "Ha, fairest woman, hide your glance! +Its beam scorches the heart within my breast—Gunther, what is +your sister's name?... Gutrune!... Are they <i>good runes</i> which +I read in her eye?..." Impetuously he seizes her hand; "I offered +myself to your brother as his vassal, the haughty one repelled me; +will you exhibit the same arrogance toward me, if I offer myself +as your ally?" She cannot answer, for the confusion of joy which +overwhelms her; signifying by a gesture her unworthiness of this +high honour, with unsteady step she leaves the room. Siegfried, +closely observed by the other two, gazes lingeringly after her, +fast-bewitched. Some sketch of a project for winning her it must +be prompting his next words: "Have you, Gunther, a wife?" "Not +yet have I courted, and hardly shall I rejoice in a wife! I have +set my heart upon one whom no well-advised endeavour can win for +me!" "In what can you fail," speaks Siegfried's brisk assurance, "if +I stand by you?" "Upon a high rock is her throne, a fire surrounds +her abode," Gunther in hopeless tone describes the forbidding +circumstances. "Upon a high rock is her throne, a fire surrounds +her abode,..." Siegfried rapidly says the words after him, which +his lips know so strangely well. "Only he who breaks through the +fire..." "Only he who breaks through the fire,..." Siegfried is +visibly making a tremendous effort to remember, to account for +the something so curiously familiar in the image evoked. "May be +Brünnhilde's suitor...." By this, the cup of forgetfulness has +completely done its work,—the name suggests to him nothing, the +effort itself to remember is forgotten. "But <a name="page_158"><span +class="page">Page 158</span></a> not for me," sighs Gunther, "to +climb the rock; the fire will not die down for me!" "I fear no fire! +I will win the woman for you," Siegfried declares, "for your man am +I, and my valour is yours, if I may obtain Gutrune for my wife!" +Gutrune is promised him. It is Siegfried's heated brain—for +the first time fruitful in stratagem—which throws off the +plan to deceive this strange woman up in the fire-girdled fastness +of whom they tell him, by means of the Tarnhelm, which lends the +wearer any shape he wish to adopt. The future brothers swear +"blood-brotherhood," pledging their truth in wine, into which each +has let trickle a drop of his blood. "If one of the brothers shall +break the bond, if one of the friends shall betray his faithful +ally, let that which in kindness we drink to-day by drops gush +forth in streams, sacred reparation to the friend!" They clasp +hands upon the compact, and Hagen with his sword cleaves in two +the drinking-horn. "Why," it occurs to Siegfried, "did not you, +Hagen, join in the oath?" "My blood would have spoiled the drink," +replies the joyless man; "it does not flow noble and untroubled +like yours; cold and morose it stagnates in me, and will not colour +my cheek. Wherefore I keep afar from the fiery league." The ancient +conception of the power of a vow, as of the power of a curse, is +interestingly illustrated in this story. The effectiveness of a vow, +as we discover, has nothing to do with persons or circumstances; an +oath becomes a sort of independent creation with a precise operation +of its own. Hagen, capable of any breach of faith, meditating nothing +but treachery, dare not join in the formality of the oath because of +sure and deadly danger in breaking it. Siegfried deceives Gunther +without intending or knowing it, yet his blood must "gush forth +in streams" as appointed, to wash out his offence. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Siegfried is for starting without delay on the quest: "There is <a +name="page_159"><span class="page">Page 159</span></a> my skiff; +it will take us quickly to the rock; one night you shall wait in +the boat on the shore, then shall you lead home the bride." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The Hall is left in Hagen's care. Followed by Gutrune's eyes, the +heroes hurry off. Hagen places himself with spear and shield in +the doorway, and, while sitting there sentinel-wise, reflects upon +the success of his devices: "Blown along by the wind, the son of +Gibich goes a-wooing. Helmsman to him is a strong hero, who is to +brave danger in his stead. His own bride this latter will bring +for him to the Rhine, but to me he will bring—the Ring! You +frank good fellows, light-hearted companions, sail cheerfully on! +Abject though he may seem to you, you are yet his servants—the +servants of the Nibelung's son!" The curtain closes. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +When it reopens we see the scene once more of Siegfried's and +Brünnhilde's leave-taking. Brünnhilde sits sunk in +contemplation of the Ring and the memories attached to it. Distant +thunder disturbs her dreams; her ear seizes a familiar sound, not +heard for many a day, the gallop of an approaching air-horse. Her +name comes borne on the wind. She rushes to receive Waltraute, +whose call she has joyfully recognised. In her delight, she does +not at once take account of the Valkyrie's sorrowful and preoccupied +mien. She presses rapid questions upon her: "You dared then for +love of Brünnhilde brave Walvater's commandment? Or—how? +Oh, tell me! Has Wotan's disposition softened toward me? When I +protected Siegmund against the god, while it was a fault, I know +that I was fulfilling his wish. I know, too, that his anger was +appeased, for even though he sealed me in slumber, left me bound +on a rock, to be the bondmaid of the man who should find and wake +me, yet he granted favour to the prayer of my terror, he surrounded +the rock with a devouring fire which should close the way to the +base. Thus was I through my punishment made <a name="page_160"><span +class="page">Page 160</span></a> happy! The most splendid of heroes +won me for wife. In the light of his love to-day I beam and laugh!" +With uncontrolled joy she embraces the sister, unconscious of the +latter's impatience and shy attempt to repel her. "Did my fate, +sister, allure you? Have you come to pasture your sight upon my +bliss, to share that which has befallen me?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The suggestion is verily too much! "To share the tumult which, +insensate, possesses you? A different matter it is which impelled +me, fearful, to break Wotan's commandment...." Brünnhilde +wakes to the sister's troubled looks, but she can still think of +but one reason for them. "The stern one has not forgiven? You stand +in terror of his anger?" "Had I need to fear him—there would +be a term to my fear!" "Amazed, I do not understand you!" "Master +your agitation, listen attentively. The terror which drove me forth +from Walhalla, drives me back thither...." "What has happened to the +eternal gods?" cries Brünnhilde, at last alarmed. Waltraute +unfolds to her then the sorrowful plight of the gods, making her +even over the events in Walhalla since her cutting off from the +eternal dynasty. She describes Walvater returning home from his +wanderings with his broken spear, the erection around the Hall +of the Blessed of the funeral pile cut from the World-Ash, the +assembling about Wotan's throne of the gods and heroes. "There +he sits, speaks no word, the splinters of the spear clenched in +his hand. Holda's (Freia's) apples he will not touch. Fear and +amazement bind the gods. His ravens both he has sent ranging; should +they return with good tidings, then once again—for the last +time!—the god would divinely smile. Clasping his knees lie we +Valkyries; he is blind to our entreating looks. I pressed weeping +against his breast, his glance wavered—Brünnhilde, he +thought of you! Deeply he sighed; he closed his eyes and as if in +dream he breathed forth <a name="page_161"><span class="page">Page +161</span></a> the words: "If to the daughters of the deep Rhine +she would restore the Ring, delivered from the weight of the curse +were the gods and the world!" I bethought me then; from his side, +between the rows of silent heroes, I stole. In secret haste I mounted +my horse and rode upon the storm to you. You, oh, my sister, I now +conjure: that which lies in your power, bravely do it,—end +the misery of the Immortals!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Brünnhilde speaks to her pityingly and gently; it is so long +since she emerged from the vapour-dimmed atmosphere of her heavenly +home that she receives no clear impression, she owns, of the affair +related to her; but: "What, pale sister, do you crave from me?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Upon your hand, the ring—that is the one! Listen to my counsel, +for Wotan's sake cast it from you!" "The ring? Cast it from me?" +"To the Rhine-daughters give it back!" "To the Rhine-daughters, +I, this ring? Siegfried's love-token? Are you mad?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Brünnhilde is unshaken by Waltraute's insistence. Good or bad +arguments have nothing to do with the case, as it stands in her +feeling. Indignation possesses her at the bare notion of the exchange +proposed to her, out of all reason and proportion: Siegfried's love, +of which his ring is the symbol, for Walhalla's and the world's +peace! "Ha! do you know what the ring is to me? How should you +grasp it, unfeeling maid? More than the joys of Walhalla, more +than the glory of the Immortals, is to me this ring; one look at +its clear gold, one flash of its noble lustre, I prize more than +the eternally enduring joy of all the gods, for it is Siegfried's +love which beams at me from the ring! Oh, might I tell you the +bliss.... And that bliss is safeguarded by the ring. Return to the +holy council of the gods; inform them, concerning my ring: Love I +will never renounce; they shall never take love from me, not though +Walhalla the radiant <a name="page_162"><span class="page">Page +162</span></a> should crash down in ruins!" When Waltraute with +cries of "Woe!" flees to horse, she looks after her unmoved: +"Lightning-charged cloud, borne by the wind, go your stormy way! +Nevermore steer your course toward me!" She has no regrets; the +request has been in her judgment so monstrous that it has hardened +and shut her heart toward those who made it. She gazes quietly over +the landscape. Her sense of security in Siegfried's love is no +doubt at its firmest in these moments following her fiery defence +of it, her sacrifice to it of old allegiances. The very peace of +possession is upon her. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Twilight has fallen; the guardian fire glows more brightly as the +darkness thickens. Of a sudden, the flames leap high,—Loge's +signal that some one draws near. At the same moment Siegfried's +horn is heard, approaching. With the cry: "In my god's arm!" +Brünnhilde rushes to meet him. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A figure springs from the flames upon a rock, a form foreign to +Brünnhilde's eyes. The flames drop back. The figure remains, +dark against the dim glow of the sky. His head and the greater part +of his face are concealed by a helmet of curious fashion; she does +not, in the uncertain light, recognise the Tarnhelm. The fact itself +of his being there is terrifying, arguing some singular treachery +somewhere. "Treason!" is Brünnhilde's first cry, as she recoils +and from a distance stares breathlessly at the sinister intruder. He +stands motionless, leaning upon his shield and regarding her. "Who +is it that has forced his way to me?" she gasps. He is silent still; +the horror of him is increased by his silence and motionlessness and +his metal mask. The motif of evil enchantment is woven through the +whole of this scene. In a hard masterful voice he speaks at length: +"Brünnhilde! A suitor is come whom your fire does not alarm! I +seek you for my wife; follow me unresistingly." It is all so strange, +so like the agonising <a name="page_163"><span class="page">Page +163</span></a> impossibilities of a dream,—Brünnhilde +falls to trembling. "Who are you, dreadful one? Are you a mortal? +Do you come from Hella's army of the night?" Still watching her, +motionless on his point of vantage, he replies: "A Gibichung am +I, and Gunther is the hero's name, whom, woman, you must follow." +It flashes upon Brünnhilde that this, this must have been the +true point of Wotan's punishment. When the figure springs from the +rock and approaches her, she raises, to hold him off, the hand with +Siegfried's ring. "Stand back! Fear this sign!... Stronger than steel +I am made by this ring; never shall you rob me of it!" "You teach me," +he replies, with his dark calm, "to detach it from you!" He reaches +for it, she defends it. They wrestle. She escapes from him with a +victorious cry. He seizes her again. The former Valkyrie, reinforced +by the Ring, is a match very nearly for the stalwart Wälsung. +A shriek is heard. He has caught her hand, and draws the ring from +her finger. As if all her strength had been in it and were gone with +its loss, she sinks, broken, in the arms of the disguised Siegfried. +He coldly lets her down upon the seat of rock. "Now you are mine, +Brünnhilde,—Gunther's bride. Withhold not your favour +from me now!" She cowers, shattered and stupefied, murmuring, "How +could you have helped yourself, miserable woman!" The right of +the stronger she recognises, primitive woman, as a right. Fairly +vanquished, she must accept the fate of battle,—no dignity, as +no success, would pertain to further struggle. When with a gesture +of command he points her to her stone chamber, trembling and with +faltering step she obeys. Siegfried, following, draws his sword +and in his natural voice again, smooth and happy, addresses it: +"Now, Nothung, do you bear witness to the restraint which marks +my wooing. Guarding my truth to my brother, divide me from his +bride!" +</p> + +<h3><a name="page_164"><span class="page">Page 164</span></a> +II</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The Hall of the Gibichungen once more, seen from the outside. It +is night. Hagen sits as we left him, in guard over the hall. He +sleeps leaning against a pillar of the portal. A burst of moonlight +shows Alberich crouching before him. "Are you asleep, Hagen, my +son? Are you asleep and deaf to my voice, whom sleep and rest have +forsaken?" "I hear you, harassed spirit; what message have you +for my sleep?" Remember! remember! is the burden of Alberich's +communication. Be true to the task for the purpose of which you +were created. The old enemy, Wotan, is no longer to be feared; +he has been made powerless by one of his own race. The object now +singly to be kept in view is the destruction of this latter, and +capture of the Ring in his possession. Quickly it must be done, +for "a wise woman there is, living for love of the Wälsung; +were she to bid him restore the Ring to the Rhine-daughters, for +ever and ever lost were the gold!" "The Ring I will have!" Hagen +quiets the care-ridden Nibelung, "rest in peace!" "Do you swear +it to me, Hagen, my hero?" "I swear it to myself!" Dawn has been +creeping over the sky. The form of Alberich fades in the growing +light and his voice dies on the ear: "Be faithful, Hagen, my son, +be faithful—faithful!" Hagen sits alone in the broadening +day, seemingly asleep, yet with eyes wide open. He starts. Flushed +with the morning-red, Siegfried strides up from the river-bank, +uttering his joyful "Hoiho!" "Siegfried, winged hero, whence do +you come so fast?" "From Brünnhilde's rock. I there took in +the breath which I put forth in calling you,—so rapid was +my journey. A couple follows me more slowly. Their journey is by +boat. Is Gutrune awake?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_165"><span class="page">Page 165</span></a> "Now +make we welcome, Gibich's-child!" he greets her, as at Hagen's +call she comes hurrying out to him. "I bring good tidings!" In +exuberantly good spirits he tells them the story of his bad action. +The magic draught administered to him had more than destroyed his +memory of Brünnhilde, we must believe; the inflaming potion +had somehow blotted out, or covered over and for the time cast into +the background, his father's part in him, the part of Siegmund, who +fought to the end an unequal and losing battle to save a girl from +a marriage without love. "Across the expiring fire," he concludes +his report, "through the mists of early dawn, she followed me from +the mountain-top to the valley. At the shore, Gunther and I, in +a trice, changed places, and by virtue of the Tarnhelm I wished +myself here. A strong wind is even at the moment driving our dear +pair up the Rhine." "Let us display all kindness in our reception of +her," Gutrune proposes, with the generosity of overflowing happiness; +"that she may be pleased and glad to sojourn with us here! Do you, +Hagen, summon the vassals to the wedding at Gibich's court, while +I will gather the women." Siegfried fondly offers her his help; +hand in hand they go within. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Hagen is conscious, presumably, of an incongruity in the task assigned +to him, the genial office of gathering together the clans for a +wedding-feast. However that may be, he does not, to perform it, +depart at all from his character. Ascending to an eminence, he +blows a melancholy blast through a great steer-horn, and, in a +voice portending tidings the most alarming, gives the call to arms: +"Hoiho! Gibich's men! Up! Arms in the land! Danger! Danger!" In +this he persists until from all sides, singly at first, then in +groups and lastly in crowds, the vassals, hurriedly armed, come +flocking. "Why does the horn sound? Why are we called to arms? +Here we are with <a name="page_166"><span class="page">Page +166</span></a> our weapons.... Hagen, what danger threatens? What +enemy is near? Who attacks us? Is Gunther in need of us?" "Forthwith +prepare, and dally not, to receive Gunther returning home. He has +wooed a wife!" This still in a tone befitting the announcement +of disaster. "Is he in trouble? Is he hard pressed by the foe?" +"A formidable wife he brings home!" "Is he pursued by the hostile +kindred of the maid?" "He comes alone, unpursued." "The danger +then is past? He has come forth victorious from the encounter?" +"The dragon-slayer succoured him in his need; Siegfried, the hero, +secured his safety." "How then shall his followers further help +him?" "Strong steers you shall slaughter and let Wotan's altar +stream with their blood." "And what, Hagen, are we to do after +that?" "A boar shall you slay for Froh, a mighty ram for Donner; +but to Fricka you shall sacrifice sheep, that she may bless the +marriage!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The men are beginning to penetrate through Hagen's sullen aspect +to his joke; with heavy playfulness they help it on. "And when we +have slaughtered the animals, what shall we do?" "From the hands +of fair women take the drinking-horn, pleasantly brimming with +wine and mead." "Horn in hand,—what then?" "Bravely carouse +until drunkenness overwhelm you—all to the honour of the +gods, that they may bless the marriage!" The rough warriors break +into laughter, and in uncouth jollity stamp with their feet and +spear-butts. "Great good fortune is indeed abroad on the Rhine +when Hagen the grim grows jovial!" Not the faintest smile illumines +the bleak face. At sight of Gunther's skiff approaching, he checks +the men's laughter. Moving among them, with careful foresight he +drops seed toward fruits of trouble: "Be loyal to your sovereign +mistress, serve her faithfully; if she should suffer wrong, be swift +to avenge her!" Hagen's plan for bringing <a name="page_167"><span +class="page">Page 167</span></a> about Siegfried's destruction is +not yet at this point settled in outline. We see him grasping at +whatever can be construed into a weapon against him. There are +repeated attempts on his part in the scene following to stir against +Siegfried some fatal demonstration of popular anger. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The skiff draws to land. The vassals greet their lord and his bride +with noisy chorus of welcome, clashing their arms together, beating +their swords against their bucklers. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Brünnhilde stands beside Gunther in the boat, statue-still, +her eyes bent on the ground, like one who neither sees nor hears. +Without resistance she lets Gunther take her hand to help her ashore; +but a suppressed snatch of the motif of Wotan's resentment suggests +the shudder ominous of danger overrunning his Valkyrie daughter +at the contact. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +This is Gunther's hour, this for him the supreme occasion in life; +the star of his destiny rides the heavens unclouded; he feels now +magnificent indeed in his seat on the Rhine, as he stands before his +people with the regal creature beside him whom he calls his wife. +As if to express the momentary expansion of his nature, his motif +resounds, as proudly he presents her, quite changed in character; it +has taken on a grandeur approaching pomp: "Brünnhilde, the +glory of her sex, I bring to you here on the Rhine. A nobler wife +was never won! The race of the Gibichungen, by the grace of the +gods, shall now tower to crowning heights of fame!" Brünnhilde +does not heed or hear. When, as Gunther leads her toward the Hall, +Siegfried and Gutrune meet them, coming forth from it with strains +of marriage-music and a festal train of ladies, her eyes never +moving from the ground, she does not see them. "Hail, beloved hero! +Hail, dearest sister!" Gunther greets the bridal pair. "Joyfully +I behold at your side, sister, him who has won you. Two <a +name="page_168"><span class="page">Page 168</span></a> happy pairs +are here met—Brünnhilde and Gunther, Gutrune and Siegfried!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At the name, Brünnhilde looks quickly up.... Her astonished +gaze fastens upon Siegfried's face and dwells intently upon it. Her +action is so marked that Gunther drops her hand; all watch her in +wonder. A murmur runs through the assembly: "What ails her? Is she +out of her mind?" Brünnhilde, still speechless, falls visibly to +trembling. Siegfried becomes at last aware of something out of the +common in the gaze so persistently fixed upon him. He goes quietly to +the woman and asks: "What trouble burdens Brünnhilde's gaze?" +She has hardly power to frame words, make sounds, her emotion still +further intensified by his cool and disengaged address. "Siegfried, +here!... Gutrune!" she painfully brings forth. "Gunther's gentle +sister," he enlightens her, in his major, matter-of-fact manner, +"wedded to me, as you to Gunther!" At this she recovers her voice +to hurl at him startlingly: "I—to Gunther?... A lie!" She +is swooning with the helpless horror of all this monstrous mystery. +Siegfried, who stands nearest, receives her as she totters, near to +falling. As she lies for a moment in the well-known arms, it seems +impossible, beyond everything impossible, that his unimaginable +purpose should not break down, that he should not be forced to drop +this incomprehensible feint of strangeness. But her dying eyes +searching the face close to them discover in it no glimmer of feeling. +Her heart-broken murmur: "Siegfried.... knows me not?" touches no +chord. The hero is for handing her over with all convenient haste +to her proper guardian. "Gunther, your wife is ailing!" As Gunther +comes, he rouses her: "Awake, woman! Here is your husband!" Because +her senses seem clouded and she a moment before rejected the statement +that she was married to Gunther, he <a name="page_169"><span +class="page">Page 169</span></a> singles out for her with his finger +the personage he means. Her eyes, as he makes this gesture, are +caught by the Ring on his hand. Her mind leaps, inevitably, to +the conclusion that Siegfried, who feigns not to know her, not +only has cast her off, but is in collusion with this man Gunther, +her captor. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Trying by a supreme effort to govern her agitation and anger at +the revelation of this unspeakable baseness, till she shall have +sounded the affair, "A ring I saw upon your finger," she addresses +him; "not to you does it belong; it was torn from me by this man!" +indicating Gunther. "How should you have received the ring from +him?" Siegfried looks reflectively at the ring. Since all trace +of the former Brünnhilde is wiped from his brain, he cannot +remember his parting gift to her of the Ring. Certainly, he wrested +a ring from this woman, in the twilight.... What became of it?... +But the ring on his hand is indisputably a relic of the old days +of the fight with the dragon. "I did not receive the ring from +him," he replies. She turns to Gunther: "If you took from me the +ring, by which you claimed me for wife, declare to him your right +to it, demand back the token!" Gunther is sore perplexed. "The +ring?... I gave him none.... Are you sure that is the one?" "Where +do you conceal the ring," Brünnhilde presses him, "which you +robbed from me?" Gunther is stupidly silent, not knowing what he +should say; his confusion is so obvious and his blankness so +convincingly unassumed, that the truth is borne upon Brünnhilde: +It was not he, despite all appearances, who took the ring from +her, and if not he—"Ha!" she cries, in a burst of furious +indignation, "This is the man who tore the ring from me; Siegfried, +trickster and thief!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Siegfried has been still gazing at the ring on his hand, trying +to puzzle out points which the lacunæ in his memory do not +permit him to make clear. The contemplation has brought <a +name="page_170"><span class="page">Page 170</span></a> back old +scenes and distant events. He speaks, unruffled: "From no woman +did I receive the ring; nor did I take it from any woman. Full well +do I recognise the prize of battle, won by me before Neidhöhle, +when I slew the mighty dragon." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +With what quiet and conviction he makes the statement, as if verily +he spoke the truth! Such assurance is hardly imaginable, save as +based upon conscious integrity.... Hagen now, the fisher in troubled +waters, interferes, still further to increase Brünnhilde's +bewilderment: "Are you sure you recognise the ring? If it is the +one you gave to Gunther, it belongs to him, and Siegfried obtained +it by some artifice which the deceiver shall be made to rue!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Plainly, there is no way of help in clearing up this desperate +tangle. The goaded woman bursts into a wild outcry, sharp as a +knife by which she should hope to cut through the coil in which +she is caught: "Deceit! Deceit! Dastardly deceit!... Treachery! +Treachery! such as never until this moment called for vengeance!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Gutrune catches her breath: "Deceit?..." The quickly roused suspicion +of the crowd takes up Brünnhilde's word: "Treachery?... To +whom?..." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Holy gods! Heavenly leaders!" Brünnhilde's madness clamours +to heaven: "Did you appoint this in your councils? Do you impose upon +me sufferings such as never were suffered? Do you create ignominy +for me such as never was endured? Prompt me then to vengeance such +as never yet raged! Enkindle anger in me such as never was quelled! +Teach Brünnhilde to break her own heart that she may shatter +the one who betrayed her!" The ineffectual Gunther tries vainly to +hush her, to stop the scandalous scene. "Away!" she thrusts him +from her, "cheat!... Yourself cheated!" and she announces ringingly +to them all the one thing which in all this confusion she knows to +be <a name="page_171"><span class="page">Page 171</span></a> true: +"Not to him (Gunther) am I married, but to that man, there!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Siegfried?... Gutrune's husband?" the murmur passes through the +astonished crowd. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Love and delight he forced from me...." Her momentary hatred of +Siegfried thus distorts the image of the past. Siegfried's only +possible interpretation of this astonishing declaration is that +the Tarnhelm did not properly conceal his identity—but even +so the woman is not speaking the truth. What her purpose can be in +thus darkening her own fame he is at a loss to divine. He replies +to her charge directly, careless at this point that the plot between +Gunther and himself stands betrayed by his words. "Hear, whether I +have broken my faith! Blood-brotherhood I swore to Gunther: Nothung, +my worthy sword, guarded the vow of truth; its sharp blade divided +me from this unhappy woman!" Brünnhilde hears him with a jeer. +They are speaking at cross purposes; he, as it should be remembered, +of the foregoing night alone, while she speaks of that past so +wholly blotted from his mind. "Oh, wily hero! see how you lie! how +ill-advisedly you call to witness your sword! I am acquainted indeed +with its sharpness, but acquainted, too, with the sheath—in +which, pleasantly encased, Nothung, the faithful friend, hung against +the wall, while the master courted his dear!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"How?... How?..." the agitated followers are beginning to ask. "Has +he broken his word? Has he smirched Gunther's honour?" Gunther, +Gutrune, the vassals, all a little shaken in their faith in Siegfried +by the assurance of his accuser, press him to refute her charge, +clear himself, take the oath which shall silence the disgraceful +accusation. He unhesitatingly asks for a weapon upon which to swear. +Hagen craftily offers his spear. Siegfried placing his right hand +on <a name="page_172"><span class="page">Page 172</span></a> the +point, solemnly calls upon the sacred weapon to register his oath, +wording it in the following ill-omened fashion: "Where sharpness +may pierce me, do you pierce me; where death shall strike me, do +you strike me, if yonder woman spoke the truth, if I broke my vow +to my brother!" Brünnhilde hearing, flings his hand from the +spear-point, and grasping it in her own, pronounces the counter-oath: +"Your weight I consecrate, spear, that it may overthrow him! Your +sharpness I bless, that it may pierce him! For, having broken every +vow, this man now speaks perjury!" Siegfried and Brünnhilde +each believe that what he swears is true; but the Oath, the blind +power which takes no account of intention, of moral right or wrong, +gives right in sequence to Brünnhilde. The spear pierces the +hero who invokes it so to do "if the woman spoke true." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +There is nothing more, the solemn oath taken, that Siegfried can +do, and in his stalwart fashion he turns his back on the whole +troublesome business, with the sensible suggestion that the wild +woman from the mountains be given rest and quiet "until the impudent +rage shall have spent itself which some unholy wizardry has suscitated" +against them all. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"You men, come away!" he subjoins, all his heroic good-humour recovered. +"When the fighting is to be done with tongues, we will willingly +pass for cowards!" For Gunther, whom he sees darkly brooding, he +has a word in the ear: "Believe me, I am more vexed than you that I +should not have more perfectly deceived her; the Tarnhelm, I could +almost believe, only half disguised me. But the anger of women is +soon appeased. The woman will beyond a doubt be grateful hereafter +that I should have won her for you!" The winged exhilaration of +the bridegroom repossessing him, he invites them all in to the +wedding-feast, and casting his arm gaily around <a name="page_173"><span +class="page">Page 173</span></a> Gutrune draws her along with him +into the Hall—whither the people swarm after them. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The three are left outside whom no festivity can allure. In long +silence they remain, sunk in gloomy study, each on his side. To +attempt arriving at clearness by questions does not occur to them; +and, indeed, what to each is the principal thing, known from the +proof of his eyes, no discussion could affect: for Brünnhilde, +Siegfried is estranged from her; for Gunther, his marriage is turned +to Dead-Sea apples. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The cheerful music, the summons to the wedding, dies away. Hagen +bends his black brow in reflection as to how he shall utilise to +his advantage the passions he has aroused; covertly he watches +his victims. Gunther has cast himself down and muffled his face +from the day, in the clutch of his jealous suspicion of Siegfried +and the smart of his public shame. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Brünnhilde stands staring ahead, with set countenance of horror +and grief. In an hour she has lived the tragedy which, spread over +howsoever many years, is still one of the hardest in human experience, +the tragedy which extorted Othello's groan: "But there, where I +have garnered up my heart, where either I must live or bear no +life—to be discarded thence!" She seeks in the void and blackness +some glimmer of light on the incredible mystery of these events. +With returning calm, a flash of the truth illuminates her, to the +extent that she suspects in the unnatural developments of the last +hour the work of sorcery. While hardly helping the actual situation, +this interpretation frees Siegfried from the hatefulness of such +black guilt as has appeared his, and we feel from this moment that +Brünnhilde's undeterred reaching after vengeance, her consent +to Siegfried's death, is less a personal need to make an offender +pay, than the instinct to cut short the dishonour in which the +most magnificent hero in the world is fallen. Impossible <a +name="page_174"><span class="page">Page 174</span></a> of endurance +is a world where Siegfried is false to all his vows, where Siegfried +and Brünnhilde are no longer each to the other "for ever and +ever, his only and his all!" Heartbreak much more than resentment +stamps Brünnhilde's cry: "Where is my wisdom against this +enigma? Where are my runes? Oh, lamentation! All my wisdom I bestowed +on him. In his power he holds the bondmaid, in thongs the captive, +whom, wailing over her wrong, the rich one joyously makes gift +of to another! Where shall I find a sword with which to cut the +thongs?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Hagen approaches her: "Place your trust in me, deceived woman! I +will avenge you on him who betrayed you...." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"On whom?..." she inquires, hazily. <i>Him who betrayed you</i> +describes more than one. "On Siegfried, who betrayed you." "On +Siegfried... you?..." She laughs, bitterly, while her unquelled +pride in her faithless lord mocks: "A single glance of his flashing +eye, which even through the lying disguise shed its radiance upon +me, and your best courage would fail you!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"But is he not, by reason of his perjury, reserved for my spear?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Perjury or none, you must fortify your spear by something stronger, +if you think of attacking that strongest of all!" "Well I know," the +subtle Hagen, with an effect of humbleness, continues, "Siegfried's +victorious strength, and how difficult to overcome him in battle; +wherefore do you give me good counsel: by what device may this +giant be defeated by me?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +She breaks into complaint over the shameful requital with which +the love has met that, unknown to him, by charms woven all about +his body, made him invulnerable. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"No weapon then can hurt him?" asks Hagen. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"No weapon that is borne in battle...." But she corrects <a +name="page_175"><span class="page">Page 175</span></a> herself, +remembering suddenly that he might, in truth, be wounded in the +back. "Never, I knew, would he retreat or in flight show his back to +the foe. Upon it therefore I spared to place the spell." "And there +my spear shall strike him!" determines Hagen. Having learned from her +all that he need, he turns to Gunther: "Up, noble Gibichung! Here +stands your strong wife. Why do you hang back there in dejection?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Gunther breaks into passionate exclamations over the indignity he +has suffered. Close indeed upon his hour of glory comes the hour +of his humiliation, when he must hear from the queenly woman in +whom his pride was placed such words as these: "Oh, ignoble, false +companion! Behind the hero you concealed yourself, that he might +gain for you the prize of courage! Low indeed has your precious race +sunk, when it produces such dastards!" Gunther utters broken excuses, +"while deceiving her he was himself deceived,—betraying her, +he was betrayed—" and appeals to Hagen to stamp him out of +life or help him to wash the stain off his honour! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Hagen has them now both where, for his purposes, he wishes them. +"No brain can help you," he replies to Gunther, "nor can any hand! +There is but one thing can help you—Siegfried's death!" The +two words fall awfully on the air, followed by a long silence. +The irresolute Gunther at the sound of the sentence writhes amid +doubts and hesitations, such as do not for a moment move his stern +fellow-sufferer. He remembers the blood-brotherhood sworn to Siegfried; +he begins to question whether the blood-brother has in very fact +been false. A returning wave of affection and admiration for the +beautiful fellow calls forth a sigh, and then the thought of Gutrune: +"Gutrune, to whom myself I freely gave him! If we punish her husband +so, with what face shall we stand before her?" At this mention of +Gutrune, a light breaks upon Brünnhilde; <a name="page_176"><span +class="page">Page 176</span></a> "Gutrune!... is the name of the +magic charm which has enchanted away from me my husband.... Terror +smite her!" "If the manner of his death must offend her, let the +deed be hidden from her," Hagen soothes Gunther's scruple. "We +will to-morrow fare on a merry hunting-expedition. The noble one +will, according to his impetuous wont, go ranging ahead of us, +and meet his death by a wild boar." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The three, coming to a common determination upon the fall of Siegfried, +are calling upon the different powers to whom they refer their deeds +to hear their vows of revenge—Brünnhilde and Gunther +upon Wotan, guardian of promises, Hagen upon Alberich—who +through the happy working of this vow of vengeance will be master +once more of the Ring—when from the Hall comes pouring forth, +with music and strewing of flowers, the bridal procession. Gutrune, +rose-wreathed, is borne shoulder-high upon a gilded and begarlanded +throne. At the vision of her and the glowing Siegfried at her side, +Brünnhilde shrinks back. Hagen forces her hand into Gunther's, +and this second bridal pair falls into the train winding up the +hillside to offer the nuptial sacrifices. +</p> + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +A rocky and wooded valley opening on the Rhine. It is part of the +region over-ranged by the hunting-party of Hagen's devising. The +horns of the hunters are heard in the distance,—Siegfried's +horn-call among them, and Hagen's. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Our old acquaintances, the Rhine-daughters, rise to the surface of +the water. They have warning or scent that Siegfried is not far, +with the Ring, their stolen gold. They complain in their undulating +song of the darkness now in the deep, where of old it was light, +when the gold was there to shine for <a name="page_177"><span +class="page">Page 177</span></a> them. Notwithstanding their loss, +they are little less full of their fun than before; they splash +and frolic in the water and with their voices copy the crystal +play of the river. They pray the sun to send their way the hero +who shall give them back the gold, after which they will regard +without envy the sun's luminous eye! Siegfried's horn is heard. +Recognising it as that of the hero who interests them, they dive +under to consult together,—concerning the best method, of +course, of extracting from him the Ring. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Siegfried comes to the edge of the bank overhanging the river, in +search of tracks of his game, mysteriously lost. He is blaming some +wood-imp for playing him a trick, when the Rhine-daughters, rising +into sight, hail him by name. They adopt with him the playful, teasing +tone of pretty girls with a likely-looking young fellow: "What are +you grumbling into the ground?.... What imp excites your ire?... +Has a water-sprite bothered you?... Tell us, Siegfried, tell us!" +He watches them, smiling, and replies in their own vein: "Have you +charmed into your dwellings the shaggy fellow who disappeared from +my sight? If he is your sweetheart, far be it from me, you merry +ladies, to deprive you of him!" They laugh loud and long, the +Rhine-nymphs. "What will you give us, Siegfried, if we find your +game for you?" "I have so far no fruit of my chase. You must tell +me what you would like!" "A golden ring gleams on your finger..." +suggests Wellgunde, and, unable to restrain their eagerness, the +three cry out in a voice: "Give us that!" He considers the Ring a +moment. "A gigantic dragon I slew for the ring, and I am to part +with it in exchange for the paws of a worthless bear?" "Are you so +niggardly?... So higgling at a bargain?... You should be generous +to ladies!..." they shame him one after the other. With perfect +good humour, he offers as a better <a name="page_178"><span +class="page">Page 178</span></a> objection: "Were I to waste my +property on you, my wife, I suspect, would find fault." "She is +a shrew, no doubt?... I dare say she beats you.... The hero has a +presentiment of the weight of her hand!..." They laugh immoderately. +"Laugh away!" the hero laughs with them, but, not to be compelled by +their derision: "I shall none the less leave you to disappointment, +for the ring which you covet no teasing shall get for you!" The +wily maidens do not take this up, but, turning from him, permit +him to overhear the remarks about him which they exchange among +themselves: "So handsome! So strong!... So fitted to inspire love!... +What a pity that he is a miser!" With shouts of laughter they duck +under. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Siegfried turns away, untroubled, and descends further into the +narrow valley. But their words have not quite glanced off him. +"Why do I suffer such a mean report of myself? Shall I lend myself +to gibes of the sort? If they should come again to the water's +edge, the ring they might have!" Too large to feel demeaned by an +inconsistency, he shouts to them: "Hey, you lively water-beauties! +Come quickly! I make you a gift of the ring!" Taking it off, he holds +it toward them. This is the point in his fortunes where we perceive +the working of Siegfried's fate. If the nymphs, as one would have +felt safe in counting upon their doing, had risen and caught the +Ring from him with a laugh louder than any before, all might have +been well. Hagen would have had nothing to gain by killing him. +But the curse which doomed the owner of the Ring to a bloody end +would not have it so. It had been crippled, it is true, against the +noble one; it had failed to make him suspicious, sad, and careful. +But his violent death we see provided for when, by what seems the +merest hazard, his offer of the Ring to the Rhine-maidens is not +accepted on the expected <a name="page_179"><span class="page">Page +179</span></a> terms. The sisters rise to his call, but instead +of faces dancing with laughter they show him grave and warning +countenances. Their subaqueous deliberations have resulted in a +most ill-inspired change of tactics. Instead of snatching at the +proffered Ring and glad to have it, they represent to Siegfried +that he will be under an obligation to them for ridding him of +it. His mood of giving is changed by a threat into one of refusal. +"Keep it, hero, and guard it with care, until you become aware of +the evil fate you are cherishing under its shape. Then you will +be glad if we will deliver you from the curse!" He slips back the +Ring on his finger and bids them tell what they know. "Siegfried! +We know of evil threatening you! To your danger you retain the +Ring! Out of the Rhine-gold it was forged; he who shaped it and +miserably lost it, placed a curse upon it long ago, that it should +bring death upon him who wore it. As you slew the dragon, even +so shall you be slain, and this very day, of this we warn you, +unless you give us the Ring to bury in the deep Rhine; its water +alone can allay the curse!" "You artful ladies," the hero shakes +his head, "let be that policy! If I hardly trusted your flatteries, +your attempt to alarm me deceives me still less...." When more +impressively still they reiterate their warning, protesting their +truth, urging the irresistible strength of the curse woven by the +Norns into the coil of the eternal law, he answers, and the nature +against which the curse had so long been of no effect shows brightly +forth in the brief tirade: "My sword once cleft asunder a spear. +The eternal coil of the law, whatever wild curses they have woven +into it, the Norns shall see cut through by Nothung. A dragon once +upon a time did of a truth warn me of the curse, but he could not +teach me to fear! Though the whole world might be gained to me by +a ring, for love I would willingly cede it; you should have it if +you gave me delight. But if you threaten me <a name="page_180"><span +class="page">Page 180</span></a> in life and limb, though the ring +should not enclose the worth of a finger, not by any force could +you get it from me! For life and limb, if I must live loveless +and a slave to fear,—life and limb, look you, like this I +cast them far away from me!" He takes up and flings a clod of earth +over his shoulder. The Rhine-daughters in agitation press him still +for a moment with warnings; but, realising the futility of these, +with the prophecy: "A proud woman will this very day inherit of you; +she will lend a more heedful ear to our warning!" they finally +swim away, as they announce: "To her! To her! To her!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Their singing floats back, dying away, a long time after they have +taken their leave; Siefgried stands watching them out of sight, +amused: "In water as on land I have now learned the ways of women; +if a man resist their cajoling, they try threats with him; if he +boldly brave these, let him look for scorn and reproaches! And +yet—were it not for my truth to Gutrune, one of those dainty +water-women I should have liked to tame!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The horns of the hunting-party are heard approaching. Siegfried +shouts in answer to their shouts. When Hagen and Gunther come in +sight, he calls to them to join him down there where it is fresh +and cool. The company with their freight of game descend into the +shady gorge, to camp for an hour. The wine-skins and drink-horns +are passed. Siegfried, questioned by Hagen of his fortune at the +chase, jestingly gives his account: "I came forth for forest-hunting, +but water-game was all that presented itself. Had I had a mind to +it, three wild water-birds I might have caught for you, who sang +to me, there on the Rhine, that I should be slain to-day!" Never had +he spoken with a more unclouded brow. Gunther starts at his words and +glances apprehensively at Hagen. Siegfried stretches out contentedly +between them, the ample sunshine in his <a name="page_181"><span +class="page">Page 181</span></a> blood, and remembers that he is +thirsty. Hagen treats the evil prophecy as lightly as does Siegfried +himself. In not unnatural sequence to Siegfried's reference to the +water-birds, he remarks: "I have heard it reported, Siegfried, +that you understand the language of the birds. Is it true?" "I +have not heeded their babble this many a day—" Siegfried is +saying, when Gunther's heavy and preoccupied mien is borne upon +him; he breaks off to reach him his drink-horn, cheerily rallying +him: "Drink, Gunther, drink! Your brother brings it to you!" Gunther, +oppressed by his dark doubt of Siegfried, is not prompt in accepting +the proffered cup. His reply obscurely conveys his sense of some +failure in their good-fellowship. Siegfried takes it up merely to +turn into occasion for one of his cordial laughs. "You over-cheerful +hero!" sighs Gunther. Something is wrong, Siegfried cannot fail to +see. He drops privately to Hagen his interpretation of the friend's +gloom: "Brünnhilde is giving him trouble?" "If he understood +her as well as you understand the song of the birds!" Siegfried +has an inspiration. Those last words of Hagen's contain the germ +of it. "Hei! Gunther!" he calls to the blood-brother, who appears +so sorely in need of cheering: "You melancholy fellow! If you will +thank me for it, I will sing you tales from the days of my youth!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Gunther's reply is politely encouraging. Hagen joins his invitation +to the half-brother's. The listeners place themselves at ease on +the ground about the narrator, seated in their midst on a mossy +stump. Then Siegfried, with his beautiful, bottomless zest in life, +recounts in vivid running sketches the story we know. One after +the other the familiar motifs pass in review. From them alone one +could reconstruct the tale. Of his childhood in Mime's cave, the +forging of Nothung, the slaying of the dragon. Of the wonder worked +by the drop of dragon's <a name="page_182"><span class="page">Page +182</span></a> blood on the tongue, the little bird's good counsel +by which he won Tarnhelm and Ring, the same bird's warning upon +which he slew Mime. At this point, when we are wondering how, with +Brünnhilde wiped from his memory, he can proceed, Hagen hands +him a horn filled with wine, in which he has been seen expressing +the juice of an herb; this, the Nibelung's son, wise in the virtues +of simples, tells him, will sharpen his memory and bring close +remote events. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Siegfried takes the cup, but for a moment does not taste it, absorbed, +as is evident, in the effort to remember what came right after the +point in his story at which he just broke off. The forgetfulness-motif +suggests his baffled groping. Mechanically he sets the horn to his +lips—a strain of the tenderest and most ecstatic of the +Siegfried-Brünnhilde love-music marks the first effect of the +draught which dissolves the mists obscuring memory,—followed +close by the whole slowly unwinding Brünnhilde-motif. We feel +as if we had suddenly, with Siegfried, waked from a bad dream. +We take a trembling breath of relief at the weight removed from +our heart. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A light of fixed joy grows and grows in Siegfried's face, as upon +this recovering of his true identity he takes up his story again: +"Wistfully I listened for the bird in the tree-tops. He sat there +still, and sang; 'Hei, Siegfried has slain the wicked dwarf! I have +in mind for him now the most glorious mate! On a high rock she +sleeps, a wall of flame surrounds her abode. If he should push through +the fire, if he should waken the bride, then were Brünnhilde +his own!'" Gunther hears in growing amazement. "Straightway, +unhesitating, I hastened forth. I reached the fire-girt rock. I +crossed the flaming barrier, and found in reward"—the memory +holds his breath suspended—a beautiful woman, asleep in a +suit of gleaming armour. I loosed the helmet from the glorious +head; audaciously with a <a name="page_183"><span class="page">Page +183</span></a> kiss I waked the maid.... Oh, with what ardour did +then the arm of the lovely Brünnhilde enfold me!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Gunther springs up in horrified comprehension. Two ravens at this +moment make sudden interruption, flying out of a tree and wheeling +above Siegfried's head. He starts up, in natural interest at the +apparition of Wotan's messengers. "Can you understand, too, the +croaking of these ravens?" sneers Hagen. Siegfried, looking after +the black birds as they bend their flight Rhine-wards, turns his +back to the questioner. "They bid me take vengeance!" Hagen grimly +interprets for himself, and with a quick thrust drives his spear +through Siegfried's body, from the back. Too late Gunther holds +his arm and the retainers spring to prevent him. Siegfried's eyes +flash wildly about for a weapon. He snatches up his great shield +and lifts it aloft to crush the perfidious enemy,—but his +strength fails, the shield drops, and he falls crashing backwards +upon it. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Hagen, what have you done?" comes accusingly from Gunther and +the men-of-arms, while a shudder runs through the assembly, and, +as one feels at the music's intimation, through the very heart +of nature. "Taken vengeance of perjury!" Hagen coldly replies, +and, turning from the group gathered around the dying hero, slowly +disappears in the gathering dusk. Gunther, seized with remorseful +anguish, bends over the wounded brother. Two of the company, aiding +his effort to rise, support him. It is clear at once that immediate +surroundings and recent events are blotted from his ken by the +brighter light of a remembered scene, filling the wide-open, +over-brilliant Wälsung-eyes. The music lets us into the secret +first of what it is—so absorbingly present to him in this +last hour: the moment marvellous among all in his existence, when +he had seen the sleeping Brünnhilde return to life. It is +as if it were all <a name="page_184"><span class="page">Page +184</span></a> happening a second time, she having mysteriously +since that first awakening been again sunk into sleep, from which +he must now again recall her: "Brünnhilde, sacred bride... +awake!... Open your eyes.... Who sealed you again in sleep?... +Who bound you in joyless slumber? The Awakener is come. He kisses +you awake.... He rends the confining bands... whereupon breaks +forth upon him the light of Brünnhilde's smile!... Oh, that +eye, henceforth to close no more!... Oh, the happy heaving of that +breath!... Sweetest languor, blissful darkness.... Brünnhilde +welcomes me to her!..." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +So he dies as he had lived, joyous and unafraid, the curse, while +having its way with him to the extent of securing his destruction, +crippled as ever before, when the death by which it would punish +is embraced like a bride. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +For a long moment all stand motionless and heavily silent. It really +seems impossible that a spear-thrust could extinguish that +glowing,—that superabundant,—that splendid life. Night +deepens. At a sign from Gunther, the men lift the dead, laid upon +his shield, to their shoulders, and in solemn procession start +upon the rocky path homeward. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +What is called Siegfried's funeral-march is, as it were, a funeral +oration spoken over him by a great voice, of one penetrated with +the sense of what he was and of earth's loss in him. "Listen! Listen +and shudder, all created things, and feel the shock, and measure +the magnitude, of your loss! Behold, he was brave among all heroes, +this Wälsung,—yet tender, too. He was the child of the +love of two beautiful, unhappy beings, and, a glory to them, he +became—Siegfried, the most exalted hero of the world! Mourn +for him heroically, not with tears, but battle-shouts, in keeping +with his greatness!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The moon breaks through the clouds and showers spectral light upon the +funeral train slowly moving up the hillside. <a name="page_185"><span +class="page">Page 185</span></a> Night-mists rise from the Rhine +and gradually blot out the scene. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +When the mists disperse we find ourselves once more in the Hall +of the Gibichungen, where Gutrune, troubled by the tardiness of +the hunters in returning, strains her hearing for Siegfried's horn. +Bad dreams have disturbed her sleep, and the wild neighing of Grane, +and the sound of Brünnhilde laughing in the solitary night. +"I fear Brünnhilde!" she confesses to herself. Yet, in need +of companionship in her anxiety, she calls at the sister-in-law's +door; receiving no answer, she looks in. The room is empty. It +must have been Brünnhilde, then, whom she saw striding down +to the bank of the Rhine, unable, like herself, to sleep. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Hearing a stir, she again listens intently for Siegfried's horn. +Not that, but Hagen's lugubrious Hoiho! comes to her ear: "Hoiho! +Awake! Lights! Bright torches! We bring home spoils of the chase!" +He appears in advance of the party thus announced. "Up, Gutrune! +Welcome Siegfried, the strong hero returning home!" She is +frightened—the fact is to her so significant of not having +heard his horn. As the confused train accompanying the slain hero +pours into the hall, Hagen's exultation can no longer contain itself, +and, negligent of all suitable appearance of concern for Gutrune's +sorrow, he announces the death of her beloved with all the gloating +glee he feels: "The pallid hero, no more shall he blow the horn, +no more storm forth either to chase or to battle, nor sue ever +more for fair women!" They bring in the body, they set down the +bier. "The victim of a wild boar, Siegfried, your dead lord!" With +a shriek Gutrune falls fainting upon the inanimate form. Gunther +tries to comfort her, clearing himself, accusing Hagen: "He is the +accursed boar who slew the noble one!" "Yes, I killed him!" boldly +boasts Hagen, so near the attainment of <a name="page_186"><span +class="page">Page 186</span></a> his object that he is careless +of all else; "I, Hagen, struck him dead! He was reserved for my +spear, by which he swore his false oath. I have earned the sacred +right to his spoils, wherefore—I demand that Ring!" "Back!" +shouts Gunther, as Hagen approaches to take it. "What belongs to me, +you shall never touch! Dare you lay hands on Gutrune's inheritance?" +But Hagen, in his new mood, is quick of his hands as earlier of +his wits. He draws his sword and without further parley attacks +Gunther. The fight is short, Gunther falls. He had been the claimant +of the Ring but a few hours. Hagen hurries to the bier to snatch +his prey from Siegfried's finger. The dead hand is slowly raised... +and threateningly warns off the robber. Hagen drops back. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +In the stillness of horror which succeeds the loud outcry of the +women at the portent, a solemn figure parts the crowd and strides +slowly forward—Brünnhilde, to whom the passing hours +have restored calm, and to whom meditation has brought light. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +She knows now what she should think, and what there remains to do. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Gutrune, hearing her voice, raises her own to accuse her of all +this woe overtaking them: "You—you incited the men against +him—woe that you should ever have entered this house!" "Hush! +pitiable girl!" Brünnhilde checks her, without anger. "You never +were his wedded wife; as his paramour you ensnared his affections. +The mate of his manhood am I, to whom he vowed eternal vows, before +ever he saw you!" Gutrune upon this, apprehending all, curses Hagen +who had given her the evil drink through which Siegfried had been +made to forget his former love. