III

The story is taken up again when the valley all green and blossoming

at our first sight of it has assumed melancholy autumn colours.

Wolfram walking at sunset comes upon Elizabeth prostrate in prayer

at the foot of the road-side shrine. He watches her with eyes of

profoundest compassion. "Full well did I know that I should find

her here, as so often I find her, when in lonely wandering I descend

from the wooded heights to the valley. With death in her heart from

the blow dealt to her by him, outstretched in burning anguish,

night and day she prays--Oh, eternal strength of a holy love!--for

his redemption. She awaits the return of the pilgrims from Rome.

Already the leaves are falling, their home-coming is at hand. Is

he among the pardoned? That is her question, that her continual

prayer. Oh, if her wound is such as cannot be healed, yet let

alleviation be vouchsafed to it!"

The chant dawns upon the distance of the returning pilgrims. Elizabeth

rises to her feet, wan and worn and frail. "It is their song,--they

are coming home!" To steady her poor, agitated, failing heart,

she calls upon the saints and prays them to instruct her in her

part, that she may fulfil it worthily.

The band of pilgrims comes in sight; they pass, as earlier, in

front of the image of Mary, lifting their voices in an anthem of

solemn joy. Elizabeth looks into the face of every one of them as

they pass. They have defiled before her to the last. He is not

among them.

They wind their way out of sight, their last Halleluyah dies.

Elizabeth falls at the Virgin's feet, and, with the fervour of one

who is praying for very life, prays for death. "All-powerful Virgin,

hear my prayer! To thee, favoured among women, I appeal! I bow in the

dust before thee, oh, take me from this earth! Make me pure and like

to an angel, fit to enter thy blessed kingdom. If ever, possessed

by a fond insanity, my heart was turned from thee; if ever a sinful

desire, a worldly longing, took root in me,--with a thousand pains

I have striven to kill it in my heart. But if I cannot wholly atone

for that fault, do thou mercifully condescend to me, that I may

with humble salutation approach thee, made worthy to become thy

servant,--only to implore thine intercession rich in grace for

his sin, only to implore thine intercession for his sin!" She is

very woman to her last breath, the saint. She has failed on earth

to gain the coveted sign of pardon for him,--his not returning

with the others can only mean that he is not among the pardoned;

it means perhaps even that he did not accomplish the pilgrimage at

all.... She renounces him before Heaven, as if by that sacrifice

to propitiate the powers above, and desires to be given entrance

through death to that higher court where she still may intercede

for him,--perhaps, when she is an angel, with better effect. She

rises from prayer with the appearance of one upon whom already

the hand of death is laid. Wolfram, who notes her feeble step and

bloodless cheek, whose faithful heart understands all, solicitous

for her, asks if be may not escort her home. Without speaking, by

gentle gesture and shake of the head she declines, and he watches

her solitary figure slowly ascending the path toward the castle,

until it has disappeared from sight.

A mortal sadness is upon him, but a sadness mild as his nature. This

poet can at the darkest pass still turn his sorrows into song. With

song he now tries to administer to his oppressed heart consolation.

He feels softly along the strings of his harp. His thoughts are

full of Elizabeth, his soul apprehends what journey her soul is

preparing for. The terror of it, as well as the hope illumining the

dark way, he sees symbolised in the surrounding darkening scene,

over which now breaks the light of the evening star. "Like the

premonition of death twilight envelops the land, enfolds the valley

in a dusky garment. The soul, yearning for yonder heights, shrinks

from the journey through night and terrors. Then do you appear, O

loveliest among the stars! You shed your light afar. Your beloved

beams cleave the nocturnal twilight, and benignly you show us the

way out of the valley.... Oh, you, my sweetly-beaming evening star,

whom I have ever greeted so gladly,--do you greet, when she rises

past you, on her way from the vale of earth to become a blessed

angel beyond the stars, do you greet her from the heart that has

never failed in its truth to her!" A long time he continues sitting

in the twilight valley, gazing at the setting star, making his harp

express the emotions he has not the heart any more to formulate

with his lips. It grows night, the evening star goes out.

A shape in ragged pilgrim's-garb, supporting itself upon a

pilgrim's-staff, as if walking were scarcely possible without, from

terrible weariness, approaches the minstrel. "I heard harp-chords,"

the tottering wayfarer speaks to himself; "How mournful they sounded!

Hardly might such music come from _her!_"--"Who are you, pilgrim,

wandering thus alone?" Wolfram addresses the shadowy figure. "Who

I am?" comes the reply, "And yet I know you well enough. You are

Wolfram, that highly-accomplished minstrel!"--"Heinrich!" cries

Wolfram, not to be mistaken in that mocking voice,--with the scorn

of which is mingled so much wild bitterness that the hearer is

made certain this pilgrim is returned under different conditions

from all the rest. "Heinrich, you?... What brings you in this

neighbourhood? Speak! Are you so bold as, unabsolved, to have let

your feet take the road to this region?"--"Be without fear, my good

minstrel, I am not come looking for you nor any of your tribe.

