Chapter 12

ship. Isolde is reclining on a couch, her face buried in the pillows. Brangäne's listless attitude as she gazes across the water, the young sailor's ditty to his Irish girl as he keeps watch on the mast, reflect the calmness of the sea as the ship glides before the westerly breeze, and contrast with the tempest raging in Isolde's breast. Suddenly she starts up in alarm, but Brangäne tries to soothe her, and tells her, to the soft undulating accompaniment of two bassoons in thirds, how she already sees the loom of the land, and that they will reach it by the evening. At present Brangäne has no suspicion of anything disturbing her mistress, whose feelings are indicated by an agitated passage in the strings (No. 6). She starts from her reverie. "What land?" she asks. "Cornwall? Never." Then follows a terrific outburst:

_Is_. Degenerate race, unworthy of your fathers! Whither, oh mother, hast thou bestowed the might over the sea and the storm? Oh, tame art of the sorceress, brewing balsam-drinks only! Awake once more, bold power! arise from the bosom in which thou hast hidden thyself! Hear my will, ye doubting winds: Hither to battle and din of the tempest, to the raging whirl of the roaring storm! Drive the sleep from this dreaming sea; awake angry greed from its depths; show it the prey which I offer; let it shatter this haughty ship, gorge itself upon the shivered fragments! What lives thereon, the breathing life, I give to you winds as your guerdon.

Both the words and the music of this wonderful invocation are worthy of attention. Especially the words of the original German with their drastic alliteration may be commended to those who still doubt Wagner's powers as a poet. The music is mostly taken from the sailor's song (No. 5), but quite changed in character; the rapid staccato movement with the strongly marked figure of the bass have transformed the peaceful ditty into a dance of furies. The entry of the trombones at the words _Heran zu Kampfe_ is characteristic of Wagner's employment of the brass throughout the work. Their slow swelling chords add volume and solemnity to the orchestral tone. They continue for a few bars only, and the voice distantly hints at the love-motive (_zu tobender Stürme wüthendem Wirbel_), but for a moment only; it goes no further.

The terrified Brangäne tries to calm her, and at the same time to learn what is the cause of her anger. She recalls Isolde's strange and cold behaviour on parting from her parents in Ireland, and on the voyage; why is she thus? A peculiar imploring tenderness is imparted to her appeal at the end by the falling sevenths, an interval which we have already met with in the Prelude and which is characteristic of this act.

Her efforts are vain; Isolde starts up hastily crying "Air! air! throw open the curtains!"