of
revenging herself on Tristan, and terminating at the same time her own
misery. "You remember your mother's art," says Brangaena: "do you think
she would have sent me over-seas with you without a means of helping
you?" Isolda knows it is the love-potion she means. She has only to
drink the contents of a small flask, and old King Mark will become at
least tolerable to her. The flask is in a casket, and another is there,
as Isolda knows, full of a deadly poison. She commands Brangaena to pour
out the poison. Brangaena, terrified, beseeches, implores; but Isolda
insists; and in the midst of the dispute the sailors suddenly roar out
their "Yo-heave-ho!" The sea had ceased, as it will in moments of
preoccupation or intense emotion, to haunt our ears for a time; now it
breaks in again, and we feel as if it had really never ceased. Kurvenal
enters, and tells them to get ready to land. Isolda tells him
point-blank that she will not stir until Tristan has come to demand her
pardon for a sin he has committed. Brusquely, Kurvenal says he will
convey the message; Brangaena again prays to her mistress to spare her.
"Wilt thou be true?" replies Isolda; and the voice of Kurvenal is heard:
"Sir Tristan!"

[Illustration: Some bars of music]

A minute of frightful suspense occurs while Isolda is waiting for
Tristan; and, as the situation is to be one of the most poignant in the
drama, it is only fitting that Wagner should prelude it with one of his
most tremendous passages. Isolda tells Tristan what is his crime, and
how she had meant to slay him. He offers her his sword to carry out her
old purpose, and she laughs at him. "A pretty thing," she says, "it
would be for me to go to King Mark as his bride with his nephew's blood
on my hands. We must drink together to our friendship, that all may be
forgotten." Brangaena has been tremblingly preparing the potion, and,
not knowing what to do--not daring to give the poison, not daring to
disobey her mistress--she has poured out the elixir of love. Isolda
hands it to Tristan, who fully understands Isolda's meaning and half of
her intention--if, indeed, there is another half, for Wagner has given
Isolda a true touch of womanly character in leaving it uncertain whether
or not she really means to poison herself. He takes the cup and drinks;
she, with a cry of "Betrayed, even here!" snatches it from him and
drinks also.

Here we have got many leagues away from _Lohengrin_, with its scene
betw