But I am looking for one who shall show me the road... the road

which of old I found so easily!"--"What road do you mean?"--"The

road to the Hill of Venus!" Wolfram recoils. "Do you know that

road?" persists Heinrich. "Madman! Horror seizes me to hear you!"

the pious knight shudders; "Where have you been? Tell me, did you

not go to Rome?"--"Speak not to me of Rome!"--"Were you not present

at the holy festival?"--"Speak not of it to me!"--"Then you have

not been?... Tell me, I conjure you!" The answer comes, after a

dark pause, with an effect of boundless bitterness: "Aye, I too

was in Rome!"--"Then speak! Tell me of it, unhappy man! I feel a

vast compassion for you surging within my breast!" Tannhäuser in

the nigh darkness regards him for a moment with astonishment; he

speaks more gently, moved in spite of himself by such gentleness.

"What is that you say, Wolfram? Are you not my enemy?"--"Never was

I such--while I believed you pure of purpose! But speak, you went

on the pilgrimage to Rome?"--"Well, then,--listen! You, Wolfram,

shall hear all." Exhausted he drops on a projection of rock, but

when Wolfram would seat himself beside him he waives him violently

off. "Do not come near me! The place where I rest is accursed!...

Hear, then, Wolfram, hear!" He had started, he relates, on his

pilgrimage to Rome with such passion of repentance in his heart

as never penitent felt before. An angel had shattered in him the

pride of sin. For that angel's sake he would do penance with the

last humility, seek the salvation he had forfeited,--that the tears

might be sweetened which angelic eyes had shed for him, sinner. The

devotions, austerities, self-castigations of the other pilgrims

had seemed to him all too light. When they trod the greensward, he

chose flints and thorns; when they refreshed themselves at roadside

springs, he absorbed instead the thirst-breeding heat of the sun; when

they but prayed, he shed his blood to the praise of the Most High;

when they turned into the shelter of Alpine sanctuaries, he made ice

and snow his bed; with closed eyes--climax of self-denial!--with

closed eyes, that he might not behold the wonder of them, he passed

unseeing through the lovely plains of Italy! All this because he

wished to atone to the point of self-annihilation, that the tears

might be sweetened of his angel. He had reached Rome, he had bowed

praying upon the threshold of the holy place. Day had dawned, bells

were pealing, heavenly anthems resounding. Then he through whom God

manifests Himself to man had passed through the kneeling crowd. He

had given absolution, had promised grace, to thousands; thousands

he had sent away rejoicing. Tannhäuser had approached him, had

knelt in the dust, had confessed the evil joys he had known, the

terrible craving which no self-mortification had availed yet to

quiet; he had cried to him, in agony, for deliverance from these

burning fetters. And the one thus appealed to had pronounced: "If

you have shared in such evil pleasure, inflamed yourself at the

fire of Hell, if you have sojourned in the Hill of Venus, to all

eternity you are damned! Even as the staff in my hand can never

more clothe itself with fresh green, even so can never out of the

conflagration of Hell redemption blossom for you!" The pilgrim thus

addressed had sunk to the earth, annihilated. Consciousness had

forsaken him. When he awoke, it was night in the deserted square.

Sounds came from the distance of happy hymns of thanksgiving. A

passion of disgust had seized him for the pious songs; an icy horror

of their lying promises of redemption. With wild steps he had

fled,--drawn back to the place where such great joys, such ineffable

delight, he had found of old upon _her_ warm breast. "To you, Venus,

Lady,"--he cries out in a frenzy of loathing for what lies behind,

and of longing to escape, "to you I am come back!--come back to

your lovely night of enchantment! Descend will I to your court,

where your beauty shall shine upon me forevermore!" Wolfram tries

vainly to stop him. He will not be stopped,--all the more ardently

he calls: "Oh, let me not seek in vain! How easily once did I find

my way to you! You have heard that men curse me; now, sweetest

goddess, guide me to yourself!... Ha!" he cries, in a moment, to

Wolfram wrestling all unheeded to turn him from his deadly purpose,

"Ha, do you not feel soft gusts of air?... Do you not smell exquisite

odours?... Do you not hear jubilant music?" Rosy vapours are rolling

near; dancing forms define themselves in the soft increasing glow.

Tannhäuser madly calls them to him, while struggling to release

himself from Wolfram's obstinate hold. "It is the dancing rout

of the nymphs! Come hither! Come hither, to pleasure and delight!

Oh, enchantment pervades all my senses, at beholding once more

that rosy light of dawn! It is the magic realm of love, we are

entering into the Hill of Venus!"--"Woe!" shudders Wolfram; "It is

evil sorcery unfolding its insidious snares! It is Hell approaching

at mad career!"

