The performance of a drama at the Fest-Spiel-Haus gives the impression of something sacred, something of the nature of a religious ceremony. All the circumstances combine to give intensity to that idea. From the beginning of time, ever since the Sumerians raised the Tower of Babel, as we are now told to imitate the sacred pinnacles of the highlands from which they swept down upon the Mesopotamian plain; long before Babylon or Nineveh were cities, hills and mountains in every country have been places of worship. Mount Zion, Sinai, Carmel, Ararat, Olympus, Fuji in far Japan, a thousand peaks in a thousand lands tell the same tale. Outside the town of Bayreuth, at a distance of perhaps half a mile is a little hill, and upon this fitting site is erected the Temple of the great High Priest of Art. An avenue of horse-chestnut trees some thirty years old, that have just reached the dignity of giving a little welcome shade, leads up to it. And here on a day when one of the great masterpieces is to be played, for a full hour before the given time you may see a long stream of the faithful toiling up under broiling sun or pouring rain, careless of either, only eager to be in time when the trumpet shall sound to tell that the doors are open. Laggards there are none. The Fest-Spiel-Haus (call it not a theatre!) is a very simple, unpretentious building: it is guiltless of all ornamentation both outside and inside: a covered verandah for shelter runs round it, but there is nothing superfluous, no pillars or gewgaws or caryatides, nothing to convey an idea of the feast of poetry that will presently be opened. Only the rapt look in the faces of the worshippers tells of expectancy and the knowledge of the joy to come. It is the expression which may be read in the features of a pious Mussulman when at eventide he kneels on his prayer-carpet and turns his face towards the holy city of his faith; it is a look that you may see in a procession of poor Russian pilgrims when they come in sight of the walls of Jerusalem. In their appreciations of other men’s writings professed critics, especially when their desire is to praise, are often led into metaphysical analyses in which subtleties are discovered at which no one could be more astonished than the authors to whom they are ascribed. When Pope was attacked by Crousaz for the heterodox opinions put forth in the “Essay on Man,” Bishop Warburton, who, by the by, had previously himself fallen foul of the poet for the same reason, took up the cudgels for him, professing to have discovered certain hidden meanings which had previously escaped him. Pope in his gratitude wrote: “You understand my work better than I do myself.” We almost feel that there is just a little tinge of perhaps unconscious satire in his gratitude.