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A long space Brünnhilde stands in contemplation of Siegfried's +face, gazing with changing emotions, from passionate <a +name="page_187"><span class="page">Page 187</span></a> sorrow to +solemn exultation. She turns at length to the vassals and commands +them to build a great funeral pile. High and bright let the flames +leap which shall devour the noble body. Let them bring Grane, that +he with herself may follow the hero, whose honours her own body +yearns to share. While they are fulfilling her wish, she falls once +more into rapt study of the dead face, her own face becoming gentler +and gentler, as clearer and clearer understanding comes to her of +him and all that had happened. Her features appear softly glorified +at last with the light of forgiveness and reconcilement—and +she speaks his praise and justification: "Clear as the sun his light +shines upon me. He was the truest of all, this one who betrayed +me!" As an instance of his truth she quotes the incident of the +sword, placed, in loyalty to his friend, between himself and his +own beloved, "alone dear to him." "Vows more true than his were never +vowed by any; no one more faithfully than he observed a covenant; no +other ever loved with a love so unalloyed; and yet all vows, all +covenants, all obligations of love, were betrayed by him as never +by man before! Do you know how this came to be?..." The dealing with +her of Wotan she recognises in these extreme calamities falling +upon her; she must suffer all this to be brought, blind one, to a +comprehension of that which was demanded of her, which she had so +haughtily refused to consider when Waltraute pleaded for the gods. +She bows now under his heavy hand, but not without reproach and +arraignment: "Oh you, holy guardians of vows! Turn your eyes upon +my broad-blown woe: behold your eternal guilt! Hear my accusation, +most high god! Through his bravest action, desired by you and of +use to you, you devoted him who performed it to dark powers of +destruction...." (The old story of the Ring!) "By the truest of +all men born must I be betrayed, that a woman might grow wise!... +And <a name="page_188"><span class="page">Page 188</span></a> have I +understood at last what it is you want of me?... Aye, of everything, +of everything, everything, I have understanding! All has in this hour +become clear to me.... I hear the rustling, too, of your ravens: +with the message so fearfully yearned for I send them both home.... +Be at rest, be at rest, you god!" The tone of these last words is +that of the old Brünnhilde once more, the tender daughter +pitying her father's sorrows. Yes, let him be at rest, for the Ring +shall go back to the Rhine, to obtain which result her dearest +happiness has been sacrificed. She takes it from Siegfried's finger, +and places it—Siegfried's love-token, not to be yielded up +while she lives—upon her own. The Rhine-daughters, when the +funeral pile has burned to the ground, shall take it from her ashes. +She has had conversation in the night with the wise sisters of the +deep; no fear but that they will be at hand. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +And is that what will be Brünnhilde's prophesied world-delivering +act? Restoring the Ring to the Rhine, thus saving the world definitely +from Alberich and the army of the night? Or can we suppose it to +be the act which she accomplishes in the same stroke,—the +act of plunging into their twilight the whole tribe of the tired +unjust gods, so long now tremulously awaiting their end? Or, is +the latter act Brünnhilde's supreme vengeance? Or,—this +seems more likely,—an act of supreme benevolence, the result +of at last understanding "everything, everything, everything!"? +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The funeral pile decked with precious covers and flowers stands +ready, Siegfried's body upon it. Brünnhilde seizes a torch +from one of the attendants: "Fly home, you ravens, report to your +master what you have heard here by the shore of the Rhine! Pass, +on your way, near to Brünnhilde's rock: direct Loge, who is +still smouldering there, to Walhalla. For the dawn is now breaking +of the end of the gods! Thus do I hurl <a name="page_189"><span +class="page">Page 189</span></a> a burning brand into Walhalla's +flaunting citadel!" She sets fire with these words to the pyre, +which rapidly blazes up. Wotan's ravens are seen slowly flapping +off toward the horizon. Brünnhilde takes Grane from the young +men holding him, and, with all the joy now again in her voice, +face, and words, which illuminated the moment of her first union, +long ago, with the then so youthful and ingenuous Awakener, she +rushes to be reunited to him in death, springing with her jubilant +Valkyrie-cry upon Grane and with him plunging into the flames. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The fire flares doubly brilliant and high; the red glare of it +fills the whole scene. It becomes evident suddenly that the Hall of +the Gibichungen is burning. The people huddle together in terror. +When the funeral pile sinks to a heap, the Rhine is seen flooding in +upon the embers. Hagen, eagerly on the watch for his last chance, +beholds with the insanity of despair the Rhine-daughters rise from +the waves close beside the site of the pyre. Hurling from him shield +and spear, he dashes into the water to thrust them back. "Away +from the Ring!" Two of the jocose sisters for all reply entwine +their arms around his neck and draw him away and away with them +into the deep water. The third triumphantly holds up before his +eyes the recovered Ring. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +As the fire dies among the blackened ruins of the Hall, and the +Rhine recedes into its boundaries, a red light breaks in the sky. +More and more brightly it glows, till Walhalla is discerned in its +central illumination, with its enthroned gods and heroes. Flames +are seen invading the stately hall. When the company of the Blessed +are completely wrapped in fire, the curtain falls. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The last word of the music is the exultant phrase by which Sieglinde +greeted the prophecy of Siegfried's birth. It has been woven all +through Brünnhilde's last ardently happy salutation <a +name="page_190"><span class="page">Page 190</span></a> to him, as +if in recognition of some mystical quality—in death—of +birth. +</p> + +<p class="indent gap"> +So Wotan finds his rest, and the ill consequences at last end of +his unjust act—end with the reparation of the injustice, +the return of the gold to the Rhine. But has not the evil act been +like the Djinn of old, let out of the insignificant-looking urn, +waxing great, looming dark, and dictating hard terms! When Wotan +in pride of being committed it, against two simpletons, how could +he have divined that by this pin-point he set inexorable machinery +moving which should bring about his confusion, forcing him in its +progress to so many injustices more, injustices which his soul +would loathe, which would blight his best beloved, which would +by far be his greatest punishment!... The Trilogy is moral as a +tract. +</p> + +<p class="bigtitle"> +<a name="page_191"><span class="page">Page 191</span></a> +THE MASTER-SINGERS OF NUREMBERG</p> + +<h2><a name="page_193"><span class="page">Page 193</span></a> +THE MASTER-SINGERS OF NUREMBERG</h2> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The "argument of The Master-singers" is effectually given in the +Overture: Art and Love. The Masters are first—a little pompously, +as befits their pretensions,—presented to us. Then Young +Love sweeps across the scene, delicate musical gale. The themes +of the two then mingle, foreshadowing how the affairs of Walther +shall become entangled with those of the Guild. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +This Walther von Stolzing, a young Franconian noble, last of his +line, had for reasons which are not given forsaken the ancestral +castle and come to Nuremberg in the intention of becoming a citizen +there. He had brought letters to a prominent burgher of the town, +Veit Pogner, the rich goldsmith, long acquainted with his family, and +known to it, by reputation. Pogner had offered him every courtesy, +hospitality, and assistance in the business of selling his Franconian +lands. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Walther had found twenty-four hours in Nuremberg and Pogner's house +ample time to fall deeply, transcendingly, rapturously, in love +with the goldsmith's daughter. She is very young, very feminine, +even in the respect of being little rather than large, so that she +is always called, fondly, Evchen, little Eva. Her name is perhaps +meant to indicate her quality of inveterate femineity. The whole story +goes to show that she <a name="page_194"><span class="page">Page +194</span></a> was pretty enough to turn heads young and old. She +had been an obedient, an exemplary daughter, up to the hour of +meeting Walther, allowing her father to think for her, accepting +demurely his views for her. How should she not feel it best, so long +as her immature heart had never spoken a word, to let a most kind +and indulgent parent, whose wisdom it was not for her to question, +dispose of her hand in the manner he thought most fitting? When she +had seen Walther, however, a new light illumined her position. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +On the second day of his acquaintance with her, it seemed to the +young lord that he could not live through another night but he made +sure of one point. He followed his lady to vespers, in the hope of +an opportunity to exchange one private word, ask one question. It was +the eve of Saint John's day. The congregation when the curtain rises +is concluding an anthem to the "noble Baptist." Eva and Magdalene, +her nurse, are in one of the pews that fill the nave of the church. +Walther stands in the aisle, leaning against a pillar, from which +position he can watch the fair one. He tries whenever her eyes +stray his way, as, irresistibly attracted, they frequently do, +to convey to her by glance and gesture his prayer for a moment's +interview. Magdalene feels herself repeatedly obliged to recall +her young lady's attention to the church-service. The congregation +rises at last and flocks to the church-door. Walther steps before +the two women as they are passing forth with the rest, with the +hurried demand to Eva for a word, a single word. Magdalene, who is +a step behind, has not caught his request. Eva with quick resource +sends her back to the pew for her forgotten kerchief. But Walther +has become alarmed at his own boldness, and instead of utilising +his opportunity to utter or obtain that "single word," falls to +pouring forth many disconnected words by way of leading up to the +all-important question. <a name="page_195"><span class="page">Page +195</span></a> He has not contrived to get it out before Magdalene +returns. But Eva then discovers that her brooch too has been left +in the pew. Walther, because he really dreads to hear an answer +which may dash his dearest hopes, makes no better use of this second +chance than of the first; he is still leading up to his famous +question when Magdalene brings the brooch. But upon this fortune +favours him, Magdalene must run back to the pew for her forgotten +prayer-book; and in the brief interval of her search Walther asks +breathlessly of Eva: if she be already betrothed! She does not reply +by the instantaneous negative he had hoped for, and the passionate +wish breaks from his lips that he had never crossed the threshold +of her father's house! Magdalene, who has rejoined them, bridles +indignantly at such an expression from him. "How now, my lord, +what is this you say? Scarce arrived in Nuremberg, were you not +hospitably received? Is not the best afforded by kitchen and cellar, +cupboard and store-room, deserving of any gratitude whatever?" Eva +tries to silence her: "That is not what he meant, good Lene. But... +this information he desires of me—How am I to say it? I hardly +myself understand! I feel as if I were dreaming—He wishes to +know whether I am already betrothed?" Lene at this recognises, of +course, that here is that reprobate thing, a lover, and remembers +her first duty as a duenna, to keep off all such from her young +charge. She is for hurrying home at once. Walther resolutely detains +her. "Not till I know all!"—"The church is empty, every one +is gone!" Eva gives as a reason for not being so punctilious. Lene +sees in the very loneliness of the place a reason the more for +departing with all speed,—but Fate again helps Walther. David, +a youthful shoe-maker's apprentice, enters the church from the vestry, +and falls to making mysterious preparations, drawing curtains which +shut off the nave of the church, measuring <a name="page_196"><span +class="page">Page 196</span></a> distances on the pavement with a +yard-rule. No sooner has Magdalene caught sight of him than she +becomes absent-minded, and when Eva urges, "What am I to tell him? +Do you tell me what I am to say!" more good-humoured than before, +she vouchsafes: "Your lordship, the question you ask of the damsel +is not so easy to answer. As a matter of truth, Evchen Pogner is +betrothed——" "But no one," quickly adds the girl, "has as +yet see the bridegroom!" He gathers from the two that the bridegroom +shall be the victor on the following day in a song-contest, the +master-singer to whom the other master-singers award the prize, +and whom the bride herself crowns. It all falls strangely on the +ears of one not a Nuremberger. "The master-singer?..." he falters. +"Are you not one?" Eva asks incredulously, wistfully. And when in his +effort to grasp the situation exactly he continues asking questions, +she answers his interrogative: "The bride then chooses?..." with +complete forgetfulness of every maidenly convention, by an ardent, +honest "You, or no one!"—"Are you gone mad?" Magdalene grasps +her arm, shocked and flustered. She has, and feels no shame. "Good +Lene, help me to win him!"—"But you saw him yesterday for the +first time!" No, she became a victim so readily to love's torment, +Eva tells Lene, because she had long known him in a picture, Albrecht +Dürer's painting of David, after the slaying of Goliath, his +sword at his belt, his sling in his hand, his head brightly encircled +with fair curls. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Joyful agitation has seized the Knight at Eva's sweet impulsive +word, and, with it, bewilderment as to what must be his course in +circumstances so unprecedented. He restlessly paces the pavement, +trying to determine how he shall deal with the strange conditions +raising their barrier between him and the object of his desire. +Magdalene calls to her the object of hers. <a name="page_197"><span +class="page">Page 197</span></a> The middle-aged spinster has a weak +spot in her heart for David. The boyish shoe-maker's apprentice +on his side adores her—and the pleasant bits she maternally +smuggles to him from Pogner's kitchen. Questioned, he informs her +that he is making the place ready for the master-singers. There is +to be directly a song-trial: such song-apprentices as commit no +offence against the table of rules are to be promoted to mastership. +Here would be the Knight's chance, reflects Lene,—his one chance +to be made master before the fateful morrow. When, as they are +leaving, Walther offers the ladies his company to Master Pognet's, +she bids him wait rather for Pogner where he stands: if he wishes +to enter the contest for Evchen's hand, Fortune has favoured him +with respect to time and place. "What am I to do?" asks the lover +eagerly. David shall instruct him, and Magdalene herself instructs +David to make himself useful to the Knight. "Something choice from +the kitchen I will save for you. And if the young lord here shall +to-day be made a master, you may to-morrow proffer your requests +full boldly!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Shall I see you again?" Eva shyly asks of Walther, as Magdalene is +hurrying her off. His answer gives the keynote of him, characteristic +outburst that it is of his vital, vigourous, enthusiastic youth, to +which all things seem possible—beautiful youth, which has +the splendour and force of fire, with the freshness of flowers; +which flashes like a sword and trembles like a lute-string. "Shall +I see you again?" It is after vespers. "This evening, surely!" he +replies: "How shall I tell you what I would be willing to undertake +for your sake? New is my heart, new is my mind, new to me is all +this which I am entering upon. One thing only I know, one thing +only I grasp, that I will devote soul and senses to winning you! If +it may not be with the sword, I must achieve it with song, and as +a master sing you mine! <a name="page_198"><span class="page">Page +198</span></a> For you, my blood and my possessions, for you, the +sacred aspiration of a poet!" Strains from this sweet and proud +profession are scattered all through the story, they are the +Walther-motifs, heard in his first sigh as he watches her from the +shadow of the church-pillar, and woven finally into his prize-song. +And the effect of youth that goes magically with them! The fragrance +that belongs to them, with the fire! As of green things in early May, +wet with the dew of dawn,—the beams of the rising sun kindling +all to a softly-dazzling glory. The hearer feels himself young too +with an immortal youth.... But words are never so ineffectual as +when they would translate music. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +When Walther and Eva part, they are candidly lovers, for she has +joined her voice to his at the closing words of his profession, and +herself warmly professed: "My heart with its blessed ardour,—for +you, its love-consecrated kindness!" In a moment the women are +gone. Walther casts himself in a great high-backed carved seat +which apprentices have a moment before placed in the conspicuous +position it occupies, and is absorbed in the attempt to collect +himself, deal with his swarming emotions, order his wild thoughts, +scheme what to do. The excited blood in his veins sings the song +of his youth. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Apprentices in number, lively and mischievous imps, have entered and +are setting the place aright for the meeting of the master-singers, +placing seats for these on one side and forms for themselves on the +opposite side, arranging near the centre a platform and blackboard +enclosed by curtains. David stands studying that original who supposes +one can be made a master in an hour. The gentleman's rank and fine +feathers do not impress the youth, who feels himself rather, with +respect to the requirements of the hour, in a position to patronise. +Walther is startled to hear him suddenly shout: "Begin!" <a +name="page_199"><span class="page">Page 199</span></a> "What is +the matter?" he inquires, waking out of his dream. "Begin! That +is what the Marker calls out, and then you must sing. Don't you +know that?"—"Who is the Marker?"—"Don't you know? Have +you never been to a song-trial?"—"Never, where the judges +were artisans."—"Are you a poet?"—"Would that I +were!"—"Are you a singer?"—"Would that I knew!"—"But +you have at least been a 'school-frequenter' and a 'pupil?'"—"It +all sounds foreign to my ear!"—"And you wish to become a +master, off-hand, like that?"—"What enormous difficulty does +the matter present?"—David groans: "Oh, Lene, Lene... oh, +Magdalene!"—"What a to-do you make! Come, tell me, in good +faith, what I must do!" David has now the chance he loves. Here +is one who knows nothing whatever of the things it is his pride +to have learned at least the names of, the things to a Nuremberger +worth knowing among all. The ignoramus shall be properly dazzled. +David strikes an attitude. "Myself," he informs Walther, "I am +learning the Art from the greatest master in Nuremberg, Hans Sachs. +For a full year I have received his instructions. Shoe-making and +poetry I learn simultaneously. When I have pounded the leather +even and smooth, I learn of vowel-sounds and of consonance. When I +have waxed the thread hard and stiff, I apply myself to the rules +of rhyme. While punching holes and driving the awl, I commit the +science of rhythm and number...." And so forth. For a full year +he has been learning, and how far does Walther suppose he has got? +The Knight suggests, laughing: "To the making of a right good pair +of shoes!" Nay, this top-lofty aristocrat, with his jokes, does +not in the least understand! And David enlarges further on the +great and various difficulties in the way of him who aspires to +become a master-singer. A "bar," let him know, has manifold parts and +divisions, full difficult to master the law <a name="page_200"><span +class="page">Page 200</span></a> thereof!... And then comes the +"after-song," which must not be too short, nor yet too long, and +must contain no rhyme already used in the foregoing stanzas. But +even when a person has learned and knows all this, even then he is +not yet called a master. For there are a thousand subtleties and +refinements the aspirant must still make his own. Whether David in +showing off draws a bit upon his fancy, or whether the master-singers +really cherished these distinctions in mode and tone, one can but +wonder. Suggestive the titles of them certainly are. Glibly, grandly, +and with a rich relish, David tells them off: The fool's-cap, the +black-ink mode; the red, blue and green tones; the hawthorn-blossom, +straw-wisp, fennel modes; the tender, the sweet, the rose-coloured +tone; the short-lived love, the deserted-lover tones; the rosemary, +the golden lupine, the rainbow, the nightingale modes; the English +tin, the stick-cinnamon modes; the fresh orange, green linden-blossom +modes; the frogs', the calves', the goldfinch modes; the mode—save +the mark!—of the secret gormandiser; the lark, the snail +tones; the barking tone; the balsam, the marjoram modes; the tawny +lion-fell, the faithful pelican modes; the respendent gold-galloon +mode! Walther cries out to Heaven for help. "Those," proceeds David, +"are only the names! Now learn to sing them exactly as the masters +have established, every word and tone sounding clearly, the voice +rising and falling as it should...." etc., etc., etc.; "but if, +when you have done all these things correctly, you should make a +mistake, or in any wise stumble and flounder, whatever your success +up to that moment, you would have failed in the song-trial! In spite +of great diligence and application, myself I have not brought it to +that point. Let me be an example to you, and drop this folly of +seeking to be made a master!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Walther, persisting in inquiry, conquers the information at <a +name="page_201"><span class="page">Page 201</span></a> last that +in order to be named a master a man must compose an original poem +and fit it to an original air, in accordance with the many laws +laid down by his judges. "All there is for me to do then," concludes +the lover, nothing discouraged, "is to aim directly at mastership. +If I am to sing successfully, I must find, to verses of my own, a +melody of my own!" David, who has joined the apprentices, fends +off their teasing by privately preparing them for rich diversion +presently at the song-trial. "Not I to-day, another fellow is up +for trial! He has not been a 'pupil' and is not a 'singer'; the +formality of earning the title of 'poet' he says he will omit; +for he is a gentleman of quality, and expects, with one leap and +no further difficulty, this very day to become a master. Wherefore +arrange carefully the Marker's cabinet; the blackboard on the wall, +convenient to the Marker's hand.... The Marker, yes!" he repeats +bodingly to the not sufficiently impressed knight. "Are you not +afraid? Many a candidate already, singing before him, has met with +failure. He allows you seven errors; he marks them there with chalk; +whoever makes more than seven errors has completely and conclusively +failed!" The apprentices in their glee over the prospective +entertainment join hands and dance in a ring around the curtained +recess where the Marker shortly shall be chronicling the slips +and blunders of this self-confident lordling. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Their play is interrupted, and they hurriedly put on good behaviour, +at the entrance of two of the masters, Pogner and Sixtus Beckmesser, +the town-clerk. The change in the music is definite as a change +of air and scene, is like passing from the hubbub of the street +into some calm and pleasant precinct. Beckmesser is importuning +Pogner with regard to his intentions for the morrow. Beckmesser +wishes extremely to become his son-in-law, wherefore he thinks it +would be best to give the <a name="page_202"><span class="page">Page +202</span></a> young lady no choice, to decree simply and finally +that the winner of the prize for song should be her husband. He +feels cocksure of his superiority as a master-singer, but dubious, +it would seem, of his power to enthrall the fancy of a young girl. +"If Evchen's voice can strike out the candidate, of what use to me +is my supremacy as a master?"—"Come," replies Pogner sensibly, +"if you have no hopes of the daughter's regard, how do you come +to enter the lists as her suitor?" Beckmesser, after this check, +cannot, of course, urge anything further in the same direction. He +begs for Pogner's influence with his child, and turns away disgusted +with the goldsmith's merely civil assent. It seems to him that a +man like Pogner ought to know as well as he knows that women have +no real taste, that they are capable of preferring the sorriest +stuff to all the poetry in the world. How shall he, Beckmesser, +avoid a disappointment, a public defeat? He decides upon reflection +to try the prize-song he has prepared, as a serenade, and make +sure beforehand that the maiden will be pleased with it. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Walther has approached and exchanged greetings with Pogner. He +comes directly to the point, and, with airy aplomb, "If truth must +be told," he says, "the thing which drove me from home and brought +me to Nuremberg was the love of Art, nothing else! I forgot to +tell you this yesterday—but to-day I proclaim it aloud. It +is my desire to become a master-singer. Receive me, master, in +the guild!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The masters are flocking in, bakers, tailors, coppersmiths, grocers, +weavers. Pogner turns to them, delighted. "Hear, what a very interesting +case. The knight here, my friend, is desirous of dedicating himself +to our Art. It seems like the olden days come back!—You can +hardly think," to Walther, "how glad I am! As willingly indeed as +ever I lent you my assistance to sell your land, I will receive +you in the guild!"—"What man <a name="page_203"><span +class="page">Page 203</span></a> is that?" Beckmesser almost barks, +catching sight of Walther. Suspiciously he observes him: "I do +not like him.... What is he doing here? How his eyes beam with +laughter!... Look sharp, Sixtus, keep an eye on that fellow!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"And may I hope," asks Walther of Pogner, "to have this very day an +opportunity to undergo trial and be elected master?"—"Oho!" +soliloquises Beckmesser, with a shock of surprise at audacity such +as this, "on that head stands no skittle!" There is no moss growing +on him! Pogner is no doubt surprised too, but answers kindly: "The +matter must be conducted according to rule. To-day, however, as +it happens, is song-trial. I will propose you. The masters lend +a favourable ear to requests of mine." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The masters are assembled; last of all has entered Hans Sachs, +the shoe-maker,—dear, benignantly-gazing Hans Sachs. "Are +we all here?" asks one of the members. "Sachs is here! What more +is necessary?" sneers Beckmesser. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Fritz Kothner, the baker, in the capacity of speaker, calls the +roll. As the meeting is about to pass to the business of the day, +Pogner asks for the floor, and unfolds before the assembled guild +his romantic scheme: The following is Saint John's day, when it +is customary for the master-singers to hold a song-contest out +in the open, among the people, the victorious singer receiving a +prize. "Now I, by God's grace, am a rich man, and every one should +give according to his means. I cast about therefore for a gift +to give not unworthy of me. Hear what I determined upon. In my +extensive travels over Germany, I have often been chagrined to +find that the burgher is held cheap, is thought close-fisted and +mean-minded. Among high and low alike, I heard the bitter reproach, +till I was soul-sick of it,—that the burgher has no aim or +object above commerce and the getting of money. That we alone in +the whole kingdom <a name="page_204"><span class="page">Page +204</span></a> of Germany are the guardians and preservers of art, +they take into no account. To what point we place our honour in +that, with what a lofty spirit we cherish the good and beautiful, +how highly we prize art and its influence, I wished therefore to +show the world. So hear, Masters, the gift which I have appointed +for prize: To the singer who in the song-contest shall before all +the people win the prize on Saint John's day, let him be who he +may, I give, devotee of art that I am, Veit Pogner of Nuremberg, +with my whole inheritance, even as it stands, Eva, my only child, +in marriage!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Loud applause. "There is a man for you!... There is talk of the +right sort!... There one sees what a Nuremberger is capable of!... +Who would not wish to be a bachelor?..." "I dare say that some," +suggests Sachs, "would not mind giving away their wives!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +But there is a postscript to Pogner's address which qualifies the +aspect of the whole: The maiden shall have the right to reject +the masters' choice. That is what has from the first bothered +Beckmesser, in Pogner's counsel before this making public of his +idea. The general mood is changed by this revelation. "Does it +strike you as judicious?" Beckmesser privately consults Kothner; +"Dangerous I call it!"—"Do I understand aright," asks Kothner; +"that we are placed in the hands of the young lady? If the +master-singers' verdict then does not agree with hers, how is it +to operate?"—"Let the young lady choose at once according +to the inclination of her heart, and leave master-singing out of +the game!" remarks Beckmesser tartly. "Not at all! Not at all!" +Pogner strives to calm them, "Not in the very least! You have +imperfectly understood. The maiden may refuse the one to whom you +master-singers award the prize, but she may not choose another. +A master-singer he must be. Only one crowned by yourselves may +become <a name="page_205"><span class="page">Page 205</span></a> +a suitor for her." The arrangement does seem, closely considered, +rather hard on the young lady, and one fancies more than once, in +the course of the play, a shade of sheepishness in the father's +own attitude toward it,—momentary ripples of misgiving. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A voice of beautiful, calm, corrective sanity is now raised in +the assembly. "Your pardon!" speaks Sachs to Pogner, "you have +perhaps already gone somewhat far. The heart of a young girl and +the heart aglow for master-art do not always burn with an identical +flame. Feminine judgment, untutored as it is, would seem to me +on a level with popular judgment. If therefore you have in mind +to show the people how highly you honour art, and if, leaving to +your daughter the right of choice, you wish her not to repudiate +the verdict, let the people be among the judges, for the people's +taste is sure to coincide with the girl's." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Indignation upon this among the masters. "The people?... That were +fine! As well say good-bye, once for all, to art!... Sachs, what +you say is nonsense.... Are the rules of art to be set aside for +the people?"—"Understand me aright!" Sachs meets them; "How +you take on! You will own that I know the rules thoroughly. For +many a year I have been at pains to keep the guild to a strict +observation of them. But once a year it would seem to me wise to +test the rules themselves, and see whether in the easy grooves of +habit their strength and vitality have not been lost. And whether +you are still upon the right track of nature you can only find out +from such as know nothing of tabulated rules!" (The apprentices, +who here represent the people, and have no great love for the +<i>Tabulatur</i>, give evidence of joy.) "Wherefore it would seem +to me expedient that yearly, at Saint John's feast, instead of +permitting the people to come to you, you should descend out of +your <a name="page_206"><span class="page">Page 206</span></a> +lofty mastership-cloud, and yourselves go to the people. You wish +to please the people. It would strike me as to the point to let +the people tell you itself whether you succeed in pleasing it. +You would thus secure a vital advantage, both for the people and +for art. There you have Hans Sachs's opinion!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +No one agrees with him, of course. "You no doubt mean well, but +it would be a mistake.... If the people is to have a voice, I, +for one, shall keep my mouth shut.... If art is to run after the +favour of the people, it cannot fail to come to grief and +contempt."—"His success would be enormous, no doubt, who +urges this matter so stiffly," Beckmesser puts in spitefully; "His +compositions are nearly all popular street-songs!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Pogner sets Sachs's suggestion aside with perfect civility and good +humour. "The thing I am about to do is novel already. Too much novelty +at one time might bring in its wake regret...."—"Sufficient +to me," Sachs yields the point, "is the maiden's right of +refusal!"—"That cobbler always excites my wrath!" mutters +Beckmesser. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +They pass to the order of the day. "Who enters the lists as a candidate? +A bachelor he must be."—"Or perhaps a widower?" offers Beckmesser; +"Ask Sachs!"—"Oh, no, master Beckmesser," Sachs retorts; "Of +younger wax than either you or I must the suitor be, if Evchen +is to bestow the prize on him!"—"Younger than I, too?... +Coarse fellow!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At the question whether any be on the spot who wish to take the +song-trial, Pogner presents Walther von Stolzing, as one desirous +of being that same day elected master-singer. The motif of Wather's +presentation gives a clear idea of the knight's charming appearance, +his grace, his elastic step, his hat and feathers, the delicate +haughtiness of his bearing, in keeping with his proud name. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_207"><span class="page">Page 207</span></a> A black +suspicion enters Beckmesser's breast at sight of him: he is the +card which Pogner has all along had up his sleeve. The town-clerk +declares promptly that it is too late now to enter the new-comer. +The masters exchange glances: "Anoble?... Is it a case for rejoicing? +Or is there danger in it?... The fact that Master Pogner speaks for +him has its weight, certainly..."—"If he is to be welcomed +among us," says Kothner, somewhat forbiddingly, "he must show proper +recommendations."—"Do not mistake me," Pogner hastens to say; +"Though I wish him good fortune, I have no thought of waiving any +rule. Put to him, gentlemen, the customary questions." At the very +first question, however, whether he be free and honourably born, +Pogner hurriedly prevents Walther's answer by his own, making himself +voucher for him in every respect such as that. The generous Sachs, +feeling the something grudging in the attitude of the masters, reminds +them that it had long been one of the rules made by themselves that +an applicant being a lord or a peasant should have no significance, +that inquiry concerning art alone should be made of one desiring to +become a master-singer. Kothner passes thereupon to the question: +"Of what master are you a disciple?" And then is born into the +world a new, a ravishing melody—which has all the delight +in it that can be compressed into the space. Airily, confidently, +debonairly, Walther delivers himself, in the sweet ingenuousness +of his heart, "new," as he had said, ignorant as yet of the jealous +world's ways: "Beside my quiet hearth in winter-time, when castle +and court were buried in snow, in an ancient book, bequeathed to +me by my fathers, I was wont to read recorded the engaging beauties +of past Springs, as well as, prophesied, the beauties of the Spring +soon to reawaken. The poet, Walther von der Vogelweid, he it is who +has been my master!" Sachs has listened with a surprised, charmed +sympathy. He <a name="page_208"><span class="page">Page 208</span></a> +nods beamingly: "A good master!"—"But long dead!" snaps +Beckmesser; "How could he learn the canons from him?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Kothner proceeds without comment to the next question: "In what +school did you learn to sing?"—"Then when the sward was free +from frost, and summer-time was come back, all that in the long +winter-evenings I had read in the old book was proclaimed aloud +in the luxuriance of the forest. I caught the clear sound of it +there. In the forest where the birds congregate, I learned likewise +to sing!"—"Ho, ho, from finches and tomtits you acquired +the art of master-singing?" Beckmesser jeers; "Your song no doubt +smacks of its teachers!"—"What do you think, masters," inquires +Kothner, upon this hopeless revelation, "shall I proceed with the +questions? It strikes me his lordship's answers are altogether +wide of the mark."—"That is what will presently be seen," +Sachs interposes warmly; "If his art is of the right sort, and he +duly proves it, of what consequence is it from whom he learned it?" +Whereupon Kothner proceeds, addressing Walther: "Are you prepared, +now, at once, to attempt an original master-song, new in conception, +original both in text and tune?" Walther answers unhesitatingly: +"All that winter-night and forest-splendour, that book and grove +have taught me; all that the magic of poetry has secretly revealed +to me; all that I have gathered, a thoughtful listener, from ride +to battle or from dance in gay assembly,—all this, in the +present hour, when the highest prize of life may be purchased by +a song, is what must necessarily flow into my song, original in +word and note,—is what must be outpoured before you, masters, +if I succeed, as a master-song!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Did you gather anything from that torrent of words?" Beckmesser +asks, with his eyebrows up among his hair, of his fellow-masters. +"Now, masters, if you please," Kothner directs, "let the Marker +take his seat. Does his lordship," to <a name="page_209"><span +class="page">Page 209</span></a> Walther, "choose a sacred subject?" +"One that is sacred to me!" the young man answers magnificently; +"The banner of Love I swing and I sing—and cherish good hope!" +"That," considers Kothner, without a gleam, "comes under the head +of secular subject. And now, Master Beckmesser, pray shut yourself +in!" With a thin pose of reluctance, Beckmesser takes his way toward +the curtained cabinet. "A sour office—and to-day especially. +The chalk, I surmise, will be troublesomely in requisition. Know, +Sir Knight, Sixtus Beckmesser is the Marker. Here in the cabinet +he attends to his stern duty. He allows you seven errors. He marks +them down in there with chalk. If you make over seven errors, Sir +Knight, you have failed in the song-trial. Keen is the Marker's +ear; that the sight of him therefore may not disconcert you, he +relieves you of his presence and considerately shuts himself up +in there—God have you in his keeping!" He has climbed upon +the platform; he sharply draws the curtains. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Two apprentices take down from the wall and bring forward the <i>Leges +Tabulaturœ</i>. With pomp and flourish Kothner reads them off +to Walther. The "tabulature" gives the straight and narrow laws upon +which a song must be constructed, to earn its singer the dignity +of mastership. "Now take your seat in the singing-chair!" Kothner +orders Walther at the close of his reading. "Here, in this chair?" +It is the tall carved chair in which he had cast himself earlier. +"As is the custom of the school!" Even so much of restraint as +the obligation to sing on a given spot is repugnant to the spirit +of the highborn youth, who yet is undertaking to satisfy the most +law-ridden assemblage he could have met with. He murmurs, taking +the seat: "For your sake, beloved, it shall be done!"—"The +singer sits!" announces Kothner. "Begin!" shouts Beckmesser out +of sight. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_210"><span class="page">Page 210</span></a> From +Beckmesser's cry "Begin!" Walther takes his cue, and simply vaulting +into the seat of his Pegasus, casting the bridle upon the neck of +inspiration, he directly before them all pours forth his full heart +in profuse strains of unpremeditated art. He has never committed +their canons, is ignorant of their conventions; he has genius, +that is all, and its daring; is a poet born, not made; is at the +moment, beside all the rest, uplifted by the divine fire of his +love—and his song is right as some natural object, a crystal +or a flower. Consummate as is the song, it has yet the character +perfectly of an improvisation—the ideal improvisation, let +us say—the gush, the rush, the profusion of lovely ornament, +the unrestraint,—but essentially orderly, the unrestraint, like +that of an army with banners, swarming, in only apparent confusion, +up a height, to assured victory. The urge, the climbing effect +of the song, are owing, it is plain enough, to Walther's being +really inside of it, to his having cast his whole self into it, +with his straining after a goal, his desperate necessity to win. +In this case, verily the style is the man. "Begin!"—runs +the sense of that perfect song, "Thus shouted Spring in the woods, +till they rang again! And as the sound died away in distant waves, +in the distance a sound was born, drawing nearer and nearer in +a mighty flood. It grows, it resounds, the woods re-echo with a +multitude of sweet voices. Loud and clear, it sweeps anear, to what +a torrent it is grown! Like clangour of bells rings the multiple +voice of Joy! The forest, how readily it responds to the call which +has wakened it anew to life, and entones the sweet canticle of +Spring!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The Marker's chalk is not idle; a number of workmanlike scratches +have been heard. Walther has stopped short, jarred by the sound. +He resumes after a moment: "In a thorny hedge, devoured by envy +and chagrin, Winter, in his armour of ill-will, cowers in hiding. +Amid the rustling of withered leaves, <a name="page_211"><span +class="page">Page 211</span></a> he sits spying with watchful eye +and ear for a chance to bring to grief the happy singing...." The +singer bounds to his feet. "None the less, 'Begin!' The cry rang +in my breast, when I was as yet wholly unaware of love! And in my +breast I felt a deep stirring, which woke me as if from a dream. My +heart filled the chamber of my bosom with its trembling palpitations; +mightily surged my blood, its stream swollen by new emotions; stormily +out of the warm night pressed the host of sighs,—increasing, +in the wild tumult of joy, to the innumerableness of the sea. My +breast, with what rapture it responds to the call which has wakened +it to new life, and entones the lovely canticle of Love!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He has hardly ceased, when Beckmesser thrusts apart the curtains. +"Have you finished? I have quite finished with the blackboard!" He +holds up for inspection the blackboard, overscored on both sides +with great chalk-marks. The masters break into laughter. "Have the +goodness to listen," demands Walther imperiously; "I have only +just reached the point where my song is to publish my lady's +praise!"—"Go and sing wherever else you please. Here you +have failed." Beckmesser descends from his post, flourishing the +blackboard. "I beg you will examine, masters, this blackboard. +Never since I live has such a thing been heard of. I should not +have believed it though you had all affirmed it under oath...." +Walther, in the innocence of his youth, loudly appeals: "Do you +intend to allow him, masters, to interrupt me like this? Am I not +from any one of you to have a hearing?" Pogner's courtesy interferes: +"One word, friend Marker, are you not out of temper?" Beckmesser +excitedly proceeds to justify his chalk-marks. No beginning or end, +defective metre, defective construction! Blind meaning! Not one +proper breathing-space anywhere! No appropriate colouring—and of +melody not a vestige! Then, <a name="page_212"><span class="page">Page +212</span></a> what a mad medley of "modes"! A mixture of +adventure-tone, blue-knightly-spurs tone, tall-pine-trees tone +and haughty-stripling tone! (Which permits the supposition that +David, though moved by the desire to amaze, was yet a faithful +reporter of the refinements of master-singing.) The master-singers +agree readily with Beckmesser, are really relieved to find their +impressions boldly put into form for them by him. Not one of them +has understood anything. Walther's unprecedented leaping to his +feet in the heat of inspiration has given offence to this one; +the other terms his singing "empty battering at the ear-drums." +They are about to subscribe unanimously to Beckmesser's verdict +that he has lost his case, when Sachs's voice breaks in upon the +confusion. He has listened to Walther in complete self-forgetful +absorption. The absence of all jealousy in his large nature leaves +his mind peculiarly open for genuine first-hand impressions; his +wide understanding is not repelled by the new and strange. The close +of the young man's song has found him won, enlisted, prepossessed. +He calls the masters to halt. "Not every one shares in your opinion! +The Knight's song struck me as novel, yet not confused; although +he forsook the beaten track, he strode along with firm, unerring +step...." Sachs nods to himself and beams at this reviewing of +the intense pleasure he has just experienced. "When you find that +you have been trying to measure by your own rules that which does +not lie within the compass of your rules, the thing to do is to +forget your rules and try to discover the rules of that which you +wish to measure!" Which sage talk is not destined to be fruitfully +heard in the agitation of prejudice, alarm, and dislike possessing +the majority of the masters. "Oh, very well," fumes Beckmesser, "Now +you have heard him: Sachs offering a loophole to bunglers, that they +may slip in and out at will and flourish <a name="page_213"><span +class="page">Page 213</span></a> at ease. Sing to the people as +much as you please, in marketplace and street; here no one shall +gain admission save in accordance with rule!" Sachs insists that +Walther must be heard to the end. "The guild of the masters, the +whole body," chafes Beckmesser, "are as nothing counterbalanced by +Sachs!" "God forbid," speaks Sachs, "that I should desire anything +contrary to the guild's laws; but among those very laws it stands +written that the Marker shall be so chosen that neither love nor +hate may influence his judgment. Now, if the Marker go on lover's +feet, how should he not yield to the temptation of bringing a rival +to derision before the assembled school?" Beckmesser flares up, +trembling with rage. "What concern of Master Sachs's is it on what +sort of feet I go? Let him sooner turn his attention to making +me shoes that will not hurt my toes. But since my shoe-maker has +become a mighty poet, it's a sorry business with my foot-wear. See +there, all down at the heel, the sole half off and shuffling! His +many verses and rhymes I would cheerfully dispense with, likewise +his tales, his plays, and his comical pieces, if he would just +bring me home my new shoes for to-morrow!" The thrust tells. Sachs +scratches his ear a little ruefully, but is not found quite without +a word to say. The excuse he advances is that while it is his custom +to write a verse on the sole of every shoe he delivers, he has +not yet found a verse worthy of the learned town-clerk. "But," +by a turn of the conversation directing it to a use nearer his +heart, "I very likely shall catch inspiration from the Knight," +he says, "when I have heard the whole of his song! Wherefore let +him sing further undisturbed. Sing!" Slyly smiling he makes sign +to Walther, "Sing, in Master Marker's despite!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Walther springs to the singing-chair, but the masters cry in a voice, +"An end! An end!" Walther, undaunted, climbs <a name="page_214"><span +class="page">Page 214</span></a> to his feet upon the very seat +of the sacred chair, from which he commands the assembly by half +his height and haughtily looks down upon it. And he sings with +all his lungs and all his fire to make himself heard above the +hubbub; he sings, determined to impose the impress of himself upon +their minds, will they or not; and his tenor pierces through and +floats over the snarling chorus of objection; and he sings his song, +in spite of them all, to the very end. "From the dark thorn-hedge +rustles forth the owl, and by his hooting rouses the hoarse choir +of the ravens; in night-black swarm they gather, and croak aloud +with their hollow voices, magpies, crows, and daws! But thereupon +soars upward on a pair of golden wings, wonderful, a Bird: his +clearly-shining plumage gleams bright aloft in the air, rapturously +he soars hither and thither, inviting me to join him in flight. My +heart expands with a delicious pain, my longing to fly creates +wings. I swing myself heavenward in daring flight, away from that +death-vault, the city, away to the hills of home; thence to the +green forest, meeting-place of birds, where long ago Walther, the +Poet, won my allegiance. There sing I clear and loud the praise +of my dearest lady, there mounts upward, little as Master Crows +may relish it, the proud canticle of love!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +All this while the confusion of voices has not ceased or diminished. +Beckmesser has been heatedly, in support of his chalk-marks, going +over Walther's literary misdemeanours: Defective versification, +unpronounceable words, misplaced rhymes, etc. etc. The masters +have been vociferously criticising and rejecting the new-comer. +Pogner has looked on and taken no part, a dejected spectator. He +is sorry to see the Knight defeated, and he says to himself that +he knows he will regret his toleration of this high-handedness of +the masters. For the natural thought has risen in his mind that +it would be agreeable to have this fine fellow received in the +guild, and subsequently <a name="page_215"><span class="page">Page +215</span></a> into his family as son-in-law. Upon which thought +naturally follows the other: "The victor whom I now must fall back +upon, who knows if my child will care for him? I confess to a degree +of uneasiness as to whether Eva will choose that master!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Sachs alone has listened through all the manifold disturbance—has +intently, delightedly listened; has loved the boy's courage, and +marvelled at the force of his inspiration; has besought the masters +to keep still and listen, or at least to let others listen.... +"No use! It is labour lost! One can hardly hear his own words. +The Knight can not from one of them gain attention!... That is +what I call courage, to go on singing like that! His heart is in +the right place,—a very giant of a poet. I, Hans Sachs, make +verses and shoes, but he is a Knight and a poet on top of it!" +The apprentices, emboldened by the general disorder, add their +voices to the others, attempting to drown out the singer so fierily, +unremittingly singing from his post of vantage. They join hands +again and dance in circle around the Marker's platform. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Through all this, over all this, the stubborn song, not for a moment +weakening or wavering, has climbed its way, with the figurative +Bird, to its climax-point. His throat shall burst, but he will be +heard! His last note Walther holds for four bars: "<i>Das stolze +Lie——bes Lied!</i>"... Sung to an end it is, the lofty +canticle of love. The singer jumps down from the chair. "A lasting +farewell to you, my masters!" With a proud gesture, which rids him +of them forever and consigns them to the dust-heap of their sordid +narrowness and mediocrity, he stalks to the door. "<i>Versungen +und verthan! Versungen und verthan!</i>" cry the masters, raising +their hands according to custom in giving a vote; "<i>Versungen +und verthan!</i>" He has failed in song, he is done with! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_216"><span class="page">Page 216</span></a> The song-trial +is over. The apprentices in merry tumult take apart the Marker's +closet, hurry off benches and seats, rapidly clearing the church +of all signs of the meeting. The masters leave, except Sachs. He +stands gazing abstractedly at the singing-chair, while a snatch +of Walther's song sings itself over in his memory. His meditation +is interrupted by the apprentices snatching up and carrying off +the chair. With a half-melancholy smile and a gesture of delicate +mockery at himself for the spell he has so completely fallen under, +reluctantly the last master-singer turns to the door, and the curtain +falls. +</p> + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The second act shows the exterior of Pogner's house and of Sachs's, +his neighbour across the street. It is the close of day; David, putting +up the shutters, is thinking of the morrow and its pleasures so intently +that he does not, for a moment, recognise Lene's voice calling him. +He mistakes it for that of some teasing fellow-apprentice, until he +turns around and beholds her, as so often! with a promising-looking +basket on her arm. "I bring you something good. Yes, you may peep. +That is for my precious treasure, but first, quick, tell me, what +success had the Knight? Did you instruct him to some purpose? Was +he made a master?"—"Ah, Mistress Lene, it's a bad case! He +failed utterly and miserably!"—"He failed?..." "Ay,—why +should you so particularly care?" She jerks away the basket from his +outstretched hand: "Keep your hands to yourself! Here is nothing +for you! God ha' mercy, our young lord defeated!" and hurries into +the house, leaving him crest-fallen, an object of mockery to his +companions, who have lost nothing of the interview. Goaded, he +has finally plunged <a name="page_217"><span class="page">Page +217</span></a> among them with punishing fist, when Sachs's arrival +upon the scene stops the disorder. The boys nimbly scatter. David +is ordered indoors. "Close the shop and make a light. Put the new +shoes on the lasts!" Both go in. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The peacefulness of evening is upon the scene. Pogner, with his +daughter on his arm, returning from a walk, comes down the lane +which divides his house from Sachs's. He hesitates at Sachs's door. +"Shall we see whether neighbour Sachs be at home? I should be glad +of a talk with him. Shall I go in?..." But he decides against it. +"Why should I, after all? Better not! When a man undertakes a course +out of the usual, how should he accept advice?... Was it not he +who considered that I went too far? Yet, in forsaking the beaten +track, was I not doing even as he does? Or, was I actuated +peradventure—by vanity?" Pogner is not easy in his mind, +it is plain. He invites his silent and preoccupied daughter to +sit beside him a little space on the stone seat under the linden +in front of their house; he tries to fortify his faltering heart +with the review of his plan for the morrow, held in the poetic +light in which he first saw and found it alluring. "Deliciously +mild is the evening. It presages a most beautiful day to shine +upon you to-morrow. Oh, child, does no throb of the heart tell you +what happiness awaits you to-morrow, when the whole of Nuremberg, +with its burghers and plebeians, its guilds, its populace and high +officials, is to gather in your presence to see you award the prize, +the noble laurel-wreath, to the master of your choice and your chosen +bridegroom?" But he speaks to the Evchen of day before yesterday. +So recently as that his scheme no doubt attracted the daughter +of his blood even as it did him; she saw it with kindred eyes. +Her youthful pride rejoiced in the part she was to play of lovely +lady of romance, to know that she should become from that day a +heroine of legend, <a name="page_218"><span class="page">Page +218</span></a> her name for long years recurring in the songs of +song-loving Nuremberg. As for the practical side of the question, +she felt safe. She believed she knew which of the master-singers +was sure of election by the majority of the masters, and him she had +it in her heart to crown with a right good-will—so recently +as day before yesterday. But to-day, at her father's "the master +of your choice" she wistfully inquires, "Dear father, <i>must</i> +it be a master?"—"Understand me well, <i>a master of your +choice</i>," the uneasy parent replies. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Magdalene is making signs from the doorway to Eva. The girl becomes +absent-minded, drops the subject in question, and suggests to her +father that he go in to supper. Vexed with himself and her, he +rises from her side. "We are not expecting any guest, are we?" he +asks, a shade querulously. "Why, surely, the Knight?"—"How +is that?"—"Did you not see him to-day?"—"No desire have +I to see him!" the troubled father mutters. Then, in a flash, two +and two leap together and make four to his startled mind. "What's +this?... Nay, thick-witted am I grown!"—"Dear little father, +go in and change your coat!" urges the pretty daughter. "Humph!" +he murmurs, now as absent-minded as she, "What is this buzzing +in my head?" and goes indoors. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Magdalene reports to Eva David's news: the Knight has been refused +admission to the guild. "God help me! What shall I do!" cries Eva, +in a sea of troubles; "Ah, Lene, the anxiety!... Where to turn +to find out something?"—"From Sachs, perhaps?"—"Ah, +yes, he is fond of me. Certainly, I will go to him."—"Beware +of arousing suspicion. Your father will notice if we stay out any +longer at present. Wait until after supper. I shall have something +further to communicate to you then, a message which a certain person +charged me with privately."—"Who?.. The Knight?"—"No, +<a name="page_219"><span class="page">Page 219</span></a> +Beckmesser."—"Something proper that must be!" the fair girl +scoffs as they enter the house. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Sachs, in working-clothes, is seen moving within his shop. He orders +David to place his table and stool beside the door, and go to bed. +Reluctantly David goes off. He is troubled over Magdalene's +unaccountable behaviour to him, and this sitting up late of his +master's interferes with his slipping over to her for an explanation. +Sachs takes his seat before the work-table, sets his materials +aright, but having done it, instead of falling to work, leans back +and lets the sweetness of the evening beguile him, dreams possess +and waft him whither they will. That haunting strain from Walther's +song, repeated slowly, as by one savouring it with pensive pleasure, +again sings itself to his inward ear; it, indeed, is partly to +blame for his mood of gentle unrest. The memory will not let him +alone of that marvellous, that unprecedented experience of the +afternoon. Unreservedly the grey-haired man's homage flies to the +youngling who so easily outstrips them all, with their inveterate +painstaking, their multitudinous canons. Not only without a shade +of bitterness but with a tender elation, he lives over again the +emotions created in him by that passionate song. To his true poet's +heart it is a matter for exultation that just something beautiful +should have been, and he there to witness and rejoice. He reconsiders +it all with affectionate disquisition, fresh delight in every point. +If just a shade of sadness belongs to the hour, it lies in the +recognition that though the vision of beauty has by the contagion +that is proper to it stimulated in him the impulse to be at once +producing, he too, beautiful things, not by any longing could he, +after a life of faithful effort in the service of Poesy, produce +anything to compare with the unprepared effusion of that youth! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +In the serenity of the lovely evening his thoughts breathe <a +name="page_220"><span class="page">Page 220</span></a> themselves +forth upon the scented June air: "What fragrance—how mild, +how sweet, how abundant,—exhaled from the elder-tree! Its +soft spell loosens my fibres, solicits me to seek expression for my +thoughts. To what purpose, any expression of mine? A poor, simple +fellow am I! Little in the mood for work as I am, you had best, +friend, let me alone! Far wiser I should attend to my leather and +desist altogether from poetry!" Resolutely he falls to work. But +Friend Elder-tree does not therefore cease to shed scent. It casts +its spell over him again almost at once. "No, there is no use in +trying to work!" Sachs leans back and listens again to the echo in +his memory of Walther's song. "I feel it," he meditates, lending +ear to the persistent voice in his brain, "and cannot understand +it. I cannot retain it—nor yet can forget it! And if for a +moment I grasp it, to measure it is beyond me. But how should I +hope to grasp that which struck me as illimitable? No rule fitted +it, and yet it had not one fault! It sounded so old, and was yet so +new,—like the song of birds in the sweet May-time. One who +should hear it, and, smitten with madness, try to sing in imitation +of that Bird, would meet with scorn and derision.... The law of +Spring,—exquisite compulsion!