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The objects in this apartment were really beautiful. The tapestry on the walls represented a series of pictures taken from romances of knighthood, and from marvellous legends: Tristan and Isolde, on the deck of a ship; Flor and Blancheflor, in a garden of roses; the monk Alberich, in a Dominican habit, descending into hell.
At last I shall have my pay for all these years of trouble with that rogue I hate!" But scarcely had Mimi turned toward the dragon's cave when suddenly Alberich sprang before him. "You sly, crafty rascal!" cried Alberich. "What do you want here? Ha! I have caught you at your sneaking tricks! Long have I guarded here! You shall not steal my gold! Get back to your murky cave." But Mimi screamed:
But if you could shrink to some tiny thing, it would be even much more clever, because you could creep into a crevice and spy upon your enemies. But, of course, getting small would be too hard a thing to do." "Only tell me what you would have me be," said Alberich. "Now I shall catch him," thought Loki.
"Look!" whispered one. "What is that scowling at us from the rocks below?" There, stealing along the river-bed, they saw a hideous little black dwarf. "Who are you, and what do you want?" asked the Rhine-daughters. "I am Alberich," answered the dwarf as he tried to climb up on the slippery rocks. "I came from the kingdom of the Nibelungs, down under the earth." "What!" said the Rhine-daughters.
"Do you swear it to me, Hagen, my hero?" "I swear it to myself!" Dawn has been creeping over the sky. The form of Alberich fades in the growing light and his voice dies on the ear: "Be faithful, Hagen, my son, be faithful faithful!" Hagen sits alone in the broadening day, seemingly asleep, yet with eyes wide open. He starts.
That theme shows traces of its descent from the Alberich motive the greed for power in that it does not bear real development, but only variation; it is, in fact, not a musical subject in the sense in which, say, the Tristan subjects are musical subjects, but is, properly speaking, a figure.
Siegfried and Günther are away, and Hagen watches by night; his father, Alberich, crawls up from the river and counsels him as to how to get possession of the Ring; then he disappears as dawn begins to show. The music is weird and sinister in Wagner's finest manner. To her amazement, Brünnhilda finds Siegfried there with his new bride, unmindful of her.
And great stores of food, and of all things needful to their safety or comfort, were brought together and put on board. And Siegfried forgot not his trusty sword Balmung, nor his cloak of darkness the priceless Tarnkappe, which he had captured from the dwarf Alberich in the Nibelungen Land. Then the twelve suits of garments which fair fingers had wrought were brought.
Fantastic creatures like Alberich and Mimi, who seem to be out of their element in France, are rooted deep down in German imaginations. The Bayreuth actors surpassed themselves in making them startlingly lifelike, with a trembling and grimacing realism. Burgstaller, who was then making his debut in Siegfried, acted with an impetuous awkwardness which accorded well with the part.
Ha! the smoke of Alberich's kingdom shall smudge even your flowery mountain-sides and your sparkling rivers. Everybody shall be my slave! Beware of this black Nibelung, I say, for he shall rule the world!" Loki was very sly and cunning. While Alberich boasted, he was planning how he might trick the dwarf and take his gold. To Alberich he said: "Surely, you will be the mightiest of men.
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