Marguerite’s neighbors gather in the street and warn Dame Martha of the misdeeds of Marguerite.  The next scene seems to have been devised only to give an environment to Berlioz’s paraphrase of Goethe’s immortal song at the spinning-wheel.  From the distance is heard the fading song of the students and the last echo of drums and trumpets sounding the retreat.  Marguerite rushes to the window, and, overcome, rather unaccountably, with remorse and grief, falls in a swoon.

The last scene.  A mountain gorge, a rock in the foreground surmounted by a cross.  Faust’s soliloquy, “Nature, immense, impenetrable et fiere,” was inspired by Goethe’s exalted invocation to nature.  Faust signs the compact, Mephistophetes summons the infernal steeds, Vortex and Giaour, and the ride to hell begins.  Women and children at the foot of the cross supplicate the prayers of Mary, Magdalen, and Margaret.  The cross disappears in a fearful crash of sound, the supplicants flee, and a moving panorama shows the visions which are supposed to meet the gaze of the riders—­birds of night, dangling skeletons, a hideous and bestial phantasmagoria at the end of which Faust is delivered to the flames.  The picture changes, and above the roofs of the sleeping town appears a vision of angels welcoming Marguerite.

CHAPTER IX

“La Traviata”

In music the saying that “familiarity breeds contempt,” is true only of compositions of a low order.  In the case of compositions of the highest order, familiarity generally breeds ever growing admiration.  In this category new compositions are slowly received; they make their way to popular appreciation only by repeated performances.  It is true that the people like best the songs as well as the symphonies which they know best; but even this rule has its exceptions.  It is possible to grow indifferent to even high excellence because of constant association with it.  Especially is this true when the form—­that is, the manner of expression—­has grown antiquated; then, not expecting to find the kind of quality to which our tastes are inclined, we do not look for it, and though it may be present, it frequently passes unnoticed.  The meritorious old is, therefore, just as much subject to non-appreciation as the meritorious new.  Let me cite an instance.

Once upon a time duty called me to the two opera-houses of New York on the same evening.  At the first I listened to some of the hot-blooded music of an Italian composer of the so-called school of verismo.  Thence I went to the second.  Verdi’s “Traviata” was performing.  I entered the room just as the orchestra began the prelude to the last act.  As one can see without observing, so one can hear without listening—­a wise provision which nature has made for the critic, and a kind one; I had heard that music so often during a generation of time devoted to musical journalism that I had long