—according to that were +the rules of song laid in his breast. And he sang even as he must! +And as he must, the power to do it came to him, I marked that quite +particularly.... The Bird who sang to-day, his beak is fashioned +aright! Great as was the dismay created by him among the masters, +he was much to Hans Sachs's mind!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Evchen has come out of her house and softly approached. Sachs looks +up, joyfully surprised, at her greeting: "Good-evening, master; still +so diligent?" There follows as pretty an exhibition of youthful +feminine arts as one could wish to see. The cajoling inflections +of the music alone would inform one <a name="page_221"><span +class="page">Page 221</span></a> of what is in action. Eva has +come to Sachs with an ulterior motive: to hear the details of the +song-trial. She has no mind, of course, to avow her interest frankly. +She must gain her end as she can, and, as a beginning, to flatter +her man and challenge his fondness for her can never fall wholly +wide of the mark. Sachs loves her dearly, that she knows, and she +has, in the innocent presumption of her young beauty, not questioned +that he would enter the song-tournament for her; and until yesterday +she rested in placid contentment upon the intention of crowning this +affection which never since her birth has failed her. Her narrow +eighteen years have no conception of a devotion so generous and deep +it would not dream, however fair the opportunity, of laying upon her +youth the burden of his maturity, the oppression of his thoughtfulness. +Sachs is unwilling, too, very likely, in his wisdom, to compromise +the peace of his Indian summer by assuming the guardianship of +an over-fair young wife. His neighbour's picturesque whim, the +song-contest in prospect, has no doubt given Sachs sufficient +uneasiness, but he finally, as we heard him declare to Pogner, +rests satisfied with the maiden's privilege of refusal. Not one of +the guild of master-singers seems to him worthy of this blooming +young Eve. As for the father's "Never!" applied to her marriage +if she shall not accept the master-singers' choice, Sachs knows +his Pogner and his Eva, and is willing to entrust the matter to +Time. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +And so the ingenuous seductress finds the genial, clever, mellow +neighbour's attitude toward her in this scene more canny than she can +have expected, or quite relishes. It almost appears he had no idea +of trying for her. Perhaps an intuition of her momentary insincerity +has made him more than naturally wary. The practising upon himself +of her pretty coquetries he suffers however without unreasonable +distaste. "Ha, child, <a name="page_222"><span class="page">Page +222</span></a> dear Evchen, out so late? But I know—I know +what brings you so late. The new shoes?"—"You are mistaken! I +have not even tried on the shoes. They are so beautiful, so richly +ornamented, I have not yet ventured so much as to put them on my +feet!"—"And yet you are to wear them to-morrow as a bride?" +She takes a seat on the stone bench by his door and leans confidingly +close to him. "Who, then, is to be the bridegroom?"—"How +should I know?"—"How can you know then that I am to be a +bride?"—"What a question! The town knows it!"—"And if +the town knows it, friend Sachs feels that he has good authority. +I should have thought that he knew more than the town."—"What +should I know?"—"See, now, I shall be obliged to tell him! +I am certainly a fool!..."—"I did not say so."—"It is +you then who are more than common knowing...."—"I do not +know."—"You do not know!.. You have nothing to say!..." She +draws away, nettled: "Ah, friend Sachs, I now perceive that pitch +is not wax! I had supposed you cleverer." Calmly he takes up her +words and by them guides the conversation from that ground. "Child, +the properties both of wax and pitch I am well acquainted with. +With wax I stroke the silken threads with which I stitch your dainty +shoes; the shoes I am at this moment making, I sew with coarse +cord, and use pitch to stiffen it, for the hard-fibred customer who +is to wear them."—"Who is it? Some one of great consequence, +I suppose?"—"Of consequence, indeed! A proud master, on wooing +bent, who has no doubt whatever of coming forth victorious from +to-morrow's event. For Master Beckmesser I am making these +shoes."—"Then use pitch in plenty, that he may stick fast +in them and trouble me no more!"—"He hopes surely by his +song to win you."—"What can justify such a hope?"—"He +is a bachelor, you see; there are not many in the place." Again she +draws near and bends close <a name="page_223"><span class="page">Page +223</span></a> to him. "Might not a widower be successful?" In his +kind, sane, unsentimental voice he replies promptly: "My child, +he would be too old for you!"—"What do you mean, too old? The +question here is one of art. The man who has achieved distinction in +art, let him contend for me." Sachs smiles, indulgently, paternally. +"Dear little Eva, are you making a fool of me?" (<i>Machst mir +blauen Dunst?</i> Are you blinding me with blue haze?)—"Not +I! It is you—" she retorts warmly, "it is you who are playing +tricks on me. Confess that you are of an inconstant nature. God +knows who it is you have now housed in your heart. And I have been +supposing for years it was I!"—"Because I used to be fond of +carrying you in my arms?"—"I see! It was only because you +had no children of your own!"—"Time was when I had a wife and +children enough," Sachs reminds her gently. "But your wife died, and +I grew up!"—"And you grew up, tall and most fair!"—"And +so I thought you would take me into your house in place of wife +and child...."—"Thus I should have a child and a wife in +one ... A pleasant pastime, indeed! Ha ha! How beautifully you +have planned it all!"—"I believe," she pouts, and bends her +brows on him in a puzzled frown, "I believe that the master is +making fun of me! In the end he will calmly acquiesce in Beckmesser +to-morrow carrying me off, right under his nose, from him and all +the rest!"—"How could I prevent it," says Sachs, not upset +apparently by the fearful thought, "if he is successful? Your father +alone could find a remedy to that."—"Where such a master carries +his head!" cries Eva, in acute exasperation, "If I were to come to +your house, should I so much as be made at home?" Somewhat dryly he +takes up her words, as before, to steer the conversation from these +dubious borders; and by some hazard, or intuition, turns it upon the +subject nearest her heart. "Ah, yes, you are <a name="page_224"><span +class="page">Page 224</span></a> right! My head is in a state of +confusion. I have had much care and bother to-day. Something of it +clings very probably to my wits."—"At the singing-school, do +you mean?" she asks, with covert eagerness; "There was song-trial +to-day."—"Yes, child, I had considerable trouble over an +election." She draws close to him. "Now, Sachs! You should have +said so at once, and I would not have harassed you with senseless +questions. Tell me now who it was that sought for election?"—"A +knight, my child, wofully untaught!"—"A knight? You do not +say so! And was he admitted?"—"Far from it, my dear. There +was too much difference of opinion."—"Well, tell me, then. +Tell me how it all happened. If it troubles you, how should it +leave me untroubled? So he stood the trial discreditably and was +defeated...."—"Hopelessly defeated, the gallant cavalier!" +Walther's failure is symbolised by a melodious groan. "Hopelessly, +you say? There was no way then by which he might have been saved? +Did he sing so badly, so faultily, that there is no possibility +more of his becoming a master?"—"My child," Sachs broadly +assevers, "for him all is definitely lost. And never in any land +will he be made a master. For he who is a master born occupies +ever among masters the very lowest place." On the verge of tears, +with difficulty controlling her indignation, Eva continues her +questioning: "One thing more tell me. Did he not find among the +masters a single friend?" Sachs nearly laughs. "That were not bad! +To be, on top of everything, his friend! His friend—before +whom all feel themselves so small!..." (If Eva were not so engrossed +with her single idea, the gleam in Sachs's eye, the fire in his +tone, would interpret to her this brutal-sounding speech.) "Young +Lord Arrogance, let him go his way! Let him go brawling and slashing +through the world! As for us, let us draw our breath in peaceful +enjoyment of what we have acquired with labour <a name="page_225"><span +class="page">Page 225</span></a> and difficulty. Keep off the fiery +fellow from running amuck among us! Let fortune bloom for him +elsewhere!" Trembling with anger, and dropping all concealment, +Eva springs to her feet: "Yes, elsewhere shall fortune bloom for +him than in the neighbourhood of you repulsive envy-ridden +creatures!—elsewhere, where hearts still have some warmth in +them, in spite of all cantankerous Master Hanses!—Directly, +yes, I am coming!" (This to Magdalene, who has been calling to +her from her father's door.) "I go home much comforted! It reeks +of pitch here till God take pity on us! Kindle a fire with it, +do, Master Sachs, and get a little warmth into you, if you can!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"I thought so!" Sachs says to himself as he watches her cross the +street to her own door. Two and two have leaped together in his +mind, too. "The question is now what will be the sage course to +pursue." He goes within and closes his door... all but a crack. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Your father is asking for you," Magdalene reports to her agitated +mistress. "Go to him," weeps Eva, "and say that I have gone to my +room and to bed." But Beckmesser—the nurse reminds her of +the message from him. He desires her to be at the window; he will +sing and play to her a beautiful composition by which he hopes on +the morrow to win her. He wishes to discover whether it be to her +taste. Eva, anxiously awaiting the arrival of her lover, disposes +of the subject by ordering Magdalene to be at the window in her +place. "That would make David jealous!" reflects Magdalene; "His +chamber is toward the lane." The prospect tickles her spirits. Even +as she is urging Eva to go in, for her father, is calling, Walther +comes down the lane. Hopeless after that, Magdalene recognises, to +attempt dragging indoors the damsel. She hurries in by herself +to content Pogner with some discreet misrepresentation. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_226"><span class="page">Page 226</span></a> With +passionate endearments Walther and Eva have rushed into each other's +arms. All is lost which depended upon his winning the title of +master-singer. There is nothing further to hope from that quarter; +no choice is left, they must fly together. "Away, where liberty +is!" he cries, "That is where I belong, there where I am master in +the house!" He grows hot with anger at remembrance of the masters' +treatment of him, but, even more, with loathing at the thought +of his beloved sitting to-morrow in their midst, looked upon by +them with covetous eyes as a possible bride. "And I would endure +it, do you think? I would not fall upon them all, sword in hand?" +The night-watchman's horn breaks across his heated outburst. He +claps hand to his sword. Eva draws him gently into the shadow of +the linden-tree, to lie concealed until the watchman have passed, +and leaves him a moment to go within. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The night-watchman, with pike, horn, and lantern, comes down the +lane, calling the hour of ten; he bids the householders look to +their fires and lights, avoiding disaster, and so let God the Lord +be praised! He turns the corner, the sound of his horn dies away. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Sachs from behind his door has played the eavesdropper. "Evil doings +are under way! No less than an elopement! Attention! This must +not be!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Eva creeps forth from her father's house, disguised for the journey +in Magdalene's things. "No stopping for reflection!" she cries; "Away +from here! Away! Oh, that we were already off and afar!"—"This +way, through the lane...." Walther draws her along with him. "At the +city-gate we shall find servant and horses." But right across the +lane falls suddenly a great shaft of light, projected from Sachs's +window, cast by a lamp placed behind a glass globe which magnifies +it to intense brilliancy. The lovers find themselves standing in a +<a name="page_227"><span class="page">Page 227</span></a> bright +illumination. Eva pulls Walther quickly back into the dark. "Woe's +me, the shoe-maker! If he were to see us!... Hide! Do not go near +that man!"—"What other road can we take?"—"The street +there—but it is a winding one, I am not well acquainted with it, +and, besides, we should run into the night-watchman."—"Well, +then, through the lane!"—"The shoe-maker must first leave +the window!"—"I will force him to leave it!" says Walther, +fiercely.—"He must not see you. He knows you."—"The +shoe-maker?..."—"Yes, it is Sachs."—"Hans Sachs, my +friend?"—"Do not believe it! He had nothing but evil to say +of you!"—"What, Sachs? He, too?... I will put out his lamp!" +She catches again at his arm, and even at that moment both are +startled into immobility by the sound of a lute. Some one approaches, +testing as he comes the strings of a lute, if they be in tune. +The light has disappeared from the shoe-maker's window. Walther +is again for dashing down the lane toward the city-gate and the +horses. "But no! Can't you hear?"—his lady hangs back. "Some +one else has come and taken up his station there."—"I hear it +and see it. It is some street-musician. What is he doing so late +at night?"—"It is Beckmesser!"—"What, the Marker? The +Marker in my power? There is one whose loafing in the street shall +not trouble us long...." Again she catches in terror at his arm, so +ready ever to catch at the sword. "For the love of Heaven, listen! +Do you wish to waken my father? The man will sing his song and then +will go his way. Let us hide behind the shrubs yonder." She draws +her lover to the stone seat under the linden-tree. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Sachs at the sound of the lute has drawn in his light, become +superfluous, since the road is effectually blocked for the lovers by +the musical interloper. He overhears Eva's exclamation, "Beckmesser!" +and has an idea. Beckmesser shall be made of <a name="page_228"><span +class="page">Page 228</span></a> use to prevent the lovers as long +as possible from moving any farther from the safe parental roof +than that stone seat under the linden, where they huddle close, +whispering together, while keeping a watchful eye on the actors of +the comedy which follows. Sachs, as one might know of him, loves +a joke. He softly opens his door, places his work-bench and lamp +right in the doorway, and sets himself at his work. When Beckmesser, +after impatiently preluding to bring to the window the figure he +is expecting, clears his throat to begin the serenade, Sachs, +vigourously hammering on his last, prevents him by bursting forth +on his own account in a lusty ditty with much loud Ohe, Ohe, +Trallalei!—a playful ditty, sweet at the core, about Eve, +the original mother, and the first pair of shoes, ordered for her +from an angel by the Lord himself, who was sorry to see the pitiful +sinner, when turned out of Paradise, go bruising her little feet, +for which He had a tenderness, on the hard stones; and Adam, too, +stubbing his toes against the flints, the song tells how he on +the same occasion was measured for boots. Beckmesser can hardly +contain his impatience and disgust till the first verse comes to +an end. Upon the last note of it, he addresses the shoe-maker with +what sickly civility he can summon: "How is this, master? Still +up? So late at night?" Sachs expresses an equal surprise to find +the town-clerk moving abroad: "I suppose you are concerned for +your shoes. I am at work on them, as you see; you shall have them +to-morrow."—"Devil take the shoes!" groans Beckmesser; "What I +want here is quiet!" But his words are lost amid Sachs's hammer-blows +and unmoderated voice launching forth upon the second verse. "You +are to stop at once!" Beckmesser, in mounting anger, orders Sachs, +as, hardly pausing to take breath, the shoe-maker is attacking +the third verse. "Is it a practical joke you are playing on me? +Do you make no distinction between <a name="page_229"><span +class="page">Page 229</span></a> the night and the day?" Sachs +looks at him in innocent surprise. "What does it matter to you +that I should sing? You are anxious, are you not, to have your +shoes finished?"—"Shut yourself up indoors then and keep +quiet!"—"Nay, night-labour is burdensome; if I am to keep +cheerful at my work, I must have air and light-hearted song. So +hear how the third verse goes!" And he attacks it with a will. There +is added to Beckmesser's other troubles the fearful thought that the +maiden may mistake this outrageous bellowing for his love-song. A +second-story window in Pogner's house has softly opened, a form is +dimly outlined within the frame of it. "I am lost now," Beckmesser +desperately reflects, "if he goes on singing!" He resolutely steps +up to Sachs: "Friend Sachs, just listen to one word! How bent you +seem upon those shoes! I truly had forgotten all about them. As a +shoe-maker, the fact is, I hold you in great esteem, but as an artist +and critic I honour you even more highly. I beseech you therefore to +give your attention to a little song by which I hope to-morrow to +win the prize. I am eager to be told whether you think well of it." +While talking, he strums, as if casually, upon his lute, to keep the +lady from leaving the window. "Oh, no!" Sachs replies; "You wish +to catch me by my weak side. I have no wish for another berating. +Since your shoe-maker takes himself for a poet, it fares but ill +with your footgear. I can see for myself that it is in a deplorable +condition. And so I drop verse and rhyme, knowledge and erudition, +and I make you the new shoes for to-morrow."—"Let that be, +do!" Beckmesser adjures him; "That was only a joke. Understand +now what my true sentiments are. You stand high in honour with the +people, and the daughter of Pogner has a great opinion of you. +Now, if I intend to offer myself as a suitor for her to-morrow, +can you not see how I might be destroyed by her not taking kindly +to my <a name="page_230"><span class="page">Page 230</span></a> +song? Therefore listen to me quietly, do, and when I have finished +my song tell me what in it you like, and what not, that I may make +my dispositions accordingly."—"Go along! Let me alone!" Sachs +still excuses himself; "How should so much honour accrue to me? My +songs are but common street-songs; let me therefore, in my common +way, sing them to the street!" He is taking up his noisy lay again +about Eve and shoes when Beckmesser's rage explodes. Quaking, the +town-clerk pours forth reproach and insult. This conduct of the +shoe-maker's has its source in envy, nothing else; envy of the +dignity of Marker which has never been bestowed upon him, and which +now never will be, not so long as Beckmesser lives and has influence +with the masters. When he stops at last, for lack of breath, Sachs +asks artlessly: "Was that your song?... Somewhat irregular in form, +but it sounded right spirited!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Walther, in the shadow, clasping his troubled lady, who is unaccountably +saddened by the untimely farce, struggles with a hysterical desire +to laugh—it is all so like a fantastic dream. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At last shoe-maker and town-clerk come to an arrangement. Beckmesser +shall sing his song, and Sachs, whose criticism he so unwontedly +desires, shall act as Marker; but Sachs, who contends that he is +loath to stop work on his shoes, instead of marking with chalk, +shall mark the singer's mistakes by blows of his hammer on the +last, and so, peradventure, while listening, forward his work. A +disgusting arrangement, but Beckmesser is in such terror lest the +lady leave her post before he have sung that he consents. "Begin!" +hollaes Sachs, and Beckmesser, after preluding, sings, while Sachs +punctuates the lines with smart taps on the last. These at first +discompose the singer, and he stops at each tap to inquire angrily +what it is that is not right; he shortly resolves, however, to pay +no heed to the spiteful enemy, but cover over the interruptions with +his voice. <a name="page_231"><span class="page">Page 231</span></a> +Louder and louder and ever more breathlessly he sings, a lyric that +is more prosy than prose, a piece of common statement of facts, +tortured into verse, which attains metre only by throwing the accent +continually, ludicrously, on the wrong syllables. The melody, nasal +and snuffling, is the very prose, too, of music. A ridiculous, +dead-in-earnest song, relating in three long verses the circumstances +of the song-contest and the singer's tender hopes. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +By the end of the second verse, the teasing shoe-maker has tapped +so much that the soles are solid with the vamps. He swings the +finished shoes triumphantly before his customer, announcing that +he has thought of an appropriate verse to write on the soles, and +it is: "A good song must keep time!" But Beckmesser does not stop +for him. Beckmesser disdainfully goes on, as if he and the lady +were alone in the world, and he sang thus loud to overpower some +such thing as the sea-surf. In his engrossment he fails to take +account of various ominous signs. He does not see David appear at +his chamber-window. In spite of Eva's clothes which she is wearing, +the boy recognises Magdalene at the casement across the way. His +jealousy is quick to suppose her cold treatment of himself due to +an inclination toward this new admirer. The neighbours, too, begin +to lean out of their windows and ask the reason of this abominable +caterwauling. A crowd collects in the street, of persons trying +to find out what is the matter. The apprentices come flocking, +mischievous instigators to mischief, and the journeymen, little +better than they. Soon, there is difference and quarreling among +those arriving to inquire the cause of the disturbance. Neighbours +pour into the street, men and women in night-attire; finally, the heavy +burghers arrive, the masters themselves, noisy, almost disorderly, +in their attempts to restore order. Beckmesser, singing at the top +of his lungs, does not <a name="page_232"><span class="page">Page +232</span></a> wake to consciousness of his surroundings until a +cudgel falls across his back, wielded by David. He flees—but +is at every few steps overtaken again and beaten. The two figures, +in flight and pursuit, waving lute and brandishing cudgel, disappear +and reappear at intervals among the swaying crowd. In vain Magdalene +from above screams to David to let the gentleman go. Pogner's hand +draws her away from the window; in the dim light he mistakes her +for Eva. Sachs, when the confusion is well under way, draws in his +work-bench and closes his door ... again all but a crack, through +which he can watch the two figures wrapped in a single cloak beneath +the linden-tree. When the disorder is at its height, Walther clasps +the girl with his left arm, with his right bares his sword, and +attempts a rush through the crowd, toward the gates and horses +of freedom. Quick as thought, Sachs has cleared his way to the +couple; he grasps Walther by the arm. Pogner at the same moment +appears at his door, calling for Lene. Sachs pushes toward him +Eva, half-fainting, bereft by panic of all power to withstand the +impulsion. Pogner receives her in his arms and draws her within +doors, not suspecting but that she is the faithful nurse whose +garments she wears. With deft foot Sachs propels David before him +into the house; then, forcibly drawing Walther with him across the +threshold, fastens the door,—his object happily accomplished. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The street-battle is still raging. But at this point women pour +water from the windows on the heads of the combatants, as they would +on fighting dogs. Simultaneously, the horn of the night-watchman +is heard. In the space of a yawn the scene is deserted; all down +the street are fast-closed windows and doors; Beckmesser hobbles +off rubbing his back. The old night-watchman, reaching the spot, +rubs his eyes, clearly wondering if he have dreamed that he heard +alarming sounds <a name="page_233"><span class="page">Page +233</span></a> from that quarter. After looking all around, he +droningly calls the hour of eleven, enjoins the people to be on +guard against phantoms and spooks, that no evil spirit may work +harm to their souls, and so let God the Lord be praised! The full +moon rising above the housetops suddenly floods the quiet lane. +The watchman slowly goes down it. As he vanishes around the corner, +the curtain falls. +</p> + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The interior of Sachs's workshop. The poet sits in an ample armchair, +near the window, bathed in the morning sunshine, absorbed in a +great book. The magnanimity of his mood, the beautiful deep calm +following upon certain resolutions and sacrifices, the gently exalted +melancholy of his meditations—half remembrance, and dreamy +as if violet shades of evening softened them,—the composer +has given us to apprehend all in the introduction to the third +act. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +So rapt is Sachs in the perusal of his great volume, or, as may +be suspected, in images which float between the page and his eyes, +that he does not see David enter carrying a basket of Lene's bestowal +filled with flowers and ribbons for the adornment of his person on +this festival day, as well as with cake and sausage. The apprentice, +when Sachs does not speak, or, spoken to, answer, or make sign when +he informs him that Beckmesser's shoes have been duly delivered, +believes him to be angry, and goes into a long apology for his +misconduct on the night before, brightening finally with the relation +of his making-up this morning with Lene, who has satisfactorily +explained all. Sachs reads on, as little disturbed as by the buzzing +of a fly on the pane. Only when he has finished, and closed his +book,—the unexpected clap of the covers so startles David +that he <a name="page_234"><span class="page">Page 234</span></a> +stumbles to his knees—Sachs looks around him, as if coming +back from a dream. His eye is caught by the bright flowers and +ribbons brought in by David. Their effect of young gayety touches +some chord in him more than usually sensitive at this moment. "Flowers +and ribbons I see over there," he muses audibly; "Sweet and youthful +they look! How come they in my house?" David is relieved to find him +in this gentle mood, yet puzzled at the remoteness and abstraction +from which the master is but slowly drawn. He has occasion for a +moment to wonder even whether the master have perchance become +hard of hearing.... +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Fully returned at length to a sense of the common surrounding world, +Sachs asks David for his day's lesson, and the apprentice briskly +sings his verse, first comically confusing the tune with that of +Beckmesser's serenade, still buzzing in his head, then, at Sachs's +gesture of astonishment, righting himself and acquitting himself of +his task without slip. The verse is a playful bit, between psalm +and street-song. It relates that when Saint John was baptising +on the banks of Jordan there came to him a lady from Nuremberg +bringing her little son for baptism. When she got home, however, to +German land, it proved that vainly had one on the banks of Jordan +been given the name of Johannes, on the banks of the Pegnitz he +became Hans! The pronouncing of the name brings to David's mind +the remembrance suddenly that it is his master's name, that the +day is therefore his name's-day. In an impulse of affectionate +devotion he presses on him all the gay articles just received from +Lene, the flowers and ribbons, the magnificent cake, and, but shyly, +as if it were not quite worthy of a poet, the sausage. With great +gentleness, Sachs thanks the lad and bids him keep the things for +himself, adding a request that he make himself fine with those +same flowers and ribbons to accompany him <a name="page_235"><span +class="page">Page 235</span></a> presently to the meadow outside +the city gates where the song-contest is to be held. His stately +herald he shall be. Sachs's friendliness encourages the boy to +venture a small liberty. "May I not rather go as your groom's-man? +Master, dear master, you must marry again!"—"You would be +glad of a mistress in the house?" asks Sachs dreamily.—"It +would make, in my opinion, a much more imposing household!" There +is popular talk and expectation of it, as an outcome of the coming +song-contest, David intimates; "You will hardly have much trouble, +as I think, in singing Beckmesser out of the field; I hardly believe +he will make himself very conspicuous to-day!"—"I hardly +believe so, either," Sachs smiles: "But go now, and be careful +not to disturb his lordship. Come back when you have made yourself +fine." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Left alone, Sachs sinks into thought again, sitting there with +his book on his knees and his head propped on his hand. We are +allowed to follow his reflections, those of a philosopher,—but +not one standing apart and watching a little scornfully the vagaries +of men; a very human being, taking part in them, without losing a +humourous sense of their character. "Illusion! Illusion! Everywhere +illusion! Whichever way I bend my inquiry, searching the chronicles +of the city and those of the world, to discover the reason why +people, in vain and frantic rage, torment and oppress themselves +and one another to the point of bloodshed! No one has any good +of it, or receives any thanks for it. Through its working, the +defeated and put to flight fancies himself chasing the foe. He is +deaf to his own cry of pain. When he twists the knife in his own +flesh, he has an idea that he is doing himself a pleasure! Who shall +find a name for it? One name, forsooth, befits it: Ancient Illusion +it is, without which nothing happens, nothing either goes or stands +still. If it halts in its career, it merely while slumbering <a +name="page_236"><span class="page">Page 236</span></a> gathers new +force; it presently wakes up, and then see who can master it!..." +He smiles whimsically, nodding to himself, at the contemplation of +the instance of all this uppermost in his mind, the events of the +evening before. "How peaceful, in its adherence to good customs, +approved in conduct and deed, lies in the heart of Germany my beloved +Nuremberg! But late upon a night, a man there is found totally +void of counsel how to prevent a catastrophe, resulting from youth +and hot blood. A shoe-maker in his shop tugs gently at the threads +of illusion: how promptly up and down the lanes and streets the +thing begins to rage; men, women, boys and children, fall upon one +another like mad and blind; and the crack-brained spirit is not +to be laid until a shower fall of blows—a shower of blows, +kicks and cudgel-thwacks, to smother the angry conflagration. God +knows how it all came about?" He smiles again, reflectively, over +the recollection of the lovely quiet evening it was, the terrific +discordant pother that arose,—the lovely and hushed night that +presently resumed her reign. The incident looks fantastic now. "An +imp must have had a hand in it!" is the poet's fanciful induction; +"A glow-worm could not find his mate, it was he responsible for +all the damage done! It was the fault of the elder-tree—of +Saint John's night! ... But now—" he broadly dismisses the +fancies and aberrations of the warm mid-summer night, and turns +his face toward the clear-defined duty of the day: "But now it is +Saint John's Day! And now let us see how Hans Sachs shall contrive +deftly to guide Illusion to the working out of a noble purpose. +For if the spirit will not let us rest even here in Nuremberg, +let it be for such works as seldom succeed by vulgar means, and +succeed never without some grain of illusion in the perpetrator +himself!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Walther appears at the door of an inner chamber. Sachs <a +name="page_237"><span class="page">Page 237</span></a> rises to +meet and greet his guest. They had a good talk the night before, +after the wise shoester's act of well-meant violence. Walther was +grateful, no doubt, upon calmer reflection, to have been saved +from the ruinous folly he had projected. The two men are obviously +fast friends. There is in Sachs's attitude a touching deference +toward the younger man, the heart-wholly acknowledged superior +in talent. It is a pleasant spectacle, the grey meistersinger's +eager glorying in the golden youth's simple, abundant, God-bestowed +gift. The motif of his address to Walther has a touch of charming +courtliness. "God keep your lordship! Did you find rest? You were +up late—you did, however, finally sleep?"—"A little," +Walther answers, "but soundly and well." There is something hushed +and fixed in Walther's aspect, as if he listened to voices no one +else could hear, gazed upon some vision invisible to others. He is +still under the spell of a recent marvellous impression. "I have +had—" he tells Sachs, when the latter genially asks is he +feeling, after his good sleep, in good form and of good courage, +"I have had a wonderfully beautiful dream...."—"A good omen, +that! Tell me your dream!"—"I hardly dare to touch it with +my thought, so do I fear to see it fade away."—"My friend," +the older poet with fine amenity takes up the part of teacher, and +his observations have a ripe, sunny, elevated wisdom, for which one +should store them carefully as one does good fruit, "that exactly +is the task of a poet, to mark dreams and interpret them. Believe +me, of all the illusions of man the most nearly approaching truth +are those he comes into cognisance of through dreams. The whole +art of poetry is but the interpretation of true-dreaming. What if +this dream now should contain a hint how you may to-day be made +a master?"—"No, no," Walther rejects the idea with distaste; +"In the presence of the guild and its masters, scant inspiration +would animate my <a name="page_238"><span class="page">Page +238</span></a> dream-picture!"—"But yet, suppose your dream +contained the magic spell by which you might win over the guild?" +Walther shakes his head: "How do you cling to an illusion, if after +such a rupture as you witnessed you still cherish such a +hope!"—"Nay, my hope stands undiminished, nor has anything +so far occurred to overthrow it; if that were not so, believe me, +instead of preventing your flight, I would myself have taken flight +with you! Pray you, therefore, let your resentment die! You are +dealing with honourable men. They make mistakes and are fairly +settled in the comfortable determination to be taken in their own +way. Those who offer prizes desire after all that one shall please +them. Your song scared them, and with reason, for, upon reflection, +the like flaming poetry and passion are adapted for the luring +of daughters into mad adventures, but the sentiment leading to +the blessed married state finds words and notes of a different +sort!" Walther grins: "I know the sort—from hearing them +last night; there was a good deal of noise out in the street." +Sachs laughs too; "Yes! yes!... You heard likewise how I beat time. +But let be all that, and follow my advice, good and short: summon +up your energies for a master-song!"—"A beautiful song, and +a master-song, how am I to seize the distinction between them?" +asks the singer of the beautiful song which had been despised. "My +friend," Sachs explains, with a warmth as of tears and blood, "in +the beautiful days of youth, when the bosom expands high and wide +with the mighty transports of happy first love, many are they who +can achieve a beautiful song: the Spring-time it is which sings for +them! But let summer come, autumn and winter, the sorrows and cares of +life,—no dearth of wedded joys along-side!—christenings, +business, discord and difficulties, those who still after all that +can compass the singing of a beautiful song, those, mark me, are +entitled <a name="page_239"><span class="page">Page 239</span></a> +masters!" Aye, first, as a modern poet has said, warm natural drops +of blood; later, the alchemist's laborious spheres of chemic gold. +In youth, all-sufficient inspiration,—later, labour and rule, +with meritorious concentration substituting for impetus and fire the +beauty of careful form, and making durable in this the evanescent +dreams of youth. "Learn the master-rules in good season," Sachs adds, +"that they may be faithful guides to you, helping you to preserve +safely that which in the gracious years of youth spring-time and love +with exquisite throes bred in your unconscious heart, that you may +store and treasure it, and it may not be lost!"—"But who—" +Walther asks, inclined to cavil where anything is concerned which +relates to the master-singers, "Who created these rules which stand +in such high honour?"—"They were sorely-needy masters," Sachs +in his moved tones continues the charming lesson, "spirits heavily +weighted with the weariness of life; in the wilderness of their +distresses they created for themselves an image, that they might +retain vivid and lasting the memory of young love, bearing the sign +and stamp still, and breathing the fragrance, of Spring!"—"But," +Walther objects, suspicious of that whole tribe of snuffy masters, +for whom Sachs has the same charity of a broad understanding which +he has shown in Walter's own case, "however can he for whom Spring +is long past fix the essence of it in an image?"—"He recreates +it as well as he can," Sachs sums with sudden curtness, recognising +perhaps the futility of his attempt against this so lively dislike; +and passes on to the point more important at this moment, to his +thinking. "I beg you, therefore, sorely-needy man that I am, if I +am to teach you the rules, that you should renew in me the sense +of that which originally gave them rise. See, here are ink, pen, and +paper. I will be your scribe, do you dictate."—"Hardly should I +know how to begin."—"Relate to me your <a name="page_240"><span +class="page">Page 240</span></a> morning dream."—"Nay, as a +result of your teaching of rules, I feel as if it had faded quite +away."—"The very point where the poet's art comes into +requisition! Recall your beautiful dream of the morning, for the +rest, let it be Hans Sachs's care!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Walther takes a moment to collect himself. Sachs sits with quill +poised over paper. Then Walther relates his dream, meeting Sachs's +request for a master-song by casting it as he goes, with the light +ease of genius, into verse and melody,—his second astonishing +improvisation, joyous as the first, but not agitated—reflective, +as if he filled Sordello's account of himself: "<i>I' mi son un +che quando Amore spira, noto, e quel che detta dentro vo +significando.</i>" I am one who when Love breathes, do note, and +that which he dictates within do go expressing. All things lovely +seem to have congregated in this dream of his; it is no wonder that +the lingering impression of it enveloped him with an atmosphere of +Paradise, and that he feared almost to breathe lest it be dispelled. +Just the words he has to use, without their relations, conjure up a +flock of alluring images: Morning-shine, roseate light, blossoms, +perfume, air, joy,—unimaginable joy, a garden! The idea that +a poet's song is as much a part of him as fruit is of the tree +stands illustrated by the fact that the song which falls on our +ear as in its ensemble so fresh, is yet composed in great part of +the Walther-motifs with which we have become familiar; his youth, +his enthusiasm, his courage and his love, all go into the making +of his song. As he said in answer to Kothner, what should be put +into his song unless the essence of all he had known and lived? +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Glimmering beneath the rosy light of dawn, the air being laden +with the scent of flowers, a garden, he sings, full of never before +imagined attractions, had invited him to enter it.... +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"That was a stanza." Sachs states, as Walther pauses. "Take <a +name="page_241"><span class="page">Page 241</span></a> careful heed +now that the one following must be exactly like it."—"Why +exactly alike?" the free-born asks, ready to chafe at the shadow +of a restriction. Sachs, indulgent, makes play for this prodigious +child's sake of the to him so grave business of song-making: "That +one may see that you have selected a mate!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +In that blissful garden a magnificent tree had proffered to his +desire a sumptuous harvest of golden fruit.... Such is the matter +of the second stanza. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"You did not," Sachs critically considers, "close on the same tone. +Excruciating is that to the masters, but Hans Sachs learns from +your doing it that in Spring-time it must perforce be so! Proceed +now to the aftersong."—"What is that?" asks Walther. "Your +success in finding a well-suited couple will appear now from their +off-spring!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +In the garden, by an exquisite miracle, he had found suddenly standing +at his side a woman, more sweetly and graciously beautiful than +any he had ever beheld. Like a bride she had entwined her arms +softly about him, and had guided him, with eyes and hand, toward +the fruit of his desire, the fair fruit of the tree of life.... +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Joyfully stirred as he is by the beauty of dream and song, Sachs +controls his emotion, to secure all he can from the young poet's +momentary docility. "There's what I call an aftersong!" he exclaims +cordially; "See, now, how rounded and fine is the whole first part. +With the melody you deal, to be sure, a bit freely. I do not say, +however, that it is a fault. But it makes the thing more difficult +to retain, and that incenses our old men. Let us have now a second +part, that we may gain a clear idea of the first. I do not even +know, so skilfully have you cast them into rhyme, what in your +song was invention and what was dream...." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_242"><span class="page">Page 242</span></a> With +heavenly glow of sunset-light, day had departed, as he lay there +drinking joy from her eyes, desire the sole power in possession +of his heart. Night had closed down, baffling the eyesight, when, +through the branches, the rays of two bright stars had shed their +light upon his face. The sound of a spring upon the quiet height +had reached his ear, murmuring more musically than any spring heard +theretofore; stars had appeared in multitude, dancing among the +boughs overhead, until, instead of golden fruit, the laurel-tree +had swarmed with a host of stars.... +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Friend!" cries Sachs, striving against the full betrayal of his +pleasure, lest it be an interrupting element, "your dream was an +effectual guide! The second part is successful as the first. If +now," he ventures, "you would compose a third, it might contain +the interpretation of your dream...." But Walther jumps up from his +chair, suddenly weary of the game. "Enough of words!" And Sachs, with +sympathetic understanding of the incalculable ways of poets, refrains +from pressing him. That overbubbling inspiration he believes can be +counted upon. "Reserve then word and deed for the proper place. And +I pray you hold fast in memory, this melody, a charming one it is +to fit with words. And, against the moment of singing it in a more +extended circle, hold fast likewise to your dream!"—"What have +you in mind?" Walther inquires. Sachs does not directly enlighten +him, but: "Your faithful servant has, very seasonably, arrived +with packs and porte-manteaux. The garments in which you intended +to make yourself brave for wedding-ceremonials at home, he has +brought here to the house. A little dove no doubt directed him +to the nest where his master slept. Come with me therefore to your +chamber. Fitting it is we both attire ourselves splendidly, when +a splendid deed is to be dared!" Walther without question <a +name="page_243"><span class="page">Page 243</span></a> places his +hand, as if it held his whole confidence, in Sachs's. They pass +together out of the workshop. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The stage remains for a moment empty. The air retains as if echoes, +or fragrances, of the personalities which have but just withdrawn; it +is sweetened with effluvia of Walther's youth, of Sachs's greatness +of heart. Suddenly, like a bar of bilious green across a shimmering +mother-o'-pearl fabric, harmonies of a very different sort catch +the attention, and Beckmesser's face is seen peering in at the +window. Finding the workshop empty, he limps in. He is in holiday +array, but there is little of holiday about him, save in his gaudily +beribboned clothes. A long comedy-scene follows, in which Beckmesser +says never a word, but his thoughts are heard and his actions are +eloquent. His body is one mass of aches and pains, his soul the +battleground of anger, shame, thirst for vengeance. The din of the +evening before fills his ears; he is chased, as if by furies, by +memories of the indignities put upon him. He is so sore he cannot +sit; when he goes his joints hurt rackingly. His restless moving +about the room while he waits for Sachs brings him to the master's +writing-table: his eye falls on the sheet of music on which Sachs +has taken down Walther's song; his attention is arrested; he reads +it off mentally with ever-increasing agitation. No mistake possible, +in his mind: Sachs, who had declared that he would not enter the +song-contest for Pogner's daughter, has outrageously lied, and +here is the proof of it, this song which he means to sing at the +tournament. "Now," bursts forth Beckmesser, "everything becomes +clear to me!" He jumps, hearing Sachs at the door, and stuffs the +paper into his pocket. Sachs, in his handsome best-coat, meets him +pleasantly. "You surely are not having any more trouble with the +shoes?" Beckmesser's wrath holds in but a moment before voiding +itself upon Sachs in accusation and threat. "Be sure, <a +name="page_244"><span class="page">Page 244</span></a> friend Sachs, +I know you now!... That I may not stand in your way, you go so +far even as to incite the mob to riot.... You have always been +my enemy.... Now hear, whether I see through you. The maiden whom +I have chosen, who was verily born for me, to the frustration of +all widowers there be,—of her you are in pursuit! In order +that Master Sachs might gain the goldsmith's rich inheritance it +was that at the council of masters he stood upon minor clauses. +For that reason, fool that I was! with bawling and hammering he +tried to drown my song,—that the child might not be made +aware of another's ability! Yes, yes! Have I hit the mark? And +finally from his cobbler's shop he egged after me boys with cudgels, +that he might be rid of me.... Ouch! Ouch! Green and blue was I +beaten, made an object of derision to the beloved woman, so drubbed +and maltreated that no tailor's flat-iron can smoothe me out! Upon my +very life an attempt was made! But I came out of it with sufficient +spirit left to reward you for the deed. Stand forth to-day and +sing, do, and see how you prosper. Beaten and bruised as I am, +I shall certainly manage to throw you out of time!" Sachs has +unperturbedly let him spend himself. "My good friend, you are labouring +under a delusion. You are free to attribute to me what actions you +please... but I have not the least thought of competing." "Lies and +deceit!" roars Beckmesser, "I know better!" Sachs quietly repeats +his statement. "What else I have in mind is no affair of yours. +But concerning the contest you are in error."—"Not in the +contest? No competition-song?"—"Certainly not." Beckmesser +produces the piece of music. "Is that your hand?"—"Yes," +Sachs owns, amused; "Was that it?"—"I suppose you call it +a biblical lay?"—"Nay," laughs Sachs, "any one guessing it +to be such would hit wide enough of the mark."—"Well, +then?"—"What is it?"—"Do you ask me?"—"What <a +name="page_245"><span class="page">Page 245</span></a> do you +mean?"—"That you are, in all can dour, a rogue of the first +magnitude!" Sachs shrugs good-humouredly; "Maybe! I have never, +however, pocketed what I found upon another's table. That one may +not think evil of you, dear sir, keep the paper, I make you a gift +of it." Beckmesser leaps in the air with incredulous joy: "Lord +God! A poem of Sachs's!... But soft, that I may not be led into +fresh troubles. You have, no doubt," he insinuates, "committed +the thing perfectly to memory?"—"Have no uneasiness with +regard to that."—"You bestow the sheet on me then +outright?"—"To prevent you being a thief."—"And suppose +I made use of it?"—"You may do as you please."—"I may +sing it, then?"—"If it is not too difficult."—"And +if I should please my audience?"—"I should be greatly +astonished!"—Beckmesser misses the sly shoester's intention. +"You are too modest altogether," he says; and goes on to explain in +what dire need he stands of a new composition, since the song sung +the night before as a serenade can have no chance, if sung again +to-day, of charming the Pognerin, for whom it must be associated, +thanks to the cobbler's merry jests, with every undignified +circumstance. And how can he, poor belaboured wretch, find the +necessary peace of mind to compose a new one? Yet, if he have not +a new song, he must give up the hope of marriage. But a song of +Sachs's would enable him to overcome every obstacle; if he may +have it, let all the disagreements which have kept them apart be +forgotten and buried. But,—he suddenly holds in, and puckers +his forehead,—if this were a trap? "Even so late as yesterday," +he says to Sachs, "you were my enemy. How is it that after all +the troubles between us you are to-day kindly disposed toward +me?"—"I worked on your shoes until late at night," Sachs +disingenuously replies; "is that the sort of consideration one +shows an enemy?"—"True, true. But <a name="page_246"><span +class="page">Page 246</span></a> now give me your word. Whenever +and under whatever circumstances you hear that song, you will never +by any chance say that it is of your composing."—"I give you +my word and oath," Sachs assents, with a spice of wicked glee, +"that I will never boast of that song being mine."—Beckmesser's +spirits rise to heights of mad exhilaration. "What more do I want? +I am saved! Beckmesser need trouble no further!"—"Friend," +Sachs warns him, "in all kindness I advise you, study that song +carefully. It is of no easy execution."—"Friend Sachs," Beckmesser +waives the warning, "you are a good poet, but in all that relates to +tones and tunes there is no one goes ahead of me. But now, quickly +home, to learn the thing by heart. Hans Sachs, my dear fellow, +I have misunderstood you. My judgment was thrown off the track +by that adventurer. Just such a one was needed! But we masters +made short work of him! Good-bye! I must be off! Elsewhere will +I show my gratitude for your sweet friendliness. I will vote for +you hereafter, I will buy your works. I will make you Marker!" +Effusively he embraces him: "Marker, Marker, Marker Hans Sachs!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Hans Sachs looks after the departing figure with a meditative smile. +"So entirely ill-natured have I never yet found any one. He cannot +fail to come to grief of some sort. Many there be who squander +their wits, but they reserve enough to keep house with. The hour +of weakness comes for each one of us, when he turns fool and is +open to parley." So entirely ill-natured Beckmesser has been found +that Sachs feels no compunction at letting him run into the pitfall +gaping ahead. He is willing to win an advantage by a deception, let +him follow his head, why should honest Sachs be tender of him? The +joke is not severe beyond his deserts. He has candidly rejoiced that +short work was made of that adventurer, Von <a name="page_247"><span +class="page">Page 247</span></a> Stolzing; why should he not be +permitted to encounter the same sort of treatment? Why indeed should +not his dishonesty be turned to use? "That Master Beckmesser here +turned thief," reflects Sachs, "falls in excellently with my plan." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Eva appears in the doorway, Eva dazzling in her white wedding-dress. +"I was wondering," says Sachs to himself at sight of her, "where +she could be!" For, as Walther was known to be in the house, it +was thought she must before long find some pretext to stand beneath +the same roof. She wears a little languid air; last evening was a +sore trial to young nerves. A tinge of accusing plaintiveness is in +her voice. She is markedly abstracted; her thoughts are wandering, +of course, all about the house in search of <i>him</i>. She has her +pretext ready, and meets Sachs's warm compliment upon her appearance +with a reproachful: "Ah, master! So long as the tailor has done +his work successfully, who ever will divine where I suffer +inconvenience, where secretly my shoe pinches me?"—"The wicked +shoe!" Sachs is for a moment really deceived; "It was your humour +yesterday not to try it on."—"You see? I had too much confidence. +I was mistaken in the master."—"I am sorry, indeed I am!" +He is on his knee at once: "Let me look at it, my child, that I +may help you, right off, quick!"—"As soon as I stand on it, +it obliges me to go; and as soon as I go, it obliges me to +stand."—"Place your foot here on the stool, I will remedy +the evil at once. Now, what is wrong with it?"—"You can see, +it is too wide!"—"Child, that is pure vanity. The shoe is +snug."—"That is what I said, and that is why it pinches my +toes."—"Here, at the left?"—"No, the right."—"At +the instep?"—"No, the heel."—"What?" he asks incredulously, +"Something wrong too with the heel?"—"<i>Ach</i>, master," +she exclaims, "do you know better than I where my shoe pinches +me?"—"I can only wonder," he replies, good-humouredly, <a +name="page_248"><span class="page">Page 248</span></a> "that your +shoe should be loose and yet pinch you everywhere!" The door of +the inner room opens at this moment, and Walther stands upon the +threshold in the rich gala costume of a young noble. Eva at sight +of him in his splendour utters a cry, and remains spell-bound, +gazing. He stops short in the doorway, spell-bound equally at sight +of her in her shimmering bride's-robe of white,—and from +their eyes, fixed unwaveringly upon each other, their hearts travel +forth on luminous beams to meet and mingle. Sachs's back is toward +Walther; he has not see him, but the tell-tale light on Eva's face, +reflection of a sun-burst, has reported to him of the apparition. +He pretends not to see. "Aha! Here is the trouble!" he speaks, as +if nothing were; "Now I see what the matter is! Child, you were +right, the seams are stiff. Just wait and I will set the matter +aright. Stay where you are, I will take the shoe and put it on the +last for a minute. After that it will give you no further trouble." +He draws the shoe tenderly from her childish foot, and leaves her +standing, statue-still, lost in her trance of contemplation, with +her foot on the stool, while he takes the shoe to his bench and +pretends to work at it. He cannot forbear,—while he plays +his little comedy, and those two angelically beautiful beings, +saved and aided by him, between whom he shares his big heart, stand +hushed, drinking, in oblivion of all, the heavenly nectar of each +other's glances,—he cannot forbear teasing the little lady +a bit, giving her a little lesson, taking a very mild vengeance on +her for the faintly perfidious wiles of yesterday. So he runs on, +while making himself busy with her shoe: "Forever to be cobbling! +That is my fate. Night nor day, no deliverance for me! Child, listen! +I have thought over what shall bring my shoe-making to an end. The +best thing I can do will be after all to enter the contest for your +hand. I might thus at least win something for myself as a poet!... +<a name="page_249"><span class="page">Page 249</span></a> You are +not listening? Yet it was yourself put the idea in my head.... +Oh, very well! I see! Attend to your shoes! If at least," he slyly +suggests, without turning, "some one would sing to me while I work! +I heard to-day a regularly beautiful song. If just a third verse, +equally successful, might be added to it!" Like the hypnotised +receiving a suggestion, Walther, ready as a bird, breaks forth +singing, his gaze never swerving from Eva: "Did the stars come +to a pause in their charming dance? Light and clear, above the +clustering locks of the most beautiful of all women, glittered with +soft brilliancy a crown of stars..." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Listen, child," Sachs bids Eva, in the short pause between the +verses, "that is a master-song!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Miracle upon miracle! A double radiance of day now illumines me, +for, even as two suns of purest delight, two divinely beautiful +eyes bend their light upon me...." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"That," says Sachs, "is the sort of thing you hear sung in my house +nowadays!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Oh, gracious vision which my heart found boldness to approach! +The wreath, which in the rays of the twin suns shows pale at once +and green, tenderly and mildly she weaves about the consort's head. +Into the breast of the poet—born erst to joy, now elect to +glory,—Paradisal joy she pours, in Love's dream!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Sachs has been enabled to keep in hand his emotion at the sound +of the ecstatic song by diligently busying himself with the shoe, +uttering at intervals small insignificant remarks: "Let us see, +now, whether I have got my shoe aright. I believe I have finally +succeeded, eh? Try it, now!" He has slipped it on to her foot, +"Walk on it! Tell me, does it still hurt?" But Eva, who has stood +breathlessly gazing and listening to the thrilling accents, new to +her, of her lover, when the heart-searching <a name="page_250"><span +class="page">Page 250</span></a> voice is silent and the tension +relaxes, bursts into passionate weeping, sinks on Sachs's breast +and clings to him, sobbing. Walther with a quick stride is beside +them; impulsively he grasps the hand of the good Sachs, to whom +he dimly feels he owes so much,—to whom he owes really more +than he dreams. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +For a moment not one of them can speak. Then it becomes too much +for Sachs, this soft beloved form trembling against his breast; +he gently frees himself and allows the burden he relinquishes to +slide upon the shoulder of Walther. Like a noble dog shaking his +fur, he takes himself away and finds occupation at the further end +of the room, trying by his commonplace playful talk to dispel the +oppression of a too great emotion. Again he must, all for her good, +tease Evchen a bit. "Has not a shoe-maker his fill of troubles?" he +grumbles; "Were I not at the same time a poet, not another shoe +would I make. So much hard work, such a perpetual calling upon +you! This one's shoe is too loose, that one's too tight, here it +claps, it hangs at the heel, there it presses, it pinches. The +shoe-maker must know everything, mend everything that is torn, +and if he be in addition a poet, then verily he is not allowed a +moment's peace. But if, on top of all, he be a widower, then he +is in all truth regarded as a very fool! The youngest of maidens, +if a husband is wanted, request him to apply for them; let him +understand them or let him not, it is all the same; let him say +yes, let him say no, in the end he is told that he smells of pitch, +and is called stupid, cantankerous, and impertinent! I wouldn't +care so much," he concludes humourously, "but for my apprentice. +He is losing all respect for me!..." