nished, he
inquires, "What, after all, can the charm of the amiable goddess
signify to you clumsy boors?" Fasolt enlarges, "You, reigning through
beauty, shimmering lightsome race, lightly you offer to barter
for stone towers woman's loveliness. We simpletons labour with
toil-hardened hands to earn a sweet woman who shall dwell with
us poor devils.... And you mean to call the bargain naught?..."

Fafner gloomily checks him: Words will not help them. And the possession
of Freia in itself is to his mind of little account. But of great
account to take her from the gods. In her garden grow golden apples,
she alone has the art of tending these. Eating this fruit maintains
her kinsmen in unwaning youth. Were Freia removed, they must age
and fade. Wherefore let Freia be seized!

Wotan frets underbreath, "Loge is long acoming!"

Freia's cries, as the giants lay hands upon her, bring her brothers
Donner and Froh--the god of Thunder and the god of the Fields--quickly
to her side. A combat between them and the giants is imminent, when
Wotan parts the antagonists with his spear, "Nothing by violence!"
and he adds, what it might be thought he had lost sight of, "My
spear is the protector of bargains!"

And then finally, finally, comes in sight Loge. Wotan lets out his
breath in relief: "Loge at last!"

The music has introduced Loge by a note-painting as of fire climbing
up swiftly through airiest fuel. There is a quick flash or two, like
darting tongues of flame. A combination of swirling and bickering
and pulsating composes the commonest Loge-motif, but the variety
is endless of the fire's caprices. Fantastical, cheery, and light
it is mostly, sinister sometimes, suggestive of treachery, but
terrible never; its beauty rather than its terror is reproduced.
So characteristic are the fire-motifs that after a single hearing a
person instinctively when one occurs looks for some sign or suggestion
of Loge.

He stands now upon the rock, a vivid, charming, disquieting apparition,
with his wild red hair and fluttering scarlet cloak. The arch-hypocrite
wears always a consummately artless air. He comes near winning
us by a bright perfect good-humour, which is as of the quality
of an intelligence without a heart. The love of mischief for its
own sake, which is one of his chief traits, might be thought to
account easily for his many enemies.

He is related to the gods, a half-god, but is regarded coldly by
his kin. Wotan is his single