remembrance, and dreamy as if
violet shades of evening softened them,--the composer has given
us to apprehend all in the introduction to the third act.

So rapt is Sachs in the perusal of his great volume, or, as may
be suspected, in images which float between the page and his eyes,
that he does not see David enter carrying a basket of Lene's bestowal
filled with flowers and ribbons for the adornment of his person on
this festival day, as well as with cake and sausage. The apprentice,
when Sachs does not speak, or, spoken to, answer, or make sign when
he informs him that Beckmesser's shoes have been duly delivered,
believes him to be angry, and goes into a long apology for his
misconduct on the night before, brightening finally with the relation
of his making-up this morning with Lene, who has satisfactorily
explained all. Sachs reads on, as little disturbed as by the buzzing
of a fly on the pane. Only when he has finished, and closed his
book,--the unexpected clap of the covers so startles David that he
stumbles to his knees--Sachs looks around him, as if coming back
from a dream. His eye is caught by the bright flowers and ribbons
brought in by David. Their effect of young gayety touches some chord
in him more than usually sensitive at this moment. "Flowers and
ribbons I see over there," he muses audibly; "Sweet and youthful
they look! How come they in my house?" David is relieved to find him
in this gentle mood, yet puzzled at the remoteness and abstraction
from which the master is but slowly drawn. He has occasion for a
moment to wonder even whether the master have perchance become
hard of hearing....

Fully returned at length to a sense of the common surrounding world,
Sachs asks David for his day's lesson, and the apprentice briskly
sings his verse, first comically confusing the tune with that of
Beckmesser's serenade, still buzzing in his head, then, at Sachs's
gesture of astonishment, righting himself and acquitting himself of
his task without slip. The verse is a playful bit, between psalm
and street-song. It relates that when Saint John was baptising
on the banks of Jordan there came to him a lady from Nuremberg
bringing her little son for baptism. When she got home, however, to
German land, it proved that vainly had one on the banks of Jordan
been given the name of Johannes, on the banks of the Pegnitz he
became Hans! The pronouncing of the name brings to David's mind
the remembrance suddenly that it is hi