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The conscience-smitten girl flings her arms around him again: "Oh, +Sachs, my friend, oh, noble heart, how can I ever repay you? Without +your love, what were I? What were I, <a name="page_251"><span +class="page">Page 251</span></a> without you? I should have remained +a child forever, had you not awakened me. Through you I won the +things one prizes, through you I learned what a soul is. Through +you I awoke, through you alone I learned to think nobly, freely, +courageously. You guided my growth, and brought me to flowering. +Oh, dear master, scold me, well you may!... But yet I was on the +right track. For, had I any choice, you, no other, should be my +husband. I would hold out the prize to you alone. As it is, I myself +have been chosen—to never-before-dreamed-of torment! And if +this day I am wedded, it will be without choice of my own. Coercion +I have suffered, have suffered violence. You know, master, that the +force of it frightened even you!"—"My child," he replies, +mildly, collectedly—if feelingly and a little sadly, to her +impulsive confession, while a known, poignant strain, like a profound +sigh, holds the ear for a moment, an echo from a different opera, +"of Tristan and Isolde I know the sorrowful story. Hans Sachs was +shrewd and would have none of King Mark's happiness!" With a return +to the lightness which is his policy of the moment, he adds, lest +emotion too far unnerve them all: "Full time it was that the right +one should appear, or I should after all have run into the snare!... +Aha! There comes Lene looking for you. Hey, David, aren't you coming?" +Nurse and apprentice enter, one from outside and one from within, +in their holiday garments. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"The witnesses are here, the sponsors present, now quickly to the +christening! Take your places!" Sachs directs. All look at him +in wonder. He lays before them his idea of giving, with proper +ceremony, a name to the master-song born in his house. It is a +poet's fancy, an act of tender superstition on Sachs's part, a +form by which he tries to lay a helpful charm or blessing upon the +new-born creation on which so much depends; <a name="page_252"><span +class="page">Page 252</span></a> send it forth equipped as well as +possible with spiritual arms, that it may, as he says, "grow great +without harm or mishap." The young melody's father, of course, +is Walther; the Pognerin and he, Sachs, will stand its sponsors; +Lene and David shall be witnesses. But as an apprentice is not a +proper witness, David is promoted with the rite of a smart box on +the ear from apprentice to journeyman. Sachs suggests as the name of +the new-born: Song of Interpretation of the Blissful Morning-Dream, +and the young godmother is requested to speak appropriate words over +it. The point of what follows is hardly in Eva's words, pretty as +they are; the point is that one of the most extraordinary quintets +that ever charmed human ear serves as baptismal send-off to the +infant melody. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Each of the five singing together expresses, according to custom +in concerted pieces, the aspect which the common subject, or the +hour, has for him. And so dear Sachs, while Eva and Walther rejoice +on their side, and David and Lene—to whom the apprentice's +promotion opens vistas of mastership and marriage,—rejoice +on theirs, Sachs, adding a less glad but more serene voice to the +glorious sheaf of song, reveals his heart,—with no one to +listen, for all are singing. "Full fain"—he sighs, "Full +fain had I been to sing before the winsome child, but need was +that I should place restraint upon the sweet disorderly motions of +the heart. A lovely evening dream it was, hardly dare I to think +upon it...." But the wreath of immortal youth shall be the poet's +reward. Impertinent to pity the sturdy Sachs, who has his poetry +and his strong heart. And he has at all moments been wiser than +his lovely evening dream. There has been really no renunciation on +his part, for he had never allowed himself any serious parleying +with the tender temptation. Not for an instant does he present himself +as a <a name="page_253"><span class="page">Page 253</span></a> +sentimental figure; but the generosity with which he employs himself +to secure for others the happiness which, though in his good sense +he had denied it to himself, his heart had yet caressed in its +alluring evening dream, makes him a magnanimous one. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +It is time when they have finished to start for the seat of the +Saint John's Day celebration. Sachs sends Eva home to her father, +orders David to close the shop, and starts along with Walther. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +While the curtain is lowered for the change of scene, one of those +musical transformations takes place of which there are several +instances in these operas. With elements we know, new elements +begin to mingle; the old are withdrawn, and presently, musically, +as ocularly, the scene is changed. We behold a green meadow on +the banks of the Pegnitz; in the distance, the city of Nuremberg. +The place is decorated for holiday. There is a great stand for +the master-singers and judges in the song-contest. Crowds of +holiday-makers are on the spot already, more still arrive by the +river in bright boats. The various guilds march in procession with +their respective insignia, shoe-makers, tailors, bakers. Apprentices +and young girls dance together to a measure daintily gay as their +fluttering ribbon-knots. Conspicuous among them is David, so forgetful +for the moment of Lene and himself as to imprint a glowing kiss on +his partner's cheek. Frivolities stop short with the arrival of +the masters. These assemble to the sound of what we will call their +unofficial march; then, to their great march, they walk to their +places on the stand, Kothner waving the banner of the guild, and the +people acclaiming. Pogner escorts Eva to the seat of honour. When +all are in their places, a corps of young apprentices, filling the +function to-day of heralds, and carrying staffs of office liberally +be flowered, call out in Latin the <a name="page_254"><span +class="page">Page 254</span></a> order for silence. Quiet being +established, Sachs, spokesman for the occasion, rises. At once +the silence is shattered by cheers for the popular poet, cries +of joy at sight of him; there is waving of kerchiefs and hats. To +show how every one knows and loves his songs, the people entone +one of them all together and sing it jubilantly through; and "Long +live Sachs!" they shout, "Hans Sachs! Long live Nuremberg's beloved +Hans Sachs!" It is too much for poet to experience unmoved, and +Sachs's voice, when the people quiet down at last, to listen, only +gradually regains its manly firmness. "You ease your own hearts +and burden mine, in offering me, unworthy, too great honour. If I +am not to sink crushed beneath it, let it be in the thought that +it is the gift of your love. Great honour already has fallen to +my portion to-day, in that I have been elected to the dignity of +spokesman. And the announcement which I have to make to you, believe +me, is full of high honour!" He imparts to them Pogner's project, +but with these important modifications or omissions,—and +it is they which constitute the stroke Sachs has been preparing. +No mention whatever is made of the limitations determined upon by +the masters at the last meeting: that the singers contending must +be members of the guild, and that the masters exclusively shall be +judges. So the offer stands: A lovely girl and a rich inheritance +shall be the portion of the singer who before the assembled people +shall carry off the prize,—awarded, one naturally understands, +since nothing different is stated, by popular acclamation. Free +candidature, therefore popular election! And Sachs so presents +the thing that the masters cannot very well object, if even they +had the courage to chance the awkwardness of a public scene; they +can hardly claim it is not fair that they, presumably superior in +song to non-masters, should accept the contest on the same terms. +Sachs's peculiar audacity <a name="page_255"><span class="page">Page +255</span></a> has lain in his taking the risk of a perfectly justified +revolt on the part of the masters against his high-handed proceeding; +he has counted on the restraining effect of the public occasion; has +counted on luck, which proverbially follows the bold. High-handed, +his course, undeniably, but too much was at stake for any narrow +consideration to hold back Sachs: the happiness of Eva,—of, +as he says, at the conclusion of his announcement, "the amiable +stainless one, who must never be made to regret that Nuremberg holds +in such honour art and its professors!" Hearty applause follows +his words. Pogner grasps his hand, moved, infinitely relieved. +"Oh, Sachs, my friend, what thanks do I owe you! How did you know +what was weighing on my heart?"—"Much was staked upon that +cast," replies Sachs; "now pluck up heart!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He catches sight of Beckmesser, who ever since arriving with the rest +of the masters has been feverishly studying his bit of music-sheet, +at intervals wiping the desperate sweat from his brow. "Mr. Marker, +how are you getting on?"—"Oh, this song!" groans the Marker, +"I cannot make head or tail of it, and I have worked over it, in +all truth, hard enough!" Sachs shows him, if he but knew it, a way +of escape. "My friend, you are not obliged to use it."—"What +is the good? My own song, through your fault, is done for. Now be +a kind dear fellow, it would be abominable of you to leave me in +the lurch."—"It is my opinion that you had better give it +up."—"Give it up?... Well, hardly! I can easily beat all +the others, if only you will not sing. I am certain that no one +will understand the song, but I am building upon your popularity." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Sachs abandons him to his fate, and declares the song-contest open. +Kothner summons the contestants, "And let the oldest," he calls, +"come first. Master Beckmesser, pray begin. We are late!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_256"><span class="page">Page 256</span></a> The little +heralds have piled up grassy sods into a sort of pedestal for the +singers to stand on. They lead Beckmesser to this. He stumbles in +going, and can hardly from nervousness keep his balance on the none +too secure elevation. The common people begin to titter. Murmurs +fly from one to the other: "What? That one? That is one of the +suitors? Why, he can't even walk!... Keep quiet! He is an eminent +master! He is the town-clerk.... Lord, what a muff! He is toppling +over!... Be still, and stop your jokes; he has a seat and a voice +in the committee!..."—"<i>Silentium! Silentium!</i>" calls +the chorus of little heralds. And Kothner: "Begin!" Beckmesser, +after bowing to the queen of the day and to the assembly, gives +forth, haltingly, Walther's song as he remembers it, as it has +become with passing through the medium of his mind. What he utters, +with many an anxious peep at the crumpled manuscript, is nonsense +of the most ludicrous. For every word he substitutes another of +distantly the same sound, but different meaning, betraying how +he has not understood a syllable. The melody, if so were he had +mastered it, has completely dropped from his mind, and what he +sings to the eccentric words is his own serenade, but perverted +by the interference of the alien influence. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The masters at the end of the first verse look at one another, +mystified. "What is that? Has he lost his senses? An extraordinary +case! Do our ears deceive us?" The people giggle and make remarks, +not too loud as yet. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At the end of the second verse, the masters inquire of one another, +"What does it mean? Has he gone mad? His song is one piece of nonsense!" +while the people giggle louder and make remarks less and less +respectful. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At the end of the third verse, populace and masters burst into +peals of laughter. Beckmesser descends from his pedestal <a +name="page_257"><span class="page">Page 257</span></a> and hurls +himself raging at Sachs. "Accursed cobbler! To you I owe this!—The +song is none of mine," he excitedly informs the rest. "Sachs here, +whom you honour so, your Sachs gave me the song. The scandalous +wretch compelled me to sing it, he foisted off his miserable song +on me!" He dashes the sorry-looking manuscript at Sachs's feet, +and rushes off like one pursued by a nest of hornets. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Amazement reigns among master-singers and people: "A song of Sachs's? +The matter grows more and more astonishing! The song is yours? Be +so good, Sachs, as to explain!" Sachs has picked up and smoothed +out the crumpled page. "The song, as a matter of truth, is not +of my composing. Herr Beckmesser is mistaken, in this respect as +in others. How he obtained it let him tell you himself. But never +should I be audacious to the point of boasting that so fine a song +had been written by me, Hans Sachs."—"What?... Fine?... That +crazy rubbish? Sachs is joking! He says that in fun!"—"I +declare to you, gentlemen, that the song is beautiful. But it is +obvious at a single glance that Master Beckmesser misrepresents +it. I swear to you, however, that you would hear it with delight +were one to sing it in this circle correctly as to word and melody. +And one who should be able to do this would by that fact sufficiently +prove that he is the author of the song, and that in all justice, +if he found just judges, he would be called a master. I have been +accused and must defend myself. Let me therefore summon a witness. +If any one is present who knows that right is on my side, let him +come forward as a witness before this assembly." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Quietly and quickly, with his proudly-borne head and his light +proud step, Walther advances. A murmur of pleasure runs through +the assembly at sight of him, in his resplendent clothes and plumed +hat. The good populace on whom Sachs <a name="page_258"><span +class="page">Page 258</span></a> had counted do not disappoint +him: the gallant young figure finds instantaneous favour. "A proper +witness, handsome and spirited," they comment, "from whom something +proper may be expected!" The master-singers are not slow to recognise +the intruder of yesterday, and to grasp the situation. They accept +it good-humouredly enough, with artistic appreciation, no doubt, +of Sachs's well managed <i>coup de théâtre</i>. "Ah, +Sachs, confess that you are a sly one! But, for this once, have +your way!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Masters and people are agreed to try the worth of my witness," +Sachs announces; "Herr Walther von Stolzing, sing the song. And you, +masters, see if he render it aright." He hands them the manuscript. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Walther takes his stand on the flowery mound and starts singing +the song we know already. Presently however, the song lifts him +away, and he alters, as with that power of inspiration behind him +how could he help?—he amplifies, makes more beautiful still. +But by that time the masters have become so interested that they +withdraw their attention from the manuscript, and follow enthralled +the voice of the singer alone. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The song is in its final effect considerably different from the +original one, being the fruit of the moment, like Walther's other +improvisations. It preserves, however, both in text and tune, a +sufficient likeness to the first to prove it of an identical source. +It is the same dream he tells, but expressed in different images. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +In a blessed love-dream, he had been led to a garden where, beneath +a miraculous tree, he had beheld—vision promising fulfilment +to love's wildest desire!—a woman of all-surpassing beauty: +Eve, in the garden of Paradise.... +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +In a poet's waking dream, he had been lured by the crystal murmur +of a spring up a steep path. There, beneath a laurel-tree, he had +beheld—and from her hand had received upon his <a +name="page_259"><span class="page">Page 259</span></a> brow water +from the sacred fount,—a woman of a beauty grave and sublime: +the Muse of Parnassus.... +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +There is no doubt of the impression the song produces upon the +audience. As he pauses between the verses, Walther cannot but seize +their irrepressible exclamations. "That is a very different matter! +Who would have thought it?" The people surrender heart-wholly. +"How it soars,—so sweet, so far from earth, and yet it is +all as if one had lived through it himself!"—"It is bold +and unusual, but well-rhymed and singable!" the masters admit. The +circumstances of this hearing are different enough from yesterday's. +The infection of Beckmesser's jealous spite is wanting; softening +influences are in the lovely scene, the poetic occasion. The pure +ecstasy of the song has a chance to work its spell, to transport +them outside of their limitations. They are honourable men, as +Sachs assured Walther; they have no <i>parti pris</i> of bolts +and shutters against the New; on occasion they can be generous. +"Yes, yes, I see, it is quite another thing," they say, "when it +is sung aright!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Sure of victory, already triumphant, Walther leaps to the goal: +"Oh, day most rich in blessing, on which I awake from my dream! The +Paradise I saw in sleep lies before me in intensified splendour. The +murmuring spring lures me along the way which leads to it,—and +the One whose home is there, the elect of my heart, the loveliest of +earth, my muse and inspiration, as holy and high as she is fair, +I have boldly wooed her,—I have won, by the bright light of +day, through the victory of song, both Parnassus and Paradise!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Before the last note has died, all are clamouring together, awarding +to Walther the master-prize. "Reach him the wreath! There is no lover +or singer like him!" And then Walther's exquisite morning-dream comes +true. He kneels before the <a name="page_260"><span class="page">Page +260</span></a> woman more graciously beautiful than any he had +ever seen, while, bending upon him eyes luminous with joy as twin +suns, she places upon his head the wreath of laurel and myrtle, +the poet's and lover's crown. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Pogner wrings Sachs's hand. "Oh, Sachs, to you I owe happiness +and honour!" He draws a sigh of immense well-being. "Lifted is the +weight from my heart!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +There are congratulations and rejoicings. In the general glow of +good-humour, voices of master-singers call out to Pogner: "Up Master +Pogner, and announce to his lordship his admission to the master-guild!" +Pogner takes the decoration of the order, the gold chain with the +three medallions, and with the words, "I receive you into the +master-guild," is casting it over the victorious singer's head, +when Walther starts back, as from something of horridly unpleasant +association, and makes a gesture of uncompromising refusal. "Not +a master, no!... I mean to be happy without that title!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +An uncomfortable silence follows upon the hard snub. All look toward +Sachs, whose face has clouded over with pain. He walks to Walther, +and seizing him by the hand, as one might a child, to bring it to +reason, vigorously speaks the defence of the order to which he +belongs. "Despise not the masters, but, rather, honour their art. +The great good you have this day received speaks loud in their +praise. Not to your ancestors, however great, not to your coat of +arms, your spear or sword, but to the fact that you are a singer, +that you have proved yourself a master, you owe to-day your highest +happiness. If then you apply to the question a grateful mind: how +can that art be of no account which holds such prizes? That our +masters cared for it in their own way, that according to their +lights they were faithful to it, that is what has preserved it. +Though it no longer is aristocratic, as in the times when it was +fostered <a name="page_261"><span class="page">Page 261</span></a> +by princes and courts, yet despite the stress of evil years it has +remained German, it has remained sincere. And if it had prospered +nowhere but among us, with our burdens and restrictions, you can +see in what honour it is held here. What more do you require of +the masters?... Have a care! Evil contingencies threaten! Should +the day come when the German people and kingdom fall asunder, its +princes, seduced by false outlandish splendours, would soon no +longer understand the language of their own people, and outlandish +error, outlandish vanities, would be sown by them in German soil. +In that day, should it come, no one would know any longer what +is German and genuine, did it not survive by grace of the German +masters! Then honour the German masters! By that spell shall you +command good genii! And if you second them by your favour, holy +Rome may pass away in smoke: we shall still have our holy German +art!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Nobly and contritely Walther bows his head, and Sachs hangs about +his neck the collar of the guild. Eva, fired, takes from her lover's +fair curls the laurel-wreath, and presses it upon the grisled head +of the master. He stands radiant between the two whose happiness +is his work. The populace wave their hats and kerchiefs, cheering, +"Hail, Sachs! Hans Sachs! Hail Nuremberg's beloved Hans Sachs!" +</p> + +<p class="indent gap"> +One cannot help imagining, in "Meistersinger," a fragment of +autobiography, a recollection of days when Wagner must have heard +on all sides concerning his work what we still occasionally hear, +such words as he puts into the mouth of Beckmesser: "<i>Kein Absatz +wo, kein' Coloratur! Von Melodei auch nicht eine Spur!</i>" No +pause anywhere for breath! No appropriate colouring! Of melody not +the remotest trace! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_262"><span class="page">Page 262</span></a> No pause +anywhere for breath! The headlong rush it has of genius. No appropriate +colouring! The colouring happens merely to be new. Of melody not the +remotest trace,—when in this opera particularly the composer +casts melodies up in the air like golden balls and juggles with +them; when, like a conjurer, he goes on taking fresh roses in absurd +abundance out of a horn that should naturally have been ten times +empty! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +If we may translate the personages of this delicious play into +types, Walther must stand for the poet and singer by God's grace, +fresh young Genius, winged bringer of a new message. Beckmesser +for Old School, where it has become fossil, where forms moulded +on life have become void and dry, and rules are held sufficient +without breath of inspiration. Nay, inspiration, which jostles and +disturbs rule, is regarded with suspicion. Inspiration to Beckmesser +is as much an intruder as would be Saint Francis coming to visit +some Prior of his own order long after the spirit animating the +saint had been hardened into forms. Hans Sachs, then, is a sort +of Ideal Critic, with affection and allegiance toward the past, +but with a fair and open mind toward the new. Walther himself could +have no more admirable attitude, more perfect temper, toward Art, +than Sachs. It is only to be hoped that in his maturity he was +as tolerant and broad-minded. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The wise, the gentle Sachs! It is a pity that in listening to an +opera one hears so little of the words, for there fall from his +genial lips precepts which it would be really worth while to impress +upon the memory, among which could there be a more golden than his +word to critics: "When you find that you are trying to measure +by your own rules that which does not lie within the compass of +your rules, the thing to do is to forget your rules and try to +discover the rules of that which you wish to measure!". +</p> + +<p class="bigtitle"> +<a name="page_263"><span class="page">Page 263</span></a> +TRISTAN AND ISOLDE</p> + +<h2><a name="page_265"><span class="page">Page 265</span></a> +TRISTAN AND ISOLDE</h2> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The Ouverture to Tristan and Isolde is singularly calculated to +create the mood in which the Opera needs to be heard. It discourses of +nothing but love. It is long, it knocks and presses upon chords lying +abysmally below thought, until these vibrate in response,—and +the curtain goes up before an almost helplessly sympathetic listener. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Chief among the emotions expressed in this harmonious setting-forth +of the argument,—rich in sighs, glances, caresses,—is +certain tragic yearning, which seems of the very essence of love, +the love in question; tragic, because it is a thirst which from +the nature of things admits of no satisfaction upon the earth we +know, since its demand is no less than fusion of one soul and flesh +into another, so that each is completely possessed and neither knows +any more which of the two he is; the condition we hear the lovers +sigh for later on their bank of flowers in the warm summer night: +"I," says the man, "shall be Isolde, you will be Tristan."—"I +shall be Tristan," the woman says, "and you Isolde." Nay, there +shall be no more Tristan, no more Isolde, but nameless, indivisible, +possessed of a single consciousness, they shall float in an eternal +night of love to ever-new recognitions, ever-new ardours.... +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The story belongs to the period of King Arthur and his Round Table. +At that time Cornwall, we learn, was subject <a name="page_266"><span +class="page">Page 266</span></a> to Ireland, to the extent at least +of owing tribute. But the subject country, with increase of power, +had become impatient of the tax, and, when the Irish hero Morold +was sent to collect it, a knight of the Cornish court, Tristan, +fought and slew him, and in lieu of the exacted tribute sent back +his head to Ireland. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Tristan had not come forth unhurt from the combat in which Morold +had fallen. With the peculiar daring which earned him the fame of +"hero without equal, wonder of all nations," he took the wound +of which he was dying to the country of the enemy, to the very +castle of the Irish King whose daughter Isolde's affianced he had +slain. For Isolde was renowned for her skill in the art of medicine. +The Queen, her mother, possessed even rarer secrets of magic. In a +small skiff, almost unattended, Tristan, obscuring his glory under +the name of Tantris, came to Isolde to be healed. The high-born +physician gave him faithful care. No one suspected him, until Isolde, +remarking a trifling notch in his sword, made the discovery that +a steel splinter which she had removed from the severed head of +Morold fitted it. This man, then, completely in her power, was +Tristan, the enemy of her land, the slayer of her betrothed. The +duty of a princess of the time was clear. She caught up the sword +and approached his bed with the intention of avenging Morold's +death. But the wounded man unclosed his eyes, and glancing past +the sword, past the hand which brandished it, looked into her eyes. +And, inexplicably, she could not proceed; pity moved her, she let +the sword sink. She kept the secret of his identity. She applied +herself more than ever diligently to heal him, "that he might betake +himself home, and burden her no more with the look of his eyes." +He went at last with professions of eternal gratitude. The least +he could have done, in accordance with these, so it seemed to her, +was to preserve silence as she had preserved it, to let the <a +name="page_267"><span class="page">Page 267</span></a> incident +have no more result than as if oblivion had engulfed it. Instead of +which, behold before long Tristan arriving in his own resplendent +person, with an embassy of Cornish nobles, to arrange peace between +the two countries and obtain the hand of the Irish king's daughter +for the Cornish sovereign, Mark, his uncle. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Now the Irish, being, as we gather, at a disadvantage in any match +of force with the insolent tributaries who had cast off their yoke, +could not well refuse,—could not afford to give offence by +refusing. The alliance was in truth a splendid one,—were it not +for that old unavenged affront! Even as matters stood, the proposal +admitted of being looked upon in the light of reparation,—if one +did not see in it, as did one of the principal personages involved, +a second insult more intolerable than the first. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The Cornish suit was successful. The feud was publicly declared +at an end, and peace sworn to. The heiress of the Irish crown set +sail for Cornwall under the escort of Tristan. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The curtain rising shows the rich pavilion on ship-deck where Isolde +hides her face from the light against the cushions of a day-bed. +Her attendant, Brangaene, stands gazing over the ship-side. The +voice of a young sailor is heard from the rigging out of sight. +Now, though the Cornish diplomats have comported themselves during +their mission with delicacy, the crew accompanying them take less +trouble to conceal the glee they feel over the humiliation of their +former lords, signified in this present carrying off of Ireland's +proudest jewel. Isolde, spite of all courteous forms, is regarded +by them as, in a sense, a prize of war. Some hint of this appears +in the song of the young seaman, who permits himself references +to the "wild and lovely Irish maid," and asks whether they be her +sighs which swell his sail. The words penetrate through Isolde's <a +name="page_268"><span class="page">Page 268</span></a> absorption; +she starts up in sudden fury, crying: "Who dares to mock me?" and +looks wildly around, as if she had been so engrossed in other scenes +that she did not, on returning to the light of day, know for a +moment where she was. Then she recognises Brangaene, and remembers, +and inquires where they are. "Streaks of blue are rising up out +of the West," Brangaene describes what she is watching, "softly +and swiftly sails the ship; on a calm sea before evening we surely +shall reach the land."—"What land?" Isolde asks unexpectedly. +"The verdant coast of Cornwall."—"Nevermore!" bursts from +the princess, "Not to-day! Not to-morrow!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Brangaene hurries to her, alarmed and wondering at the hurricane +of passion she now lets loose,—calling upon the arts of magic +to restore to her the lost power of commanding sea and storm, calling +upon the winds and waves to wreck this insolent ship and drown +everyone upon it! Brangaene stands aghast. What she had but dimly +apprehended, then, was true. She clings to her mistress, endeavouring +to calm her. "What, dear heart, have you so long been concealing from +me? Not one tear did you shed at parting from father and mother. +Hardly a word of farewell did you speak to those remaining behind. +Coldly and dumbly you left the land of home; pale and silent you +have been on the voyage, taking no food, taking no sleep, deeply +troubled, rigid and wretched,—how am I to endure to see you +thus, to be nothing to you, to stand before you as a stranger? +Oh, tell me what troubles you! Tell me, make known to me what is +torturing you! If she is to think herself in any measure dear to +you, confide now in Brangaene!" The unhappy Isolde, suffocating, +gasps for air: "Air!... Air!... My heart is smothering!... Open! +Open wide!" Brangaene hurriedly draws apart the tapestries which +form the wall of the apartment at the back. The deck of the ship +<a name="page_269"><span class="page">Page 269</span></a> is seen +from mainmast to stern; sailors busy with ropes, groups of knights +and their esquires lounging. Tristan stands apart from the rest, +with folded arms, staring abstractedly over the water. His servant +Kurwenal lies idly outstretched at his feet. Isolde's eyes at once +find the half-averted figure; her absorption in it becomes equal +to his in the unknown object of the thoughts engrossing him. She +does not hear this time the sailor at the topmast singing over again +the song she had before resented; "O Irish maid, where tarriest +thou? Is it the force of thy sighs which fills my sails?" Slow, +involuntary, words drop from her lips, her inmost thoughts speaking +to herself, while her eyes brood gloomily upon the unconscious head. +"Mine elected,—lost to me! Lofty and beautiful,—brave +and craven! Death-devoted head! Death-devoted heart!" Starting +awake at the ring of her own words, she laughs unpleasantly and, +turning to Brangaene: "What do you think of the lackey yonder?" +Brangaene's glance follows Isolde's. She does not understand. "Whom +do you mean?"—"The hero over there who averts his glance from +mine, who in shame and embarassment gazes away from me. Tell me, +how does he impress you?"—"Are you inquiring, my dear lady," +Brangaene asks in wonder, "of Tristan, the marvel of all nations, +the man of exalted renown, the hero without equal, honour's treasure +and vaunt?" Isolde catches up her tone, to continue in scornful +mimicry: "Who terrified at his own achievement flies to refuge +wherever he can, having won for his master a corpse to bride?... Is +my saying dark to you? Go then and ask himself, the presumably free +man, whether he dare to venture near me? All forms of reverence +and considerate service he forgets toward his sovereign mistress, +the shrinking hero, that of all things her glance may not light on +him.... Oh, he no doubt knows why!" Suddenly overmastered by an +impulse <a name="page_270"><span class="page">Page 270</span></a> +of her too-long controlled rancour: "Go to the haughty one," she +orders Brangaene, "bear to him this message from his lady: Let him +come into my presence forthwith, prepared to do my command."—"Am +I to bid him come and offer his duty?" Brangaene timidly interprets. +"Nay," Isolde storms, "let the self-sufficient one be warned to +fear the mistress! That do I bid him, I, Isolde!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Fixedly she watches the attendant moving along the deck, past the +sailors at their work, toward the solitary figure of the knight. +She watches the two fixedly while their interview lasts. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Kurwenal, catching sight of the woman approaching, tugs at his +master's mantle: "Attention, Tristan! Message from Isolde!" Tristan's +start suggests how complete his abstraction, and what the effect +of that name unexpectedly pronounced. <i>As Brangaene comes before +him</i>, the stage-directions say, <i>he rapidly composes himself</i>. +Deferently he inquires of his lady's wishes. Bragaene tells him, +barely, that her lady wishes to see him. Then begins the series of +his evasions, courteous as possible, but determined as courteous. +"If she be weary of the long voyage, that is nigh ended. Before +sunset we shall touch land. Whatsoever orders my lady have for me +shall be faithfully carried out." Brangaene repeats the order: "Let +Sir Tristan then go to her, such is our lady's will."—"Yonder +where the green meadows are still coloured blue to the eye, my +king awaits my lady. That I may escort her to him, soon will I +approach the Bright One. To none would I yield the privilege." +The maid repeats, still patiently: "Tristan, my lord, listen and +attend: My lady requests your service,—that you should betake +yourself to the place where she awaits you."—"At what place +soever I be found, faithfully do I serve her, to the greater honour +of women. If I should forsake the helm <a name="page_271"><span +class="page">Page 271</span></a> at this moment, how could I safely +guide the keel to King Mark's land?" Brangaene's temper flashes +a faint reflection of Isolde's fire. "Tristan, my lord, are you +mocking me? If the stupid handmaid cannot make her meaning clear +to you, hear my mistress's own words. This she bade me say: Be +warned, a self-sufficient one, to fear the mistress! That is her +behest,—Isolde's!" Without giving Tristan time to hesitate, +Kurwenal jumps up: "May I frame an answer?"—"What would your +answer be?" Tristan asks, for the moment at a loss. And Kurwenal, +very loud, that his words may not fail to reach Isolde's ears: +"This say to Madam Isolde: That he who made over to the maid of +Ireland the crown of Cornwall and the inheritance of England cannot +be the chattel of that same maid, presented by himself to his uncle. +A lord of the world,—Tristan, the hero! I cry it aloud and do +you report my words, though they should bring upon me the wrath of +a thousand Madam Isoldes!" Tristan has vainly tried to silence him. +As Brangaene indignantly hastens away, the irrepressible servant +sings after her at the top of his voice a mocking fragment of ballad, +popular no doubt in Cornwall: "Lord Morold came over the sea to +Cornwall to collect tribute. An island floats in a lonely sea, +there he now lies buried. His head, however, hangs in Ireland, the +tribute paid by England. Hurrah for our lord Tristan! What a one +is he to pay tribute!" Tristan drives the fellow off, orders him +below. But the whole crew have taken up the last lines of the song +and shout them with a will. Brangaene drags together the curtains, +shutting from sight the cruel rabble. Isolde, who has with difficulty +controlled herself, seems on the point of an outburst, but she quells +it, and in the restored silence asks with forced composure: "But +now, about Tristan?—I wish to be told exactly." Brangaene, +at first unwilling, reports the interview. When she has finished, +<a name="page_272"><span class="page">Page 272</span></a> Isolde, +whose anger has made room for a sorrowful intense dejection, reveals +to her what explains the humour, to her so far inexplicable, of +her mistress. Her deeply wounded feelings bleeding afresh at their +exposure, Isolde makes the relation almost tearfully. "You have +been a witness to my humiliation, hear now what brought it about. +They sing to me derisive songs. I could reply if I would! Of a boat +I could tell which, small and mean, drew to the coast of Ireland. +In it a sick and suffering man, in woful plight, at the point of +death...." She tells the story of her recognition in this Tantris +of Tristan; of her resolve to take immediate vengeance upon him; +of the look which disarmed her, her dismissal of him, healed, that +he "might go home and burden her no more with the look of his +eyes!"—"Oh, wonder!" breathes Brangaene. "Where were my eyes? +The guest whom I once helped to nurse...?"—"You heard his +praise a moment ago! 'Hurrah for our lord Tristan!' He was that +unhappy man. He swore a thousand oaths of eternal gratitude to me, +and truth. Now hear how a hero keeps his word. He whom I dismissed +unknown as Tantris, as Tristan comes boldly back. On a proud tall +ship he draws to land, and desires the heiress of Ireland in marriage +for the worn King of Cornwall, for Mark, his uncle. In Morold's +lifetime who had ventured to offer us such an affront? To sue for +the crown of Ireland for the King of the tribute-owing Cornish!... +Oh, woe is me! It was I, I, who in secret prepared for myself this +shame! Instead of smiting with the avenging sword, weak, I let +it drop. Now I am the servant of my own vassal!" Brangaene, when +all is told, does not apparently recognise in the situation cause +for so much bitterness. "When peace, reconciliation, and friendship +were sworn on all sides," she says wonderingly, "we all rejoiced to +see the day. How could I suppose it was a source of affliction to +you?" The <a name="page_273"><span class="page">Page 273</span></a> +point then appears of that bitterness, which would hardly in reality +have been a point but for a sentiment not among those which Isolde +confesses to her confidante. That what she kept silent the other +should reveal! That what he could only know and live to report +through the weakness of her woman's heart, he should publicly make +use of, to his own glory and his relative's advantage! She paints +his attitude, as she imagines him, victory-flushed, hale and whole +now, pointing at her and saying in loud, clear tones: "There were +a treasure for you, my lord and uncle! What do you think of her as +a wife? The pretty Irish-woman I will bring to you here. By roads +and by-paths well known to me, give the sign, I fly to Ireland: +Isolde is yours! I delight in the adventure!" The picture goads +her to very madness, and, with a cry for its mingling of ferocity +with anguish like the roar of a baited and wounded lioness, she +breaks into maledictions upon his head, calling down vengeance +upon him, death upon him, nay,—at the climax of her rage +and insupportable pain,—death upon them both! With impetuous +tenderness Brangaene showers words of endearment on the exhausted +friend, hushes her with caresses, heaps, as it were, smothering +flowers upon her angry coals. She forces her gently to a seat, +comforting her with word and touch. Then she holds up all in a +different light, endeavours to make her see the thing reasonably, +as it must appear to others. "What delusion is this? What idle +raving? How can you stultify yourself till you neither can see +nor hear? Whatever debt of gratitude Sir Tristan owes you, tell +me, could he better repay it than with the most magnificent of +crowns? Thus does he at the same time faithfully serve his noble +uncle and bestow upon you the world's most enviable prize. He has +renounced, generous and true-hearted, his own inheritance, and +placed it at your feet, that he may call you Queen. And if through +him you are <a name="page_274"><span class="page">Page 274</span></a> +to wed Mark, how should you find fault with the choice? Can you fail +to prize and honour the man? Of great lineage and gentle nature, +where is his equal in power and splendour? Who would not wish to +share his good fortune, as consort to tarry beside him, whom the +greatest of heroes so devotedly serves?" Isolde, but half heeding, +has fallen again to her miserable brooding. Brangaene's last words +find their way to her brain and produce an image there which she +stares at with gloomy and tragic eyes. As before, unconscious in her +perturbation that she is doing it, she voices her inmost thoughts +audibly, like a somnambulist: "Unloved by him, to behold the unrivalled +man ever near, how could I endure the torment?" Brangaene catches +the words, and innocently supposes them applied to King Mark. She +presses fondly against this unaccountably humble-minded mistress: +"What are you dreaming, perverse one? Unloved? Where does the man +live who would not love you? Who could see Isolde and not blissfully +dissolve in love for her? But, if so were that he who has been +chosen for you should be of a nature to that degree cold, if so +were that some evil magic drew him away from you, I should know +how very soon to bind the unkind one to you, the power of love +should work its spell upon him...." She draws so near to Isolde +that she can speak without fear of being overheard. "Do you forget +your mother's magic? Do you imagine that she, who ponders all things +so sagely, has sent me void of counsel along with you to a strange +land?"—"At the right moment I am reminded of my mother's +counsel," Isolde murmurs thoughtfully before her; "Her art I prize +and welcome its aid. Vengeance it affords for the betrayal, peace +in the need of the heart. Bring the casket here to me."—"It +contains what shall secure your happiness!" Brangaene joyfully +hurries to fetch the small golden coffer, lifts the lid, fingers <a +name="page_275"><span class="page">Page 275</span></a> the phials. +"In this very order were they placed by your mother, the mighty +magic potions. For hurts and wounds here is balm; here, for poison, +is counterpoison...." She takes out and holds up before Isolde +with a significant smile a small flask. "The sweetest draught of +all I hold here!" Isolde pushes aside her hand and stretches her +own to the casket. "You are mistaken. I know better which one that +is. I marked it with a deep incision. Here is the draught which +shall serve my turn!" Brangaene stares at the phial which Isolde has +taken from among the rest. "The death-potion!" she gasps, recoiling. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A sing-song shout interrupts them, the voices of the sailors hauling +at ropes, taking in sail,—a reminder to Isolde that the land, +the terrible land, is near. Kurwenal hurries in: "Up, up, you ladies! +Briskly and cheerily! Quickly prepare to land! Ready at once, nimble +and spry! And to Madam Isolde I was to say from Tristan, my master: +the pennant of joy waves merrily from the mast, making her approach +known in Mark's royal castle. Wherefore he begs Madam Isolde to +haste and make ready, that he may escort her ashore." Isolde, for +a minute convulsed with a shuddering horror at her realization of +the decisive moment so near, reconquers her composure, and replies +with contrasting dignity and calm to Kurwenal's familiar and rude +pressing of the high-born ladies to haste. "To Sir Tristan bear my +greetings and report to him what I say. If he look to have me walk +at his side and stand before King Mark, as custom and seemliness +demand, let him know that this shall in no wise happen if he have +not before sought pardon of me for an uncondoned offence. Let him +therefore cast himself upon my clemency!" As Kurwenal by a gesture +signifies his stiff-necked resistance to her command, she repeats +it, more regally peremptory than before: "Take careful heed <a +name="page_276"><span class="page">Page 276</span></a> of what I +say and carefully report it. I refuse to make ready to accompany +him to land, I refuse to walk beside him and stand before King +Mark, unless he have before, as is fit and becoming, sued for +forgiveness and forgetfulness of an unexpiated fault. Let him hope +these from my grace!"—"Be quite sure that I shall tell him!" +the bluff serving-man replies, turning to go: "Now wait and see +how he takes it!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Isolde flings her arms around Brangaene: "Farewell, Brangaene! Commend +me to the world! Commend me to my father and mother!"—"What +is it?" the handmaid asks, not understanding, yet half frightened; +"What are you meditating? Are you planning flight? Whither must I +follow you?"—"Nay, did you not hear? I shall remain where +I am. I intend to await Tristan. Follow faithfully my command. +At once prepare the peace-draught,—you know the one I showed +you."—"What draught do you mean?" Brangaene asks, not daring +to understand. Isolde takes it out of the coffer once more and +holds it up for Brangaene to see well, the little deadly phial. +"This draught! Pour it into the golden goblet; it will contain +the whole without brimming over.—Mind you are true to me!" +she adds, forcing it into the maid's hand. "But this drink..." +falters the appalled girl, "for whom?"—"For him who betrayed +me!"—"Tristan?"—"Shall drink to our peace-making!" +Brangaene falls at Isolde's feet, entreating her to spare her. "Do +you spare me, disloyal girl!" Isolde passionately chides. What was +the purpose, she asks, of that provision made by her mother for their +assistance in a strange land? For hurts and wounds she had given balm; +for poison, antidote; for deepest woe, for utmost affliction, she +had given the death-draught: thanks be rendered to her now—by +death! Brangaene still resisting, Isolde imperiously presses her +command. Their struggle is cut short by <a name="page_277"><span +class="page">Page 277</span></a> Kurwenal announcing Tristan. Brangaene +staggers to the back. Isolde visibly summons up all her courage, +all her strength, and with queenly self-possession bids Tristan +approach. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The music introducing the following scene has the effect of lifting +the story on to a plane of larger things. The proportions of the +personages, in the light of the magnifying music, are seen to be +heroic, their natures vast, their passions, in their very +tremendousness, august. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Tristan stops at the entrance and waits deferentially. Constraint +makes him into a man of chill iron. There is a long moment of +heavy-laden silence. He is first to speak: "Make known to me, lady, +your wish!" She comes to the point at once. "Do you not know my wish, +when the dread of fulfilling it has kept you afar from my glance?" He +evades her, as he had before evaded Brangaene. "Reverence laid its +compulsion upon me!"—"Small reverence have you shown me. With +overt scorn you have refused obedience to my command."—"Obedience +alone restrained me."—"Paltry cause should I have to thank +your master, if his service required of you discourtesy to his own +consort."—"Custom demands," he quietly meets this, "where +I have lived, that the escort of the bride, while bringing her +home, should keep afar from her presence."—"For what +reason?"—Stiffly as he stands, his answer resembles a shrug. +"Ask of custom!"—"Since you cherish so great a regard for custom, +my lord Tristan," Isolde mocks, "let me remind you of what likewise +is a custom: to make peace with the enemy, if he is to report you +as his friend." "And what enemy?" he questions, unmoved. "Inquire +of your terror!... Blood-guiltiness stands between us!"—"That +was made good!"—"Not between us!"—"In the open field, +before the assembled people, a solemn oath was sworn to let vengeance +rest."—"Not <a name="page_278"><span class="page">Page +278</span></a> there was it, not in the open field, that I kept +Tantris concealed, that Tristan lay at my mercy. In the open field +he stood magnificent, hale and brave; the thing however which he +swore, I fore bore to swear. I had learned to keep silence. When +he lay languishing in the hushed chamber, and I stood silent before +him with the sword, though my mouth no made sound, though my hand +refrained, yet the thing which I had sworn with hand and mouth +I silently renewed my oath to perform. I now intend to keep +it."—"What did you swear, lady?" Tristan asks simply, without +effect of defiance. "Vengeance for Morold!" she hurls at him. He +seems to wonder. A sort of numbness has been creeping over him; +an atmosphere of dream has closed around him; her neighbourhood, +her voice, no matter what words she is saying, even these angry and +cruel ones, have an effect of lulling, of making the real world seem +unreal. "Are you concerned for that?" he asks, with the sincerity +of that state of having lost grasp on things as it is agreed to +pretend they are. "Dare you to mock me?" she rages, "He was affianced +to me, the gallant Irish hero. I had consecrated his arms, for me +he went into battle. When he fell, my honour fell with him. In +the heaviness of my heart I swore an oath that if no man would +take vengeance for his murder, I, a woman, would find the hardihood +for it. Why, when sick and feeble you lay in my power, I did not +strike, explain to yourself by easy interpretation: I cared for +your wound, that a man in sound health should be struck down by the +vengeful hand of him who won Isolde. Judge for yourself now what +your doom shall be. Since the men are all your adherents, who is +to smite Tristan?" More than ever it seems like the atmosphere of a +dream closing down upon him, a dream in which they move, projecting +incredible things. But he has perfectly seized her meaning, and +even in a dream a <a name="page_279"><span class="page">Page +279</span></a> man acts in character. Pale and self-contained, +he hands her his unsheathed sword, and his voice shows a first +tinge of emotion as he speaks the name of Morold, whom, it would +almost seem, she had loved. "If Marold was so dear to you, again +take up the sword, and drive it surely and steadfastly, that it +may not drop from your grasp!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +If she seemed somewhat like a lioness before, striding and chafing +in her regal rage, she is again, it must be confessed, a little like +one now, but presenting a different aspect of the great feline, +a sort of cruelty, a need to torment before sacrificing. "What +would King Mark say if I were to slay his best servant, the most +faithful of his retainers, who won for him crown and land? Does it +seem to you such a paltry matter, that for which he stands indebted +to you, bringing home to him the Irish bride, that he would not +chide, should I slay the envoy who so faithfully delivers into +his hands the hostage of the peace-compact?... Put up your sword! +When upon a time I brandished it, my heart hot with desire for +vengeance, at your gazing upon me with an eye that took my measure, +to see if I would answer as a wife for King Mark"—(There, +there is point of insufferable bitterness!)—"I let the sword +sink. Let us drink now to our reconciliation!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +By a sign she orders Brangaene to bring the draught. The poor creature +shrinks away shuddering. Isolde, by a gesture more peremptory still, +repeats her command, and Brangaene is seen tremulously busying herself +with the golden casket and the golden cup. Again the sing-song +chorus is heard, of the sailors hauling in the topsail. The sound +falls with a shock upon Tristan's ear. "Where are we?" he cries, +in bewilderment. "Close to our destination!" Isolde replies +significantly. They are so close indeed to the end of their voyage +that anything there is to say must be said now, and she invites, +with a <a name="page_280"><span class="page">Page 280</span></a> +first suspicion of softness, some expression from him of regret, +some explanation before they die, some attempt at justification +of his so unkind-seeming return to the woman who had nursed and +saved him. "Tristan, shall I obtain amends? What have you to say +to me?" But he is guarded now as earlier; the compulsion of honour +is no less strong upon him than before. "The lady of silence," he +replies darkly, "teaches me to be silent. I apprehend, mayhap, what +she concealed.... I conceal what she does not apprehend!"—"I +shall apprehend the reason of your silence," she exclaims angrily, "if +you mean to elude me. Do you refuse to drink to our peace-making?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Brangaene has brought the cup. Tristan gazes rigidly into Isolde's +eyes as she approaches him bearing it. "The voyage nears its end. +In brief space we shall stand," her lip curls with irony, "before +King Mark! As you lead me to him, should you not deem it an apt +speech to make: My lord and uncle, look at her well! A meeker woman +you could never hope to win. I slew her affianced, I sent home to +her his head; the wound made by his weapon she graciously healed. +My life lay in her power; the gentle maid made me a gift of it, and +gave her consent to the dishonour and degradation of her country +that she might become your wife. In kind acknowledgment of my good +gifts to her, she mixed me a sweet peace-draught; of her grace she +tendered this to me, to make all offences forgotten!" No, Tristan +can hardly entertain a doubt of the cup's contents which the princess +holds toward him with her ambiguous smile. But her right, aside +from any other consideration, is recognised as indubitable to the +life which she saved. We have from his own lips later what his +emotions were in this moment so pregnant with fate. What we see +is that he stands like a man in a dream. A voice is heard outside +shouting orders to the sailors: "Up with the cable! Free <a +name="page_281"><span class="page">Page 281</span></a> the anchor!" +He starts awake—he rises as if with a spring to the height of +the moment. "Anchor loose!" he cries wildly. "Helm to the stream! +Sails and mast to the wind!" Ay, let go all regards and restraints +of life, since life itself is about to be tossed over. There is zest +in doing it, and then rid at once forever of the puzzling world of +duty and prudence and heart-starvation! He snatches the goblet from +Isolde's hand: "Well do I know Ireland's queen and the magic power +of her arts. I made use of the balm which she proffered, I take the +cup from her now, that I to-day may completely recover. And do you +mark the pledge with which, grateful, I drink to our peace!" It is +an answer, this enigmatic pledge, to her wistful question: "What +have you to say to me?" He cannot pass into silence, and leave her +forever with her unmingled contempt for him. By broken intimations +he flashes light upon the thing which his lips are interdicted from +revealing. Charged with emotion, the words chime slowly: "Tristan's +honour,—highest truth!... Tristan's misery,—cruellest +spite!... Lure of the heart!... Dream-intuitions!... Sole comforter +of an eternal woe, merciful draught of forgetfulness, unwaveringly +I drink!" He sets the cup to his lips and is drinking as he said, +when with the cry: "Defrauded here too! Mine, one half!" Isolde +wrests the goblet from him: "Traitor, I drink to you!" and drains +it, unwavering as he. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The empty cup drops from her hand. They stand in suspense, gazing +at each other, as defiantly they await death. The searching potion +in a moment begins to take effect; each sees in the eyes of the +other a new thing dawning, strange and beautiful; a trembling seizes +upon their limbs. They press their hands convulsively to their +hearts, the seat of an incomprehensible trouble, then to their +foreheads, within which the brain seems to have become subject to +over-wild delusions. <a name="page_282"><span class="page">Page +282</span></a> Their eyes meet again, and are averted in a confused +terror; but, invincibly allured, again seek the other—and +both gaze with increasing, at last unconquerable, yearning. With +tremulous lips she speaks his name,—a complete confession in +the one word so spoken. Passionately he calls hers,—confession +for confession. She sinks overpowered on his breast. He clasps +her ardently to him. Brangaene wrings her hands at sight of them +locked in their long, mute embrace. Her work this, the work of +her disobedient hands which, too weak for the stern task assigned +them, poured out the love-potion in place of the death-draught. +"Woe, woe," she wails, "eternal, irredeemable woe, instead of brief +death! Behold the pernicious work of a foolish fondness blossoming +heavenward in lamentation!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The two move apart for a moment in order better to gaze at each +other. "What was I dreaming," he falters, "of Tristan's honour?" +"What was I dreaming," she wonderingly asks, "of indignities to +Isolde?"—"You, lost to me?" Could man have imagined so wild +a thing! "You repulsing me?" Probable, it seems, as he stretches +to her those yearning arms! It has all been a malignant trick, +then, of evil sorcery! Restored at length from that delusion, they +yield themselves exultantly to the tide of passion that has caught +them away and shall carry them whither it will, scornful of the +whole world, lost in each other, conscious of a sweetness in the +surrender surpassing all that life had given them to suspect. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The peculiar action of the potion is detected from the above. It +seems less to create passion than to remove all that obscured and +controlled it, dissolve the barriers which up to the moment of +drinking stood so effectively between the two. Tristan's will crumbles +under it, the will which had kept him loyal to Mark, which had made +him, to the point of offence, shun the <a name="page_283"><span +class="page">Page 283</span></a> radius of her dangerous magnetism. +Isolde's pride melts under it, which had enabled her to keep up +with herself and him a fiction of hate for the man who had wronged +her. All that keeps love within bounds being burned away, it towers +in a sublime conflagration. Their sense of the change is that they +have awakened from a dream; but the effect of the potion has been +in truth rather more to plunge them into a state of dream, in which +while one emotion is in the ascendant the others sleep,—reason +sleeps, will sleeps, all other interests and considerations sleep, +leaving love free to reach proportions and an intensity unknown +during wakefulness. