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In wild and broken accents he tells of his passionate longing for death, and calls upon the Judgment Day to put an end to his pilgrimage. 'Annihilation be my lot, he cries in his madness, and from the depths of the black vessel the weird crew echoes his despairing cry. Daland issues from his own vessel and gives the stranger a hearty greeting.
Daland is to take the stranger home with him, and if his daughter Senta proves satisfactory, Vanderdecken is to have her as his bride in return for infinite treasure out of the hold of the strange vessel. Daland has been shown a sample, and is overjoyed with his bargain: a distinguished-looking husband for his daughter and the husband's wealth for himself.
There are one or two fine dramatic touches, as, for instance, when Daland asks if his ship is any the worse: "Mein Schiff ist fest, es leidet keinen Schaden," with its bitter double meaning; but on the whole things are very dreary and dispiriting until the south wind blows up and stirs the composer's imagination.
When Daland brings the Dutchman in, and Senta sees before her the hero of her romance, the living embodiment of the mysterious picture, she gazes spell-bound at the weird stranger, and seems scarcely to hear her father's hasty recommendation of the new suitor's pretensions.
The ship of Daland, a Norwegian mariner, has just cast anchor at a wild and rugged spot upon the coast not far from his own home, where his daughter Senta is awaiting him. He can do nothing but wait for fair weather, and goes below, leaving his steersman to keep watch.
From the hold of the phantom-ship the unseen crew echo his prayer: "Eternal void, receive us!" He is leaning against a rock, absorbed in sombre meditation, when Daland, emerging from the cabin to take a look at the weather, becomes aware of the looming neighbour. He rouses the sleep-drunken mate.
And this chest is full to the brim of jewels, and that ship contains more still a hundred-fold, and the man asking for his daughter's hand is clearly a hypochondriac, infinitely sea-weary, who sees in the prospect of home and settled life the whole desire of his heart, cloyed with riches and sick of wandering. If he, Daland, should hesitate, the suitor might change his mind.
Will she prove to be my angel?" he sighs aside; "Do I still permit myself the folly of an illusion that an angel's heart will pity me? Hopeless as I am, I yet follow the lure of hope!" "The wind is propitious, the sea is calm. We will heave anchor at once, and speedily reach home," says Daland. "If I may beg, do you sail ahead," the Hollander suggests. "The wind is fresh, but my crew is spent.
Daland has the Dutchman's picture at home; he sees the ship before his eyes; but in a matter-of-fact manner he asks him who he is. Daland's sailors are called on deck to set sail, and pay no attention to so weird a craft. In the next act we have a room in Daland's house. A number of girls are spinning; Senta alone is idle, absorbed in a portrait that hangs on the wall that of Vanderdecken.
No flesh-and-blood girl, no daughter of the common fellow he is, can to his mind be a reasonable equivalent, really, for the mass of riches proposed in exchange for her. Daland nor she had probably in all their lives owned a precious stone.
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