elements on which the whole thing rests) it was perfectly reasonable. I
fancy that Wagner, after some years with his very stupid wife, Minna,
was getting thoroughly angry with the irrational curiosity of women and
the idiotic demands which they make on their life-mates. Anyhow, though
he gives Elsa some very beautiful music to sing, he does not spare her
in drawing her character. It is one of the few characters he did attempt
to draw, and by far the most important of them. In the _Mastersingers_
Walther and Eva are sketched, and Hans Sachs is worked out in some
detail; but nothing in their nature especially affects the drama. In
_Lohengrin_ the tragedy is directly produced by Elsa's weakness and
curiosity. The characterization is by no means profound or microscopic.
It is, indeed, a question whether music is capable of anything of the
sort, whether it can render anything save bold, simple outlines. In
_Figaro_ and _Don Giovanni_ Mozart was content with this, and yet his
characterization appears subtle in comparison with that of every other
composer, with the exception of Wagner with his Elsa. Music can express
things that lie outside the range of literature; and perhaps fine and
delicate portrait and character painting are things that lie outside the
range of music.

In the _Dutchman_, I have said, we have the North Sea for a background,
in _Tannhäuser_ the sultry, scented cave of Venus. In _Lohengrin_ it is
the broad, shining river, flowing ceaselessly from far-away lands to the
distant sea, and on it the swan floats--the swan which throughout is
used as the symbol of the river. In the first act it gives the pervading
atmosphere and colour; in the third it recurs with amazing effect in the
midst of one of Elsa's paroxysms. Here is the simple phrase by which
such magic is wrought:

[Illustration: Some bars of music]