The radiant form of Venus appears in the midst of the rosy atmosphere,

Venus holding out to the recreant knight her perfect arms. "Welcome,

faithless man! Has the world condemned and rejected you? And do you,

finding no mercy anywhere, come seeking love now in my arms?" Wolfram

speaks exorcisms rapid and vigorous as he can, while Tannhäuser

stretches his hands toward the soft vision: "Oh, Venus, Lady, rich

in forbearance! To you, to you I come!" With tenderest smiles she

holds forth forgiveness. "Since you are returned to my threshold,

your revolt shall be condoned. The well of joy shall gush for you

forever, never shall you go from me again!" With the desperate

cry: "All hope of Heaven is lost to me, I choose therefore the

pleasures of Hell!" Tannhäuser tears himself free from Wolfram.

Wolfram seizes him again, calling upon the help of the Almighty,

not to be thrown off. The battle over Tannhäuser is hot between

Wolfram and Venus, this one calling him to her, that one physically

holding him back, while the insensate man orders him off, tries to

loose himself and rush to her. "Heinrich, one word--" Wolfram makes

the last appeal; "One word and you are free! Oh, sinner though you

be, you shall yet be saved. An angel prayed for you on earth; ere

long, shedding benedictions, she will hover above you... Elizabeth!"

Tannhäuser had violently wrested himself from Wolfram, but the

name roots him to the spot. "Elizabeth!" It is as if to reach Venus

now he must first thrust her aside. The spell of that name changes

in an instant the current of his being; fills his eyes with a memory

that blots out the riot of rose-faces and golden hair toward which

all his desire had pitched him.

Moving torches spot the darkness of the road winding down from the

Wartburg; voices are heard approaching, chanting a dirge. "Peace

to the soul" the words come floating, "just escaped from the clay

of the saintly sufferer!" Wolfram understands but to well. "Your

angel pleads for you now before the throne of God. Her prayer is

heard. Heinrich, you are saved!" With a cry of "Woe! Lost to me!"

the apparition vanishes of Venus and her train; the hill-side

mysteriously engulfs them.

The torches flicker nearer, the singing becomes louder. "Do you hear

it?" Wolfram asks of Tannhäuser, who stands transfixed, corpse-like

still and pale and staring. "I hear it!" he murmurs in a dying

voice.

The funeral train, pilgrims, nobles, minstrels, Landgrave, descend

into the valley chanting their requiem. At a motion of Wolfram's

they set down the uncovered bier at the foot of the Virgin's shrine.

In the torch-light they recognise the unhappy Tannhäuser. Seized

with pity at sight of his ravaged countenance, "Holy," they sing,

"the pure one who now united to the host of Heaven stands before

the Eternal. Blessed the sinner over whom she wept, for whom she

now implores the salvation of Heaven!"

She lies outstretched, still and serene, all white beneath her

white pall. She has saved him, after all,--by dying. Her dead body

has barred his way back to Venus. The infinitely-tired and worn

pilgrim, destroyed by the violence of his passions good and bad,

with faltering steps,--helped, in the faintness of death upon him,

by Wolfram,--approaches the white bier. He sinks down beside it,

giving up his proud soul in the so humble prayer: "Sainted Elizabeth,

pray for me!"

And behold, a second band of pilgrims arriving from the Holy City

announce a miracle: The dry staff in the Pope's hand, which he had

declared should sooner return to bloom than so black a sinner be

forgiven, had in the night burst into leaf and blossom; and order

had gone forth to proclaim the sign through all lands, that the

forgiven sinner should learn of it. The company lift their voices

in awe and exaltation: "Salvation and grace have been granted to

the sinner! He has entered into the peace of the blessed!"

The warfare between soul and sense is presented by Wagner with

singular fairness. The pilgrims' song is very beautiful, and beautiful

is all the music of good in the opera of Tannhäuser. The Venus-music

is certainly equally beautiful; perhaps, to the superficial ear, is

a little more beautiful still: the goddess's own Call, penetrating,

wonderful; the well-nigh irresistible song of the Sirens. The Bacchic

dance, which stands we suppose for the animal element in love,

the Satyr part in man, is hardly beautiful; yet the love-music

as a whole, we can concede without difficulty, carries it over

the sacred music in beauty of a sort, even as the goddess would

have carried off the palm of beauty over the saint. The power of

the music of good, as Wagner lets us see, lies just in the fact

that it is good; the final victory of the saint in the fact that

she is a saint, and that from a mysterious eternal bias of human

nature man finally must prefer good. He has a soul, he cannot help

himself; that, as we have seen, is the secret reason why Venus cannot

forever completely content him, why the pale hand of the saint,

beckoning him at the end of a penitential pilgrimage diversified

with every sort of suffering, draws him still on and upward.