opinion."--"Well, tell me, then.
Tell me how it all happened. If it troubles you, how should it
leave me untroubled? So he stood the trial discreditably and was
defeated...."--"Hopelessly defeated, the gallant cavalier!" Walther's
failure is symbolised by a melodious groan. "Hopelessly, you say?
There was no way then by which he might have been saved? Did he
sing so badly, so faultily, that there is no possibility more of
his becoming a master?"--"My child," Sachs broadly assevers, "for
him all is definitely lost. And never in any land will he be made
a master. For he who is a master born occupies ever among masters
the very lowest place." On the verge of tears, with difficulty
controlling her indignation, Eva continues her questioning: "One
thing more tell me. Did he not find among the masters a single
friend?" Sachs nearly laughs. "That were not bad! To be, on top of
everything, his friend! His friend--before whom all feel themselves
so small!..." (If Eva were not so engrossed with her single idea,
the gleam in Sachs's eye, the fire in his tone, would interpret to
her this brutal-sounding speech.) "Young Lord Arrogance, let him
go his way! Let him go brawling and slashing through the world!
As for us, let us draw our breath in peaceful enjoyment of what
we have acquired with labour and difficulty. Keep off the fiery
fellow from running amuck among us! Let fortune bloom for him
elsewhere!" Trembling with anger, and dropping all concealment,
Eva springs to her feet: "Yes, elsewhere shall fortune bloom for
him than in the neighbourhood of you repulsive envy-ridden
creatures!--elsewhere, where hearts still have some warmth in them,
in spite of all cantankerous Master Hanses!--Directly, yes, I am
coming!" (This to Magdalene, who has been calling to her from her
father's door.) "I go home much comforted! It reeks of pitch here
till God take pity on us! Kindle a fire with it, do, Master Sachs,
and get a little warmth into you, if you can!"

"I thought so!" Sachs says to himself as he watches her cross the
street to her own door. Two and two have leaped together in his
mind, too. "The question is now what will be the sage course to
pursue." He goes within and closes his door... all but a crack.

"Your father is asking for you," Magdalene reports to her agitated
mistress. "Go to him," weeps Eva, "and say that I have gone to my
room and to bed." But Beckmesser--the nurse reminds her of the
message from him. He desires her to