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +They have not heard or heeded the cries of the crew: "Hail, hail, +King Mark!" The curtains of the pavilion are suddenly drawn wide +apart. The ship's company crowds the deck; all are gazing toward +the land. Tristan and Isolde take account of nothing, their senses +fast sealed to all but the contemplation of each other. Brangaene +and other women place on Isolde's unconscious shoulders the royal +mantle, and deck her, unaware of it, with jewels. Kurwenal comes +running to his master: "Hail, Tristan, fortunate hero! King Mark, +with rich rout of courtiers, approaches in a barge. Ha! He looks +well pleased, coming to meet the bride!" Tristan asks, dazed: "Who +approaches?"—"The King!"—"What king?"—Kurwenal +points overboard. Tristan stares landward, not comprehending. The +men shout and wave their caps. "Hail, King Mark!"—"What is it?" +Isolde inquires, reached in her trance by the clamour; "Brangaene, +what cry is that?"—"Isolde, mistress," the distraught Brangaene +implores, "self-control for this one day!"—"Where am I?" the +bewildered lady asks helplessly. "Am I alive?..." What, the question +asks itself, what is this still familiar surrounding scene, when +they ought, by true working of the drug, to be dead? If any <a +name="page_284"><span class="page">Page 284</span></a> thought had +accompanied the overmastering impulse which she had blindly followed, +it had been that before death all disguises drop, that in dying one +is sincere. But since death had not followed the drinking of the +draught—"Ha! What draught was that?" she asks in consternation. +Brangaene gives the desperate truth. "The love-draught!" Isolde's +eyes widen with horror, and turning from Brangaene fix themselves +upon Tristan. The situation flashes before her for one shocked +moment in its true colours; and as before her calling his name +had revealed all love, it reveals now her sense of an unspeakable +awfulness in what has happened to them. As he calls her name, too, +it expresses, with his boundless tenderness, pity and a tragic +recognition of the black ingredient in the cup which had lifted +them to such heights of intoxication. "Must I live?" speaks the +last glimmer of the old Isolde, provided normally with a moral +nature; and overwhelmed by the greatness of the catastrophe she +sinks fainting upon his breast. A last glimmer of the old Tristan +groans aloud: "O rapture beset with snares! Bliss on betrayal built!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Trumpets are heard. The eager expectancy of all indicates that the +King's barge is close at hand. The curtain falls. +</p> + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The introduction to the second act opens with the motif of the +Day. It is no tender dawn described, with tremulous lights among +the clouds; it has little of the touching <i>Morgenpracht</i> in +Parsifal. It is a startling announcement of a fateful fact, an obtruder +feared and unloved; it is like a clash of cymbals or call of trumpets +summoning to unwelcome tasks, away from delights and dreams. It is +indeed the day as it appears to lovers when, dispelling the gentle +night which united them, <a name="page_285"><span class="page">Page +285</span></a> with cruel golden shafts it drives them apart. The +musical rendering follows upon it of love's impatient heart-beats, +love's ungovernable eagerness for the beloved's presence, love +listening for the footsteps of the beloved. The curtain rises upon +a garden under a cloudless summer night. Beside the door of Isolde's +apartment a torch is burning. The sound is heard of hunting-horns +gradually retreating. Brangaene stands on the castle-steps, listening +to these. Isolde, all in a happy agitation, hurries forth to ask +if they still be audible. She herself cannot hear them any more. +But to Brangaene's ear the sound is still distinct. Isolde listens +again: No! Brangaene, she believes, is deceived by her over-great +anxiety, deceived by the rustling of the leaves. "You," Brangaene +retorts, "are deceived by the impetuosity of your desire! I hear +the sound of the horns." Isolde again listens. "No!" she discourses +in her over-running tender exhilaration, "the sound of horns was +never so pleasing as that! It is the soft purling of the fountain +whose music comes so sweetly borne to us; how could I hear it, +if hunting-horns were still blaring near by? In the silence, all +I hear is the murmured laughter of the fountain. The one who is +waiting for me in the hushed night, are you determined to keep him +away from me as if horns were still close at hand?"—"The one +who is waiting for you—do but listen to my warning," Brangaene +pleads, "there are spies in the night lying in wait for him! Because +you are blind, do you believe the eyes of the world dulled to your +actions and his?" Against Melot she warns her, Melot, who, when he +came aboard the ship with King Mark to receive the bride,—and +the kindly King was engrossed by anxiety for the condition of the +pale and fainting princess,—with treacherous, suspicious eye, +Brangaene had seen it, scrutinised the countenance of Tristan, +to read in it what might thereafter serve his purpose. Often <a +name="page_286"><span class="page">Page 286</span></a> since then +she has come upon him eavesdropping. Against Melot let Isolde be +warned!... Melot? Isolde rejects the idea with light scorn. Is not +he Tristan's dearest friend? When Tristan is forced to keep afar from +her, with whom does he spend the time but Sir Melot? "The thing which +makes him suspicious to me, to you endears him!" cries Brangaene, +in despair at such wilful blindness. "From Tristan to Mark lies +Melot's road. He there sows evil seed. This nocturnal hunting-party, +so hurriedly concerted, has in view a nobler quarry than your fancy +deems!"—"Melot," Isolde persists in his defence, "invented +the stratagem, out of compassion for his friend. And do you make +it into a reproach to him? He cares for me better than do you. +He opens to me that which you close. Oh, spare me the misery of +hesitation! The signal, Brangaene, give the signal! Extinguish +the light to its last flicker. Beckon to the Night, that she may +completely bend over us. Already she has poured her silence upon +grove and house. Already she has filled the heart with her happy +trepidation. Quench the light! Smother its frightening glare! Throw +open the way to my beloved!"—"Oh, let the torch of warning +stand!" Brangaene struggles with her still, "Let it stand to illumine +your danger!" And she wrings her hands anew, lamenting over this +which is the work of those unfaithful hands, in a single instance +disobedient to the mistress's will. "Your work?" Isolde smiles, +with that mortal lightness which is upon her to-night; "Oh, foolish +girl! Do you not know the Lady of Love? Do you not know her power, +her miracles? Queen of high hearts, ruler of earth's destinies, +life and death are subject to her. She weaves them out of pain +and pleasure. She can change hate into love. Presumptuous, I took +in hand the work of death. The Lady of Love wrested it from me. +The death-devoted she took into her keeping, she seized the <a +name="page_287"><span class="page">Page 287</span></a> work in +her own hands. To whatever purpose she will to turn it, however +she will to end it, whatever the doom she appoint me, I am become +her own. Let me then show myself obedient to her!" Clearly, Isolde +to-night is <i>fey</i>. A rapturous madness is upon her. Aphrodite, +the Lady of Love, possesses her indeed, and no impression is to be +made upon her great mood by anything Brangaene can say. The girl +might talk more hopefully to a gust of summer wind. Poor-spirited +and grey-hued she appears, with her anguish and forebodings, beside +the glowing, rosily-smiling queen, in her secure expectation. Still +she presses the prayer of her terror: Just this one night let Isolde +listen to her pleading! Just this one night let her not put out the +light! But the mad Queen declares bafflingly that <i>Frau Minne</i>, +Madam Love, desires that it shall become night, that she herself may +illumine the place whence Brangaene's torch banishes her. To the +watch-turret with Brangaene, whence let her keep faithful look-out. +"The torch," Isolde cries, grasping it, "were it the light of my +life, laughing, without a tremor, I would put it out!" She dashes +it to the ground, where it slowly dies. The troubled Brangaene +disappears with heavy step up the stairway to the battlements. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Then is heard the motif again of love's impatience, of love listening. +Isolde peers down the avenue of trees, strains her ear for the +sound of footsteps. She waves her veil, which glimmers white in the +darkness; she waves it, in her impatience, more and more quickly. +She has caught sight of him, as an ecstatic gesture betrays. She +hurries to the top of the stairs, the better to see him from afar +and wave welcome to him. She rushes at last to meet him and they +are gathered in each other's arms. So over-great is their joy that +neither can believe the witness of his senses; nothing so good +could be true as that this verily which can be seen and clasped +should be the so <a name="page_288"><span class="page">Page +288</span></a> sorely desired one. They vent themselves in such +childish, fond, incredulous exclamations as: Is it you yourself? +Are they your eyes? Are they your lips? Have I here your hand? +Have I here your heart? Is it I? Is it you? Do I hold you close? +Is it no fancy? Is it no dream? And, as if finally convinced, they +burst forth in a hymn of thanksgiving and joy. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"The light! The light! Oh, that light!" the lover voices his grudge +against it. "How long ere it went out! The sun sank, day departed, +but the ill-will of the Day was still unsated. It lit a fearful +danger-signal and fastened it at the beloved's door, to prevent +me coming to her!"—"But the hand of the beloved extinguished +the light," Isolde pacifies him; "What the handmaid refused, I +feared not to do. At the command and under the protection of Great +Love, I cried defiance to the Day!"—"The Day! The Day! the +malignant Day!" he inveighs; "To that implacable enemy hate and +reproach! Oh, might I, even as you quenched the light, put out the +torches of the insolent Day, in vengeance for all the sufferings +of love!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +There is a great deal in the often fanciful, yet ever earnest, +conversation between the lovers, about the Day and the Night; the +Day being devoted to their hate, the Night to their worship. It +is not only, however, that the day divides them, and their trysts +belong to the night. They make the image of Day to stand for falsehood +and evil illusion, while Night represents truth. The reason of +this is not far to seek. Their love is not like the love of other +mortals. Inevitably in the latter many elements enter. Will controls +it, at least to some extent; reason guides and bounds it; sense +of humour even qualifies it. A thousand things besides love find +room in the most enamoured human heart and brain: other persons, +pursuits, <a name="page_289"><span class="page">Page 289</span></a> +interests,—what Rossetti calls "all life's confederate pleas, +work, contest, fame." The many-sided nature of man is appealed to +by myriad things. Only for brief moments do lovers stand on the +high peaks of pure passion where Tristan and Isolde perpetually +reside. Love they never so truly, lovers who have not quaffed the +magic potion love great part of the time almost unconsciously, in +a divine under-current,—no otherwise indeed than Tristan +before the potion, when, despite the Image in his heart, he devoted +thought to his career, cherished dreams of ambition. But after the +cup Tristan and Isolde are lovers, nothing more,—or less. +All the furniture of the day which has nothing to do with their +love is therefore an impertinence, an obtrusion; all day's pageants +and activities are a vanity, and a pernicious vanity; a glaring +mask hiding from sight the only true and beautiful. Everything that +the garish daylight shows, which can never show them the depths +of the other's heart, is a false show, an ugly delusion. The night, +during which all the troublesome, battering appeals of the day +are suspended, in which everything fades from the eye, leaving it +free to fix itself upon the only reality, love,—the night +is fosterer and patroness of truth. To love the night, to yearn +for it, to wish it forever prolonged, is natural in these lovers +who have drank of the cup; and, by a natural step further, since +earthly life affords no such night, to wish for the night of death, +as we hear them presently doing, a night in which they picture +themselves eternally floating in a state of ever-renewed joy in +each other, ever fresh ardour, two and yet one. It is not in the +least like Paradise. Paradise, with its interfering light and shows +and other-souls-in-bliss, could be to them but another version +of the Day. The Paradise of their desire is an eternal twilight, +and nothing more asked for each than the heaven of the other. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_290"><span class="page">Page 290</span></a> Meanwhile +they are talking together like commoner lovers, of the past, of +their first meeting, the beginnings of their love. How, she asks +him, very humanly, how could he do to her the thing he did, betray +her as he had done, claim her for another, give her over to death? +"It was the Day!" he explains. "The Day, shining about me, which +showed Isolde, where she stood sun-like, in the splendour of glory +and greatness, infinitely far removed. That which so ravished my +eye, weighted down my heart to the earth. How, in the brilliant +light of the Day, how could Isolde be mine?"—"Was she not +yours, whose elect you were? What falsehoods did the evil Day tell +you, that you should betray the faithful one, who had preferred +you?" The love of glory it had been, he avows, which moved him. +That sun of the Day, worldly honour, with its idle and false rays +had allured him. An Image all the while lay in the deepest shrine +of his heart, an unsleeping Image which had impressed itself while +he was hardly aware, and lived in the chaste night there, closely +shut in. Till a ray of the Day had penetrated even so deep, and +that which was so secret and sacred that his eyes scarcely trusted +themselves to look at it, that Image, smitten by Daylight, lay +brilliantly revealed. And, Day-deluded, he had vaunted before the +whole army that which seemed to him so desirable and beautiful, +the fairest King's-bride of all the earth; and to silence the envy +and hatred which had begun to make his honours heavy to him, to +maintain his glory, he had undertaken that boldest exploit, his +quest to Ireland. "Vain slave of the Day!" Isolde calls him. She +tells her part of the story, and we are enlightened concerning +the mood in which she proffered to him the death-draught: how, +deceived she too by the Day, tortured in her love for him, she +had, while ardently loving him, hated him to the bottom of her +heart. From the light of Day, which showed him an ingrate and a +traitor, she had <a name="page_291"><span class="page">Page +291</span></a> longed to flee, to draw him along with her into the +night, where her heart foretold an end of the mistake, a dispelling +of the apprehended delusion; to drink to him eternal love and enter +death simultaneously with him. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +We learn thereupon the mood in which he accepted the cup from her. +"When I recognised the sweet draught proffered by your hand, when +intuition clearly and surely told me what it was the peace-drink +promised me, there dawned in my bosom, mild and divine, the +Night—my Day had reached its close!" In other words, when +he had stood facing, as he knew, death, all the vain shows and +disguises of the Day had melted away, he had seen for the first +time clearly in his own heart. "O hail to the draught!" he exclaims, +"Hail to its sublime magic! At the portal of death, where I quaffed +it, it opened wide to me the region where I theretofore had wandered +but in dream, the wonder-kingdom of the Night! From the Face in +the innermost shrine of the heart it dispelled the deceiving glare +of the Day, that my eyes, grown accustomed to the Night, might see +it in its truth." But the Day, she carries on the conceit with +gathering sadness, had its revenge! The Day entered into league +with his sins, and that Face which the Night had vouchsafed him +to see he had been forced to surrender to the royal power of the +Day, and behold it shining lonesomely afar, in barren magnificence. +"How have I endured it?" she moans, "How do I still endure it?" +Nay, he comforts her, "We are now become the initiate of the Night. +The malevolent Day, the cruel, can divide, but no longer deceive +us. They whose eyes the Night has consecrated laugh to scorn Day's +idle splendour, his braggart brilliancy. The fugitive flashes of +his lightning cannot dazzle them more. He who has gazed longingly +into the night of death, he to whom that Night has confided her +deep secret, the lies of the Day, honour and glory, power and <a +name="page_292"><span class="page">Page 292</span></a> gain, lovely +and shining though they be, like idle star-dust he sees them float +past. Amid the vain delusions of the Day he is possessed by a single +longing, the longing for the holy Night, in which the one thing +from all eternity true, Love with its rapture, awaits him!" He +draws her gently to a flowery bank, sinks kneeling before her and +lays his head within her arm. And they breathe forth together, +with an equal dreamy devoutness, their invocation to the Night. +"Oh, close around us, night of love! Give forgetfuless of life! +Gather us up in your arms, release us from the world!..." Quenched +is the last torch, quenched all thought, all memory. In a sacred +twilight full of wondrous divinations, the dread illusions of the +world melt away, leaving free the spirit. And the sun in the breast +having set, softly shine forth the stars of joy. And when, heart +upon heart, lip against lip, breathing one breath, the lovers' +eyes are blinded with joy, the world with its dazzling deceits +fades from sight, the world which the Day had flashed before their +eyes for their delusion, and they themselves are the world, and +the world is life, is love, is joy, is a beautiful wish come true, +from which there shall be no awakening.... +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Reaching completely the state they describe, of forgetfulness of +the world and the Day, each the whole world to the other, they +sink back side by side, cheek to cheek, among the flowers. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +From the turret comes the lonely voice of Brangaene, warning the +lovers to have a care, have a care, the night is nearly over! There +is a leisurely moment. Isolde stirs: "Hark, beloved!" But Tristan, +too deeply steeped in the languor of night and dreams, replies with +a sigh: "Let me die!" Isolde raises herself a little: "Oh, envious +sentinel!" Tristan remains reclining: "Never to waken!"—"But +the Day must rouse Tristan?" she softly exhorts. "Let the Day yield +unto <a name="page_293"><span class="page">Page 293</span></a> +death!" She considers this quietly: "Day and death then with a +simultaneous stroke shall overtake our love?" He comes a little +more awake to protest that death cannot destroy such love as theirs, +that love is stronger than death, is eternally living, that all +that could die in death would be the disturbing things which now +prevent him from being always with her, whereas were they to +die,—inseparable,—to all eternity one,—nevermore to +awake,—nevermore to know fear,—nameless, close enfolded +in love,—belonging singly to themselves,—they should live +wholly for love!... She says the words after him, dreamily, charmed, +allured by the vista they open before her. And when Brangaene's +voice is heard again from her turret warning them to have a care, +have a care, day is at hand, and Tristan bends over her smiling +to ask: "Shall I heed?" she sighs, as he had done before: "Let +me die!"—"Shall I awake?" he very gently teases. "Never to +wake again!"—"Must the Day rouse Tristan?"—"Let the +Day yield unto death!"—"We will brave then the threats of +the Day?" With increasing earnestness she cries: "To be rid of +his malice forever!"—"Day-break shall never more frighten +us apart?"—"Eternal shall be our night!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +This is really but a lovers' device for clinging together a little +longer; one does not feel that they have seriously determined to +remain where they are till they shall have been discovered and +sacrificed on the altar of a husband's honour. They plainly are +in the state they have described: quenched is thought, is memory; +they are intoxicated with the <i>Liebes-wonne</i> they celebrate, +and so while day is whitening overhead, feeling really, as far as +they are capable of thought, besottedly secure,—Frau Minne will +protect!—they caress, clasped in each other's arms, the thought +of the eternal night lying beyond the death they would die for love, +where far from the sun, <a name="page_294"><span class="page">Page +294</span></a> far from the lamentation of Day-decreed partings, +delivered from fear, delivered from all ill, they shall dream, in +exquisite solitude and in unbounded space, a super-adorable dream. +He shall be Isolde, she Tristan,—but no, there shall be no +more Tristan, no more Isolde, but undivided, inexpressible, they +shall move to ever-new recognitions, new ardours, possessed in +everlasting of a single consciousness—Ineffable joy of love! +Their voices soar with these flights of fancy.... Of a sudden, as +if with a crash, the sweet harmonies turn to discord. A shriek is +heard from Brangaene. Kurwenal rushes in with drawn sword, crying: +"Save yourself, Tristan!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Hard upon his heels come Mark, Melot, and a flock of courtiers +in hunting-attire. They stop in consternation before the lovers, +who have seen nothing, heard nothing, and stand quietly lost in +each other's embrace. It is only when Brangaene seizes her that +Isolde becomes aware of the spectators. With a natural impulse of +womanly shame she averts her face from all those eyes and hides +it against the flowery bank. Tristan with one arm holds his mantle +wide outspread so that it screens her from sight, and for long +moments continues so, motionless, gazing rigidly at the motionless +men who return his gaze in silence. In the pale first glimmer of +dawn, he might well think them unreal, creations of a bad dream. +The spell of silence is broken by the cry bursting from his lips: +"The desolate Day—for the last time!" Melot steps forward +and points at him: "You shall now tell me," he speaks to Mark, +"whether I rightfully accused him? Whether I am to retain my head +which I placed at stake? I have shown him to you in the very act. +I have faithfully preserved your name and honour from stain." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The King is deeply shaken. No anger is in his unsteady voice, but +utter sorrow. Something deeper has been reached <a name="page_295"><span +class="page">Page 295</span></a> than his pride in his honour, +and that is not his love for Isolde, but his faith in Tristan. +"Have you really?" he bitterly takes up Melot's last assurance +and his boast of fidelity. "Do you imagine it? Behold him there, +the most loyal among the loyal! Look upon him, the friendliest +of friends! The most generous act of his devotion he has used to +stab my heart with deadliest perfidy. If Tristan then has betrayed +me, am I to hope that my honour, which his treason has struck at, +has been loyally defended by Melot?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +These are strange words for Tristan the knight to hear. Applied +to himself, such words as perfidy, treason.... He brushes his arm +wildly across his eyes: "Phantoms of the Day! Morning-dreams! empty +and lying,—vanish, disperse!" The heart-broken King, with a +gentleness more effectual in punishing than the angriest objurgations, +goes on to sear the false friend's conscience by holding up before +him, simply, what he has done; comparing the image of him as he +has in fact proved with the image of him which Mark had cherished. +The reproach is intolerable in view of what Mark himself is: noble, +gentle, great-hearted, and toward Tristan so full of affection! +"To me—this? This, Tristan, to me? Where now shall one look +for truth, since Tristan has deceived me? Where look for honour +and uprightness, since the pattern of all honour, Tristan, has +lost them? Whither has virtue fled, since she is gone from Tristan, +who had made her into his shield and defence, yet has now betrayed +me?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Tristan's eyes, which had been fixed steadily upon Mark, slowly +sink to the ground; a wondering sadness overspreads his countenance, +heavier and heavier as the royal master proceeds with his arraignment. +Why Tristan's innumerable services, the greatness he had won for his +King, if they were to be paid with the receiver's dishonour? Was +it too small a reward <a name="page_296"><span class="page">Page +296</span></a> that the King had made him his heir? So dearly he +had loved him that, having lost his wife, and being childless, he +had resolved for his sake not to wed again. He had been obdurate +to the prayers of his people, to Tristan's own entreaties, until +Tristan had threatened to leave the kingdom unless he were himself +despatched to bring home a bride for the King. And his courage had +won for Mark this woman, lovely to a wonder, whom who could know, +who behold, who proudly call his own, without accounting himself +blessed? This one, to whom he, Mark, would never have presumed to +aspire, Tristan, braving enemies and danger, had brought home to +him. And now that through such a possession his heart had become +more vulnerable to pain than before, wherefore wound him in the very +spot where it was tenderest?—destroy his faith in his friend, +fill his frank heart with distrust, bring him to the degradation of +dogging his friend by night and listening covertly? "Wherefore +to me this hell which no heaven can deliver me from? Wherefore to +me this indignity which no suffering can wash out? The dreadful, +deep, undiscoverable, thrice-mysterious reason,—who will +reveal it to the world?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Tristan's eyes, as, thus questioned, he lifts them at last again to +Mark's, express boundless compassion. "Oh! King, I cannot answer; +and that which you ask you never can learn!" No, for it is as strange, +as full of black mystery, to Tristan as to Mark. It is the very +impossible which has happened, the never to be accounted for. Tristan, +the soul of honour, has betrayed his friend, and with all those +circumstances of aggravation which the friend has just counted +off. Nothing can explain it. It is surely like a dream, a curious +dream, the worst of the Day's lies. But in a dream also, as we +remarked before, there is a right thing to do, for a man of heart. +Tristan is not long deciding upon his course. But before acting he +<a name="page_297"><span class="page">Page 297</span></a> turns +to Isolde, where she sits with eyes of undiminished love raised +toward the companion in shame and agony. In following the call of +honour he has no mind to forsake her. "Whither Tristan now departs, +will you, Isolde, follow him? The country Tristan means no beam +of the sun illumines. It is the dim nocturnal land from which my +mother sent me forth, when dying she gave to the light a dead man's +child. The refuge to which, having borne me, she carried her love, +the wonder-kingdom of the night from which of old I woke. That is +what Tristan offers. Thither he goes before. If she will follow, +kind and true, let now Isolde say!" With touching more-than-readiness +Isolde, trustful and unashamed, declares: "When once before the +friend bade her to a strange land, Isolde, kind and true, must +follow the unkind one. But now you lead to your own dominions, +to show me your heritage. How should I avoid the realm which lies +about the whole world? Where Tristan's house and home, there let +Isolde take her abode. That she may follow, kind and true, let +him now show Isolde the way!" Again for a moment so lost in her +that it is no else than as if they were alone in all the world, he +slowly bends over her and kisses her forehead. A cry of indignation +breaks from Melot. "Traitor! Ha, King, revenge! Shall you endure +this outrage?" But Tristan has suddenly cast off the inertia of +dreams, bared his sword, and turned about. "Who will match his life +against mine?" He gazes full into Melot's face. "He was my friend. +He loved me, he held me high. He, more than any, was concerned for +my honour, my fame. He made proud my heart to arrogance. He headed +the band of those who urged me on to augment my glory and renown by +wedding you to the King. Your eye, Isolde, has dazzled him too. From +envy he betrayed me to the King—whom I betrayed!" With a feint +of attack he springs toward Melot. "Defend <a name="page_298"><span +class="page">Page 298</span></a> yourself, Melot!" Melot quickly +thrusts with his sword. Tristan who has not parried, who has let +the sword drop from his hand, sinks back wounded in Kurwenal's +arms. Isolde casts herself upon his breast. The music makes a brief +sorrowful comment—and the curtain falls. +</p> + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The introduction to the third act not only presents the emotions +belonging to what shall follow, heaving deep heart-groans and expending +itself in pity over the stricken hero; it paints with strange clearness +a scene: the sea stretching to the horizon, under leaden sunshine, +empty of every sail—the sea which lies in fact before us when +the curtain rises, fading off into the sky beyond low battlements +which enclose on the outer-side a neglected castle-garden. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Tristan lies with closed eyes upon a couch, in the shadow of a +tree. Kurwenal, sitting at his head, bends a careworn face to listen +for his breathing. A shepherd's pipe is heard playing a little +wavering tune, melancholy in its simplicity to heartbreak. The +tune grieves itself out. A shepherd looks over the wall and, after +a moment watching, calls to Kurwenal, asking if <i>he</i> does not +yet awake? Kurwenal sadly shakes his head. "Even if he should awake, +it would only be to take his leave forever, unless the Physician, +the only one who can help us, should first arrive...." Has he seen +nothing, he inquires, no ship on the sea? "In that case you should +hear a different tune," the shepherd answers, "as merry a one as +I can play! But tell me the truth, old friend, what has happened +to our master?"—"Let be that question!" Kurwenal heavily +turns from it: "not for any asking can you learn! Keep diligent +look-out; go, and when you see a ship pipe loud and merrily." <a +name="page_299"><span class="page">Page 299</span></a> The shepherd +shades his eyes and looks off over the endless blue waste of the +waters. "Barren and empty the sea!" He sets his pipe to his lips +again and plays over, withdrawing, the hauntingly melancholy tune +of before. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Without premonitory sign of returning consciousness, Tristan's lips +move. His voice comes very faint: "The ancient tune.... what does it +wake me?" He opens his hollow eyes. "Where am I?" Kurwenal starts up +with a shout of joy: "Ha, that voice! His voice! Tristan, my master! +my hero! my Tristan!" Tristan by a great effort brings his mind to +consider these sounds, and with great effort speaks: "Who... calls +me?"—"At last! At last!" Kurwenal's heart overflows. "Life! +Oh, life! Sweet life, given back to my Tristan!" Tristan knows him +now. "Kurwenal... is it you? Where have I been?... Where am I?" +Kurwenal on the spot assumes that ultra-joyous tone of persons +about a sick-bed when their faces are turned toward the patient whom +they are determined to infect with hope. "Where you are? In peace, +in safety, in freedom! At Kareol, master! Do you not recognise the +castle of your fathers.?"—"Of my fathers?" Tristan murmurs +stupidly. "Just look about you!"—"What—" the sick man +asks after a vague glance, "what was the sound I heard?"—"The +shepherd's pipe you heard again, after so many days! On the hillside +he keeps your flocks."—"My flocks?..."—"Master, that +is what I said! This is your house, your court and castle. Your +people, loyal to the beloved lord, saved for you, as well as they +could, the patrimony which my hero once made over to them outright, +when he forsook all to travel to a distant land."—"To what +land?"—"Cornwall, to be sure!" And the anxious grey-bearded +nurse, to rouse in the patient some gleam of joy in being, of pride +in past prowess, breaks enthusiastically forth: "Oh, what good <a +name="page_300"><span class="page">Page 300</span></a> fortune +Tristan, brave and bonny, met with there! What splendour of glory, +what honors he won in the teeth of his enemies!"—"Am I in +Cornwall?" Tristan asks discouragingly. "No, no, I have told you! +At Kareol."—"How did I get here?" Kurwenal almost laughs, +and in the pride of the unhoped-for hour cracks a joke. "How you +got here? Not on horseback! A little ship brought you, but to the +ship I carried you on these shoulders of mine. They are broad, +they bore you to the shore. And now you are safe at home, on your +own land, the right land, the native land, where amid familiar +pastures and homely joys, under the rays of the old sun, from death +and wounds you blessedly shall recover!" The rough fellow presses +his cheek to his master's breast, like a woman. There is silence. +Tristan stares vacantly ahead, vaguely pondering the servant's +last words, of which the echo has lingered teasingly in his ear. +"Do you believe so?" he says at last. "I know a different +thing—but the manner of it I cannot tell you! This where I +have awakened is not the place where I have been,—but where +I have been—I cannot tell you! I did not see the sun, I saw no +earthly scene, nor any people, but what I saw—I cannot tell +you! I found myself—where from everlasting I was, whither to +everlasting I go: in the boundless realm of the night which girds +the world. One knowledge alone belongs to us there,—divine +eternal perfection of oblivion! How"—he faintly wails, with a +beginning of restlessness—"how have I lost the sense of it? +Is it you again, unforgotten longing, driving me back to the light +of the day? All that still survives in me, a pitiless torturing +love, impels me forth to gaze upon the light which, deceivingly +bright and golden, shines, Isolde, upon you!" With the memory of +Isolde becoming clear-defined again, as he emerges more completely +from the deathlike stupor which had chained him, agitation seizes upon +him, greater from moment <a name="page_301"><span class="page">Page +301</span></a> to moment. Isolde still in the region of the sunshine! +Still in the light of the day, Isolde! Unendurable longing to see +her repossesses him. For that it is he has turned back from the +portals of death, come back from among the shadows, to seek for +her, to behold her, to find her, in whom alone it is granted to +Tristan to lose himself and cease to be! His old hatred of the day +is upon him, and one's sympathy feels, well enough, the distress +to his fever of being thus drawn from the dark of unconsciousness +and thrust into this glare of summer. By a natural confusion of +ideas, as his agitation turns to delirium, this day torturing him, +this day upon which he calls a malediction, becomes his old enemy, +the Day which used to keep him from her,—and shifts from that +into the signal-light which even at night used to warn him off. +His delusion complete, he calls imploringly to Isolde, Sweetest, +Loveliest, "When, oh, finally, when, will you quench the torch, +that it may announce to me my happiness? The light... when will +it go out?... When will the house be wrapped in rest?" He falls +back exhausted. Kurwenal, whose joy of a little while before has +dropped at the contemplation of this torment, takes heart again +from his hope in the good news he has to impart. "The one whom of +old I braved, from devotion to you, how am I brought to longing +for her now! Rely upon my word, you shall see her, here, and this +very day, if only she be still among the living!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The meaning of his words has not penetrated. Tristan is far away +among old scenes. "The torch has not yet gone out! Not yet is the +house wrapped in darkness!... Isolde lives and keeps watch.... +She called to me out of the night!"—"If then she lives," +Kurwenal eagerly, seizes the cue, "let hope comfort you. Dullard +as you must esteem Kurwenal, this time you shall not chide him. +Ever since the day when Melot, the <a name="page_302"><span +class="page">Page 302</span></a> infamous, dealt you the wound, +you lay like one dead. The evil wound, how to heal it? Then I, +thick-witted fellow, reflected that the one who closed the wound +made by Morold could find easy remedy to the injury from Melot's +sword. Not long was I deciding upon the best physician! I have +sent to Cornwall,—a trusty fellow. It cannot be but that he +will bring Isolde over the sea here to you!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He has understood, Tristan has understood, and started up ablaze, +so beside himself with joy that after the great incredulous cry: +"Isolde is coming! Isolde is near!" he struggles vainly for breath +and words. Then his overflowing gratitude finds an immediate, a +pertinent thing to do, and Kurwenal has all in a moment the reward +of his long passionately-devoted service. The master in his madness +of joy throws his arms around the servant to whom he owes the hope +which in a moment has made him strong and well again. "My Kurwenal, +you faithful friend, whose loyalty knows no wavering, how shall +Tristan ever thank you? My shield and defence in battle and warfare, +in pleasure and pain equally prompt at command,—whom I have +hated, you have hated, whom I have cherished, you have cherished; +when in all truth I served the good Mark, how were you true to +him as gold! When I must betray the noble King, how willingly did +you deceive him! Not your own, but wholly mine, you suffer with me +when I suffer, but what I suffer—that you cannot suffer!" +As before the excitement of his pain, now the excitement of his +joy is gradually turning to delirium. "This dreadful longing which +consumes me, this languishing fire which devours me, if I could +describe it, if you could comprehend it, not here would you loiter +but would haste to the watch-tower, with every sense astrain longingly +would you reach out and spy toward the point where her sail shall +appear, where, blown by the wind and urged on by the fire <a +name="page_303"><span class="page">Page 303</span></a> of love, +Isolde comes steering to me!... There it comes!..." he points wildly, +"There it comes, with brave speed!... See it wave, see it wave, +the pennant at the mast!... The ship! The ship! It streaks along +the reef! Do you not see it?... Kurwenal, do you not see it?" With +watchful intensity he scans Kurwenal's face. Kurwenal hesitates, +between the wish to humour him by going to the watch-tower, and +the fear of leaving him, when the shepherd's pipe is heard again in +the same plaintive tune, and Kurwenal has no heart to pretend. "No +ship as yet on the sea!" he announces heavily. Tristan's excitement, +as the notes spin out their thin music, whose message he seems to +divine, gradually dies; the happy delusion fades; a deeper sadness +than ever, of reaction, closes down upon him. The minor strains +which now for a moment hold his flickering attention are full of +associations for him, all sorrowful. The sound of them came wafted +to him upon the breath of evening when as a child he was told the +manner of his father's death; it came again, plaintive and more +deeply plaintive, in the morning grey, when he learned his mother's +fate. And in their day, he wanderingly reflects, "when leaving an +unborn son he died; when she in dying gave me birth, the ancient +air, full of yearning and foreboding, no doubt pierced its sorrowful +way to them too,—the ancient air, which has asked me before +this, and asks me again in this hour, to what possible end, what +destiny, I was born into the world?... To what destiny?... The +ancient song tells me over again: To spend myself in longing and +to die!... +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"No! No!" he in a moment corrects himself, and his misery surges +back upon him in all its violence, "That is not what it says! Longing! +Longing! To spend myself in longing, not in longing to find death! +This longing which cannot die to the distant physician calls out +for the peace of death!" <a name="page_304"><span class="page">Page +304</span></a> Confused images crowd upon him of the beginning +of this affliction. The voyage to Ireland, the wound of which he +was dying, her healing of his wound—only to open it again; +her offering him the poisoned cup which when he drank, hoping to +be cured of ills forever, a fiery charm was upon him, dooming him +never to die, but exist eternally in torture! We remember how in the +fragrant summer night and the balmy presence of Isolde he blessed +the magic draught which opened the region of all enchantment; but +in this hour, parted from her, it seems, forever, the draught which +keeps him vainly aching for her presence, which will not let him die +apart from her, or find a little rest, which makes him a spectacle +of torture for the Day to feed its eyes upon, the draught seems to +him verily no blessing. They are the bitter dregs he is drinking +now of the cup of wonder. "The dreadful draught," he terms it, and +reaching, with the enumeration of his sufferings, the point of +cursing it, he has the flashed intuition of a truth; by a poet's +spring reaches a conclusion worthy of a philosopher: that he, he +himself is responsible for the effect upon him of the drink. "The +dreadful draught," he cries, "which devoted me to torment, I myself, +I myself, I brewed it! From my father's anguish and my mother's woe, +from the tears of love of all my life, from laughing and weeping, +joys and hurts, I furnished the poisoned ingredients of the cup!" +He had, more plainly, if we seize the sense of his raving, fed and +fostered an inherited emotional nature which made him the cup's +easy victim. And recognising it, he adds to his curse upon the +dreadful cup, with all the strength of his tortured heart, his +curse upon him who brewed it,—and exhausted with his own +delirious violence drops back in a swoon. Kurwenal, who has vainly +striven to calm his frenzy, now sees him with horror relapsed into +deathlike stillness; he calls him, laments over him and over this +fatal <a name="page_305"><span class="page">Page 305</span></a> +love, the world's loveliest madness, which rewards so ill those who +follow its lure. "Are you then dead?" he weeps, "Do you still live?... +Have you succumbed to the curse?" He listens almost hopelessly for +his breathing, and starts up with a return of joy: "No! He lives! +He rises! How softly his lips stir...."—"The ship!" Tristan +murmurs, "Do you not see it yet?"—"The ship?... Certainly!" +the poor nurse answers, with his determined cheerfulness, "It will +arrive this very day.... It cannot delay much longer!"—"And +upon it"—Tristan describes the vision which is calling back +the light to his eyes—"upon it, Isolde. How she beckons, how +graciously she drinks to our peace! Do you see her?... Do you not +see her yet?... How sweetly, lovely and gentle, she comes wandering +over the plains of the sea. On soft billows of joyous flowers she +advances, luminous, toward the land. She smiles comfort to me and +delicious rest, she brings me utmost relief.... Ah, Isolde, Isolde! +How kind, how fair are you!... What, Kurwenal," he breaks off with +that return to agitation toward which his fever by its law begins +from the moment of returning consciousness to drive his poor brain, +till, reaching a violence his strength cannot support, it plunges +him back exhausted into unconsciousness, "What, Kurwenal, you do not +see her? Away, to the watch-tower, dull-witted churl, that the sight +may not escape you which is so plain to me! Do you not hear me?... To +the tower! Quick, to the tower!... Are you there?... The ship! The +ship! Isolde's ship! You must—must see it! The ship!... Is +it possible," he cries despairingly, "that you do not see it yet?" +He has been starting up from his bed, in his eagerness. Kurwenal +has struggled with him to keep him down. While he hesitates as +before between obedience and fear to leave his patient, the servant +realises that the shepherd's pipe has changed its tune,—has +<a name="page_306"><span class="page">Page 306</span></a> changed +it for a shrill, lively, tripping air. He listens with all his soul +for a second, then with a shout of triumph dashes to the battlements +and sends his eyes sweeping the sea. "Ha! The ship!... I see it +nearing from the north!"—"Did I not know it?" Tristan exults +like a child. "Did I not say so? Did I not say she lived and knit me +still to life? From the world which for me contains her only, how +should Isolde have departed?" His joy is new life poured into him; +his agitation this time produces no exhaustion, he has strength for +the moment to squander. "Hahei! Hahei!" shouts Kurwenal from his +post, "How boldly it steers, how the sails strain in the wind! +How it chases, how it flies!"—"The pennant?... The pennant?" +Tristan holds his breath for the answer. "The bright pennant of +joy floats gaily from the topmast!"—"Cheer! The pennant of +joy!... In the bright light of day, Isolde coming to me! To me, +Isolde!... Do you see her self?"—"The ship has disappeared +behind the reef..." Tristan's joy drops like a shot bird. One seems +to feel his heart stop. "The reef?..." he asks trembling, "Is there +danger in it?... That is where the surf rages, the ships founder.... +Who is at the helm?"—"The safest of sea-men."—"Could +he betray me? Might he be a confederate of Melot's?"—"Trust +him as you would myself!"—"But you, wretch, are a traitor +too!... Do you see her again?"—"Not yet!"—"Lost!" wails +Tristan—but at Kurwenal's shout in a moment more that the +ship has cleared the rocks and is sailing up the safe channel into +port, springs again to the peaks of joy and promises Kurwenal the +bequest of all his worldly goods. And now Kurwenal from his outlook +communicates that he sees Isolde,—she is waving,—the +keel is in the harbour,—Isolde has sprung ashore. "Down!" +Tristan orders wildly, "Down to the shore! Assist her! Assist my +lady!"—"I will bring her up here in my arms—trust <a +name="page_307"><span class="page">Page 307</span></a> to them! +But you, Tristan," the poor nurse stops on his hurried way down +to enjoin, "stay reliably on the bed!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Tristan, left alone, falls to tossing and writhing with impatience. +His burning fever is confused to his sense with the heat of the +sun, and this day of joy he calls the sunniest of all days. This +tumult of the blood, this julibant urge to action, this immeasurable +delight, this frenzy of joy, how, how to endure them prostrate +upon the couch? Up, bravely up and away, where hearts are alive +and throbbing! We can see his fever again working itself toward +delirium. It reaches this time complete madness. With the proud +cry: "Tristan, the hero, in jubilant strength has raised himself +up from death!" he in fact lifts himself suddenly quite up. And +then no doubt some reminder, at the violent motion, of his wound, +suggests to his madness its next wild fancy, that a sort of glory +is in a streaming wound, such as he bore while fighting Morold, +that he will meet Isolde in the same manner, gloriously bleeding, +not ignobly constrained by a bandage. And prompted by some obscure +instinct perhaps to relieve a torture of which his flaming brain +will not permit him duly to take account, he tears the wrappings +from his wound, shouting with gladness, and bidding his blood now +flow merrily forth. He jumps from the couch, he goes a few feet in +swaying progress toward the castle-gate: She who shall heal the +wound forever draws near like a hero, draws near bringing health, +let the world fade away before his victorious haste!... The victorious +haste has taken him a staggering step or two, when Isolde's voice +comes borne to him, calling before she appears. "Tristan, Tristan! +Beloved!" He stops short and listens, shocked out of the idea of +what he was trying to do, losing his grasp on the present. "What?... +Do I hear the light?" he falters, taken back by the spell of that +voice to the old time, when never the light <a name="page_308"><span +class="page">Page 308</span></a> called to him, or never the beloved +called to him out of the light, but ever and only out of the night. +The suggestion of the darkness now gathering over his eyes is that +the torch is going out,—her signal to him to come. "To her!" +therefore he cries, "To her!" and is making such effort to hurry as +one makes in a dream, when behold, there she is! There she comes +flying to him through the castle-gate, breathless with her haste. +He has strength enough still, in his transporting joy, to get as +far as her arms; but, with the relief of being caught in them, +all relaxes, he sinks to the earth. Frightened, she calls him. +He turns his eyes upon her with the last of their long yearning, +and softly breathes forth his life upon her name. He could not +die before she came, but now at once it is grown sweet and easy. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Isolde cannot believe this which she seems to see. She falls on +her knees beside him, beseeches, coaxes, reproaches him, and wrings +her hands over his obdurate unresponse. "Just for one hour! Just +for one hour, be awake to me still! Such long days of terror and +yearning Isolde has endured for the sake of one hour to spend with +you! Will Tristan defraud her, defraud Isolde of this single +infinitely-short last earthly joy? The wound,—where? Let +me heal it, that we may have the joyous night together!... Oh, do +not die of the wound! Let the light of life go out for us clasped +together!... Too late! Too late!... Hard-hearted!... Do you punish me +so with ruthless sentence? Do you shut your heart to my complaint?... +Only once... only once more!... Look, he wakes! Beloved!..." +Consciousness mercifully forsakes her. She sinks senseless upon +his body. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Kurwenal has been standing apart with eyes bent in dumb and rigid +despair upon his master. A confused tumult of arms is heard. The +shepherd climbs hurriedly over the parapet with the announcement: +"A second ship!" Kurwenal starts <a name="page_309"><span +class="page">Page 309</span></a> from his trance of grief and rushes +to look off. He breaks into curses, recognising Mark and Melot +among the men just landed. His resolution is instantly taken. "Arms +and stones! Help me! To the gate!" With the shepherd's help he is +fastening and barricading the castle-gate, when Isolde's skipper +hurries in with the cry: "Mark is behind me with men-of-arms and +folk. Vain to attempt defence, we are overpowered!" Kurwenal does +not pause in his preparations: "While I live, no one shall look in +here! Take your post and help!" Brangaene's voice is heard, calling +her mistress. Kurwenal's excitement, his rage of determination +to keep the sight of those helpless embraced bodies sacred from +profane eyes, shuts his reason to every sign. Brangaene's cry to +him not to close the gate he takes to signify that she is in league +with the enemy. Melot's voice, just outside: "Back, madman! Bar not +the way!" calls forth a fierce laugh: "Hurrah for the day which +gives me the chance to have at you!" The gate resists but a moment; +Melot is first to break in. Kurwenal with a savage cry cuts him +down. Brangaene is heard calling to him that he labours under a +mistake; Mark calling upon him to desist from this insanity. He sees, +understands but one thing, to keep out these enemies of Tristan's, +defend the master to the last against this intrusion. He orders +one of his party to throw back Brangaene, who is coming by the +way of the wall; he hurls himself at the invaders now crowding +in. In self-defence they draw arms upon the slashing madman. He +extorts his death-wound as it were by force from one of them... +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Painfully he drags himself along the earth, until he can touch his +master's hand: "Tristan, dear lord! Chide not that the faithful +one comes along too!" The last note about him as he expires is +a fragment of the theme of determined cheerfulness, his pitiful +sick-nurse encouragements to Tristan. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_310"><span class="page">Page 310</span></a> Brangaene +has reached Isolde and is making frightened efforts to restore +her. Mark stands regarding the still forms with profound emotion. +Reproach is in his tone when he now speaks, as earlier, the gentle +complainingness of one in all things blameless, who, doing all +for the best, has met with unmerited suffering. "Dead! All dead!" +he mourns, "My hero! My Tristan! Most tenderly-beloved friend! +To-day again must you betray your friend, to-day when he comes +to give you proof of highest faith. Awake! Awake at the voice of +my sorrow, O faithless, faithfullest friend!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Brangaene's ministrations have brought back a little life to Isolde. +Brangaene holds her in her arms and labours to reassure her. "Hear +me, sweetest lady, happy news let me report. Would you not trust +Brangaene? For her blind fault she has made amends. When you +disappeared, quickly she sought the King. No sooner had the secret +of the potion been made known to him than in all haste he put to +sea, to overtake you, to renounce you, to lead you himself to the +friend!" Mark completes the revelation: "When I was brought to +understand what before I could not grasp, how happy was I to find +my friend free from blame! To wed you to the peerless hero with full +sails I flew in your wake,—but how does ravaging misfortune +overtake him who came bringing peace! I but made greater the harvest +of death! Madness heaped the measure of disaster!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Isolde has neither heard what they say, nor does she appear to +recognise them. Half of her clearly has gone with Tristan, the +rest is near taking wing, according to her word: "Where Tristan's +house and home, there will Isolde abide." Her own swan-song takes +us a little way with her into her <i>Liebes-tod</i>, her love-death. +Her eyes, fixed in contemplation of his face, have the vision of it +returning to life. She <a name="page_311"><span class="page">Page +311</span></a> sees him re-arise, powerful and loving, growing +in glory till he assumes transcendent splendour. "Do you see it, +friends,—do you not see it?" she asks, of what shines so +vividly before her that her face is transfigured as if with reflected +light. And music is shed from this luminous ascending form.... +"Am I alone to hear it?" she exclaims, it is so clear to +her,—music wonderful and soft, which says everything, which +gently reconciles one to all. It grows, it swells, it penetrates, +uplifts.... And what is this enfolding her? Floods of soft air! +Billows of perfume! They softly surge and murmur around her.... +She is in wonder whether to inhale, or to listen, or drink and +be immersed and yield up the breath sweetly amid perfumes.... Ah, +yes, in the billowing surge, in the great harmony, in the breath +of the spheres, to sink under, to drown, to be lost... that, that +will be the supreme ecstasy!... As the mysterious experiences she +describes absorb her soul, her body sinks softly upon Tristan's. +Mark extends his hands in blessing over the dead. +</p> + +<p class="indent gap"> +And so the curtain fans on this wonderful and moving drama, and +the thousands scatter in an exalted mood, impressed once more with +the incomprehensible loveliness of love. The point of fascination +of this work does not lie surely in any celebration of enviable +joys, or sorrows nearly as enviable; it is not that it is spiritual, +which would strengthen its appeal for some, neither that it is +sensuous, which would make it alluring to others; it is that it +breathes love,—love, indefinable but unmistakable, mysterious +but absolute, understood of all, explainable by none, and of greater, +or at least more universal, interest than any other emotion. Those +equally fitted to enjoy all Wagner's operas show, it is observed, +a predilection usually for Tristan and Isolde. If the pre-eminent +beauty of <a name="page_312"><span class="page">Page 312</span></a> +the music accounts for this, the fact suggests none the less that +Wagner could reach his utmost eloquence on the theme. It is as if +the composer had wished for once a fair field to render all he +felt and understood of love, and so had chosen a story in which +it moves free from ordinary trammels and is permitted an intensity +more prolonged, more fervid deeps, languors more abandoned, than +love in the shackles of thought and will. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A thing which must not be forgotten. The love of Tristan and Isolde +is not to be brought under the head of what is vulgarly termed a +guilty love. We have seen how Mark learning the secret of the potion +instantly and completely exonerated them and rejoiced that he could +return to his faith in Tristan. We know little of love-potions, and +had best forget such attempts at rational explanation of them as +we may have read, accepting the old story as it is offered, with +its cup of magic by which all struggle against the power of love +became vain. The lovers must be regarded as essentially innocent. +The language of their hearts is always perfectly noble, their music +is never sultry. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +It seems to matter less, in the case of this opera than of Wagner's +other operas, that one should be able to distinguish the motifs. When +Fasolt falls, or the dragon, or Mime, it is distinctly interesting +to know that the conspicuous phrase thrilling the air is the Curse +of the Ring; but we are easily willing to let Glances and Sighs +and the Effect of the Love-draught melt into one general fire of +tenderness. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +There is likewise less need in the case of this opera than, I think, +any other of Wagner's, to be familiar beforehand with the argument. +Any one seeing the Rhine-gold unprepared would probably not understand +anything whatever, as far as the story is concerned. The same is +in some degree true of Walkuere and Goetterdaemmerung; even of +Parsifal one need <a name="page_313"><span class="page">Page +313</span></a> to know the inwardness of the plot. But Tristan +and Isolde can be grasped through the eye by the dullest. A Woman +is seen expressing great anger; there is a scene of coldness and +incrimination between her and a Man. They drink from a golden cup +and are from that moment lovers. They talk lengthily and most +mellifluously of love in a garden at night. They are surprised by +one with an evident right to be incensed. The lover is wounded. In +a different scene he lies dying. His love comes to him. He expires +in her arms and she follows him in death. Any one can understand, +everyone sympathises. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +In spite of which the study of the original text is full of great +reward; not only because one will hear the music after all with +a richer intellectual enjoyment, but even if one had no hope of +hearing the music. The text produces upon one to a singular +extent—or do we imagine it?—the effect of music. Its +musical counterpart is contained somehow in the written poetry, +and mists rise before our eyes when the small black type informs +us that Isolde cries in the ears of deaf love: "<i>Isolde rutt!... +Isolde kam!</i>" no otherwise than if the violins played upon our +hearts. +</p> + +<p class="bigtitle"> +<a name="page_315"><span class="page">Page 315</span></a> +LOHENGRIN</p> + +<h2><a name="page_317"><span class="page">Page 317</span></a> +LOHENGRIN</h2> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +Henry the Fowler, the German King, coming to Brabant to levy men-of-arms +for assistance against the Hungarian, has found the country distracted +with internal dissension, troubles in high places. These, as its +feudal head, he must settle before proceeding further. He summons +together the nobles of Brabant and holds his court in the open, +beneath the historical Oak of Justice, on the banks of the Scheldt, +by Antwerp. