If Lohengrin did not mean to tell his secret the musical phrase might imply that he had no intention of letting them ask for it. But he has come there with no other intention than that of revealing everything--and, in a word, the whole business is incomprehensible because there is nothing to be comprehended--because it is sheer nonsense. How Wagner, even supposing he had originally some other idea for the ending of the work, could let so flat a contradiction of his final plan stand--this also is more than I can understand; for in later years he saw his opera performed. And at that I must leave the matter. Lohengrin presently proceeds to disclose his secret in that wondrous "In fernem Land"--surely the most superb thing of its sort ever written. The vocal part is--as I have already pointed out, this is often the case in Wagner--something between pure song and recitative; and here it is of a quality he himself rarely matched--not even in _Tristan_. Technically, it is a piece of descriptive music for instruments; but the words which give it significance and point are set to phrases themselves so beautiful, pathetic and inevitable that one feels that the vocal part and the orchestral were begotten simultaneously in that marvellous brain. In other chapters I will point to passages, especially in the _Ring_, where quite obviously the voice part has been laboriously worked in with instrumental music already conceived in its final form; but that was in Wagner's later years, when the free inspiration, enthusiasm and energy of his _Tristan_ and _Lohengrin_ and _Mastersingers_ days had for ever departed. There is an accent of passionate grief in Lohengrin's words to Elsa, and of remorse in Elsa's wailings; but the most touching thing in this final scene is the song in which he hands her his sword, horn and ring, to be given to her brother should he return. The note of regret, especially in the poignant "leb' wohl," reminds one irresistibly of Wotan's farewell to Brünnhilda. The latter is broader, richer, vaster,--and yet the tender simplicity of this is inexpressibly touching. After that the opera proceeds to its conclusion in what one may call a normal manner: there is nothing, anyhow, in the music that requires analysis. VI