f art because it cannot be grasped in a
glance.

There are four music-dramas, or operas (I use the terms
indiscriminately, now that there is no danger of the Wagnerian opera
being confused with the older forms). Wagner made each self-contained,
complete and comprehensible by itself, and yet he carried the main
action on from one to the next until the final catastrophe; but he did
this at the cost of much repetition, whence another charge brought
against the work--that of its interminable tedium. I will therefore
first disentangle the main idea, which is simple. Let it be granted that
Wotan is ruler of the world--not a first cause, but a god, limited in
his powers, conditioned, ruling only so long as he obeys the laws
inscribed in Runic characters on his spear. How he arrived in this
position we do not know, any more than we know the origin of the Greek
gods; indeed, in this respect and others there are parallels between the
Greek and the Northern mythology. Wotan goes in fear lest the powers of
the nether world usurp his domination, which he wants to make absolute.
He makes a pact with the giants--the Titan forces of the earth--that be
will give them Freia if they build him a castle, Valhalla, which he
intends to fill with slain warriors in sufficient numbers to keep down
his foes. This is his primary, essential, fatal blunder; for unless the
gods eat of Freia's apples every day they must wither and their powers
decay. But Wotan means to cheat the giants, and Loge, the deceitful god
of fire, who is ultimately to destroy the whole of the present regime,
has been sent off to find a means of doing it. It is when so much has
been accomplished that Wagner raises the curtain on the first scene of
the first drama. _The Rhinegold_ is entirely devoted to an exposition of
the main drama.

The gold lies in the Rhine. The Rhine maidens play about it. It is only
a pretty plaything for them. The Nibelung comes and steals it.
Meanwhile, far above, Wotan and his wife Fricka awake and find Valhalla
built, and now Wotan has to pay the giants. They arrive; Loge has not
arrived. Loge does arrive and makes his excuses--no man will give up a
beautiful woman, for no matter what sum. But he tells of the Rhinegold,
and the giants agree to accept it in lieu of Freia. Wotan and Loge go
off and get it by a trick. But Alberick has shaped part of it into a
magic ring, which gives its possessor absolute power over the whole
world. When they come ba