later one of the crowning glories of the Ring; the Fire music—­the Loge theme—­comes out at once in its full magnificence.  It is fair criticism to say that had Wagner written the opera again after finishing the Valkyrie he might have wrought up his material into a perfect work of art.  A mere mortal, even the greatest mortal, could hardly be expected to attempt the task, and the Rhinegold is a little less than perfect.  Moreover, it is superfluous.  We can follow the 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 Wotan himself, and by some other mysterious beings, also raised up by Wotan, one of whom, the Valkyrie, Bruennhilda, is condemned in the final scene to become human.