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He calls upon Friedrich von Telramund, conspicuously involved in +the quarrel disturbing the land, to lay before him the causes of +this. The subject complies: The Duke of Brabant had on dying placed +under his guardianship his two children, the young girl Elsa and +the boy Gottfried. As next heir to the throne, his honour was very +particularly implicated in his fidelity to this trust, the boy's +life was the jewel of his honour. Let the King judge then of his +grief at being robbed of that jewel! Elsa had taken her young brother +to the forest, ostensibly for the pleasure of woodland rambling, and +had returned without him, inquiring for him with an anxiety which +Telramund judged to be feigned, saying that she had accidentally +lost him a moment from sight and upon looking for him failed to find +trace of him. All search for the lost child had proved fruitless. +Elsa, accused and threatened by her guardian, had by blanched face +and terrified demeanour, he states, confessed guilt. A fearful +revulsion of feeling toward her had thereupon <a name="page_318"><span +class="page">Page 318</span></a> taken place in him; he had relinquished +the right to her hand, bestowed upon him by her father, and taken +to himself a wife more according to his heart, Ortrud, descended +from Radbot, Prince of the Frisians. Telramund presents to the +King the sombre-browed, haughty-looking Princess at his side. "And +now," he declares, "I here arraign Elsa von Brabant. I charge her +with the murder of her brother, and I lay claim in my own right +upon this land, to which my title is clear as next of kin to the +deceased Duke; my wife belonging, besides, to the house which formerly +gave sovereigns to this land." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A murmur passes through the assembly, in part horror, in part +incredulity of so monstrous a crime. "What dreadful charge is this +you bring?" asks the King, in natural doubt; "How were guilt so +prodigious possible?" Telramund offers as explanation a further +accusation, and in doing it gives a hint, not of his motive in +accusing Elsa, for the violent ambitious personage is honest in +thinking her guilty, but of the disposition of mind toward her +which had made him over-ready to believe evil of her: "This vain +and dreamy girl, who haughtily repelled my hand, of a secret amour +I accuse her. She thought that once rid of her brother she could, +as sovereign mistress of Brabant, autocratically reject the hand +of the liegeman, and openly favour the secret lover." His excess +of vehemence in accusation for a moment almost discredits him. The +King demands to see the accused. The trial shall proceed at once. +He apprehends difficulty in the case: a charge so black against one +so young and a woman, made by a man so impassioned and almost of +necessity prejudiced, yet of long confirmed reputation for stern +integrity of honour as for bravery. "God give me wisdom!" the King +publicly prays. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The King's herald asks if the court of justice shall be held on +the spot? The King in answer hangs his shield on the Justice-Tree, +<a name="page_319"><span class="page">Page 319</span></a> declaring +that this shield shall not cover him until he shall have spoken +judgment, stern yet tempered with mercy. The nobles all bare their +swords, declaring that these shall not be restored to their scabbards +until they shall have seen justice done. The herald in loud tones +summons the accused, Elsa von Brabant, to appear before this bar. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +There advances slowly, followed by her women, a very young, very +fair girl, whose countenance and every motion are stamped with gentle +modesty. Between the dignity which upbears her and the sorrow which +crushes her, she is pathetic as a bruised lily. She looks dreamy +withal, as Telramund described her; her expression is mournfully +abstracted, her eyes are on the ground. The murmur passes from +lip to lip at sight of her: "How innocent she looks! The one who +dared to bring against her such a heavy accusation must be sure +indeed of her guilt." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +She answers the King's first question, of her identity, by a motion +of the head alone. One divines that she has wept so much she could +only with difficulty summon up voice to speak. "Do you acknowledge +me as your rightful judge?" the King proceeds. She lifts her eyes +for a moment to read his, and slowly nods assent. "Do you know," +he asks further, "whereof you are accused?" Her eyes slide for a +second toward Telramund and Ortrud, and she answers by an involuntary +shudder. "What have you to reply to the accusation?" With infinite +dignity she sketches a meek gesture signifying, "Nothing!"—"You +acknowledge then your guilt?" A faint cry, hardly more than a sigh, +breaks from her lips: "My poor brother!" and she remains staring +sorrowfully before her, as if upon a face invisible to the others. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Struck and moved, the good King, whom we heard promise that his +sentence should be <i>streng und mild</i>, severe yet merciful, <a +name="page_320"><span class="page">Page 320</span></a> speaks kindly +now to this strange girl, standing in such danger, yet engrossed +in other things,—invites her confidence. "Tell me, Elsa, +what have you to impart to me?" With her eyes fixed upon vacancy, +she answers, almost as if she spoke in sleep: "In the darkness +of my lonely days, I cried for help to God. I poured forth the +deep lament of my heart in prayer. Among my moans there went forth +one so plaintive, so piercing, it travelled with mighty vibrations +far upon the air. I heard it resound at a vast distance ere it +died upon my ear. My eyelids thereupon dropped, I sank into sweet +slumber...." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +All look at her in amazement. She stands before a tribunal on a +matter of life and death, and with that rapt look offers a plea +of such irrelevancy! "Is she dreaming?" ask some, under-breath, +and others, "Is she mad?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The King tries to bring her to a sense of reality, a sense of her +peril. "Elsa!" he cries urgently, "speak your defence before this +court of justice!" But she goes on, with an air of dreamy ecstasy: +"All in the radiance of bright armour, a Knight drew near to me, +of virtue so luminous as never had I seen before! A golden horn +hung at his side, he leaned upon his sword. He came to me out of +the air, the effulgent hero. With gentlest words and action he +comforted me. I will await his coming, my champion he shall be!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Her audience is impressed by the look of inspiration with which +she tells her tale of vision. "The grace of Heaven be with us," +they say, "and assist us to see clearly who here is at fault!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The King in doubt turns to Telramund: "Friedrich, worthy as you +are of all men's honour, consider well who it is you are accusing!" +"You have heard her," the haughty lord answers excitedly; "she is +raving about a paramour! I am not deceived <a name="page_321"><span +class="page">Page 321</span></a> by her dreamy posturing. That +which I charge her with, I have certain ground for. Her crime was +authoritatively proved to me. But to satisfy your doubt by producing +testimony, that, verily, would ill become my pride. Here I stand! +Here is my sword! Who among you will fight with me, casting slur +upon my honour?"—"None of us!" comes promptly from the +Brabantians, "We only fight for you!" The high-tempered gentleman +turns somewhat violently upon the King: "And you, King, do you +forget my services, my victories in battle over the wild Dane?" +The King answers pacifyingly that it would ill beseem him to need +reminding of these, that he renders to Telramund the homage due to +highest worth, and could not wish the country in any keeping but +his. God alone, in conclusion, shall decide this matter, too difficult +obviously for human faculty. "I ask you, therefore, Friedrich, Count +von Telramund, will you, in life and death combat, entrust your +cause to the judgment of God?" Telramund gives assent. "And you +I ask, Elsa von Brabant, will you entrust your cause to a champion +who shall fight for you under the judgment of God?" She assents +likewise. "Whom do you choose for your champion?" the King asks +of her. "Now—" eagerly interjects Telramund, "now you shall +hear the name of her lover!"—"Listen!" say the rest, with +sharpened curiosity. The girl has fixed her eyes again upon the +vacancy which to her apparently is full of things to see. "I will +await the Knight. My champion he shall be! Hear what to the messenger +of God I offer in guerdon. In my father's dominions let him wear +the crown. Happy shall I hold myself if he take all that is mine, +and if he please to call me consort I give him all I am!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Four trumpeters turn to the four points of the compass and blow a +summons. The herald calls loud: "He who will do battle here, under +judgment of God, as champion for Elsa <a name="page_322"><span +class="page">Page 322</span></a> van Brabant, let him appear,—let +him appear!" The vibrations die of horns and herald's voice. There +is silence and tension. No one appears, nothing happens. Elsa, at +first calm in her security of faith, gives evidence of anxiety. +Telramund calls attention to her: "Now witness, witness if I have +accused her falsely. Right, by that token, is on my side!" Elsa with +childish simplicity appeals to the King: "Oh, my kind sovereign, +let me beseech you, one more call for my champion! He is far away, +no doubt, and has not heard!" At the King's command, the trumpets +sound again, the herald repeats his summons. There is no answer. +The surrounding stillness is unbroken by movement or sound. "By +gloomy silence," the men murmur, "God signifies his sentence!" +Elsa falls upon her knees: "Thou didst bear to him my lament, he +came to me by Thy command. Oh, Lord, now tell my Knight that he +must help me in my need! Vouchsafe to let me see him as I saw him +before, even as I saw him before let him come to me now!" The women +kneel beside her, adding their prayers to hers. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Elsa's last word has but died when a cry breaks from certain of +the company standing upon an eminence next the river. "Look! Look! +What a singular sight!"—"What is it?" ask the others. All +eyes turn toward the river. "A swan! A swan, drawing a skiff!... +A knight standing erect in it.... How his armour gleams! The eye +cannot endure such brightness.... See, he is coming toward us. +The swan draws the skiff by a golden chain! A miracle! A miracle!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Elsa stands transfixed, not daring to look around; but her women +look, and hail the approaching figure as that of the prayed-for +champion. Amazement at sight of him strikes Telramund dumb. Ortrud +upon a glance at the swan wears for one startled moment an expression +of unconcealable fear. He stands, the stranger, leaning on his +sword, in the swan-drawn <a name="page_323"><span class="page">Page +323</span></a> boat; adorned with that excess of lovely attribute +not looked for save in figures of dream or of legend, knightly in +one and archangelic, with his flashing silver mail and flowing locks +and unearthly beauty. As the boat draws to land all involuntarily +bare their heads. Elsa at last finds hardihood to turn; a cry of +rapturous recognition breaks from her lips. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He steps ashore. All in spell-bound attention watch for his first +action, his first words. These are for the swan, and contain not +much enlightenment for the breathless listeners. "Receive my thanks, +beloved swan. Return across the wide flood yonder from whence you +brought me. When you come back, let it be to our joy! Faithfully +fulfil your service. Farewell, farewell, my beloved swan!" The +mysterious bird slowly draws away from shore and breasts the river +in the direction from whence it came. The Knight looks after the +diminishing form with such effect of regret as would accompany +the departure of a cherished friend. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Voices of wonder pass from person to person; wonder at his impressive +beauty, and at themselves for the not unpleasant terror it inspires, +the spell it casts over them. He turns at last and advancing toward +the King salutes him; "Hail, King Henry! God's blessing stand by +your sword! Your great and glorious name shall never pass from +earth!" The King, who from his throne beneath the oak has been +able to watch the stranger from the moment of his entering the +story, is not of two minds concerning so luminous an apparition. +"If I rightly recognise the power," he speaks, "which has brought +you to this land, you come to us sent by God?"—"I am sent," +replies the Knight, "to do battle for a maid against whom a dark +accusation has been brought. Let me see now if I shall tell her +from among the rest." With but a passing glance at the group of +women, unhesitatingly he singles out Elsa, undistinguishable <a +name="page_324"><span class="page">Page 324</span></a> from the +others by any sign of rank. "Speak, then, Elsa von Brabant! If I +am chosen as your champion, will you without doubt or fear entrust +yourself to my protection?" Elsa, who from the moment of seeing +him has stood in a heavenly trance, answers this with no discreet +and grudging acquiescence; she falls upon her knees at the feet +of this her deliverer and hero, and with innocent impetuousness +offers him, not assurance of confidence in his arm, or gratitude +for his succour, but the whole of herself, made up solely of such +confidence and gratitude. "Will you," asks the Knight, while a divine +warmth of tenderness invests voice and face, "if I am victorious in +combat for you, will you that I become your husband?"—"As I +lie here at your feet," the girl replies with passionate humility, +"I give over unto you body and soul!" Full of responsive love as is +his face, bent upon so much beauty and innocence and adoration, he +does not at once gather her up from her knees to his arms. Strangely, +he stops to make conditions. "Elsa, if I am to be called your husband, +if I am to defend your land and people, if nothing is ever to tear +me from your side, one thing you must promise me: Never will you +ask me, nor be concerned to know, from whence I came to you, nor +what my name and race."—"Never, my lord, shall the question +rise to my lips!" She has spoken too readily, too easily, as if +she scarcely considered. "Elsa, have you perfectly understood?" +he asks earnestly, and repeats his injunction more impressively +still: "Never shall you ask me, nor be concerned to know, from +whence I came to you, nor what my name and race!" But she, how should +she in this moment not promise whatever he asked or do whatever be +required? There is no question of pondering any demand of this +exquisite dream made flesh, this angelic being come in the darkest +hour to make all the difference to her between life and death. +As he has asked more <a name="page_325"><span class="page">Page +325</span></a> earnestly, she replies more emphatically. "My defender, +my angel, my deliverer, who firmly believes in my innocence! Could +any doubt be more culpable than that which should disturb my faith +in you? Even as you will protect me in my need, even so will I +faithfully obey your command!" He lifts her then to his breast +with looks of radiant love, uttering the words which confirm his +action and make him her affianced. The people around them gaze in +moved wonder, confessing an emotion at sight of the <i>wonnigliche +Mann</i> beyond natural, suggesting magic. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The Silver Knight steps into the midst of the circle about the +Justice-Oak, and declares: "Hear me! To you nobles and people I +proclaim it: Free from all guilt is Elsa von Brabant. That you +have falsely accused her, Count von Telramund, shall now through +God's judgment be confirmed to you!" Telramund, obviously in grave +doubt, gazes searchingly in the face of this extraordinary intruder. +He is sure of his own integrity, relies perfectly on his private +information against Elsa; what then is an agent of Heaven's doing +on the opposite side? How can this be an agent of Heaven's at all? +While he hesitates, the Brabantian nobles warn him in undertones: +"Keep from the fight! If you undertake it, never shall you come +forth victorious! If he be protected by supernal power, of what +use to you is your gallant sword?" But Friedrich, true to his stiff +necked, proud self, bursts forth: "Rather dead than afraid!" and +violently addresses the stranger: "Whatever sorcery have brought +you here, stranger, who wear such a bold front, your haughty threats +in no wise move me, since never have I intended deceit. I accept +your challenge, and look to triumph by the course of justice!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The lists are set, the ground of the duel is marked off with spears +driven into the earth. When all is ready, the herald in <a +name="page_326"><span class="page">Page 326</span></a> solemn +proclamation warns all present to refrain from every sort of +interference, the penalty for any infringement of this rule to +be, in the case of a noble, the loss of his hand, in the case of +a churl, the loss of his head. He then addresses himself to the +combatants, warning them to loyally observe the rules of battle, +not by any evil art or trick of sorcery to disturb the virtue of +the judgment. God is to judge them according to custom in such +ordeals; in Him let them place their trust and not in their own +strength. The two champions with equal readiness declare themselves +prepared to obey this behest. The King descends from his throne, +removes his regal crown, and, while all beside uncover and unite +in his prayer, solemnly he makes over, as it were, his function +of judge to God. "My Lord and my God, I call upon Thee, that Thou +be present at this combat. Through victory of the sword speak Thy +sentence, and let truth and falsehood clearly appear. To the arm +of the righteous lend heroic strength, unstring the sinews of the +false! Help us Thou, O God, in this hour, for our best wisdom is +folly before Thee!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Each of the persons present feels certain of victory for his own +side, even dark Ortrud, with the black secrets of her conscience, +who believes in no messengers from God, and pins her faith to the +well-tested strength of her husband's arm. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At the thrice-repeated blow of the King's sword upon his shield, the +combatants enter the lists. The duel lasts but a moment. Friedrich +falls, not from any wound, but from the lightening flash of the +adversary's sword, brought down upon him with a great sweep. The +mysterious weight of it crushes him to the earth, overthrows him, +deprives him of force to rise again. The gleaming enemy stands over +him with sword-point at his throat: "By victory through God your +life now belongs to me. I give it you. Make use of it to repent!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_327"><span class="page">Page 327</span></a> In the +rejoicings that follow, the acclamations of the victorious champion +of innocence, no one takes any thought further of the vanquished. +Unnoticed he writhes, appalled at the recognition that very God has +beaten him, that honour—honour is lost! The wife struggles +with a different emotion. Her eyes, unimpressed by his splendour, +unconvinced by his victory, boldly scrutinise the countenance of +the Swan-brought, to discover the thing he had forbidden Elsa to +inquire, what manner of man he be. Who is this, she asks herself, +that has overcome her husband, that has placed a term to her power? +Is it one whom verily she need fear? Must she give up her hopes +because of him? +</p> + +<h3>II.</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The Second Act shows the great court in the citadel of Antwerp, +bounded at the back by the Palace, where the knights are lodged; +at the left, by the Kemenate, the women's apartments; at the right, +by the Minster. It is night. The windows of the Palace are brightly +lighted; smothered bursts of music from time to time issue forth +from them. Telramund and Ortrud, in the poor garb of plebeians, +sit on the church-steps. Excommunication and banishment, following +the condemnation of God signified by such defeat as Telramund has +suffered, have made of them beggars and fugitives. Telramund is +sunk in dark reflection. Ortrud, half-crouched like a dangerous +animal lying in wait, stares intently at the lighted windows. With +sudden effort of resolve Telramund rouses himself and gets to his +feet. "Come, companion of my disgrace!" he speaks to the woman +beside him; "Daybreak must not find us here." She does not stir. +"I cannot move from here," she answers; "I am spell-bound upon +this spot. From the contemplation of <a name="page_328"><span +class="page">Page 328</span></a> this brilliant banqueting of our +enemies let me absorb a fearful mortal venom, whereby I shall bring +to an end both our ignominy and their rejoicing!" Friedrich shudders, +in spite of himself, at such incarnate malignity as seems represented +by that crouching form, those hate-darting eyes. The sense seizes +him, too, in the dreadful soreness of his lacerated pride, how much +this woman is responsible for what he has suffered. "You fearful +woman!" he cries, "What is it keeps me still bound to you? Why do +I not leave you alone, and flee by myself away, away, where my +conscience may find rest? Through you I must lose my honour, the +glory I had won. The praise that attaches to fair fame follows me +no more. My knighthood is turned to a mock! Outlawed, proscribed +am I, shattered is my sword, broken my escutcheon, anathemised +my house! Whatever way I turn, all flee from me, accursed! The +robber himself shuns the infection of my glance. Oh, that I had +chosen death sooner than life so abject and miserable!..." With the +agonised cry, "My honour, oh, my honour! I have lost my honour!" +he casts himself face downward upon the ground. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Ortrud has not stirred, or taken her eyes from the bright orange-gold +windows. As Telramund's harsh voice ceases, music is heard again +from the banquet-hall. Ortrud listens till it has died away; then +asks, with cold quiet: "What makes you waste yourself in these wild +complaints?"—"That the very weapon should have been taken +from me with which I might have struck you dead!" he cries, stung to +insanity. Scornfully calm and cold as before, "Friedrich, you Count +of Telramund, for what reason," she asks, "do you distrust me?" Hotly +he pours forth his reasons. "Do you ask? Was it not your testimony, +your report, which induced me to accuse that innocent girl? You, +living in the dusky woods, did you not <a name="page_329"><span +class="page">Page 329</span></a> mendaciously aver to me that from +your wild castle you had seen the dark deed committed? With your +own eyes seen how Elsa drowned her brother in the tarn? And did you +not ensnare my ambitious heart with the prophecy that the ancient +princely dynasty of Radbot soon should flourish anew and reign over +Brabant, moving me thereby to withdraw my claim to the hand of Elsa, +the immaculate, and take to wife yourself, because you were the last +descendant of Radbot?"—"Ha! How mortally offensive is your +speech!" she speaks, but suppresses her natural annoyance to continue: +"Very true, all you have stated, I did say, and confirmed it with +proof."—"And made me, whose name stood so high in honour, whose +life had earned the prize due to highest virtue, made me into the +shameful accomplice of your lie!"—"Who lied?" she asks coolly. +"You!" he unceremoniously flings at her; "Has not God because of it, +through his judgment, brought me to shame?"—"God?..." She utters +the word with such vigour of derision that he involuntarily starts +back. "Horrible!" he shudders after a moment; "How dreadful does that +name sound upon your lips!"—"Ha! Do you call your own cowardice +God?" He raises against her his maddened hand: "Ortrud!..."—"Do +you threaten me? Threaten a woman?" she sneers, unmoved; "Oh, +lily-livered! Had you been equally bold in threatening him who +now sends us forth to our miserable doom, full easily might you +have earned victory in place of shame. Ha! He who should manfully +stand up to the encounter with him would find him weaker than a +child!"—"The weaker he," Telramund observes, ill-pleased, +"the more mightily was exhibited the strength of God!"—"The +strength of God!... Ha, ha!" laughs loud Ortrud, with the same +unmoderated effect of scorn and defiance, which sends her husband +staggering back it step, gasping. "Give me the opportunity," <a +name="page_330"><span class="page">Page 330</span></a> she proceeds, +with a return to that uncanny quiet of hers, "and I will show you, +infallibly, what a feeble god it is protects him!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Telramund is impressed. She is telling him after all that which he +would like to believe. Still, the impression of the day's events +is strong upon him,—his overthrow at God's own hand. After +that, how dare he trust her? And yet— But then again— +"You wild seeress," he exclaims, torn with doubt, "what are you +trying, with your mysterious hints, to entangle my soul afresh?" +She points at the Palace, from the windows of which the lights have +disappeared. "The revellers have laid them down to their luxurious +repose. Sit here beside me! The hour is come when my seer's eye shall +read the invisible for you." Telramund draws nearer, fascinated, +reconquered to her by this suggestion of some dim hope rearising +upon his blighted life. He sits down beside her and holds close +his ear for her guarded tones. "Do you know who this hero is whom +a swan brought to the shore?"—"No!"—"What would you +give to know? If I should tell you that were he forced to reveal his +name and kind there would be an end to the power which laboriously +he borrows from sorcery?"—"Ha! I understand then his +prohibition!"—"Now listen! No one here has power to wring +from him his secret, save she alone whom he forbade so stringently +ever to put to him the question!"—"The thing to do then would +be to prevail upon Elsa not to withhold from asking it!"—"Ha! +How quickly and well you apprehend me!"—"But how should we +succeed in that?"—"Listen! It is necessary first of all not +to forsake the spot. Wherefore, sharpen your wit! To arouse +well-justified suspicion in her, step forward, accuse him of sorcery, +whereby he perverted the ordeal!"—"Ha! By sorcery it was, and +treachery!"—"If you fail, there is still left the expedient +of <a name="page_331"><span class="page">Page 331</span></a> +violence."—"Violence?"—"Not for nought am I learned +in the most hidden arts. Every being deriving his strength from +magic, if but the smallest shred of flesh be torn from his body, +must instantly appear in his original weakness."—"Oh, if it +might be that you spoke true!" wistfully groans Telramund. "If +in the encounter you had struck off one of his fingers," Ortrud +continues, "nay, but one joint of a finger, that hero would have +been in your power!" Rage and excitement possess Telramund at the +retrospect of the combat in which he had been beaten, not, as he +had supposed, by God, but by the tricks of a sorcerer, and at the +prospect of avenging his disgrace, proving his uprightness, recovering +his honour. But—he is checked by a sudden return of suspicion +of this dark companion and adviser. "Oh, woman, whom I see standing +before me in the night," he addresses the dim figure, "if you are +again deceiving me, woe to you, I tell you, woe!" She quiets him +with the promise of teaching him the sweet joys of vengeance. A +foretaste of these they have, sitting on the minster-steps, gloating +upon the walls which enclose the unconscious foes. "Oh, you, sunk +in sweet slumber, know that mischief is awake and lying in wait +for you!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A door opens in the upper story of the Kemenate. A white figure +steps out on to the balcony and leans against the parapet, head +upon hand. The pair in the shade watch with suspended breath, +recognising Elsa. She is too happy, obviously, to sleep; her heart +is too heavily oppressed with gratitude for all that this wonderful +day has brought. The well-born gentle soul that she is must be +offering thanks to everything that has contributed to this hour; +and so, girlishly, she speaks to the wind: "You breezes, whom I +used so often to burden with my sadness and complaints, I must +tell you in very gratitude what happy turn my fortunes have taken! +By your means he came travelling to me, you smiled upon his <a +name="page_332"><span class="page">Page 332</span></a> voyage, on +his way over the wild waves you kept him safe. Full many a time +have I troubled you to dry my tears. I ask you now of your kindness +to cool my cheek aglow with love!" Ortrud has kept basilisk eyes +fixed upon the sweet love-flushed face touched with moonlight. +"She shall curse the hour," speaks the bitter enemy in her teeth, +"in which my eyes beheld her thus!" She bids Telramund under-breath +leave her for a little while. "Wherefore?" he asks. "She falls to +my share," comes grimly from the wife; "take her hero for yours!" +Telramund slips obediently away into the black shadow. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Ortrud watches Elsa for a time breathing her innocent fancies to +the wind; then abruptly cuts short the pastime, calling her name +in a loud, deliberately-plaintive tone. Elsa peers anxiously down +in the dark court. "Who calls me? How lamentably did my name come +shuddering through the night!"—"Elsa, is my voice so strange +to you? Is it your mind to disclaim all acquaintance with the wretch +whom you have driven forth to exile and misery?"—"Ortrud, is +it you? What are you doing here, unhappy woman?"—"Unhappy +woman?..." Ortrud repeats after her, giving the turn of scorn to +the young girl's pitying intonation; "Ample reason have you indeed +to call me so!" With dark artfulness she rouses in Elsa more than +proportionate compassion for her plight, by casting upon the +tender-conscienced creature the whole blame for it. In no scene +does the youthfulness of Telramund's ward appear more pathetically +than in this. "In the solitary forest, where I lived quiet and at +peace, what had I done to you," Ortrud upbraids, "what had I done +to you? Living there joylessly, my days solely spent in mourning +over the misfortunes that had long pursued my house, what had I done +to you,—what had I done to you?"—"Of what, in God's +name, do you accuse me?" asks Elsa, bewildered. Ortrud pursues +<a name="page_333"><span class="page">Page 333</span></a> in her +chosen line of incrimination at all cost: "However could you envy +me the fortune of being chosen for wife by the man whom you had +of your free will disdained?"—"All-merciful God," exclaims +Elsa, "What is the meaning of this?"—"And if, blinded by +an unhappy delusion, he attributed guilt to you, guiltless, his +heart is now torn with remorse; grim indeed has his punishment +been. Oh, you are happy! After brief period of suffering, mitigated +by conscious innocence, you see all life smiling unclouded before +you. You can part from me well-pleased, and send me forth on my +way to death, that the dull shadow of my grief may not disturb +your feasts." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Ortrud's policy is completely successful; this last imputation is +intolerable to the generous girl, made even more tender-hearted +than wont by her overflowing happiness. "What mean sense of Thy +mercies would I be showing," she cries, "All-powerful, who have +so greatly blessed me, should I repulse the wretched bowed before +me in the dust! Oh, nevermore! Ortrud, wait for me! I myself will +come down and let you in!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +She hurries indoors. Ortrud has gained what she wanted, intimate +access to the young Duchess's ear, that she may pour her poison +into it. She has a moment's joy of triumph, while the fair dupe +is hastening down to her within. We discover at this point that +she is no Christian like the rest; that the secret gods of the +secret sorceress are the old superseded ones, Wotan and Freia. +For that reason it was the Silver Knight did not impress her as +he did the others. She could not admit that he came from God, the +false god whose name we heard her pronounce with such unconcealable +scorn; but, herself a witch, supposed that he performed the feat +through wizardry. She had explained the phenomenon to her husband +in good faith; she believed what she said, that were he forced +to tell his name, <a name="page_334"><span class="page">Page +334</span></a> or might a shred of flesh be torn from him, he would +stand before them undisguised, shorn of his magic power. Wild with +evil joy at the success of her acting, she calls upon her desecrated +gods to help her further against the apostates. "Wotan, strong +god, I appeal to you! Freia, highest goddess, hear me! Vouchsafe +your blessing upon my deceit and hypocrisy, that I may happily +accomplish my vengeance!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At the sound of Elsa's voice calling: "Ortrud, where are you?" she +assumes the last abjectness. "Here!" she replies, cowering upon +the earth. "Here at your feet!" Simple Elsa's heart melts at the +sight, really out of all reason soft, out of all reason unsuspecting. +Yet she is infinitely sweet, in her exaggeration of goodness, when +she not only pardons, but begs pardon of this fiendish enemy for +what the latter may have had to suffer through her. She eagerly +puts out her hands to lift Ortrud from her knees. "God help me! +That I should see you thus, whom I have never seen save proud and +magnificent! Oh, my heart will choke me to behold you in so humble +attitude. Rise to your feet! Spare me your supplications! The hate +you have borne me I forgive you, and I pray you to forgive me too +whatever you have had to suffer through me!"—"Receive my thanks +for so much goodness!" exclaims feelingly the accomplished actress. +"He who to-morrow will be called my husband," continues Elsa, in her +young gladness to heap benefits, "I will make appeal to his gentle +nature, and obtain grace for Friedrich likewise."—"You bind me +to you forever with bonds of gratitude!" With light innocent hand +Elsa places the crowning one on top of her magnanimous courtesies. "At +early morning let me see you ready prepared. Adorned in magnificent +attire, you shall walk with me to the minster. There I am to await my +hero, to become his wife before God. His wife!..." The sweet pride +with which <a name="page_335"><span class="page">Page 335</span></a> +she says the word, the soft ecstasy that falls upon her at the thought, +stir in Ortrud such hatred that she cannot forbear, even though +the time can hardly be ripe, taking the first step at once which +is to result in the quick ruin of the poor child's dreams. "How +shall I reward you for so much kindness, powerless and destitute +as I am? Though by your grace I should dwell beside you, I should +remain no better than a beggar. One power, however, there is left +me; no arbitrary decree could rob me of that. By means of it, +peradventure, I shall be able to protect your life and preserve it +from regret."—"What do you mean?" asks Elsa lightly. "What +I mean is—that I warn you not too blindly to trust in your +good fortune; let me for the future have care for you, lest disaster +entangle you unaware." Elsa shrinks back a little, murmuring, +"Disaster?" Ortrud speaks with impressive mystery close to her +ear: "Could you but comprehend what marvellous manner of being +is the man—of whom I say but this: May he never forsake you +through the very same magic by which he came to you!" Elsa starts +away from Ortrud, in horror at such impiety,—disbelief in +the highest. But in a moment her displeasure gives way to sadness +and pity for the darkness in which this other woman lives. "Poor +sister!" she speaks, most gently, "you can hardly conceive how +unsuspecting is my heart! You have never known, belike, the happiness +that belongs to perfect faith. Come in with me! Let me teach you +the sweetness of an untroubled trust. Let me convert you to the +faith that there exists a happiness without leaven of regret!" This +warm young generous sweetness which makes Elsa open to any appeal, +blind to grossest fraud, merely exasperates Ortrud's ill-will. She +reads in it plain pride of superiority. As she could not admit +in the Knight of the swan a god-sent hero, she cannot see in Elsa +an uncommonly good-hearted girl. "Oh, <a name="page_336"><span +class="page">Page 336</span></a> that arrogance!" she is muttering +while Elsa is exhorting her; "It shall teach me how I may undo that +trustfulness of hers! Against it shall the weapons be turned, her +pride shall bring about her fall!"—Elsa by gesture inviting, +the other feigning confusion at so great kindness, the two pass +into the house together. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The first grey of dawn lightens the sky. Telramund, who has been +spying unseen, exults to see mischief in the person of his wife +entering the house of the enemy. He is not an evil man, he cares +beyond all for honour, and his consciousness of a certain unfairness +in the methods his wife will use is implied in his exclamation; +but the violent man so rages under a sense of injustice that all +weapons to him are good which shall bring about the ruin of those who +have ruined him. "Thus does mischief enter that house! Accomplish, +woman, what your subtlety has devised. I feel no power to check you +at your work. The mischief began with my downfall; now shall you +plunge after me, you who brought me to it! One thing alone stands +clear before me: The robbers of my honour shall see destruction!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Daylight brightens. The warders sound the reveillé from +the turret. Telramund conceals himself behind a buttress of the +minster. The business of the day is gradually taken up in the citadel +court. The porter unlocks the tower-gate that lets out on to the +city-road; servants come and go about their work, drawing water, +hanging festive garlands. At a summons from the King's trumpeters, +nobles and burghers assemble in great number before the Minster. +The King's herald coming out on the Palace-steps makes the following +announcements: Firstly: Banished and outlawed is Friedrich von +Telramund, for having undertaken the ordeal with a knowledge of +his own guilt. Any one sheltering or associating with him shall +according <a name="page_337"><span class="page">Page 337</span></a> +to the law of the realm come under the same condemnation. Secondly: +The King invests the unknown God-sent man, about to espouse Elsa, +with the lands and the crown of Brabant; the hero to be called, +according to his preference, not Duke, but Protector of Brabant. +Thirdly: The Protector will celebrate with them this day his nuptial +feast, but they shall join him tomorrow in battle-trim, to follow, as +their duty is, the King's arms. He himself, renouncing the sweetness +of repose, will lead them to glory. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +These proclamations are followed by general assent and gladness. +A small group there is, however, of malcontents, former adherents +of Telramund's, who grumble: "Hear that! He is to remove us out of +the country, against an enemy who has never so much as threatened us! +Such a bold beginning is ill-beseeming. Who will stand up against him +when he is in command?"—"I will!" comes from a muffled figure +that has crept among them, and Friedrich uncovers his countenance. +"How dare you venture here, in danger as you are from the hand of +every churl?" they ask him, frightened. "I shall dare and venture +more than this ere long, and the scales will drop from your eyes. +He who presumptuously calls you forth to war, I will accuse him +of treason in the things of God." The Brabantian gentlemen, afraid +of his being overheard or recognised, conceal the rash lord among +them, and compel him toward the church, out of sight. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Forerunners of the wedding-procession, young pages come from the +Kemenate, and clear a way through the crowd to the church-door. A +long train of ladies walk before the bride. There are happy cheers +when she appears, dazzling in her wedding-pomp; there are blessings +and the natural expressions of devotion from loyal subjects. The +pages and ladies stand massed at either side of the Minster-door +to give their mistress <a name="page_338"><span class="page">Page +338</span></a> precedence in entering. She is slowly, with bashful +lowered eyes, mounting the stairs, when Ortrud, who in magnificent +apparel has been following in her train, steps quickly before her, +with the startling command, given in a furious voice: "Back, Elsa! I +will no longer endure to follow you like a serving-maid! Everywhere +shall you yield me precedence, and with proper deference bow before +me!" This is, we believe, no part of any deep-laid plan of Ortrud's, +though it does in the event help along her scheme; it is an +uncontrollable outburst of temper at sight of Elsa in her eminence +of bridal and ducal glory. "What does the woman mean?" ask the +people of one another, and step between Elsa and her. "What is +this?" cries Elsa, painfully startled; "What sudden change has +taken place in you?"—"Because for an hour I forgot my proper +worth," Radbot's daughter continues violently, "do you think that +I am fit only to crawl before you? I will take measures to wipe +out my abasement. That which is due to me I am determined to +receive!"—"Woe's me!" complains Elsa, "Was I duped by your +feigning, when you stole to me last night with your pretended grief? +And do you now haughtily demand precedence of me, you, the wife of +a man convicted by God?" Ortrud sees here her opportunity again to +introduce the wedge of suspicion into her victim's mind. "Though a +false sentence banished my husband, his name was honoured throughout +the land, he was never spoken of save as the pattern of virtue. His +sword was well-tested and was feared—But yours, tell me, +who that is present knows him? You cannot even yourself call him by +his name!... Nay, but can you?" she taunts the shocked, pale-grown +bride, who has found no more than force to gasp,—"What does +she say? She blasphemes! Stop her lips!"—"Can you tell us +whether his lineage, his nobility, be well attested? From whence +the river <a name="page_339"><span class="page">Page 339</span></a> +brought him and whither he will go when he leaves? No, you cannot! +The matter, no doubt, would present difficulties, wherefore the +astute hero forbade all questioning!" Elsa has found her voice +at last, and speaks right hotly: "You slanderer! Abandoned woman! +Hear, whether I can answer you! So pure and lofty is his nature, +so filled with virtue is that noblest man, that never shall the +person obtain forgiveness who presumes to doubt his mission! Did +not my hero overcome your husband by the power of God in singular +combat? You shall tell me then, all of you, which of the two must +lawfully be held true?"—"Ha! That truth of your hero's!" +mocks Ortrud, fearfully ready of tongue; "How soon were it cast +in doubt, should he be forced to confess the sorcery by which he +practises such power! If you fear to question him concerning it, +all may believe with good right that you are not free yourself +from the suspicion that his truth must not be too closely looked +into!" Elsa is near fainting with the anguish of this encounter; +her women surround and comfort her. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The doors of the Palace have opened, the King and the Knight of +the Swan, with great retinue of nobles, issue forth, bound for +the church and wedding-ceremony. They arrive upon the scene before +the confusion is allayed occasioned by the quarrel between vulture +and dove. Elsa runs to the arms of the Protector. Receiving her and +glancing naturally about for explanation, he beholds the dangerous +Ortrud, whom his clear eye reads, restored to splendour, part of the +wedding-train, and remarks upon it with amazement to the trembling +bride. "What do I see? That unhappy woman at your side?"—"My +deliverer," weeps Elsa, "shield me from her! Scold me, for having +disobeyed you! I found her in tears here before my door; I took +her in out of her wretchedness. Now see how dreadfully she rewards +my kindness!... She taunts me for <a name="page_340"><span +class="page">Page 340</span></a> my over-great trust in you!" The +Knight fixes his eyes sternly upon the offender, who somehow cannot +look back bold insult as she would wish, but stands spell-bound +under the calm severity of his glance. "Stand off from her, you +fearful woman. Here shall you never prevail!—Tell me, Elsa," +he bends over her tearful face, "tell me that she tried vainly to +drop her venom into your heart?" Elsa hides her face against his +breast without answering. But the gesture with its implied confidence +satisfies him; the tears increase his protecting tenderness. "Come!" +he draws her toward the church; "Let your tears flow in there as +tears of joy!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The wedding-train forms again and moves churchward in wake of King +and bride and groom. But the wedding to-day is not to come off +without check and interruption—an ill omen, according to +the lore of all peoples. As the bridal party is mounting the +Minster-steps, there starts up in front of it, before the darkly +gaping door, the figure of Telramund. The crowd sways back as if +from one who should spread infection, so tainted did a man appear +against whom God through his ordeal had spoken judgment. "Oh, King, +oh, deluded princes, stand!" he cries, barring their way. He will +not be silenced by their indignant threats; he makes himself heard +in spite of shocked and angry prohibitions. "Hear me to whom grim +injustice has been done! God's judgment was perverted, falsified! +By the tricks of a sorcerer you have been beguiled!" The King's +followers are for seizing and thrusting him aside; but the soldier, +famous no longer ago than yesterday for every sort of superiority, +stands his ground and says what he is determined to say. "The man +I see yonder in his magnificence, I accuse of sorcery! As dust +before God's breath, let the power be dispersed which he owes to +a black art! How ill did you attend to the matters of the ordeal +which was to strip me of <a name="page_341"><span class="page">Page +341</span></a> honour, refraining as you did from questioning him, +when he came to undertake God's fight! But you shall not prevent +the question now, I myself will put it to him. Of his name, his +station, his honours, I inquire aloud before the whole world. Who +is he, who came to shore guided by a wild swan? One who keeps in +his service the like enchanted animals is to my thinking no true +man! Let him answer now my accusation. If he can do so, call my +condemnation just, but if he refuse, it must be plain to all that +his virtue will not bear scrutiny!" All eyes turn with unmistakable +interest of expectation toward the man thus accused; wonder concerning +what he will reply is expressed in undertones. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He refuses point-blank, with a bearing of such superiority as an +attack of the sort can hardly ruffle. "Not to you, so forgetful +of your honour, have I need here to reply. I set aside your evil +aspersion; truth will hardly suffer from the like!"—"If I am +in his eyes not worthy of reply," Friedrich bitterly re-attacks, +"I call upon you, King, high in honour indeed. Will he, on the +ground of insufficient nobility, refuse likewise to answer you?" +Aye, the Knight refuses again, with an assurance partaking in no +wise of haughtiness, but speaking a noble consciousness of what +he is which places him above men's opinions. "Yes! even the King I +must refuse to answer, and the united council of all the princes! +They will not permit doubt of me to burden them, they were witnesses +of my good deed. There is but one whom I must answer. Elsa!" He turns +toward her with bright face of confidence, and stops short at sight +of her, so troubled, so visibly torn by inward conflict, her bosom +labouring, her face trembling. There is no concealing it, she would +have wished him to answer loudly and boldly, to crush those mocking +enemies, Ortrud and Telramund, with the mention of a name, a rank, +which should have bowed them <a name="page_342"><span class="page">Page +342</span></a> down before him in the dust, abject. There is silence, +while all, entertaining their respective reflections, watch Elsa, +and she struggles with herself, staring blindly ahead. His secret +no doubt,—thus run her pitiable feminine thoughts,—if +revealed publicly like this would involve him in some danger. Ungrateful +indeed were it in her, saved by him, to betray him by demanding +the information here. If she knew his secret, however, she would +surely keep it faithfully.... But—but—she is helpless +against it, doubt is upheaving the foundations of her heart! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +It is the good King who speaks the right, the pertinent word. "My +hero, stand up undaunted against yonder faithless man! You are +too indubitably great to consider accusations of his!" The nobles +readily accept the King's leadership, in this as in other matters. +"We stand by you," they say to the Knight. "Your hand! We believe +that noble is your name, even though it be not spoken."—"Never +shall you repent your faith!" the Knight assures them. While the +nobles crowd about him; offering their hands in sign of allegiance, +and Elsa stands apart blindly dealing with her doubt, Telramund +steals unperceived to her side and whispers to her: "Rely on me! +Let me tell you a method for obtaining certainty!" She recoils, +frightened, yet without denouncing him aloud. "Let me take from +him the smallest shred of flesh," he continues hurriedly, "the +merest tip of a finger, and I swear to you that what he conceals +you shall see freely for yourself...." In his eagerness, forgetful +really at last of honour, he adds the inducement, "And, true to +you forever, he will never leave you!"—"Nevermore!" cries +Elsa, not so vigourously, however, but that he finds it possible +still to add: "I will be near to you at night. Do but call me, +without injury to him it shall be quickly done!" The Knight has +caught sight of him and is instantly <a name="page_343"><span +class="page">Page 343</span></a> at Elsa's side, crying astonished, +"Elsa, with whom are you conversing?" The poor girl sinks overwhelmed +with trouble and confusion at his feet. "Away from her, you accursed!" +speaks the Knight in a terrible authoritative voice to the evil +pair; "Let my eye never again behold you in her neighbourhood!" +Gently he lifts the bride; he scans her face wistfully: "In your +hand, in your loyalty, lies the pledge of all happiness! Have you +fallen into the unrest of doubt? Do you wish to question me?" He +asks it so frankly and fearlessly, albeit sorrowfully; he stands +there so convincingly brave-looking and clear-eyed, full of the +calm effect of power, that Elsa gazing at him comes back to her +true self and answers with all her heart: "Oh, my champion, who +came to save me! My hero, in whom I must live and die! High above +all power of doubt my love shall stand!" He clasps her in his arms, +solemnly saluting her.... +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +And once more the wedding-party sets itself upon the way to church. +Organ-music pours forth from the Minster-portals. With her foot on +the threshold the bride turns an eager, instinctive, searching, +almost frightened look upon the groom. In answer, he folds reassuring +arms around her. But, even so held, woman-like she looks back, in +spite of herself, over her shoulder, toward Ortrud, who receives +the timid glance with a detestable gesture of triumph. Properly +frightened, the bride turns quickly away, and the procession enters +the church. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +III +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +It is night. The stately bridal apartment awaits its guests. Music is +heard, very faint at first, as if approaching through long corridors. +Preceded by pages with lights, there enter by <a name="page_344"><span +class="page">Page 344</span></a> different doors a train of women +leading Elsa, a train of nobles and the King leading the Knight. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The epithalamium is sung to its end. After grave and charming ceremony, +with blessings and good wishes, all withdraw, leaving the bride and +groom alone. Elsa's face is altogether clear again of its clouds; +all is forgotten save the immeasurable happiness which, as soon +as the doors discreetly close, impels her to his arms; clasped +together, seated upon the edge of a day-bed, they listen in silence +to their wedding-music dying slowly away. When all is still at +last, in the dear joy of being "alone, for the first time alone +together since first we saw each other," life seems to begin for +each upon new and so incredibly sweeter terms. The stranger knight, +whom mystery enwraps, shows himself, despite certain sweet loftiness +which never leaves him, most convincingly human. In the simplest +warm way, a way old-fashioned as love, we hear him rejoice: "Now we +are escaped and hidden from the whole world. None can overhear the +exchange of greetings between our hearts. Elsa, my wife! You sweet +white bride! You shall tell me now whether you are happy!"—"How +cold must I be to call myself merely happy," she satisfies him +liberally, "when I possess the whole joy of Heaven! In the sweet +glowing toward you of my heart, I know such rapture as God can +alone bestow!" He meets her gratitude with an equal and just a little +over. "If, of your graciousness, you call yourself happy, do you not +give to me too the very happiness of Heaven? In the sweet glowing +toward you of my heart, I know indeed such rapture as God can alone +bestow!" He falls naturally, happy-lover-like, into talking of their +first meeting and beginning love: "How wondrous do I see to be the +nature of our love! We had never seen, but yet had divined, each +other! Choice had been made of me for your champion, but it was love +showed <a name="page_345"><span class="page">Page 345</span></a> +me my way to you. I read your innocence in your eyes, by a glance +you impressed me into the service of your grace!"—"I too," +she eagerly follows, "had seen you already, you had come to me in a +beatific dream. Then when wide-awake I saw you standing before me, +I knew that you were there by God's behest. I would have wished to +dissolve beneath your eyes and flow about your feet like a brook. I +would have wished like a flower shedding perfume out in the meadow +to bow in gladness at your footfall. Is this love?... Ah, how do my +lips frame it, that word so inexpressibly sweet as none other, save +alas! your name... which I am never to speak, by which I am never +to call the highest that I know!" There is no return indicated +in this of any doubt of him. Elsa is in this moment certainly all +trust. It is but an expression of love chafing a little at the +reticence which seems a barrier one must naturally wish away, if +hearts are to flow freely together. Hardly warningly, just lovingly, +he interrupts her: "Elsa!"—"How sweetly" she remarks enviously, +"my name drops from your lips! Do you grudge me the dear sound of +yours? Nay, you shall grant me this boon, that just in the quiet +hours of love's seclusion my lips should speak it...." He checks +her, as before, unalarmed, without reproach, by an exclamation of +love. "My sweet wife!"—"Just when we are alone," she coaxes, +"when no one can overhear! Never shall it be spoken in hearing of +the outside world." Instead of answering directly, he draws her +to him and turns to the open casement overlooking the garden; he +gazes thoughtfully out into the summer night and answers by a sort +of tender object-lesson. "Come, breathe with me the mild fragrance of +the flowers.... Oh, the sweet intoxication it affords! Mysteriously +it steals to us through the air, unquestioningly I yield myself to +its spell. A like spell it was which bound me to you when I saw +you, <a name="page_346"><span class="page">Page 346</span></a> +Sweet, for the first time. I did not need to ask how you might be +descended, my eye beheld you, my heart at once understood. Even as +this fragrance softly captures the senses, coming to us wafted from +the enigmatic night, even so did your purity enthrall me, despite +the dark suspicion weighing upon you!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +That she owes him much she is ready and over-ready to own. It is +almost embarassing to owe so much, to owe everything, and no means +of repaying, because the whole of oneself is after all so little. +"Oh, that I might prove myself worthy of you!" she sighs, "that +I need not sink into insignificance before you! That some merit +might lift me to your level, that I might suffer some torture for +your sake! If, even as you found me suffering under a heavy charge, +I might know you to be in distress! If bravely I might bear a burden +for you, might know of some sorrow threatening you! Can it be that +your secret is of such a nature that your lip must keep it from the +whole world? Disaster perhaps would overtake you, were it openly +published. If this were so, and if you would tell it to me, would +place your secret in my power, oh, never by any violence should +it be torn from me, for you I would go to death!" The bridegroom +cannot but be touched by such devoted gallant words from the fairest +lips. Off guard, he murmurs fondly, "Beloved!"—"Oh, make +me proud by your confidence, that I may not so deeply feel my +unworthiness!" she pleads, eagerly following up the advantage of +his not having yet remonstrated; "Let me know your secret, that +I may see plainly who you are!" Wilfully deaf to his imploring, +"Hush, Elsa!" more and more urgently she presses: "To my faithfulness +reveal your whole noble worth! Without fear of regret, tell me +whence you came. I will prove to you how strong in silence I can +be!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_347"><span class="page">Page 347</span></a> Her words, +all at once, their significance penetrating fully, have brought +a change in him. Gravely he moves apart from her, and his voice +is for a moment stern as well as sorrowful: "Highest confidence +already have I shown you, placing trust as I unhesitatingly did in +your oath. If you will never depart from the command you swore to +observe, high above all women shall I deem you worthy of honour." +But he cannot continue in that tone, the altogether human bridegroom. +At sight of the pained look his severity has produced, he goes +quickly again to her, he makes instant reparation for his momentary +harshness. "Come to my breast, you sweet, you white one!" he profusely +caresses and consoles; "Be close to the warmth of my heart! Bend +upon me the soft light of your eye in which I saw foreshining my +whole happiness!..." And just to satisfy her so far as he can, to +prove still further his great love, he proceeds: "Oh, greatly must +your love compensate me for that which I relinquished for your sake! +No destiny in God's wide world could be esteemed nobler than mine. If +the King should offer me his crown, with good right I might reject +it. The only thing which can repay me for my sacrifice, I must look +for it in your love. Then cast doubt aside forever. Let your love be +my proud security! For I came to you from no obscure and miserable +lot. From splendour and joy am I come to you!" Oh, the ill-inspired +speech! What he dreamed must unite closer, in the momentary mood +of the incalculable feminine being he is dealing with, divides +further. The thought is instantly back in her mind which she had +smothered and then forgotten, the idea suggested by Ortrud, implied +by Friedrich, that mysteriously as he came the unknown Knight may +presently be going away from her. The hour that should have been +so sweet and quiet in the "fragrant chamber adorned for love" of +the wedding-song, is turned to strain and <a name="page_348"><span +class="page">Page 348</span></a> dreadfulness. "God help me!" wails +her passionate alarm, "What must I hear? What testimony from your own +lips! In your wish to beguile me, you have announced my lamentable +doom! The condition you forsook, your highest happiness lay bound +in that. You came to me from splendour and joy, and are longing +to go back. How could I, poor wretch, believe that my faithful +devotion would suffice you? The day will come which will rob me of +you, your love being turned to rue!"