The great exploit has been successful, and Siegfried at last has Siegmund’s sword.  Mime takes him to the cave where Fafner, the giant-dragon, guards the gold.  Siegfried slays the monster, and laughs over the ease of the task.  His finger is heated with the dragon’s blood, and as he puts it to his lips to cool it he tastes the blood, and thus learns the language of the birds.  He cares nought for the treasure, and takes only the ring and a magic helmet, which enables the wearer to assume any form.  After the contest he throws himself at the foot of a tree in the forest and dreamily listens to the “Waldweben,” the rustle and mysterious stirrings of the woods.  Amid all these subtle, soothing sounds, pierced now and then with the songs of the birds, and distant cries in far-away sylvan recesses, he realizes that he is alone, while his old companions of the woods are together.  He thinks of the mother whom he has never known, and of that mysterious being whom he has never seen, who should make the companionship he observes among the birds.  The passion of love begins to assert itself vaguely and strangely, but full soon it will glow out with ardent flame.  A bird flying over his head sings to him.  He can understand its song and fancies it his mother’s voice coming to him in the bird-notes.  It tells him now he has the treasure, he should save the most beautiful of women and win her to himself.  “She sleeps upon a rock, encircled with flames; but shouldst thou dare to break through them, the warrior-virgin is thine.”  The bird wings its flight through the forest, and Siegfried, joyously seizing his sword, follows it with swift foot, for he knows it is guiding him to Bruennhilde.  The time for great deeds has come.  The wild, free life of the forest is over.

The third act once more shows us the god Wotan still plunged in gloom.  Gazing into a deep abyss, he summons Erda, who knows the destiny of all the world, to question her again as to the twilight of the gods.  The mysterious figure appears at his bidding, but has nothing further to communicate.  Their doom is certain.  The fearless race of men is destined to efface the gods, and Walhalla must disappear.  The hero is at hand, and coming rapidly.  The despairing Wotan, who appears in this scene as “Der Wanderer” (the wanderer), cries out, “So be it.  It is to this end I aspire.”  He turns gloomily away, and confronts Siegfried bounding from rock to rock like a deer, still following his airy guide.  The god angrily tries to bar his way, but in vain.  His lance is shattered at a single blow of the sword Nothung, which he himself had once so easily shivered.  It is the first catastrophe of the final fate which is approaching.  The hero without fear has come, the free will of man has begun to manifest itself.  The power of the gods is breaking.  Joyously Siegfried rushes on over the rocks.  He is soon bathed in the glow of the fire, which casts weird shadows through the wild glen.  Now the burning wall of red flames