ven mad by baseless
jealousy--in fancy she sees the swan coming to lead Lohengrin away
from her; with mournful and dreary effect a fragment of the swan theme
sounds from the orchestra. This simple touch is weird to a degree
never dreamed of by all the purveyors of operatic horrors; it is
unearthly, uncanny, in its wild beauty. The climax is immensely
powerful, but very simple, and, above all, sheer art of the theatre.
There is a crash as Frederick rushes in to be instantly killed; a bass
passage tears down the scale to the depths; and the horns sustain two
pianissimo chords, two notes in each; then silence, broken only by
soft drum-beats to make the silence felt. Elsa has fainted, and as she
revives we hear a bit of the duet--Lohengrin's tenderness as he tends
her, and a fleeting dream of Elsa's, perhaps, seem to blend in it. All
is finished.

To compare this duet with that in _Tristan_ would be profitless but
for one reason. Wagner had not yet reached that perfect mastery of his
art which enabled him, so to speak, to fuse the dramatic and the
musical inspiration. We saw how in the _Dutchman_ the music rose to
its full height and splendour when the drama was sincere and true; in
_Tristan_ drama and music are inseparable. In _Lohengrin_, where the
inspiration is, if not wholly, at any rate mainly, musical, the drama
seems at times to be somewhat of a hindrance. I have mentioned the
fine dramatic or stage touches; but the finest things occur when the
pair, singly or together, are singing music that would be as effective
on a concert platform as on the stage. The art, that is, is far away
from the art of the _Tristan_ duet. At many points the situation is
saved by Wagner's stage dexterity: only when the music is almost as
completely self-moulded as in a symphony, or any other form of
"absolute" music, is it at its best. For practical purposes with
Wagner the songs are "absolute" music: the words were his own, and he
could alter them to suit the musical exigency.

V

The opening of the next scene is spectacular, and the music is not
striking--for Wagner, though Marschner or Spontini might have owned it
with pride. The entry of the nobles bringing Frederick's corpse, the
entry also of Elsa, "like Niobe, all tears," are theatrically
powerful. Elsa's entry is a particularly beautiful example of what I
have previously called Wagner's dramatict use of the leitmotiv. There
are twenty bars of accompaniment, and in that space