—"Forbear, forbear thus +to torture yourself!"—"Nay, it is you, why do you torture +me? Must I count the days during which I still may keep you? In +haunting fear of your departure, my cheek will fade; then you will +hasten away from me, I shall be left forlorn."—"Never" he +endeavours to quiet her, "never will your winning charm lessen, if +you but keep suspicion from your heart."—"How should I tie +you to me?" she pursues undeterred her fatal train of thought; +"How might I hope for such power? A creature of weird arts are +you, you came here by a miracle of magic. How then should it fare +but ill with me? What security for you can I hold?" She shrinks +together in sudden terror and listens. "Did you hear nothing? Did +you not distinguish footsteps?"—"Elsa!"—"No, it is not +that!... But there..." she stares vacantly ahead, pointing,—her +face how changed from the sweet, glowing face of so short a time +ago!—and describes what her over-excited fancy paints on +the empty air before her: "Look there! The swan! The swan! There +he comes, over the watery flood.... You call him, he draws the boat +to shore...."—"Stop, Elsa! Master these mad imaginings!" the +poor lover strives with her, in despair.—"Nay, nothing can give +me rest," she declares, wholly unmanageable, wholly unreasonable, +"nothing can turn me from these imaginings, but, though I should +pay for it with my life, the knowledge who you are!"—"Elsa, +what are <a name="page_349"><span class="page">Page 349</span></a> +you daring to do?"—"Uncannily beautiful man, hear what I must +demand of you: Tell me your name!"—"Forbear!"—"Whence +are you come?"—"Alas!"—"What manner of man are +you?"—"Woe, what have you done?" Elsa utters a shriek, catching +sight of Telramund with a handful of armed men stealing in by the +door behind her husband's back,—the explanation of the sound +she had heard. With a cry of warning, she runs for her husband's +sword and hands it to him. Quickly turning he rewards Friedrich's +ineffectual lunge with a blow that stretches him dead. The appalled +accomplices drop their swords and fall to their knees. Elsa, who had +cast herself against her husband's breast, slides swooning to the +floor. There is a long silence. The Knight stands, deeply shaken, +coming to gradual realisation of the whole sorrowful situation. All +the light, the bridegroom joy, have faded from his face. With a +quiet suggestive of infinite patience and some strange superiority +of strength, some unearthly resource, he considers this ruin, his +audible comment on it a single sigh, more poignant than if it were +less restrained: "Woe! Now is all our happiness over!" Very gently +he lifts Elsa, sufficiently revived to realise that she has somehow +worked irreparable destruction, and decisively places her away +from him. By a sign he orders Telramund's followers to their feet +and bids them carry the dead man to the King's judgment-place. +He rings a bell; the women who appear in answer, he instructs: +"To accompany her before the King, attire Elsa, my sweet wife! +There shall she receive my answer, and learn her husband's name +and state." +</p> + +<p class="indent gap"> +At daybreak the Brabantian lords and their men-at-arms are assembling +around the Justice-Oak in readiness to follow the King. The King, +with noble expressions of gratitude for <a name="page_350"><span +class="page">Page 350</span></a> their loyalty, takes command of +them. "But where loiters," he is inquiring, "the one whom God sent +to the glory, the greatness of Brabant?" when a covered bier is +borne before him and set down in the midst of the wondering company, +by men whom they recognise as former retainers of Telramund's. This +is done, explain these last, by order of the Protector of Brabant. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Elsa attended by her ladies appears at the place of gathering. +Her pale and sorrow-struck looks are attributed naturally to the +impending departure of her husband for the field. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Armed in his flashing silver mail, as he was first seen of them, +he now appears on the spot. Cheers greet him from those whom he +is to lead to battle and victory. When their shouts die, he makes, +standing before the King, the startling announcement that he cannot +lead them to battle, the brave heroes he has convoked. "I am not +here as your brother-of-arms," he informs their consternation; +"You behold me in the character of complainant. And, firstly..." +he solemnly draws the pall from the dead face of Telramund, "I +make my charge aloud before you all, and ask for judgment according +to law and custom: This man having surprised and assailed me by +night, tell me, was I justified in slaying him?"—"As your +hand smote him upon earth," the horrified spectators cry in a voice, +"may God's punishment smite him yonder!"—"Another accusation +must you hear," the Knight continues; "I speak my complaint before +you all. The woman whom God had given to my keeping has been so +far misguided as to forget her loyalty to me!" There is an outcry +of sorrowful incredulity. "You all heard," he proceeds, steeled +to severity, "how she promised me never to ask who I am? She has +broken that sacred oath. To pernicious counsel she yielded her +heart. No longer may I spare to answer the mad questioning of her +doubt. I could deny the <a name="page_351"><span class="page">Page +351</span></a> urgency of enemies, but must make known, since she +has willed it, my name,—must reveal who I am! Now judge if +I have reason to shun the light! Before the whole world, before +the King and kingdom, I will in all truth declare my secret. Hear, +then, if I be not equal in nobility to any here!" There runs a +murmur through all the impressed multitude, not of curiosity, but +regret that he should be forced to speak; the uneasy wish is felt +that he might not. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +His face has cleared wonderfully. As his inward eye fixes itself +upon images of the home, the <i>Glanz und Wonne</i>, he is about to +describe, memory lights his countenance as if with the reflection +of some place of unearthly splendour. "In a far land," his words +fall measured and sweet, "unapproachable to footsteps of yours, +a fastness there stands called Monsalvat. In the centre of it, +a bright temple, more precious than anything known upon earth. +Within this is preserved as the most sacred of relics a vessel of +blessed and miraculous power. It was brought to earth by a legion +of angels, and given into the guardianship of men, to be the object +of their purest care. Yearly there descends from Heaven a Dove, to +strengthen anew its miraculous power. It is called the Grail, and +there is shed from it into the hearts of the knights that guard +it serene and perfect faith. One chosen to serve the Grail is armed +by it with over-earthly power; against it no evil art can prevail, +before the vision of it the shades of death disperse. One sent by +it to distant countries to champion the cause of virtue retains +the holy power derived from it as long as he remains unknown. Of +nature so mysteriously sublime is the blessing of the Grail that +if disclosed to the layman's eye it must withdraw. The identity +of a Knight of the Grail must therefore not be suspected. If he is +recognised—he must depart! Now hear my reply to the forbidden +question. By the Holy Grail <a name="page_352"><span class="page">Page +352</span></a> was I sent to you here. My father Parsifal in Monsalvat +wears the crown. A Knight of the Grail am I and my name is Lohengrin!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The people gaze at him in awe and worshipping wonder. The unhapppy +Elsa, feeling the world reel and grow dark, gasps for air and is +falling, when Lohengrin catches her in his arms, all his sternness +melting away, his grief and love pouring forth in tender reproach. +"Oh, Elsa, what have you done to me? From the first moment of beholding +you, I felt love for you enkindling my heart, I became aware of an +unknown happiness. The high faculty, the miraculous power, the +strength involved in my secret, I wished to place them all at the +service of your purest heart. Why did you wrest from me my secret? +For now, alas, I must be parted from you!" She expends herself in +wild prayers to be forgiven, to be punished by whatsoever affliction, +only not to lose him. He feels sorrow enough, immeasurable sorrow, +heart-break, but not for an instant hesitation. "The Grail already +is offended at my lagging! I must—must go! There is but one +punishment for your fault, and its hard anguish falls equally upon +me. We must be parted,—far removed from each other!" He turns +to the King and nobles imploring him to remain and lead them as +he had promised against the enemy. "Oh, King, I may not stay! A +Knight of the Grail, when you have recognised him, should he +disobediently remain to fight with you, would have forfeited the +strength of his arm. But hear me prophesy: A great victory awaits +you, just and single-hearted King! To the remotest days shall the +hordes of the East never march in triumph upon Germany!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +From the river-bank comes a startling voice: "The swan! The swan!" +All turn to look. A cry of horror breaks from Elsa. The swan is +seen approaching, drawing the empty boat. <a name="page_353"><span +class="page">Page 353</span></a> Less master of himself than +theretofore, Lohengrin, realising the last parting so near, gives +unmistakable outward sign of his inward anguish. "The Grail already +is sending for the dilatory servant!..." Going to the water's edge he +addresses to the snowy bird words which no one can quite comprehend. +"My beloved swan, how gladly would I have spared you this last +sorrowful voyage. In a year, your period of service having expired, +delivered by the power of the Grail, in a different shape I had +thought to see you.—Oh, Elsa," he returns to her side, "oh, +that I might have waited but one year and been witness of your joy +when, under protection of the Grail, your brother had returned +to you, whom you thought dead!... When in the ripeness of time he +comes home, and I am far away from him in life, you shall give +him this horn, this sword, this ring...." He places in her hands +the great double-edged sword, the golden horn from his side, the +ring from his finger. "This horn when he is in danger, shall procure +him help. This sword, in the fray, shall assure him victory. But when +he looks at the ringlet him think of me who upon a time delivered +you from danger and distress. Farewell, farewell! My sweet wife, +farewell! The Grail will chide if I delay longer.... Farewell!" +He has kissed over and over again the face of the poor woman who, +annihilated by grief, has not the power to make motion or sound. +He places her, with terrible effort of resolution, in the arms +at last of others, and hastens, amid general lamentation, to the +shore. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Ortrud, lost in the crowd, has watched all. She has in reality +gained nothing by the disaster to Elsa, but she exults in it. Further +revenge for what she has suffered from Elsa's mere existence, for +the bitterness of her husband's death at the hand of Elsa's husband, +she seeks recklessly in a revelation which cannot but hold danger for +herself. In the insanity <a name="page_354"><span class="page">Page +354</span></a> of her mingled despair and gloating hate, her hurry +to hurt, she does not wait until the powerful antagonist be well +out of the way of retorting—Lohengrin has but one foot as +yet in the boat,—before she cries, "Go your way home, go +your way, O haughty hero, that gleefully I may impart to this fair +fool who it is drawing you in your boat. By the golden chain which +I wound about him, I recognised that swan. That swan was the heir +of Brabant!—I thank you," she mockingly addresses Elsa, "I +thank you for having driven away the Knight. The swan must now +betake himself home with him. If he had remained here longer, that +hero, he would have delivered your brother too!" The whole dark +scheme of Ortrud's ambition now lies bare: She had compassed the +disappearance of the heir to the crown of Brabant, changing him +by magic art into a swan; had cast the guilt of his disappearance +upon Elsa, and married the man who upon Elsa's condemnation would +have become Duke. Through no neglect of her own was Ortrud's brow +still bare of the crown. At the cry of execration that greets her +revelation, she faces them all, drawn up to her proud height, and +announces: "Thus do they revenge themselves, the gods from whom +you turned your worship!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +But Lohengrin had not been too far, nor too engrossed in going, +to hear her words. The Knight of the Grail has sunk on his knees +and joined his hands in prayer. All eyes are upon him, his eyes +earnestly heavenward. For a long moment all is in motionless suspense. +A white dove flies into sight, and hovers over the boat. With the +gladness of one whose prayer is heard, Lohengrin rises and unfastens +the chain from the swan; this vanishes from sight, leaving in its +place a beautiful boy in shining garments, whom Lohengrin lifts +to the bank. "Behold the Duke of Brabant! Your leader he shall +be!" At sight of him, Ortrud utters a cry of terror, Elsa, drawn +for a <a name="page_355"><span class="page">Page 355</span></a> +moment out of her stupor, a cry of joy. She catches the brother +in her arms—But looking up, after the first transport of +gladness, and seeing the place empty where her husband had stood, +his boat gone from sight, forgetting all else, she sends after +him a despairing cry, "My husband! My husband!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +In the distance, at a bend of the river, the boat reappears for +a moment, drawn now by the dove of the Grail. The Silver Knight +is seen standing in it, leaning on his shield, his head mournfully +bowed. Sounds of sorrow break from all lips. The sight pierces +like a sword through the heart of the forsaken bride. She sinks +to the ground <i>entseelt</i>—exanimate. +</p> + +<p class="indent gap"> +Such figures as play their part in this story, the Silver Knight, +with his swan and faery skiff, the fair falsely-accused damsel, the +wicked sorceress, could hardly be painted in flagrant life-colours. +The music of Lohengrin brings to mind pictures one seems to remember +on vellum margins of old books of legend, where against a golden +background shine forth vivid yet delicate shapes, in tints brilliant +yet soft as distance, the green of April, the rose of day-break, +the blue of remote horizons. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +There is an older story on these same lines, the story of Cupid +and Psyche, an allegory, we are told, of Love and the Soul. And an +allegory is meant to teach somewhat. And what does this teach—but +that one must be great? Not enough to be innocent, kind, loving, +pure as snow, like Elsa, a being golden and lovely through and +through, such as could lure down a sort of angel from his heaven. +Beside it all, great one must be. Life, the Sphinx, requires upon +occasion that one be great. Just a little greatness, so to speak, +and Elsa would first of all have recognised the obligation to keep +her word; would further have trusted what must have been her <a +name="page_356"><span class="page">Page 356</span></a> own profound +instinct about the man she loved, rather than the suggestions of +others troubling her shallow mind-surface. Had she been great, +we may almost affirm, she would have known that he was great; she +would have trusted truth and greatness though they came to her +unlabelled. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +But Life, the Sphinx, proposed to her a riddle, and because she +was no more than a poor, sweet, limited woman she could not solve +it, and Life ground her in its teeth and swallowed her up. +</p> + +<p class="bigtitle"> +<a name="page_357"><span class="page">Page 357</span></a> +TANNHÄUSER</p> + +<h2><a name="page_359"><span class="page">Page 359</span></a> +TANNHÄUSER</h2> + +<h3>I.</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +We are shown in the Ouverture of Tannhäuser the power which +contended for the young knight and minstrel's soul: the appeal of +good is symbolised by the solemn chant of the pilgrims; of evil, +by the voice of Venus, the song of the Sirens, the Bacchic dance. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +We are not informed how he came into the Hill of Venus, but when +we see him at the Landgrave's court, which we are told he forsook +of yore in offended pride, we think we divine. He is more greatly +gifted than any of his associates. By his sense of superiority +he is made—young and hot-blooded as he is,—haughty, +quick, impatient. They cannot suffer his overbearing way. We can +imagine how upon an occasion he left them, after a round quarrel, +in a fury of vexation, sick with disgust at the whole world of +such slow, limited creatures, the whole world of petty passions +and narrow circumstances, in a mood to sell himself to the Devil +for something in life which should seem to him worth while, of +satisfactory size, peer to himself. And so his feet had come in +the familiar valley suddenly upon a new path, and been led to the +interior of the mountain where Venus, driven from the surface of +the earth by the usurping Cross, had taken refuge with all her +pagan train. There the Queen of Love herself had contented him, +and his thirsty youth had thought this no doubt a sufficient crown +<a name="page_360"><span class="page">Page 360</span></a> of life; +this had met all his vast desires, appeased all his boundless pride. +He had lived in the rosy atmosphere there he knew not how long, +existence one feast, at which everything in man was satisfied, +heart, imagination, senses—everything but his soul. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +We first have sight of him lying at the feet of Venus, his head +pillowed on her lap. There are dances and revels for their delight, +but he has fallen asleep,—and in his dream he hears, through +the song of stupefying sweetness in which the Sirens hold forth +enkindling promises, a fragment of anthem, the long-forgotten music +of church-bells. He starts awake. The tender queen draws down-his +head again with a caress. "Beloved, where are your thoughts?" But +his neglected soul has in dream made its claim. The sweetness of +all this other is found by sudden revulsion cloying to the point of +despair. "Too much!" he cries wildly, "Too much! Oh, that I might +awaken!" At just that touch, that sound in sleep of bells, his +whole poor humanity has flooded back upon him, and at the goddess's +indulgent "Tell me what troubles you?" his weak infinite homesickness +breaks bounds. "It seemed to me, in my dream, that I heard—what +so long has been foreign to my ear!—the pleasant pealing of +bells. Oh, tell me, how long is it that I hear them no more? I +cannot measure the length of my sojourn here. There are no longer +for me days or months, since I no longer see the sun or the sky's +friendly constellations. The grass-blade I see no more, which, +clothing itself with fresh green, brings in the new summer. The +nightingale I hear no more announcing the return of Spring. Am +I never to hear them, never to see them more?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Venus, mildly amazed at folly so prodigious, reproaches him for +this complaining, these regrets. What, is he so soon weary of the +marvels with which her love surrounds him? Discontented <a +name="page_361"><span class="page">Page 361</span></a> so soon +with being a god? Has he so soon forgotten the old unhappiness? "My +minstrel, up! Take your harp! Sing the praise of love, which you +celebrate so gloriously that you won the Goddess of Love herself." +Tannhäuser, thus bidden, seizes the harp and warmly entones a hymn +of praise to her, which from its climax of ardour, suddenly—as +if his lips were tripped by the word "mortal" occurring in the +song,—turns into a prayer to her to release him. "But mortal, +alas, I have remained, and your love is over-great for me. A god +has the capacity to enjoy perpetually, but I am the creature of +change. Not joy alone can satisfy my heart, after pleasure I yearn +for sorrow. Forth from your kingdom I must fare. Oh, Queen, Goddess, +let me depart!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Reproachful questions succeed on her part: Of what neglect has her +love been guilty, of what can he accuse her? In reply, grasping +his harp again, he adds fiery praise to praise of her greatness, +the wonders of her kingdom,—to drop again into his prayer +for release: "But I, amid these rosy perfumes, I yearn for the +odour of the forest, yearn for the pure blue of our skies, the +fresh green of our sward, the sweet song of our birds, the dear +sound of our bells! Forth from your kingdom I must fare. O Queen, +Goddess, let me depart!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The beautiful queen's surprise is turning to anger, without ceasing +to be surprise. "You sing the praise of my love, and wish at the +same time to flee from it? My beauty, is it possible, has brought +surfeit?" He tells her, disarmingly as he may, what must fall +incomprehensibly on her pagan ears, that it is that over-great +beauty of hers he must shun, that never was his love greater, never +sincerer, than in this moment when he must flee from her forever. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +She drops chiding then, truly alarmed, and tempts. She paints to him +with glowing art the delights awaiting them; to <a name="page_362"><span +class="page">Page 362</span></a> these she bids him with the persuasive +voice of love. When the goddess of beauty thus invites a mortal, +she feels secure in counting upon his forgetting all else. But +this Tannhäuser, with the dreamy echo in his earth-born ears +of the church-bells of home, he catches, instead of her beautiful +form to his breast, his harp again. He grants that her beauty is +the source of all beauty, that every lovely marvel has its origin +in her: against the whole world, he promises, he will thereafter be +her champion, but—back to the world of earth go he must, for +here he can but become a slave. Freedom, for freedom he thirsts! +Battle and struggle he must have, though he should meet through +them defeat and death. Forth from her kingdom he must fare! Queen, +Goddess, let him depart! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Go, then, madman, go!" she bids him in lovely wrath. "Traitor, +see, I do not hold you back! I leave you free, go your way, go +your way! Let your doom be to have that which you yearn for! Go +back to cold mankind, before whose gross dismal delusion we Gods +of Joy fled deep into the warm bosom of the earth. Go back to them, +infatuated! Seek your soul's welfare and find it never! Not long +before your proud heart will surrender. I shall see you humbly draw +near. Broken, trampled, you will come seeking me, will invoke the +wonders of my power!" Unheedful of the remainder, he seizes avidly +upon his dismissal. "Ah, lovely goddess, farewell! Never will I +return!" What—never return? She threatens with her curse, if he +shall not return, him and the whole human race: in vain let them go +seeking for her miracles, let the world become a wilderness and have +for its hero a slave! But yet—he cannot have meant what he said, +he will come back, let him say that he will come back! "Nevermore!" +cries the captive of this suffocating prison-house of love, as he +pants upon the threshold of freedom, "nevermore let joy of love +delight <a name="page_363"><span class="page">Page 363</span></a> +me!"—"Come back" she desperately entreats, "when your heart +impels you!"—"Forever your beloved flees!"—"Come back +when the whole world rejects you!"—"Through penance I shall +be absolved from sin!"—"Never shall you gain forgiveness! Come +back if the gates of salvation close to you!"—"Salvation!... +My hope of salvation lies in the Blessed Mary!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At that name, Venus uttering a cry vanishes, and with her the dim-lit +subterranean kingdom.... +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Tannhäuser finds himself standing in a sunny well-known valley, +near to a road-side shrine of the Blessed Mary at whose hem he +had caught. The Wartburg is in sight, where he was used in former +days to take part in song-tournaments. In dim distance looms the +Hörselberg, concerning which a sinister rumour ran: that in +the heart of it the pagan goddess Venus still lived and held her +court. All the landscape smiles, the trees are in blossom, nature +is altogether at her loveliest. Oh, so sweeter to the ears of the +resuscitated knight than the song of sirens, comes the homely tinkle +of sheepbells. A little shepherd pipes and sings in joy over the +return of May. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Tannhäuser stands statue-still, as if he feared by the slightest +movement to wake himself, to dispel the vision. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A band of penitents, starting on a pilgrimage to far-off Rome, +defile past the Virgin's shrine, saluting her and asking her grace +upon their pilgrimage. Their pious chant stirs in Tannhäuser +deep, long-untouched chords. At the same moment that the aroused +sense of pollution would overwhelm him, the reminder shines forth +to him in the pilgrims' words of the possibility of forgiveness +and regeneration through repentance and penitential practices. A +very miracle of God's grace it seems to him, by which he sees the +door of hope open to him anew. The weight of his emotion forces +him to his knees; he makes his own <a name="page_364"><span +class="page">Page 364</span></a> the words of the pilgrims wending +their way out of sight: "Ah, heavily oppresses me the burden of +sin, no longer can I carry it. No more will I therefore of ease +and rest, but choose for my portion pain and effort." The pilgrims' +voices come drifting more and more dyingly, the breeze wafts sounds +of church-bells. With tears Tannhäuser bows his head and sinks +into prayer. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Cheerful hunting-horns breaking upon the air do not rouse him, nor +the approach of the hunters. They are the Landgrave and a group +of his favorite minstrel-knights. Catching sight of the kneeling +figure, they stop to observe it. The minstrel Wolfram recognises +their old companion, Heinrich, who had left them, time gone, to +disappear utterly. The circumstances of their parting are suggested +by the first words uttered when Tannhäuser starts to his feet +and faces them. "Is it truly yourself?" asks the Landgrave; "Have +you come back to the community which you forsook in impatient +arrogance?"—"Tell us what is implied by your return?" says +the minstrel Biterolf; "Reconciliation? Or renewed battle?"—"Do +you come as friend or foe?" asks the minstrel Walther. So much the +more probable thing does it seem that he comes as foe that there +is a challenging note in the address of all—save Wolfram. +The latter, the gentlest soul among them, has taken account of the +old companion's countenance; his sympathy is quick to interpret +it, by a word he changes the mood toward him of all the others. +"As a foe? How can you ask? Is that the bearing of arrogance? Oh, +welcome back among us, you singer bold, who too long have been absent +from our midst!"—"Welcome if you come peaceably-minded!" say +the others; "Welcome if you approach as a friend! Welcome among +us!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The Landgrave, after adding his gracious greeting to the greetings +of the others asks where he has been this long time. <a +name="page_364"><span class="page">Page 364</span></a> "Far, far +from here I wandered," Tannhäuser replies, with a vagueness +mysteriously pregnant, "where I found neither peace nor rest. Inquire +not! I have not come to contend with you. Forgive the past and let +me go my way!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Marvellously softened by this novel gentleness in the formerly so +testy and proud companion, all now with a single mind desire him +to stay, nay, refuse to let him go. He turns from them resolutely: +"Detain me not! It would ill profit me to tarry! Never more for me +repose! Onward and ever onward lies my way, to look backward were +undoing!" He is hastening away, despite their entreaties, when +Wolfram pronounces the name which brings him to an instantaneous +standstill. "Remain beside Elizabeth!"—"Elizabeth!" +Tannhäuser repeats after him, reverently as if the name were +consecrated bread upon his lips; "Oh, power of Heaven, is it you +calling that sweet name to me?" At the spectacle of his emotion, +Wolfram turns to the Landgrave: "Have I your leave, my lord, to +be the herald to him of his good fortune?" The Landgrave consents. +"Inform him of the magic spell he has wrought, and may God lend +him virtue to loose it worthily!" Wolfram imparts to Henry then +that when in the days before his disappearance the minstrels were +wont to contend with him in song, whatever the event of the contest, +one prize there had been won by him alone, his song alone had had +power to enthrall the interest of that most virtuous maid, Elizabeth. +And when he had proudly withdrawn from their midst, her heart had +closed to the singing of the remaining minstrels; her cheek had +lost bloom, she had shunned their song-tourneys. "Return to us, O +daring minstrel," Wolfram concludes, "let your song resound alongside +of ours, that she may no longer be absent from our festivals, that her +star once more may shed brightness upon us!" The fellow-minstrels join +their voices to Wolfram's, <a name="page_366"><span class="page">Page +366</span></a> to press the recovered companion to remain among +them. "Let discord and quarrel be laid aside! Let our songs form +one harmony! As brothers regard us henceforward!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Great gladness has fallen upon the knight, crushed to earth a moment +past by a sense of sin; a swift rebound lifts up the heart that had +asked of this fair and over-fair world just restored to him only +opportunity to expiate and be made clean. Can this be true, this which +seems like the most madly impossible of beautiful dreams? Elizabeth! +the Landgrave's niece, the fair and faultless, the saint!... No +doubt in the old days he had worshipped her, not daring to lift +his eyes above her footprints, had loved as a moth may a star. +That lily had shone in his dreams, cool and pure and unattainable, +by the mysterious attraction of opposites compelling homage and +desire more than might any being less removed in nature from his +hot, pleasure-thirsty, sense-ridden, undisciplined self. An element +in his discontent with the earth had been perhaps his sense of +life-wide separation from her, of unsurpassable barriers between +them, the vanity of aspiration. And now the Landgrave permits her +name to be used to keep him from departing! And with his long-dead +soul come back to intenser life than ever, that lily more than ever +calls forth the worshipping devotion of his reawakened highest +self. In total self-abandonment of joy, he breaks forth: "To her! +To her! Oh, conduct me to her! Ah, I recognise it now, the lovely +world from which I was cut off! The sky it is, looking down upon +me, it is the greensward flaunting rich multitude of flowers. Spring +with its thousand voices of joy has entered into my soul, and my +heart in sweet ungovernable tumult cries out aloud: To her! To +her!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Praise be to the power," say Landgrave and minstrels, "which has +dispelled his arrogance!" What the remembrance is in this circle of +Tannhäuser's arrogance appears from the <a name="page_367"><span +class="page">Page 367</span></a> frequency of reference to it. The +remainder of the hunting-retinue has now joined the Landgrave; +the scene is brilliant with swarming figures of hunters, hounds, +and horses. With bright horn-calls the train starts homeward, on +its rejoicing way "to her!" +</p> + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The Hall of Minstrels in the Wartburg, where the famous song-tournaments +were held. Such a tournament is directly to take place, and Elizabeth +for the first time after many days will preside over it. She enters +the hall while it is still empty of guests, and looks around with +glad affectionate eyes, like one returning home after long exile. She +is sincere as she is innocent, the white princess, "une âme sans +détours," and speaks the truth of her heart with wonderfully +little circumlocution, as to herself now in her salutation of the hall, +so to others later. "Once more I greet you, beloved hall,—oh, +joyously greet you, place ever dear! In you reawaken echoes of his +singing, and draw me from my melancholy dream. When he departed +from you, how desolate did you appear to me! Peace deserted me, +joy deserted you! But now that my breast rides high with gladness +you appear to me proud again and splendid as of yore. The one who +gives new life both to you and to me no longer tarries afar. All +hail to you, beloved hall, all hail!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Wolfram, who loves Elizabeth, but in such unworldly, elevated, +self-abjuring wise that he can for the sake of happiness to her +set wholly aside hopes, desires, and jealousies of his own, finds +for Tannhäuser this opportunity of seeing the Princess alone. +He leads him into her presence and effaces himself, while their +interview lasts, among the arches at the back of the hall. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_368"><span class="page">Page 368</span></a> +Tannhäuser, flushed and radiant, magnificent in his festival +robes of a noble minstrel-knight, casts himself impetuously at her +feet. His sudden appearance startles her painfully. Her manner +speaks a confusion almost tremulous: "Father in Heaven!... Do not +kneel!... It is not meet that I should see you here!"—"What +else so meet? Oh, do not leave," he cries ardently, "and suffer +me to remain thus at your feet!" Her timidity wears away like dew +in sunshine; we fancy the play of faint gracious smiles upon her +next words. "Stand up, then! Not in this place must you kneel, +for this hall is your rightful kingdom. Oh, rise to your feet! +Take my thanks for having come back to us. Where did you tarry so +long?" Tannhäuser rises slowly. As when the Landgrave asked +him the same question, a shadow falls across his countenance, his +answer is vague and mysterious. "Far from here, in distant, distant +lands. Heavy oblivion has dropped between to-day and yesterday. +All memory of the past has quickly faded from me, and one thing +only I know: that I had not hoped ever again to bow before you, +or ever again to lift my eyes to you."—"What was it then +that brought you back?"—"A miracle it was, an inconceivable, +highest miracle!"—"Oh, from the depths of my heart I give +thanks to God for that miracle!" she exclaims, and confused at her +own fervour catches herself back, only to proceed further, with +the candour of an angel: "Your pardon, if I hardly know what I am +about! I move as if in a dream, and am feather-brained as a child, +given over, hand-bound, in thrall to a miraculous power! Hardly do +I recognise myself; oh, do you help me to solve the enigma of my +heart!" Not only with the candour of an angel, but the simplicity +of very high rank, accepting the prerogative of her station to +step forward a little way to meet the favoured lover, she lays +before him the puzzle over the small difficulty of which <a +name="page_369"><span class="page">Page 369</span></a> her purity +and greatness make one unable to smile. "To the wise songs of the +minstrels I was wont to listen often and with delight. Their singing +and their descanting appeared to me a charming pastime. But what +strange new life did your song awake in my breast! Now it pierced +me through like pain, now roused me to mad joy. Emotions I had +never felt! Desires I had never known! Things that until then had +seemed to me lovely lost their charm by comparison with delights I +had not even a name for! Then, when you went from among us, peace +and happiness were gone too. The minstrels' songs seemed to me +an uninspired affair, dim of meaning, languid of execution. My +dreams were full of dull pain, my waking hours a dejected dream. +All capacity for joy forsook my heart. Heinrich, Heinrich, what +had you done to me?" The "singer bold," the "daring minstrel," +is of a candour matching her own. "Oh, give praise to the god of +Love!" he cries; "He it was who touched my strings! He spoke to +you through my songs, and it is he who has brought me back to you!" +They unite in joyful praise of the hour which has revealed this +miracle-working of Love's. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Wolfram watching them from his distance sighs gently: "Thus fades +from all my life the light of hope!" Tannhäuser, encountering him +as he hastens away, lets a wave of his joy overflow in an impetuous +embrace of the friend. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Elizabeth stands on the terrace overlooking the castle-court and +the valley to watch the lover out of sight, moved and simply happy +as a woman who is not a saint. Her whiteness loves that colour; +her paleness warms itself at that glow; her gentleness glories +in that force. She makes no question but that he is worthy of her +love. Her high spirituality has intuition no doubt of the vast +potentialities of good in that superabundant life, which of itself +seems a virtue as well as a charm. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_370"><span class="page">Page 370</span></a> When +the Landgrave enters she cannot bear his searching eyes upon her +transparent face, and hides it against his breast. "Do I find you +in this hall which for so long time you have avoided? You are lured +at last by the song-festival we are preparing?" he questions her. +She cannot answer, she falters: "My uncle!... Oh, my kind +father!"—"Are you moved at last," he asks kindly, "to open +your heart to me?" She lifts her face and bravely raises her eyes. +"Look into my eyes, for speak I cannot!" He reads, and does not +press her. "Let then for a brief space longer your sweet secret +remain unspoken. Let the spell remain unbroken until yourself you +have power to loose it. Be it as you please! Song, which has awakened +and set working such wonders, shall to-day unfold the same and +crown them with consummation. Let the Lovely Art now take the work +in hand. The nobles of my lands already are assembling, bidden by +me to a singular feast. In greater numbers they flock than ever +before, having heard that you are to be Princess of the gathering." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The Hall of Minstrels gradually fills with these same nobles and +their ladies. They salute the Landgrave and the Princess, and take +their places to the well-known, long-loved march. The minstrels have +seats apart from the rest, facing their audience. The Landgrave +addresses them nobly, with gracious compliment for the skill shown +theretofore by them in singing as in fighting, for their victorious +championship of virtue and the true faith, high tradition and all +things lovely. Let them offer the guests to-day a banquet of song, +upon the occasion of the return among them of the "daring singer" +whose absence they so long had deplored, whom a wonderful mystery +has brought back into their neighbourhood. He sets to the +song-contestants as their task to define the nature of love. He +who shall most worthily besing it shall receive the prize from <a +name="page_371"><span class="page">Page 371</span></a> Elizabeth's +hand. Let his demand be bold as he will, the Landgrave's care it +shall be to see his wish granted. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Lots are drawn. Fortune appoints Wolfram to open the song-feast. +He preludes pensively, and sets forth in an improvisation of slow +and stately gait his delicate dreamer's sentiments: Glancing around +this noble assemblage, his heart kindles at sight of so many heroes, +valiant, German, and wise,—a proud oak-forest, verily, splendid, +fresh and green. And among them fair and virtuous ladies, fragrant +garland of beauteous flowers. The eye swoons, drunken with gazing, +the poet's song grows mute before such splendour of loveliness. He +fixes his eyes, then, upon one only of the stars in that dazzling +firmament. His spirit is forced to worship and bow in prayer. And, +behold, the vision he has of a miraculous fount, from which his spirit +may draw sacred joys, his heart receive ineffable refreshment. And +never would he wish to trouble that fountain, never with criminal +presumption stir those waters,—but offer himself up to it in +self-sacrificing adoration, and shed for its sake the last of his +blood. From these words the company may apprehend what he conceives +to be the nature of love at its purest. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +There is warm applause from the noble knights and ladies, whether +because they understand the star to be Elizabeth, and the fountain +the pure love she inspires, or because it was the ideal of that +period of song-contests and Courts of Love and chivalry to love with +a reverence that precluded any near approach to the lady elected +for adoration. A poet might marry and have seven children, while +regarding with exalted passion and celebrating in enraptured +song,—making into his star, his sacred fountain, his Muse, +some dazzling remote princess, held to be too fair and good by far +for human nature's daily food. The audience, when Wolfram resumes +his seat, cry: "So it is! So it is!" and loudly praise his song. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_372"><span class="page">Page 372</span></a> +Tannhäuser has lent ear somewhat listlessly. This hall has +been called his rightful kingdom; he sits among the other minstrels +consciously like a young monarch. At the closing figure of Wolfram's +rhapsodical rhetoric, the image of the fount, a shadowy smile of +superiority has dawned upon his face. As the applause dies, he +grasps his harp and rises to take exception to Wolfram's definition. +Such a song-feast was in fact a song-debate. His words come warm +and ready: "I too, Wolfram, may call myself so fortunate as to +behold what you have beheld. Who is there unacquainted with that +fountain? Hear me loudly exalt its virtue! But yet can I not approach +those waters without sense of warm longing. That burning thirst I +must cool. Comforted I set lips to the spring. In full draughts +I drink joy, unmixed with doubt or fear, for inexhaustible is the +fountain, even as inextinguishable is my desire. That my longing +therefore may be prolonged eternally, eternally I drink refreshment +at the well. Know Wolfram, thus do I conceive of love's truest +essence!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +There is deep silence when he has ended. One person only in the +large assemblage has given a sign of approval, made a little gesture +of assent, and that is Elizabeth, at bottom a very simple normal +woman, who does not recognise herself as a star or a sacred well +unapproachable to the one she loves. But as all refrain, she timidly +checks herself, and waits to hear the rest. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Walther has taken his harp, has risen; in growing excitement, touched +with indignation, he sweeps the strings: "The fountain spoken of by +Wolfram, by the light of the soul I too have looked into its depths! +But you, who thirst to drink at it, you, Heinrich, know it verily +not! Permit me to tell you, accept the lesson: That fountain is true +virtue. Devoutly you shall worship it and sacrifice to its limpid +purity. Should you lay <a name="page_373"><span class="page">Page +373</span></a> lip to it, to cool your unhallowed passion, nay, +should you but sip at the outermost brim, forever gone were its +miraculous power! If you shall gain life from that fountain, through +the heart, not the palate, must you seek refreshment!" Again there +is lively applause. Tannhäuser springs to his feet, the old +contemptuousness toward these companions,—compends of density, +conventionality, and hypocrisy!—curving his lip. "Oh, Walther, +singing as you have done, how direly have you misrepresented love! +Through such languors and timidities as you describe, the world would +unmistakably go dry! To the glory of God in his exalted distance, +gaze at the heavens, gaze at its stars. Pay tribute of worship to +such marvels, because they pass your comprehension. But that which +lends itself to human touches, which lies near to your heart and +senses, that which, formed of the same clay as yourselves, in a +softer shape nestles against your side, the tribute called for by +that is hearty pleasure of love. Enjoyment, I say, is the essence +of love!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +At this, which falls upon all ears present with the effect of rank +blasphemy, Biterolf rises in wrath. "Out, out, to fight against +us all. Who could be silent hearing you? If your arrogance will +vouchsafe to listen, hear, slanderer, me too! When high love inspires +me, it steels my weapons with courage; to save it from indignity +proudly would I pour forth my last blood. For the honour of women +and of lofty virtue I unsheathe my knightly sword,—but that +which your youth is pleased to call pleasure is cheap enough and +worth no single blow!" The audience cheer him enthusiastically: +"Hail, Biterolf, our good blade!" Tannhäuser can no longer +contain himself. It is now again quite as it used to be, when never +could he live at peace with these purblind tortoises, dull of wit +to the point of amazement, and yet pretending to pronounce <a +name="page_374"><span class="page">Page 374</span></a> upon things, +pass judgment upon others. What can there be but warfare forever +between him and them? But that Biterolf, this war-worn, middle-aged, +rugged minstrel should take it upon himself to instruct Heinrich +Tannhäuser, pupil of Venus, in matters of love! His retort +comes quick, from the shoulder, so to speak, though the form is +not dropped of fitting his words to chords of the peaceful harp: +"Ha, fond braggart, Biterolf! Is it you, singing about love, grim +wolf? But you can hardly have meant that which I hold worthy to be +enjoyed. What, you poverty-stricken wight—what pleasure of +love may have fallen to your share? Not rich in love your life has +been! And such joys as may have sprouted along your path, indeed, +were hardly worthy of a blow!"—"Let him not be allowed to +finish! Forbid his insolence!" cry the incensed nobles, who had +suffered Biterolf's personal attack, but find insufferable this of +the over-splendid, over-bearing, over-confident youth. Biterolf's +sword has leaped from its scabbard. The Landgrave orders it back. +"Preserve peace, you singers!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A hush falls as Wolfram takes the floor again. He had sacrificed +every selfish hope to serve both Elizabeth and Tannhäuser, +had employed himself to further their union. What now is happening +is plainly terrible to him. His opinion of the friend has undergone +in the last moments a grievous subversion. He has been wounded to +the soul by the bold and profane tone of Tannhäuser's argument. +His sensibility detects an atmosphere of sin about this novel love's +advocate, and as a good and pious knight he is forced to array +himself against the friend, to uphold Ideal Love in antagonism to +the Carnal Love he has just heard exalted. "Oh, Heaven, hear my +prayer and consecrate my song!" he sings, a pale flame informing his +song, as, imaginably, his cheek and eye; "Let me see evil banished +<a name="page_375"><span class="page">Page 375</span></a> from this +pure and noble circle! To you, Highest Love, let my song resound, +inspired, to you that in angelic beauty have penetrated deep into +my soul. As a messenger from Heaven do you appear to us; I follow +from afar. You guide us toward the regions where immortally shines +your star!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Tannhäuser, exasperated, reckless, frenzied with that temperamental +need of his to dominate, that impatience of being lessoned, losing +sight of all but one thing, that it shall be proved to them they +can teach nothing about love to him, the lover of the very Goddess +of Love, seizes his harp, his sword in this duel, and breaks forth +in his impassioned Praise of Venus,—the song we heard in the +heart of her Hill, when he celebrated her at her own bidding, in +conclusion begging so lamely for his dismissal. "To you, Goddess +of Love, shall my song resound! Loud shall your praises now be sung +by me! Your sweet beauty is the source of all that is beautiful, +and every lovely miracle has its origin in you! He who aglow has +enfolded you in his arms, he knows, and he alone, what love is! +Oh, you poor-spirited, who have never tasted love, go,—to +the Hill of Venus repair!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The last words have the effect of a thunder-clap, in the consternation +they produce. Tannhäuser in the drunkenness of his pride had +forgotten what this revelation would mean in the ears he trumpeted +it to; in his long sojourn in the pagan underworld, where his moral +judgment had become dulled and perverted, had forgotten, apparently, +how the Christian world regarded such commerce with it as his words +betrayed. That mysterious Hörselberg looming in the distance was +in popular thinking the very ante-chamber of Hell; its pleasures, paid +in the world to come with eternal damnation, were rewarded in this +world with excommunication and death. One who had frequented it was +sin-polluted, sin-drenched, he poisoned the <a name="page_376"><span +class="page">Page 376</span></a> air with sin. All shrink back at +his announcement as from a leper. The women flee precipitately +from the contamination of his neighbourhood. It is like a flight of +gorgeous birds. The men's instant and only thought is to immolate +him, cleanse the earth of the inexpressible blot upon it that he +is. "He has luxuriated in the pleasures of Hell! He has dwelled +in the Hill of Venus! Abominable! Accursed! Bathe your swords in +his blood! Hurl him back into the fiery lake!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Tannhäuser stands with drawn sword facing their multitude. +They are advancing toward him, his doom seems sealed,—when +Elizabeth's body is found interposed shield-wise between him and +their swords. Their hands are necessarily stayed. "What do we see?" +their wondering question runs, "What? Elizabeth? The chaste virgin +protecting the sinner?"—"Back!" the meek maiden commands +with vigour enough at this pass, "or I shall not regard death! +What are wounds from your swords beside the death-stroke I have +received from him?" Tannhäuser starts like one awakening. He +had not thought of this aspect of his action; the pride relaxes +suddenly that had stiffened him. "Elizabeth!" her uncle argues +with her, and the others add their voices to his, "What must I +hear? How has your heart allowed itself to be stultified, that +you should attempt to save from punishment the man who, added to +all else, has so dreadfully betrayed you?"—"What does it +matter about me?" she cries; "But he—his soul's salvation! +Would you rob him of his soul's eternal salvation?" He has cast +away all chance of that, they affirm; never can he gain salvation. +The curse of Heaven is upon him, let him die in his sins! At their +threatening approach, she spreads her arms resolutely before him. +She towers tall and white, she speaks with strange authority. "Back +from him! Not you are his judges! Cruel ones, cast from you the +barbarous sword, and <a name="page_377"><span class="page">Page +377</span></a> give heed to the word of the stainless virgin! Learn +through me what is the will of God. The unhappy man whom a potent +dreadful enchantment holds bound, what, shall he never come to +Heaven through repentance and expiation in this world? You who +are so strong in the pure faith, do you apprehend so ill the mind +of the Most High? Would you take away the hope of the sinner? State +then what wrong he has done to you. Behold me, the maiden, whose +blossom he shattered with a swift blow, me, who loved him to the +depths of being, and whose heart he pierced with a jubilant laugh... +I plead for him, I plead for his life! Let his feet be turned into +the path of penitence. Let the courage be restored to him of the +faith that for him too the Saviour died!" In a spasm of realisation +and self-horror the unhappy Tannhäuser hides his face and sinks +to the earth. The angry lords have calmed under the Princess's +exhortation. They see in her an angel descended from Heaven to +announce the holy will of God. Who could persist in violence after +hearing the supplications of an angel? +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Tannhäuser has come at last completely to himself, to a clear +vision, by light of that heavenly goodness, of what he has been, +what he has done. Sapped of its pride, his spirit grovels helplessly +in the lowest depths of abasement. "To lead the sinner to salvation, +the God-sent came to me, but I, alas, to touch her impiously, I +lifted upon her eyes of vice. Oh, Thou, far above the vale of earth, +who didst send to me this angel of salvation, have mercy upon me +who, ah! so deeply steeped in sin, did such ignoble wrong to the +mediatrix of Heaven!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The Landgrave decides upon the course to be taken. An abominable +crime has been committed; in hypocritical disguise the accursed son +of sin has slipped into their midst. Among them he may not remain, +the displeasure of Heaven already lowers upon this roof which too +long has covered him. <a name="page_378"><span class="page">Page +378</span></a> One road is open to the sinner, which, while rejecting +him, the Landgrave points out—let him take advantage of it +to his welfare! Numerous bands of penitents are starting from this +region on pilgrimage to Rome for the great Pardon. The older have +left already; the younger are still gathering in the valley. Let +Tannhäuser join them, go with them to the Holy City, fall +upon his knees and do penance for his sin. Let him cast himself +before him who speaks the decrees of God upon earth, entreat his +blessing, and never return if he fail to obtain it. For if their +vengeance stay its hand at the prayer of an angel, their swords will +not fail to reach him if he continue in his sin. The chant comes +wafted from the distance of those younger pilgrims gathering for +departure: "At the great feast of peace and pardon, humbly confess +your sins. Blessed is the firm in faith, he may be absolved through +contrition and penance." +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A ray of hope illumines Tannhäuser's face. He starts up from +his knees, and with a wild cry, "To Rome!" rushes forth from the +Hall. +</p> + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The story is taken up again when the valley all green and blossoming +at our first sight of it has assumed melancholy autumn colours. +Wolfram walking at sunset comes upon Elizabeth prostrate in prayer +at the foot of the road-side shrine. He watches her with eyes of +profoundest compassion. "Full well did I know that I should find +her here, as so often I find her, when in lonely wandering I descend +from the wooded heights to the valley. With death in her heart from +the blow dealt to her by him, outstretched in burning anguish, +night and day she prays—Oh, eternal strength of a holy +love!—for his <a name="page_379"><span class="page">Page +379</span></a> redemption. She awaits the return of the pilgrims +from Rome. Already the leaves are falling, their home-coming is +at hand. Is he among the pardoned? That is her question, that her +continual prayer. Oh, if her wound is such as cannot be healed, +yet let alleviation be vouchsafed to it!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The chant dawns upon the distance of the returning pilgrims. Elizabeth +rises to her feet, wan and worn and frail. "It is their song,—they +are coming home!" To steady her poor, agitated, failing heart, she +calls upon the saints and prays them to instruct her in her part, +that she may fulfil it worthily. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The band of pilgrims comes in sight; they pass, as earlier, in +front of the image of Mary, lifting their voices in an anthem of +solemn joy. Elizabeth looks into the face of every one of them as +they pass. They have defiled before her to the last. He is not +among them. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +They wind their way out of sight, their last Halleluyah dies. Elizabeth +falls at the Virgin's feet, and, with the fervour of one who is +praying for very life, prays for death. "All-powerful Virgin, hear +my prayer! To thee, favoured among women, I appeal! I bow in the +dust before thee, oh, take me from this earth! Make me pure and like +to an angel, fit to enter thy blessed kingdom. If ever, possessed +by a fond insanity, my heart was turned from thee; if ever a sinful +desire, a worldly longing, took root in me,—with a thousand +pains I have striven to kill it in my heart. But if I cannot wholly +atone for that fault, do thou mercifully condescend to me, that I +may with humble salutation approach thee, made worthy to become +thy servant,—only to implore thine intercession rich in grace +for his sin, only to implore thine intercession for his sin!" She +is very woman to her last breath, the saint. She has failed on +earth to gain the coveted sign of pardon for him,—his not +returning with the others can only mean that he is not among the +<a name="page_380"><span class="page">Page 380</span></a> pardoned; +it means perhaps even that he did not accomplish the pilgrimage at +all.... She renounces him before Heaven, as if by that sacrifice +to propitiate the powers above, and desires to be given entrance +through death to that higher court where she still may intercede +for him,—perhaps, when she is an angel, with better effect. +She rises from prayer with the appearance of one upon whom already +the hand of death is laid. Wolfram, who notes her feeble step and +bloodless cheek, whose faithful heart understands all, solicitous +for her, asks if be may not escort her home. Without speaking, by +gentle gesture and shake of the head she declines, and he watches +her solitary figure slowly ascending the path toward the castle, +until it has disappeared from sight. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A mortal sadness is upon him, but a sadness mild as his nature. This +poet can at the darkest pass still turn his sorrows into song. With +song he now tries to administer to his oppressed heart consolation. +He feels softly along the strings of his harp. His thoughts are +full of Elizabeth, his soul apprehends what journey her soul is +preparing for. The terror of it, as well as the hope illumining the +dark way, he sees symbolised in the surrounding darkening scene, +over which now breaks the light of the evening star. "Like the +premonition of death twilight envelops the land, enfolds the valley +in a dusky garment. The soul, yearning for yonder heights, shrinks +from the journey through night and terrors. Then do you appear, O +loveliest among the stars! You shed your light afar. Your beloved +beams cleave the nocturnal twilight, and benignly you show us the +way out of the valley.... Oh, you, my sweetly-beaming evening star, +whom I have ever greeted so gladly,—do you greet, when she +rises past you, on her way from the vale of earth to become a blessed +angel beyond the stars, do you greet her from the heart that has +never failed in its truth to her!" <a name="page_381"><span +class="page">Page 381</span></a> A long time he continues sitting +in the twilight valley, gazing at the setting star, making his harp +express the emotions he has not the heart any more to formulate +with his lips. It grows night, the evening star goes out. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +A shape in ragged pilgrim's-garb, supporting itself upon a +pilgrim's-staff, as if walking were scarcely possible without, from +terrible weariness, approaches the minstrel. "I heard harp-chords," +the tottering wayfarer speaks to himself; "How mournful they sounded! +Hardly might such music come from <i>her!</i>"—"Who are you, +pilgrim, wandering thus alone?" Wolfram addresses the shadowy figure. +"Who I am?" comes the reply, "And yet I know you well enough. You +are Wolfram, that highly-accomplished minstrel!"—"Heinrich!" +cries Wolfram, not to be mistaken in that mocking voice,—with +the scorn of which is mingled so much wild bitterness that the +hearer is made certain this pilgrim is returned under different +conditions from all the rest. "Heinrich, you?... What brings you +in this neighbourhood? Speak! Are you so bold as, unabsolved, to +have let your feet take the road to this region?"