song in a varied form, part of another sailors’ chorus (m); it is the very backbone of the spinning chorus; and lastly, a large portion of the spectral sailors’ chorus is made up of it.  I have no explanation to offer—­unless it be that Wagner, bent on suggesting the sea throughout the opera, felt that this phrase helped him to sustain the atmosphere.  The sea, indeed, throughout the Dutchman, is the background, foreground, the whole environment of the drama; in this wild legend which came out of the sea, every action is related to the sea, and one might say that the sea’s voice is echoed in every one’s speech.  The sea music, therefore, based on Senta’s ballad—­apart from the leitmotivs which that contains—­is of the very first importance.  The easiest way to get a firm grasp of the Dutchman is to analyse this ballad.  Then in passing rapidly over the score afterwards we shall see at a glance the structure of the whole, and how the new thematic matter is either welded into this sea music or stodgily interpolated.  The song is too long to be transcribed here; but every reader must have in his possession a copy at this time of day.  There are ten bars of introduction:  in the eleventh, to the Dutchman theme, Senta sings the “Yo-ho-ho”; at the fifteenth, with a glorious swing and rush she dashes into the ballad—­

    “Traft ihr das Schiff im Meere an,
    Blutroth die Segel, schwarz der Mast? 
    Auf hohem Bord der bleiche Mann,
    Des Schilfes Herr, wacht ohne Rast.”

This consists of eight bars—­a four-bar section repeated.  Then we get the storm music, four bars of which I quote (n), and this is freely employed throughout the opera.  The storm subsides, and at bar thirty-nine Senta sings to her own theme—­

    “Doch kann dem bleichen Manne Erloesung einstens noch werden,
    Faend’ er ein Weib, das bis in den Tod getreu ihm auf Erden.”

leading into the second part (k) to the words—­

    “Ach!  Wann wirst du, bleicher Seemann, sie finden? 
       Betet zum Himmel dass bald
       Ein Weib Treue ihm halt’!”

The three themes are of very unequal power.  The first is one of the landmarks in musical history; neither Wagner himself nor any of the other great masters ever hit upon a more gigantic theme, terrible in its direct force at its announcement, still more terrible as it is used in the overture and later in the drama.  The second, Senta, is a piece of sloppy German sentimentality:  this is not a heroine who will (rightly or wrongly) sacrifice herself for an idea, but a hausfrau who will always have her husband’s supper ready and his slippers laid to warm on the stove shelf.  It is significant that Senta herself in her moment of highest exaltation does not refer to it:  Wagner often calculated wrong, but he never felt wrong.  The third, the grief and anguish of the condemned sailor, and pity for him, is one of the most wonderful things in music; for blent with