"Garstig glatter Glitschriger Glimmer! Wie Gleit ich aus! Mit Haenden und Fuessen Nicht fasse noch halt'ich Das schlecke Geschluepfer." _There_ is a real Volapuek for you--a world language which all can understand, for it is onomatopoetic realism. Of course it is not "beautiful;" but is that a reasonable objection? What would you say to an artist who painted dramatic battle-scenes, but made all the soldiers' faces as pretty as he could and adorned with sweet smiles? _That_ is precisely what the Italian opera composers have done in stage music; and it is because Wagner taught the singer to express not only _sweet_ sentiments but _all_ dramatic emotions, whether harsh or agreeable, that his new style marks an epoch in the evolution of the art of singing. At the same time, even these harsher passages in Wagner's vocal music are not really ugly, that is, disagreeable to the ear, _when properly sung_. Just as a homely face becomes attractive when it expresses a vivid emotion, so the harshest vocal measures in the realistic music-drama become a source of enjoyment if they are sung _with expression_. Unfortunately, there are only a few artists as yet who have sufficiently caught Wagner's intentions to be able to sing in this manner. Carl Hill, who created the part of the magician _Klingsor_ at the Parsifal Festival, in 1882, was one of these exceptions. He reflected the spirit of the gruesome text assigned to him so admirably that Wagner was delighted; but afterward he complained that Hill's fine impersonation was not so widely appreciated as it deserved to be; and why? Apparently, because _Klingsor's_ melodic intervals were not pleasing, nor his sentiments sympathetic. We must conclude from this that, in regard to dramatic singing, many opera-goers are still a good deal like the honest Scotchman who, on his first visit to a theatre, climbed on the stage and administered the villain of the play a sound thrashing; or, like the Bowery audiences, which applaud the good man in the play, no matter how badly he acts, and hiss the villain, though he be a second Salvini.