The whole drama consists in this: At Montsalvat there was a monastery,
and the head became seriously ill because he had been seen with a lady.
In the long-run he is saved by a young man--rightly called a "fool"--who
cannot tolerate the sight of a woman. What it all means--the grotesque
parody of the Last Supper, the death of the last woman in the world, the
spear which has caused the Abbot's wound and then cures it--these are
not matters to be entered into here. Some of the music is fine.




TO SUM UP.


Wagner died suddenly at Venice February 13, 1883, and a few days later
was buried in the garden of Villa Wahnfried, Bayreuth. For a really
great composer he had quite a long life, and he lived it out
strenuously; and if he struggled and suffered during a great portion of
it, at any rate his last years brought him peace, undisturbed by the old
nightmare dread of poverty.

His activity manifested itself in three forms: the reforms he effected
in the theatre and the concert-room, his own music dramas, and the prose
writings, in which he both advocated the reforms and argued for his
theories. The prose, I have said, is of very small account now, and,
with the exception of the essays mentioned earlier, his essays and
articles have only a curious interest. His theatrical reforms consisted
in making the artistes sing intelligently and with care, and in
demanding realistic scenery. Intelligence and pains--these are the two
new elements he introduced into the theatre; and if most operatic