—"Be without +fear, my good minstrel, I am not come looking for you nor any of +your tribe. But I am looking for one who shall show me the road... +the road which of old I found so easily!"—"What road do you +mean?"—"The road to the Hill of Venus!" Wolfram recoils. "Do +you know that road?" persists Heinrich. "Madman! Horror seizes +me to hear you!" the pious knight shudders; "Where have you been? +Tell me, did you not go to Rome?"—"Speak not to me of +Rome!"—"Were you not present at the holy festival?"—"Speak +not of it to me!"—"Then you have not been?... Tell me, I +conjure you!" The answer comes, after a dark pause, with an effect +of boundless bitterness: "Aye, I too was in Rome!"—"Then +speak! Tell me of it, unhappy man! I feel a vast compassion for you +<a name="page_382"><span class="page">Page 382</span></a> surging +within my breast!" Tannhäuser in the nigh darkness regards +him for a moment with astonishment; he speaks more gently, moved +in spite of himself by such gentleness. "What is that you say, +Wolfram? Are you not my enemy?"—"Never was I such—while +I believed you pure of purpose! But speak, you went on the pilgrimage +to Rome?"—"Well, then,—listen! You, Wolfram, shall hear +all." Exhausted he drops on a projection of rock, but when Wolfram +would seat himself beside him he waives him violently off. "Do not +come near me! The place where I rest is accursed!... Hear, then, +Wolfram, hear!" He had started, he relates, on his pilgrimage to Rome +with such passion of repentance in his heart as never penitent felt +before. An angel had shattered in him the pride of sin. For that angel's +sake he would do penance with the last humility, seek the salvation +he had forfeited,—that the tears might be sweetened which +angelic eyes had shed for him, sinner. The devotions, austerities, +self-castigations of the other pilgrims had seemed to him all too +light. When they trod the greensward, he chose flints and thorns; +when they refreshed themselves at roadside springs, he absorbed +instead the thirst-breeding heat of the sun; when they but prayed, +he shed his blood to the praise of the Most High; when they turned +into the shelter of Alpine sanctuaries, he made ice and snow his +bed; with closed eyes—climax of self-denial!—with closed +eyes, that he might not behold the wonder of them, he passed unseeing +through the lovely plains of Italy! All this because he wished to +atone to the point of self-annihilation, that the tears might be +sweetened of his angel. He had reached Rome, he had bowed praying +upon the threshold of the holy place. Day had dawned, bells were +pealing, heavenly anthems resounding. Then he through whom God +manifests Himself to man had passed through the kneeling crowd. He +had given absolution, <a name="page_383"><span class="page">Page +383</span></a> had promised grace, to thousands; thousands he had +sent away rejoicing. Tannhäuser had approached him, had knelt +in the dust, had confessed the evil joys he had known, the terrible +craving which no self-mortification had availed yet to quiet; he +had cried to him, in agony, for deliverance from these burning +fetters. And the one thus appealed to had pronounced: "If you have +shared in such evil pleasure, inflamed yourself at the fire of +Hell, if you have sojourned in the Hill of Venus, to all eternity +you are damned! Even as the staff in my hand can never more clothe +itself with fresh green, even so can never out of the conflagration +of Hell redemption blossom for you!" The pilgrim thus addressed +had sunk to the earth, annihilated. Consciousness had forsaken +him. When he awoke, it was night in the deserted square. Sounds +came from the distance of happy hymns of thanksgiving. A passion of +disgust had seized him for the pious songs; an icy horror of their +lying promises of redemption. With wild steps he had fled,—drawn +back to the place where such great joys, such ineffable delight, +he had found of old upon <i>her</i> warm breast. "To you, Venus, +Lady,"—he cries out in a frenzy of loathing for what lies +behind, and of longing to escape, "to you I am come back!—come +back to your lovely night of enchantment! Descend will I to your +court, where your beauty shall shine upon me forevermore!" Wolfram +tries vainly to stop him. He will not be stopped,—all the +more ardently he calls: "Oh, let me not seek in vain! How easily +once did I find my way to you! You have heard that men curse me; +now, sweetest goddess, guide me to yourself!... Ha!" he cries, in +a moment, to Wolfram wrestling all unheeded to turn him from his +deadly purpose, "Ha, do you not feel soft gusts of air?... Do you +not smell exquisite odours?... Do you not hear jubilant music?" +Rosy vapours are rolling near; dancing forms define themselves in +the <a name="page_384"><span class="page">Page 384</span></a> soft +increasing glow. Tannhäuser madly calls them to him, while +struggling to release himself from Wolfram's obstinate hold. "It +is the dancing rout of the nymphs! Come hither! Come hither, to +pleasure and delight! Oh, enchantment pervades all my senses, at +beholding once more that rosy light of dawn! It is the magic realm +of love, we are entering into the Hill of Venus!"—"Woe!" +shudders Wolfram; "It is evil sorcery unfolding its insidious snares! +It is Hell approaching at mad career!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The radiant form of Venus appears in the midst of the rosy atmosphere, +Venus holding out to the recreant knight her perfect arms. "Welcome, +faithless man! Has the world condemned and rejected you? And do +you, finding no mercy anywhere, come seeking love now in my arms?" +Wolfram speaks exorcisms rapid and vigorous as he can, while +Tannhäuser stretches his hands toward the soft vision: "Oh, +Venus, Lady, rich in forbearance! To you, to you I come!" With +tenderest smiles she holds forth forgiveness. "Since you are returned +to my threshold, your revolt shall be condoned. The well of joy +shall gush for you forever, never shall you go from me again!" +With the desperate cry: "All hope of Heaven is lost to me, I choose +therefore the pleasures of Hell!" Tannhäuser tears himself free +from Wolfram. Wolfram seizes him again, calling upon the help of +the Almighty, not to be thrown off. The battle over Tannhäuser +is hot between Wolfram and Venus, this one calling him to her, that +one physically holding him back, while the insensate man orders +him off, tries to loose himself and rush to her. "Heinrich, one +word—" Wolfram makes the last appeal; "One word and you are +free! Oh, sinner though you be, you shall yet be saved. An angel +prayed for you on earth; ere long, shedding benedictions, she will +hover above you... Elizabeth!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Tannhäuser had violently wrested himself from Wolfram, but +<a name="page_385"><span class="page">Page 385</span></a> the name +roots him to the spot. "Elizabeth!" It is as if to reach Venus now +he must first thrust her aside. The spell of that name changes in +an instant the current of his being; fills his eyes with a memory +that blots out the riot of rose-faces and golden hair toward which +all his desire had pitched him. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Moving torches spot the darkness of the road winding down from the +Wartburg; voices are heard approaching, chanting a dirge. "Peace +to the soul" the words come floating, "just escaped from the clay +of the saintly sufferer!" Wolfram understands but to well. "Your +angel pleads for you now before the throne of God. Her prayer is +heard. Heinrich, you are saved!" With a cry of "Woe! Lost to me!" +the apparition vanishes of Venus and her train; the hill-side +mysteriously engulfs them. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The torches flicker nearer, the singing becomes louder. "Do you +hear it?" Wolfram asks of Tannhäuser, who stands transfixed, +corpse-like still and pale and staring. "I hear it!" he murmurs +in a dying voice. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The funeral train, pilgrims, nobles, minstrels, Landgrave, descend +into the valley chanting their requiem. At a motion of Wolfram's +they set down the uncovered bier at the foot of the Virgin's shrine. +In the torch-light they recognise the unhappy Tannhäuser. +Seized with pity at sight of his ravaged countenance, "Holy," they +sing, "the pure one who now united to the host of Heaven stands +before the Eternal. Blessed the sinner over whom she wept, for +whom she now implores the salvation of Heaven!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +She lies outstretched, still and serene, all white beneath her +white pall. She has saved him, after all,—by dying. Her dead +body has barred his way back to Venus. The infinitely-tired and worn +pilgrim, destroyed by the violence of his passions good and bad, +with faltering steps,—helped, in the faintness of death upon +him, by Wolfram,—approaches the white <a name="page_386"><span +class="page">Page 386</span></a> bier. He sinks down beside it, +giving up his proud soul in the so humble prayer: "Sainted Elizabeth, +pray for me!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +And behold, a second band of pilgrims arriving from the Holy City +announce a miracle: The dry staff in the Pope's hand, which he had +declared should sooner return to bloom than so black a sinner be +forgiven, had in the night burst into leaf and blossom; and order +had gone forth to proclaim the sign through all lands, that the +forgiven sinner should learn of it. The company lift their voices +in awe and exaltation: "Salvation and grace have been granted to +the sinner! He has entered into the peace of the blessed!" +</p> + +<p class="indent gap"> +The warfare between soul and sense is presented by Wagner with singular +fairness. The pilgrims' song is very beautiful, and beautiful is all +the music of good in the opera of Tannhäuser. The Venus-music +is certainly equally beautiful; perhaps, to the superficial ear, is +a little more beautiful still: the goddess's own Call, penetrating, +wonderful; the well-nigh irresistible song of the Sirens. The Bacchic +dance, which stands we suppose for the animal element in love, +the Satyr part in man, is hardly beautiful; yet the love-music +as a whole, we can concede without difficulty, carries it over the +sacred music in beauty of a sort, even as the goddess would have +carried off the palm of beauty over the saint. The power of the +music of good, as Wagner lets us see, lies just in the fact that +it is good; the final victory of the saint in the fact that she is a +saint, and that from a mysterious eternal bias of human nature man +finally must prefer good. He has a soul, he cannot help himself; +that, as we have seen, is the secret reason why Venus cannot forever +completely content him, why the pale hand of the saint, beckoning +him at the end of a penitential pilgrimage diversified with every +sort of suffering, draws him still on and upward. +</p> + +<p class="bigtitle"> +<a name="page_387"><span class="page">Page 387</span></a> +THE FLYING DUTCHMAN</p> + +<h2><a name="page_389"><span class="page">Page 389</span></a> +THE FLYING DUTCHMAN</h2> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +A Dutch sea-captain, so long before the date of the play that his +story at the time of it is an old legend, finding himself baffled +during a storm in his effort to double certain cape, swore a great +oath that he would persist to the end of time. The Devil heard +him and took him at his word. He was doomed eternally to sail the +seas. But an angel of the Lord interposed, and obtained for him +a condition of release: Every seven years he might land and woo +a woman; if he could find one to love him faithfully until death, +the curse upon him would be defeated, he would be saved. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The Ouverture paints a great storm at sea, and contrasts the two +ships that are drawing toward the same bay of refuge in the coast, +the phantom ship with its crew of ghosts and their sinister sea-cry, +the common substantial other craft with its comfortable flesh-and-blood +sailors. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +As the curtain rises upon the turbulent sea and black weather, +the Norwegian vessel has got safely within the haven. While the +sailors furl sails, cast cables, the captain, Daland, comes ashore +and climbs upon a rock to study the landscape. He recognises the +spot, seven miles from the harbour of home where his daughter Senta +awaits his return, whom he had thought by this hour to be clasping +in his arms. "But he who counts upon the wind," he philosophises, "is +counting upon the mercy of Satan!" There is nothing to do but wait +until the <a name="page_390"><span class="page">Page 390</span></a> +storm subsides. He returns on board, sends the tired crew below to +rest after their long struggle with the storm, leaves the watch +to the mate, and himself retires to the cabin. The mate, alone +on deck, after going the round, seats himself at the helm. The +violence of the storm has somewhat diminished, the sky has lightened. +To keep awake, he sings,—a love-song, ingenuous as sailors +are; which does not however fulfil its purpose, for the singer, +more and more oppressed with drowsiness, drops off before the last +bar. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The storm once more gathers force, the sky darkens. A ship appears +in the distance, with blood-red sails and black masts. It rapidly +nears shore and noiselessly turns into the bay beside Daland's. The +anchor drops with a crash. The Norwegian mate starts, but, half-blind +with sleep, discerning nothing to take alarm at, drops off again. +Without a sound the crew of the strange ship furl their sails and +coil their ropes. The captain, singularly pale, black-bearded, in +a black Spanish costume of long-past fashion, lands alone. It is +he whom ballads call the Flying Dutchman. Seven years have passed +since he last touched land. His opportunity has returned, to reach +out for salvation. He comes ashore wearily, perfunctorily, without +hope, or doubt but that the ocean will soon be receiving him back +for continued desperate wanderings. "Your cruelty, proud ocean," +he apostrophises it, "is variable, but my torment eternal! The +salvation which I seek on land, never shall I find it. To you, +floods of the boundless main, I shall be found faithful until your +last wave break and your last moisture dry! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"How often—" he cries, as in fixed despair he gazes back +over the past, "How often, filled with longing to die have I cast +myself into the deepest abysses of the sea, but death, alas! I +could not find! Against the reefs where ships find dreadful <a +name="page_391"><span class="page">Page 391</span></a> burial I +have driven my ship, but it found no grave! Inciting him to rage, +I have defied the pirate—I hoped to meet with death in fierce +battle. 'Here,' I have cried, 'show your prowess! Full of treasure +are ship and boat! But the wild son of the sea trembling hoisted +the sign of the cross and fled. Nowhere a grave! Never to die! +Such is the dreadful sentence of damnation. Oh, tell me, gentle +angel of God's, who won for me the possibility of salvation, was +I, wretch, the toy of your mockery when you showed me the means +of redemption? Vain hope! Fearful, idle illusion! There is no such +thing more upon earth as eternal fidelity, One hope alone is left +me, one hope alone which nothing can destroy. However long the +seed of earth endure, it must come to final dissolution. Day of +Judgment, end of the world! When shall you dawn upon my night? +When shall it sound, the trump of doom, at which the earth will +crumble away? When all the dead arise, then shall I pass into +nothingness. O ye worlds, a term to your course! Eternal void, +receive me!" From the hold of the phantom-ship the unseen crew echo +his prayer: "Eternal void, receive us!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He is leaning against a rock, absorbed in sombre meditation, when +Daland, emerging from the cabin to take a look at the weather, +becomes aware of the looming neighbour. He rouses the sleep-drunken +mate. The latter, shocked wide-awake by the conviction of negligence, +catches up a speaking-trumpet and calls to the strange ship lying at +anchor close by, "Who is there?" There comes no sound in reply, save +from the echo. "Answer!" shouts the mate; "Your name and colours!" +Silence, as before. "It appears they are quite as lazy as we!" +Daland remarks, finding nothing particularly noteworthy in the +unresponse, since his own crew are asleep too after their long +toil. Catching sight of the dark figure on shore which he <a +name="page_392"><span class="page">Page 392</span></a> rightly takes +to be the captain, he prevents the mate's further investigation, and +turns his questions to this one: "Halloo, seaman! Give your name! +Your country?" The answer comes after a long pause, almost as if the +speaker had lost the habit of human intercourse and uttered himself +with difficulty. "I have come from afar. Do you, in such stress of +weather, deny me anchorage?"—"God forbid! The seaman knows +the friendly courtesies of hospitality!" cries Daland. Joining +the stranger ashore, "Who are you?" he asks. "Hollander."—"God +be with you! So you too were driven by the hurricane on to the +bare rocky coast? I had no better fate. My home is but a few miles +from here; I had nearly reached it when I was forced to turn and +sail away. Tell me, whence are you come? Has your ship sustained +damage?"—"My ship is strong, nor likely to meet with damage," +the Hollande, answers, as drearily as mysteriously; "Driven by +storms and adverse winds I have been wandering over the face of the +waters—how long? I hardly could tell. I have long ceased to +count the years. I hardly could name all the lands I have approached. +One land alone, the one which of all I long for, I can never +find,—the land of home! Grant me for a short period the +hospitality of your house, and you shall not rue the act of +friendliness. My ship is richly laden with treasures from every +region and latitude. If you will traffic with me, you may be sure +of your advantage."—"How wonderful!" says Daland, impressed; +"Am I to take you at your word? An evil star, it would seem, has +so far pursued you. I am ready to do what I can to serve you. +But—may I ask what is the cargo of your ship?" The Hollander +makes a sign to the watch. His sailors bring ashore a chest. "The +rarest treasures you shall see, precious pearls and noblest gems," +the stranger speaks to the wide-eyed Daland. "See for yourself, and +be convinced of the value <a name="page_393"><span class="page">Page +393</span></a> of the price I offer for the hospitality of your +roof." The lid of the chest is lifted. Daland stares amazed at the +contents. "What? Is it possible? These treasures?—But who +is so rich as to have an equivalent to tender?"—"Equivalent? +I have told you—I offer this for a single night's lodging. +What you see, however, is an insignificant portion of that which +the hold of my ship contains. Of what avail to me is the treasure? +I have neither wife nor child, and my home I can never find. All +my riches I will give you, if you will afford me a home with you +and yours." Daland cannot believe that he hears aright. "Have you +a daughter?" inquires the Hollander. "I have, indeed, a most dear +child."—"Let her be my wife!" Again Daland cannot believe his +ears, cannot be sure whether he is asleep or awake. It is suggested +later that he cares unduly for wealth; but, without supposing him +avaricious, we can realise how what is offered at this moment should +seem such to his simple sailor mind that a man must be outright mad +not to grasp at it for the inconceivable happiness and splendour +of himself and house. No flesh-and-blood girl, no daughter of the +common fellow he is, can to his mind be a reasonable equivalent, +really, for the mass of riches proposed in exchange for her. Daland +nor she had probably in all their lives owned a precious stone. And +this chest is full to the brim of jewels, and that ship contains +more still a hundred-fold, and the man asking for his daughter's +hand is clearly a hypochondriac, infinitely sea-weary, who sees +in the prospect of home and settled life the whole desire of his +heart, cloyed with riches and sick of wandering. If he, Daland, should +hesitate, the suitor might change his mind. As for the daughter, +she will either see the thing as he sees it,—how could human +woman see it differently?—or, dutiful, will be ruled by his +superior wisdom. "Indeed, stranger, I have a lovely daughter; <a +name="page_394"><span class="page">Page 394</span></a> devoted to +me with the most faithful filial love. She is my pride, my highest +wealth, my comfort in evil days, my joy in good."—"May her +love," the Hollander exclaims with feeling, "never fail her father! +True to him, she will be true likewise to her husband."—"You +give jewels, priceless pearls," remarks Daland, with an attempt at +dignity that does his self-respect good, no doubt, without greatly +impressing us, "but the greatest treasure of all is a faithful +wife!"—"And you will give me such a one?"—"You have +my word. Your fate moves my sympathy. Freehanded as you are, you +give assurance of magnanimity and high-mindedness. The like of you +I have ever wished for son-in-law, and even were your fortune not +so great, I would choose no other."—"My thanks. And shall I +see the daughter this very day?"—"The next favourable wind will +take us home. You shall see her, and if she pleases you..."—"She +shall be my wife.—Will she prove to be my angel?" he sighs +aside; "Do I still permit myself the folly of an illusion that an +angel's heart will pity me? Hopeless as I am, I yet follow the +lure of hope!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"The wind is propitious, the sea is calm. We will heave anchor at +once, and speedily reach home," says Daland. "If I may beg,—do +you sail ahead," the Hollander suggests. "The wind is fresh, but +my crew is spent. I will let them rest awhile and then will +follow."—"But our wind?"—"Will continue for some time +blowing from the south. My ship is swift and will surely overtake +yours."—"You believe so? Very well! Let it be as you wish. +Farewell, and may you meet my child before the end of day!" The +sailors have lifted the anchor and set the sails. Daland goes on +board. With the crew singing cheerily together, the Norwegian ship +starts upon the homeward course. The Hollander returns to his silent +deck. +</p> + +<h3><a name="page_395"><span class="page">Page 395</span></a> +II</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +The scene is next laid in the interior of Daland's house, the large +living-room, where a flock of girls sit around the fire with their +spinning-wheels. Beside the maps and pictures of nautical interest +forming the natural decoration of a sea-captain's house, there +hangs on the wall the picture of a pale black-bearded man, dressed +in the Spanish fashion of years long gone. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The girls are spinning busily, singing while they work. They are +the sweethearts of the lads on Daland's ship, and their song is of +sailors at sea who are thinking of maidens at home, and if diligent +turning of the spinning-wheel might influence the wind—oh, +but they would speedily be back in harbour! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +One only of the young girls in the room is not working; Senta, +letting her wheel stand idle, leans back abstractedly in a great +armchair, with her eyes fixed upon the picture of the pale man. +Her old nurse, Mary, who spins diligently herself and keeps the +rest at their task, chides her, not very severely, for her idleness. +The girls in their song have been felicitating themselves that if +they are zealous at their spinning their lovers will give them +the golden earnings they bring home from the south. "You naughty +child," Mary says to Senta, at the end of the song, "if you do +not spin, you will receive no present from your <i>Schatz!</i>" +Senta's companions laugh at this. "There is no need for her to +hurry. Her sweetheart is not out at Sea. He brings home no gold, he +brings home game. Everyone knows in what the fortune of a huntsman +consists!" Senta does not stir; it is doubtful if she have heard. +Without removing her eyes from the picture of the pallid man, she +hums softly to herself certain fragment of old ballad. "Look at <a +name="page_396"><span class="page">Page 396</span></a> her!" the +nurse takes fuller account of her attitude and abstraction; "Look +at her! Always in front of that picture! Do you intend to dream +away your whole young life before that portrait?" Senta answers +gently, still without taking her eyes from the pale face: "Why +did you tell me who he is, and relate his story?... The unhappy +soul!" At the heavily burdened sigh upon which she utters the last +words, "God have you in His care!" exclaims Mary, vaguely troubled. +But the girls, who are in merry mood, laugh again. "Why, why, what +is that we hear? She sighs for the pale man! There you see what a +picture can do. She is in love. Please Heaven no mischief result! +Erik is somewhat hot of temper. Please God he do no damage! Say +not a word, else, aflame with wrath, he may shoot the rival from +the wall!" Their chatter finally reaching her consciousness, Senta +turns to them, annoyed. "Oh, keep still! Stop your silly laughing! +Do you wish to make me really cross?" Further to tease her, they +drown her voice with the refrain of their spinning-song: "Mutter +and hum, good little wheel, cheerily, cheerily turn! Spin, spin +a thousand threads, good little wheel, mutter and hum!"—"Do +stop that foolish song," begs Senta, "my ears are dazed with your +muttering and humming. If you wish me to attend, find something +better to do!"—"Very well," say the girls, "then sing yourself!" +As a bird to the nest, Senta returns to the subject engrossing +her mind. "Hear what I suggest: let Mary sing us the ballad." All +understand what ballad is meant. "God forbid!" cries the nurse; +"It is likely I will do it! Children, let the Flying Dutchman +rest!"—"Yet how often have I heard the ballad from you!" +sighs Senta; and, as the nurse continues obdurate, "I will sing +it myself," she decides, "and do you girls listen. Could I but +bring home to your hearts the wretchedness of the poor soul's fate, +it could <a name="page_397"><span class="page">Page 397</span></a> +not fail to move you to compassion!" The girls accept the offer +with delight, push aside their spinning-wheels and gather around +the singer. Only the old nurse, whose instinct has somehow caught +alarm, and who has conceived a curious dislike and fear of this +pallid hero of legend, refuses her countenance and testily goes +on spinning by herself in the chimney-corner. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Have you met the ship on the seas," sings Senta, "blood-red of +sail and black of mast? Upon the high deck, the pale man, the ship's +master, keeps incessant watch.—Hui! How the wind blows! +Yohohey!—Hui! How it sings in the stays! Yohohey!—Hui! +Like an arrow flies the ship, without stop, without rest! Yet might +deliverance one day come to the pale man, could he find a woman +upon earth who should love him faithfully until death. Oh, when, +pale sea-farer, when shall you find her? Pray to Heaven that a +woman soon may keep her troth to him! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"With contrary wind, in the rage of the storm, he determined to +double a cape. He cursed and swore in mad mood: 'Not to all eternity +will I desist!'—Hui! And Satan heard it. Yohohey!—Hui! +Took him at his word. Yohohey!—Hui! And now, a lost soul, +he sails the seas, without stop, without rest. How the unhappy +man, however, might find deliverance upon earth, an angel of the +Lord showed him,—how he might earn eventual salvation. Oh, +that you might, pale sea-farer, find it! Pray to Heaven that a +woman soon may keep her troth to him! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"He casts anchor every seven years, and to woo a woman comes ashore. +But never yet has he found a faithful one.—Hui! Spread the +sails! Yohohey!—Hui! Lift the anchor! Yohohey!—Hui! +False love, false troth! Back to sea, without stop, without rest!..." +Senta who has been singing <a name="page_398"><span class="page">Page +398</span></a> with a spirit and expressiveness full unusual as +applied to a threadbare old ballad, has at this point reached such +a pitch of emotion that her voice fails and she sinks in her chair +exhausted. The girls, whom her earnestness has impressed into a +realisation of the facts sung by her, who have for a moment had +through her eyes the vision of that lost soul's wretchedness, take +up the ballad where she drops it, and sing on in tones which confess +the contagion of her sympathy: "Ah, where tarries she, to whom +God's angel might guide you? Where shall you find her who will +be your own true and loyal love until death?" With an air of +illumination, Senta starts to her feet and finishes the song with +words which rise inspired to her lips: "Let me be that woman! My +truth shall work your deliverance! God's angel guide you to me! +Through me you shall reach salvation!" She speaks so passionately, +appears so strangely, that her companions feel a sort of puzzled +alarm. The old nurse, frightened, rushes to her side with the cry: +"Heaven help us!" and all together they try to bring her to her +normal self, calling in tones of protest, "Senta! Senta!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Unnoticed of the rest, Erik, the huntsman, has during the last +moments been standing in the doorway. He has heard Senta's exclamation, +witnessed her strange condition, and affected by it differently +from all the others cries, heart-struck, "Senta, Senta, are you +determined to destroy me?"—"Oh, help us, Erik," the others +appeal to him; "She is out of her senses!" The nurse, who has felt +her blood unaccountably running chill, turns angrily to the picture +on the wall: "Abominable picture, out of the house you shall go just +as soon as the father comes home!"—"The father has arrived," +Erik informs them; "From the cliff I saw his ship come in." All +minds veer promptly from the subject which had been engrossing +them, to this delightful one of the arrival. The girls are for +running <a name="page_399"><span class="page">Page 399</span></a> +to the harbour upon the instant. Mary prevents them. "Stop! Stop! +You shall remain quietly at home. The sailor-folk will be arriving +with hollow stomachs. To the kitchen and cellar! No time to waste! +Let curiosity torment you as it may, first of all go and do your +duty!" She drives them before her from the room, and follows. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Senta is going, too, but Erik bars the way, pleading, "Stay, Senta, +stay for a moment! Release me from this torture—or, if you +will, destroy me quite!" She affects, as the simplest girl must, +not to understand. "Erik, what is it?"—"Oh, Senta, speak, +say what is to become of me! Your father is coming home. Before +starting upon a new voyage, he is sure to wish to carry out what +he so often has spoken of..."—"And what is that?"—"To +give you a husband. My heart with its unchanging love, my humble +fortune, my hunter's luck, these things being all I have to offer, +will not your father repulse me? And if my heart breaks with its +misery, tell me, Senta, who is there will speak a word for me?" +He pleads warmly, young Erik; he is at that age and point in life +when not to obtain the woman he has set his heart upon seems a +calamity such as will extinguish the sun, make the rest of life +worthless; when refusal signifies destruction, and he is not ashamed +of this as a weakness, but proud of it as a strength, and uses it as +the most pertinent argument, and feels no abjectness in confessing +himself at the mercy of a girl, a toy in her frail hands. He is +the only lover of this type in the Wagnerian assortment, and, it +happens, the only one who fails. Senta, we are permitted to divine, +had not always felt as removed from him as at this moment. It is +but lately, no doubt, with the turning perhaps of her seventeenth +year, at some fuller opening into womanhood, that her romantic +dream has taken such possession of her, and his warm-blooded urgent +love become something <a name="page_400"><span class="page">Page +400</span></a> to withdraw from, without clearly formulated reason, +by an instinct. She tries now to silence him, to put him off with +the excuse that she must hurry to her father. But he is not to be put +off. To detain her, he reproaches. "You wish to avoid me!"—"I +must go to the harbour!"—"You shrink from me?"—"Oh, let +me go!"—"You shrink from the wound which yourself you made, +the madness of love you inspired? Oh, you shall hear me in this +hour, shall hear the last question I will ask. When my heart is +breaking with anguish, will not Senta herself speak a word for me?" +She applies herself then to quiet and comfort such evident suffering; +he is after all flesh-and-blood and close at hand, the other a dream. +Her sentiments besides are not very clear even to herself. "Do you +doubt my heart?" she asks reassuringly; "Do you doubt that it is full +of kindness toward you? What is it, tell me, makes you so unhappy? +What suspicion darkens your mind?"—"Oh, your father's heart is +set upon riches. And you, Senta, how should I count upon you? Do you +ever grant one of my requests? Do you not daily hurt and afflict my +heart?"—"Afflict your heart?..." she asks in wonder. "What am +I to think?" he goes on to show the jealous core of his unhappiness; +"That picture..."—"What picture?..."—"Will you renounce +your extravagant imaginings?"—"Can I keep from my face the +compassion I feel?"—"And that ballad... you sang it again +to-day."—"I am a child," she excuses herself, "and sing I know +not what! Are you afraid of a song, a picture?"—"You are so +pale!" he replies, studying her face dubiously; "Tell me, have I no +reason to be afraid?"—"Should I not be moved by the terrible doom +of that unhappiest man?"—"But my sufferings, Senta, do they no +longer move you?"—"Oh, vaunt not your sufferings!" she cries, +almost impatiently; "What can your sufferings be? Do you know what +the fate <a name="page_401"><span class="page">Page 401</span></a> +is of that poor soul?" She draws him before the picture, and while +indicating it to him gazes raptly at it herself; "Can you not feel +the woe, the inexpressible deep misery in the eyes which he turns +upon me? Oh, the calamity which robbed him eternally of rest, the +sense of it pierces my heart!" Veritable alarm seizes Erik at the +earnestness she exhibits, an alarm to something more vital even +than his alert jealousy, a terrible fear for her as apart from +himself. "Woe's me!" he exclaims, "I am reminded of my ill-boding +dream! God have you in his care, Satan has cast his toils about +you!"—"What frightens you so?" she asks wearily. It is as +if excess of emotion had brought on an immense fatigue; she sinks +exhausted in the grand-sire's chair. "Let me tell you of it, Senta. +It is a dream, hear and be warned by it." She leans back with closed +eyes, and as he narrates it is as if having fallen asleep she saw +in dream what he describes. "Upon the high cliff I lay dreaming. +Beneath me I saw the expanse of the sea; I could hear the surf where +it breaks foaming against the beach. I espied a foreign ship close +to shore, a strange ship, extraordinary. Two men drew toward land. +One of them, I saw it, was your father."—"And the other?" she +asks, like a somnambulist, without opening her eyes. "I recognised +him well enough, with his black doublet and pale face...."—"And +his mournful glance...." she adds, still with closed eyes. Erik +points at the picture: "The sea-man there."—"And I?..." she +asks. "You came out of the house. You ran to meet your father. But +hardly had you reached the pair, when you cast yourself at the +feet of the stranger. I saw you clasp his knees...." "He lifted +me...."—"To his breast. Passionately you clung to him, and +kissed him ardently...."—"And then?" He gazes at her with +a sort of terror, as at something unnatural, in her appearance of +sleep. "I saw you fly together over the <a name="page_402"><span +class="page">Page 402</span></a> sea." She seems to wake with a +start. "He is looking for me!" she cries in tones of extraordinary +conviction, "I shall see him! My destiny it is to perish with him!" +Erik recoils: "Horrible! Ha, I see it full plainly at last, she is +gone from me! My dream boded true!" In uncontrollable despair he +flees from the house. Senta, her excitement gradually dying, remains +gazing at the picture. She is murmuring softly to herself the burden +of the ballad: "Ah, may you, pale sea-farer, find her! Pray to +Heaven that a woman soon may keep her troth to him!"—when the +door opens and Daland and the Hollander appear at the threshold. +Serita's eyes turn from the picture to the stranger entering. A +cry escapes her lips and her eyes fasten on his face. His eyes, +too, as he slowly steps into the room, bend steadfastly upon hers. +They gaze as if the same spell had fallen upon both. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The father, after a moment watching from the doorway, waiting for +his daughter to run as usual to greet him, speaks, not altogether +displeased: "My child, you see me standing at the door, and, what is +this? No embrace? No kiss? You stand in your place as if bewitched? +Do I deserve, Senta, such a welcome?"—"God be with you!" +she murmurs faintly, and, as he comes nearer, asks underbreath, +without removing her eyes from the figure—the counterpart +of the picture on the wall, "Father, speak, who is the stranger?" +The father smiles: "You are eager to know? My child, give kind +welcome to the stranger. A sea-man he is, like myself, and solicits +our hospitality. Homeless for long years, incessantly bound on long +voyages, in far-off lands he has gathered vast treasures. An exile +from home, he offers rich compensation for a place at the fireside. +Speak, Senta, should you be sorry that the stranger should dwell +with us?" To the Hollander, while the daughter without a word's +reply continues in her fixed contemplation <a name="page_403"><span +class="page">Page 403</span></a> of his face, he speaks aside: +"Tell me, did I praise her too highly? Now you see her in person, +does she rightly please you? Must I add more still to my overflowing +praise? Confess that she is an ornament to her sex!" The Hollander +answers by an expressive gesture, his eyes fast all the while upon +the maiden's face. The father turns anew to the daughter, and, +without further preamble: "My child, let it please you to show +favour to this man. He requests a goodly gift from your heart. +Reach him your hand, for he shall be your bridegroom. If you are of +a like mind with your father, to-morrow he shall be your husband." +She shrinks, painfully, at this bluntness and precipitancy. The +father, not noticing, unpockets jewels to show her. "Look at this +circlet, behold these clasps. The sum of his possessions makes +these the merest trifle. How, my precious child, should you not +care for them? And it will all be yours for the exchanging of rings +with him. But... neither of you speaks...." He looks at them in turn. +They have neither heeded nor heard, they are lost in contemplation +of each other. "Am I in the way?" They do not hear that either. "I +clearly am," he says to himself. "The best will be to leave them +alone together." With a parting private word to the daughter: "May +you win this noble man! Believe me, such good fortune is not common!" +and to the Dutchman: "I leave you to yourselves, and betake myself +away. Believe me, fair as she is, she is no less true than fair!" +he discreetly withdraws. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The strange predestined lovers stand for long moments steadily +gazing at each other, almost unconsciously, without motion to draw +nearer—or further apart. Each of them voices his thoughts, not +speaking to the other, but, dreamily, to himself. He murmurs: "As +if out of the distance of long-past days speaks to me the semblance +of this maiden. Even <a name="page_404"><span class="page">Page +404</span></a> such as through dread eternities I dreamed her, I +behold her now here before my eyes. From the black depths of my +night I too have ventured to raise my longing eyes upon a woman. +Satan's malice left me a living heart, alas, that I might never +lose consciousness of my torment. The sullen glow which I feel +burning in my breast, should I, unhappy man, call it love? Ah, +no, the longing it is for redemption! Oh, might redemption be my +portion through such an angel as she is!" And she speaks, to herself, +half-aloud: "Have I sunk into a wonderful dream? Is this which I +see an illusion? Or have I until this moment lived in a world of +dream, and is this the day of awakening? He stands before me, his +features stamped with sorrow. His unparalleled sufferings silently +call to me. Can the voice of deepest pity deceive? As I have so +often beheld him he stands before me now. This sorrow which burns +within my bosom, this going out of desire toward him, what must +I call it? Oh, that the salvation which he goes seeking without +rest might reach the unhappy man through me!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +He moves a little nearer to her at last, and asks with the simplicity +and sincerity which befit the hour so fraught with fate, "Will you +not reject your father's choice? That which he promised—what? +shall it hold good? Could you forever give yourself to me? You +could hold out your hand to the stranger? I might, after a life +of torment, find in your truth the long craved-for peace?" She +answers upon the instant, singularly sure of her heart: "Whoever +you may be, and whatever ruin your cruel fate reserve for you, +and whatever the destiny I thereby call upon myself, my obedient +duty shall ever be to my father's wish."—"What, so +unconditionally? My sorrows, is it possible, have moved you to such +deep compassion?"—"Sorrows how measureless!" she exclaims to +herself. <a name="page_405"><span class="page">Page 405</span></a> +"Oh, might I bring you consolation for those!" And he, overhearing: +"Oh, gentlest sound through the warring darkness! An angel are you! +The love of an angel can still the pain even of lost souls! If I +may hope for salvation, Almighty, let it be through this angel!" +But in the uplift of hope reviving, a remembrance gives him +pause,—remembrance of the whole condition of his deliverance; +and, a strain of solemnity mingling with his grateful tenderness, +he warns her: "Could you apprehend the fate which, in belonging +to me, with me you must share, you would pause to consider the +sacrifice you bring in vowing to be true. Your youth would flee +shuddering at prospect of the fate to which you would have doomed +it, if the fairest virtues of womankind, if sacred fidelity and +truth, be not yours." She replies with no less assurance than before, +and her air of exalted inspiration: "Well do I know the high duties +of woman. Be comforted, unhappy man! Let fate do justice of those +who defy her decree. In my soul is written the supreme law of truth, +and unto him to whom I pledge my faith this one truth it is which +I give: Truth until death!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Like balm the words fall upon his wounded spirit. The powers of +darkness, it seems, are to be defeated; the evil star, it seems, +has set and the star of hope arisen. "Ye angels," he calls to them, +"who had quite forsaken me, confirm her heart in its constancy!" +And she, her heavenly pity prays: "Let him have reached home at +last! Let his ship rest here eternally in port!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Daland re-enters. "By your leave, my people outside can hardly wait. +Upon each home-coming, you must know, we hold a merry-making. I would +fain add to the cheer of the feast, and am come, with that in mind, +to ask if it might not be I made into a betrothal feast?—As +far as I see," he turns to the Hollander, "you have wooed to your +heart's purpose?—And <a name="page_406"><span class="page">Page +406</span></a> you, my child," to Senta, "are you ready, too?" +Senta with solemn resolution reaches her hand to the Dutchman. +"Here is my hand, and here, never to repent it, I plight my troth +until death!" The Hollander, taking her hand, cries defiance to +the mockery of Hell through this fast truth of hers. At Daland's +summons thereupon, "To the feast, and let every one to-day make +merry!" the three turn to go and take share—even, incredibly, +the Dutchman,—in legitimate human rejoicings. +</p> + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p class="indent"> +Close by Daland's house lies the rock-bound bay into which his ship +and the Dutchman's have come to anchor. The two crafts are seen in +the clear night, lying at a short distance from each other, hard by +the shore. The Norwegian is brightly illuminated, the sailors are +on deck making holiday. The Hollander presents a striking contrast: +not a light does it show, not a sound issues from it; it looms +shadowy and forbidding. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +"Steersman, leave the watch!" sing the roistering Norway lads; +"Furl the sails! Anchor fast! Come along, steersman! No wind is +there to fear nor adverse coast, and we mean to be right jolly. +Each of us has a sweetheart on shore, excellent tobacco and superior +brandy-wine. Rocks and storms are far outside, we laugh at rocks +and storms! Steersman, come and drink!" They dance on deck, marking +time with their heavy boots. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +From Daland's house comes the bevy of girls we know, laden with +generous baskets of food and drink. Finding their sweethearts so +merrily employed, "Just look at them!" they say; "As we live, they +are dancing! The ladies do certainly <a name="page_407"><span +class="page">Page 407</span></a> seem superfluous!" With a playful +feint of pique they pass without further notice the lighted, noisy +ship, and go toward the Hollander, whose blood-tinted sails and black +masts form but a grim silhouette against the star-sown sky. "Hi, +girls,—stop! Where are you going?" the simple-minded sailors +cry after them. But the girls do not abandon their small vengeance +of serving the strangers first. "You have a mind to fresh wine, have +you not? And is not your neighbour to have something too? Are the +liquor and the feast to be solely for you?" The young mate rises to +the occasion and has a fling at these suddenly-instituted rivals: +"Indeed, indeed, take something, do, to the poor lads. They appear +to be quite faint with thirst!" All turn their attention squarely +now to the foreign ship and take account of the strangeness of its +conditions. "Not a sound on board! And see, not a light! No sign +of the crew!"—"Halloo, sea-folk!" the maidens shout, "Halloo! +Do you need lights? Where are you? We cannot see...."—"Don't +wake them," chaff the Norwegians, "they are still asleep!" The girls +go close to the ship and shout again. "Halloo, sea-folk! Halloo, +answer!" There is along silence. The sailor-lads have the laugh now +on the girls. "Ha, ha! In very truth, they are dead. They are in no +need of food and drink." But the girls will not accept their defeat. +"What?" they continue calling to the invisible Dutch crew; "Are you +so lazy as to have gone already to bed? Is it not holiday-time for +you, too?"—"They lie fast in their lairs," jest the Norwegians; +"like dragons they guard their treasure!"—"Halloo, sea-folk!" +persist the girls; "Do you not wish for golden wine? Surely you are +thirsty?"—"They do not care to drink, they do not care to +sing," the sailor-lads tease; "there is no light burning in all their +ship!"—"Say," the girls continue addressing the unresponding crew, +"have you <a name="page_408"><span class="page">Page 408</span></a> +no sweethearts on land? Do you not wish to come and dance on the +friendly shore?"—"They are already old, they are pale instead +of ruddy," put in the sailors, "and their sweethearts, they are +dead!"—"Halloo!" the girls call louder, "Seafolk, wake up! +We are bringing you food and drink to heart's content!" The sailors +good-humouredly unite in chorus: "They are bringing you food and +drink to heart's content!" Another long pause, unbroken by the +faintest sound from the Dutch ship. The girls are becoming uneasy. +"It is a fact," they speak lower, struck; "They seem to be all +dead. They do not need food and drink." But the boys feel jollier +than ever. "You have heard of the Flying Dutchman," they cry, by +way of wild joke; "His ship, big as life and true to life, you +behold there!"—"Then don't wake the crew!" say the girls; +"They are ghosts, we could swear!" The sailor-lads take their turn +now shouting questions, humourously intended, at the sombre hull: +"How many hundreds of years have you already been at sea? Storm and +rocks have no terrors for you! Have you no letters, no commissions +for shore? We will see that they come to our great-great-grandfathers' +hands!" In the extravagance of fun, finally, raising their voices +to the very loudest, "Halloo, sea-folk!" they cry; "Spread your +sails! Give us a specimen of the Flying Dutchman's speed!" At the +prolonged silence following, the girls shrink away, at last really +frightened. "They do not hear. It makes our flesh creep. They do +not want anything. Why do we continue to call?"—"That is +it, you girls," the sailors heartily agree, "let the dead rest +in peace! And let us who are alive be happy!" The girls hand up +to them the savoury baskets. "There, take, since your neighbours +disdain it."—"But what? Are you not coming on board yourselves?" +inquire the sailors, when the girls do not as expected follow. +It is early still; <a name="page_409"><span class="page">Page +409</span></a> they will return a little later, they promise, Till +then let the boys drink and dance, but be careful not to disturb +the repose of their weary neighbours! +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +When the girls have returned to the house, the sailors open the +hampers and lustily fall to, casting playful thanks to those dumb +neighbours for this double share of victuals and wine. In the lightness +of their hearts they sing, and to the verses of their rollicking +"Steersman, leave the watch!" clash their goblets noisily together. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Absorbed in their carousal, they have not remarked a beginning of +movement on the ship close by and in the water immediately around +it. This rises and falls in a mysterious violent swell, which rocks +the awakening ship, while the rest of the sea is calm. Storm-wind +whistles and howls among the rigging, though the night elsewhere is +still and bright. Livid fire flares up in the place of the watch-light, +bringing into distinctness the black cordage and spectral crew. The +latter seem to come to life in the weird illumination, and with +hollow voices suddenly entone a sea-song of strange intervals and +cadences, disquieting to ears of warm flesh and blood. "Yohohey! +Yohohohey!—Huissa! The storm drives us to land!—Huissa! +Sail in! Anchor loose!—Huissa! Run into the bay!—Black +captain, go ashore! Seven years are over, sue for the hand of a +golden-haired maiden. Golden-haired maiden, be true to him, be +true! Cheerily, cheerily, bridegroom, today! The storm-wind howls +wedding-music, the ocean dances to the tune.—Hui! Hark! His +whistle sounds. Captain, are you back again?—Hui! Hoist the +sail! Your bride, say, where is she?—Hui! Off, to sea! Captain, +captain, you have no luck in love! Ha, ha, ha! Blow, storm-wind, +howl away! No damage can you do to our sails! Satan has charmed +them, they will not rend in all eternity!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_410"><span class="page">Page 410</span></a> The Norwegian +sailors, suspending their own clamour, have looked and listened in an +increasing wonder, which gradually turns to horror. To overcome the +superstitious fear they frankly own to, they start singing together +with all their might, to drown their terror as well as the voices +of the rival singers. The two sharply contrasting sea-songs strive +one against the other for a few moments, then the Norwegians, giving +up the contention, retire from deck to the last man, tremulously +making the sign of the cross. As they disappear below, the Dutchmen +break into a fearful yell of derision,—and instantly darkness +and complete silence reinvade the ship, while perfect calm falls +upon the sea. For a long interval the scene so crowded and noisy +a moment before, remains empty and still. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Senta comes hurriedly from the house, followed by Erik, both in +great agitation. He has learned of her betrothal to the stranger. +"What have I heard?" he cries in incredulous anguish; "O God, what +have I seen? Is it a delusion? Can it be truth? Can it be +fact?"—"Ask not, Erik," she falters, in anguish, too; "I +must not answer."—"Just God! There can be no doubt of it. It +is truth! What unholy power swept you along? What force so quickly +prevailed with you to make you break this devoted heart? Was it your +father? Ha, he brought the bridegroom home with him. I recognised +him. I forboded what is coming to pass. But you? Is it possible? +You give your hand to the man who has hardly more than crossed +your doorstep?"—"Oh, say no more!" pleads the girl, torn +by the sight of his sorrow, and her necessity to refuse the only +possible comfort, "Be silent! I must! I must!..."—"Oh, that +docility, blind as your act!" he raves; "You were glad, at a beck +from your father, to follow. With a blow you crush the life out of +my heart!"—"No more! No more!" she <a name="page_411"><span +class="page">Page 411</span></a> tries to stop him; "I must not see +you again, must not think of you. High duty commands it!"—"What +high duty? Is it not a higher duty still to observe that which you +once swore to me,—eternal constancy?"—"What?..." she +cries, in utmost dismay; "You say that I swore eternal constancy +to you?"—"Oh, Senta," he goes on, subdued by her shocked +amazement, sorrowfully to explain the simple rhetoric of his +misstatement, "will you deny it? Do you refuse to remember that day +when you called me to you in the valley? When in order to gather +the upland flowers for you I endured dangers and labours innumerable? +Do you remember how from the steep rocks on the shore we watched +your father departing? He sailed upon the white-winged ship, and +confided you to my care. When your arm encircled my neck, did you +not own once more your love for me? That which thrilled me at the +pressure of your hand, tell me, was it not the assurance of your +constancy?" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Unseen of the two, for the moment so absorbed in each other, the +Hollander has come from the house. He has been standing near enough +to overhear Erik's last sentences; the significance of these seems +scarcely ambiguous, his inference is natural. It is a lovers' meeting +which he has chanced upon. Whatever her reasons for accepting him, +the Hollander,—it is clear that this young huntsman has a +claim on the girl who declared so glibly that the law of truth +was written in her soul. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +The two are interrupted by a wail. "Lost! Oh, lost! To all eternity +lost!" They turn and start in horror at sight of the Hollander. +"Farewell, Senta," he cries, and with the precipitation of despair +is making straight for the boundless deep. Senta throws herself across +his path. "Stay, O unfortunate!" But the Hollander pushes past. "To +sea! To sea! To sea until the end of time!—It is at an end +with your truth! At an <a name="page_412"><span class="page">Page +412</span></a> end with your truth and my salvation! Farewell, +I would not bring about your ruin!" Erik, catching sight of his +face, the face of a lost soul, shudders at the measureless woe +in his eyes. "Stay," Senta implores, "stay, you shall never depart!" +Disregarding her, the Hollander blows a shrill note on his whistle +and shouts to his crew: "Hoist sail! Lift anchor! For ever and +ever bid farewell to the land!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +There is struggle for a long moment among the three: hers to prevent +the Hollander; Erik's to keep back her, caught, as he believes, in +the claws of Satan; the Hollander's to leave. Since her faith is +turned to mockery, he, forced to doubt her, has fallen to doubting +God himself. There is no faith more on earth. Away, then, forever +away! "Learn the fate from which I save you!" he finally turns +to her, as if softened by her pleading to the point of wishing +her to know that he leaves not in hate and anger, but very pity +for her feminine frailty; and he states plainly the threatening +fate of which we heard him give but a warning before. "Condemned +am I to the most dreadful of dooms. Tenfold death would be to me +yearned-for bliss. A woman alone can deliver me, a woman who shall +keep her faith to me even until death. You, it is true, had sworn +truth to me, but not as yet before the Almighty, and that it is +which saves you. For know, unhappy woman, the fate which overtakes +her who breaks her vow of eternal constancy to me: Everlasting +damnation is her portion. Innumerable have been the victims already, +through me, of that dread sentence. But you—you shall be saved. +Farewell, then, and farewell, to all time, salvation!" Again he +turns shoreward. "Indeed, indeed, I know you," Senta follows still; +"Full well I know your fate. From the first moment of seeing you I +knew you. The end is at hand of your torture! I am she through +whose fidelity you shall find salvation!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +<a name="page_413"><span class="page">Page 413</span></a> Erik, in +terror for Senta, has called wildly toward the house, toward the +ship, for help to save her. Daland, Mary, and the young girls have +come hurrying from the house, the Norwegian sailors from the ship. +"No, no, you know me not!" the Hollander is saying; "No suspicion +have you who I am! Inquire of the seas of every zone, inquire of +the seaman overscoring the main—Behold"—he points at +the ship whose blood-red sails are set and whose ghastly crew show +uncannily active in preparations for departure; "Behold and recognise +this ship, terror of every pious soul.... The Flying Dutchman I +am called!" +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +With lightning rapidity he has gone aboard. Instantly the weird +ship is under way and amid the cavernous Yohohoes of its seamen +making for the open sea. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Senta struggles to follow. Her father, Erik, her nurse, all forcibly +hold her back. But she is suddenly stronger than them all. She +tears herself free and rushing from them climbs a rock projecting +into the deep water. With all her strength she calls after the +departing Hollander, "Praise be to your angel and his decree! Here +am I, faithful to you until death!" and springs into the sea. +</p> + +<p class="indent"> +Upon the instant, the red-sailed ship, with all its crew, sinks. A +great wave heaves high and falls again eddying, burying the whole. +Above the drifting wreckage, in the rosy light, fore-shine of sunrise, +are seen the transfigured and glorified forms of Senta and the +Hollander rising from the sea, clasped in each others' arms, and +floating heavenward. +</p> + +<p class="indent gap"> +We are always touched in this old world of daily wickedness and +pettiness to come upon stories which seem statements of a popular +ineradicable assurance that love has power to save. It is perhaps +oftenest the love of a woman, clinging pertinaciously <a +name="page_414"><span class="page">Page 414</span></a> to her affection; +but there are legends, too, of men,—who do not save, however, +that we remember, by long fidelity, but by ardour rather in overcoming +obstacles. They kiss the fair enchanted one in the form of a hideous +dragon and she is restored to beauty. One sees the simple philosophy +of such folk-tales. The evil doom is usually the punishment for +sin. The one who loves the person so doomed is innocent. If then +she makes the fate of the sufferer her own, she suffers unjust +punishment, and God, who inclines to mercy, must sooner pardon the +sinner for her sake than condemn the innocent. +</p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Wagnerian Romances, by Gertrude Hall + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WAGNERIAN ROMANCES *** + +***** This file should be named 27265-h.htm or 27265-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/7/2/6/27265/ + +Produced by Robert J. 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