e _Valkyrie_, _Siegfried_ and the _Dusk
of the Gods_ quite well without it. Still, it is a part of Wagner's
scheme, and for many a long year will be enjoyed for its power and
beauty, a power and beauty that seem small only in comparison with the
greater operas.

CHAPTER XV

'THE VALKYRIE'

I

The _Rhinegold_ suffers from a plethora of undeveloped themes, some of
which are treated at length as the _Ring_ proceeds. Of all announced
only two remain unchanged, the Valhalla and the Fire themes. The
first, I have just remarked, is not susceptible of development, and is
only slightly varied throughout the _Ring_; the second does not demand
development, but is varied much as Beethoven varied his melodies in
his last pianoforte sonatas. The most important of those that are
metamorphosed is the Spear motive. The Spear is the symbol at once of
Wotan's sovereignty and of his bondage. On its shaft, the world
ash-tree stem, are graven the mystic laws by virtue of which he rules;
did he break these laws his power would be gone from him. The essence
of the laws lies in the sanctity of compacts, and so we first hear its
representative theme when the Giants come to claim Freia as payment
for the building of the Burg: it makes its appearance quietly,
unobtrusively, almost apologetically, and might be, as I have said, a
fragment from Spohr or Weber. Its treatment in a simple snatch of
two-part canon, one part following the other at half-a-bar's distance,
seems like a mild gibe at those who only live for and by conventions.
When it reappears in the Second Act of the _Valkyrie_ it is
altogether a different thing: here we have Wotan the ruler determined
at all costs to rule and using to the full the power the Spear confers
on him. Like many of the greatest musical subjects, it is simple
beyond the daring of the minor composers, merely an unbroken scale
descending in heavy, emphatic steps to the lower octaves: it is
authority personified, will that brooks no opposition. This motive,
the Valhalla motive and the fire motive are the principal ones carried
into the _Valkyrie_ from the _Rhinegold_; and an immense amount of new
musical matter is introduced. We see no more of the inferior deities:
we hear the stroke of Donner's hammer in a storm _Lied_, and Loge
appears as consuming flame in the last act; but, excepting Wotan, only
Fricka is seen again in human shape. The stage is now occupied by
human beings, raised up, it is true, by