SIEGFRIED " Siegfried " has been called the scherzo of the great Nibelungen symphony. To the tragedy and defeat of " The Valkyrie," with its thunder and war-cry and rushing flame, succeed peace and serenity with the young laughter of the innocent boy and the singing of the forest birds. It is a veritable mean of youth and love and courage.
Siegfried.
Mimi.
Wotan, The Wanderer.
Alberich.
Fafner.
Erda. Brunnhilde.
After the close of the preceding drama, Sieglinde, to escape the heavy hand of Wotan, flees to the forest, where she wanders until, starving and exhausted, she finds herself in the cavern of Mimi, the dwarf-brother of Alber ich. Here Siegfried is born and his mother, dying to give him life, entrusts him to the care of her misshapen host. Mimi brings him up in ignorance of his real par entage and plans to use him as the instrument for the recovery of the gold. In the depths of the untrodden wood, the boy grows to manhood strong as an oak and knowing no fear. The wild beasts are his companions and his diversion is to imitate the cries of the birds which circle about him and which merrily answer his call. But sometimes into the peace of his heart penetrate half-formed longings and aspirations which he cannot understand.
When the curtain rises, there is seen the grimy work shop of Mimi, a cave which opens towards the wood. Here the dwarf is at work before the forge, hammering a sword upon his anvil and voicing his chagrin that the " fiery stripling," with untutored strength, breaks every weapon made for him. Mimi is growing discouraged, for he long has striven to weld a blade with which his bold charge might slay the enemy Fafner, who, as a dragon watches over the ring, the helmet and the hoard.
While he is complaining, Siegfried rushes into the workshop, leading a huge bear which he has bridled and which he mischievously urges to the attack of the cring ing dwarf, When Mimi has been thoroughly frightened, Siegfried finds that he has had enough of the sport and, sending Bruin back to the wood, he runs to the forge and with one blow shatters upon it the dwarf's latest achieve ment. Impatient with such worthless workmanship, he throws himself down in rage near the fire, while Mimi tries to regain his favor with offers of food and drink.
These Siegfried thrusts from him in disgust, for he is heartily tired of the fawning dwarf and his treatment of him. In this mood, he demands some knowledge of what love means and of his own parentage. He inquires contemptuously Where have you, Mimi, Your minikin consort That I may call her mother? After many lies and evasions, Mimi reveals to him the facts concerning his birth, telling him his mother's name and that his father was slain. He then brings out the fragments of Siegmund's sword, the legacy left at Sieglinde's death. With troubled mind, the youth rushes to the forest to escape Mimi's hated presence and the dwarf begins to hammer on the pieces of the sword Nothung. While he is thus engaged, Wotan, disguised as The Wanderer, with his hat drawn low to hide his missing eye, comes upon Mimi's cave and stops to inter-. view him. Wotan proposes a contest of wit and each stakes his head upon successfully answering three riddles Wotan replies correctly to Mimi's questioning but Mimi fails on his part. The god refuses to take advantage of such a puny adversary and leaves the dwarf the gage. But he tells him that no one can forge Nothung anew, except he who knows not the meaning of fear.
Mimi, realizing his own limitations, does not attempt to resume the work and is upbraided for idleness when Siegfried returns. The dwarf explains the conditions of the task and as the youth does not know even the meaning of the word fear, he describes graphically many kinds and causes of terror even to that produced by sight of the " monstrous worm," Fafner. But Siegfried cannot recognize any of them. He springs up and seizes the fragments of the sword, blows the darkened coals to a glow, and fixing the pieces in a vise, files them to a powder which he puts in a crucible and reduces to molten metal over the heat. He then carefully casts the weapon and hammers the blade to shape, lustily singing Nothung! Nothung! Notable sword! The blade is finished, is in the handle and Siegfried breaks forth in triumphal praise of his work. Then to test its power he smites with it the anvil, which splits in twain from top to bottom, falling asunder with a great noise, while Mimi, in terror, sinks prostrate upon the floor.