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Go on with your "Valkyrie," and permit me to adapt the proverb, "Quand on prend du galon, on n'en saurait trop prendre," to your case in the following manner: "Quand on fait du sublime on n'en saurait trop faire, surtout quand ce n'est qu'une question de nature et d'habitude!" Your WEYMAR, October 12th, 1855. November 16th, 1855.

The old Adam, the biological bias, the will to live, is strong in us all. When Liszt read the score of The Valkyrie, he wrote to Wagner that he wanted to cry, like the chorus on the miraculous arrival of Lohengrin, "Wunderschön! wunderschön!" No man can cry otherwise to-day when he hears the last act.

Much to my surprise when I first saw the score of Siegfried, these form merely an excuse for going again over the ground covered in the Rhinegold and the Valkyrie.

That sailor's dance is to me as odious as anything in Meyerbeer, and the melody which ends the love-duet is scarcely more tolerable. On the other hand, not even in "The Valkyrie" did Wagner write more picturesquely weird music than most of the first act.

For instance, no one can ever forget the opening of "The Valkyrie" the inside of Hunding's house built round the tree, the half-dead fire flickering, while we listen to the steady roar of the night wind as the tempest rushes angrily through the forest nor the scene that follows, when through the open door we see all the splendours of the fresh spring moonlight gleaming on the green leaves still dripping with cold raindrops.

That Brunhilde was Leonora herself; the arrogant Valkyrie, the strong, the valiant Amazon, capable of trying to beat him for the slightest unwarranted liberty he took and of doing it besides.

Siegmund and Sieglinda have fled; Hunding is in hot pursuit; and now Wotan stands, the mighty war-god, brandishing his spear, and calling his daughter Brünnhilda, the Valkyrie, to favour and aid Siegmund. She joyfully assents and goes off, and Wotan exults.

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.

"Remember that steamer Valkyrie the Germans were supposed to have sunk by accident in the harbor of Papeete during the bombardment in September of 1914?" he queried. "I believe I read something about it in the papers at the time," Mr. Skinner replied. "What about her?" Matt Peasley demanded. "Why, the Germans didn't sink her at all, Matt! The Frenchmen did it," Cappy shrilled.

The worm heats the water, and the eagle screams; the pale of beak tears carcases; the ship Naglfar is loosed. Surt from the south comes with flickering flame; shines from his sword the Val-god's sun." Swaying there like a furred Valkyrie above the final carnage of men and gods, she touched his imagination, and the blood surged exultingly along unknown channels, thrilling and uplifting.