What a gay life in field and woodland in
the sweet springtide! All the flutes and pipes, which have lain
frozen to death in dusty corners throughout the winter, have now
awakened and remembered their best beloved melodies, which they
trill cheerfully like the birds in the air."

_B major with the diminished seventh (smanioso)._ "A warm west wind
comes sullenly complaining, like some mysterious secret, through
the wood, and wherever it brushes past, the fir trees murmur, the
beeches murmur to each other: 'Wherefore has our friend grown so
sad?'"

_E flat major (forte)._ "Follow him, follow him! His dress is green
like the dark wood--sweet sounds of horns are his sighing words.
Hearest him murmuring behind the bushes? Hearest thou the sound?
The sound of horns, full of delight and sadness? 'Tis he! up and
meet him."

_D third, fourth, sixth, chord (piano)._ "Life plays its mocking
game in all manner of fashions. Wherefore desire? Wherefore hope?
Wherefore demand?"

_C major (third) chord (fortissimo)._ "Let us rather dance over the
open graves in wild rejoicing. Let us shout for joy, those beneath
cannot hear it. Hurrah, hurrah! Dance and jollity; the devil is
riding in with drums and trumpets."

_C minor chords (ff. in rapid succession)._ "Knowest thou him not?
Knowest thou him not? See, he stretches forth his burning claw to my
heart! He masks himself in all sorts of absurd grimaces--as a free
huntsman, as a concert director, tapeworm doctor, _ricco mercante_;
he pitches snuffers into the strings to prevent my playing! Kreisler,
Kreisler, shake thyself up? Seest thou it hiding, the pale ghost
with the red burning eyes, stretching out its clawy, bony hand
from beneath its torn mantle--shaking the crown of straw on its
smooth bald skull? It is Madness! Johannes, be brave! Mad, mad,
witch-revelry of life, wherefore shakest thou me so in thy whirling
dance? Can I not escape? Is there no grain of dust in the universe on
which, diminished to a fly, I can save myself from thee, horrible
torturing phantom? Desist, Desist! I will behave. My manners shall be
the very best. _Hony soit qui mal y pense._ Only let me believe the
devil to be a _galantuomo_! I curse song and music; I lick thy feet
like the drunken Caliban; free me only from my torments! Ai! Ai!
abominable one! Thou hast trodden down all my flowers: not a blade of
grass still greens i