That strange scene where Siegmund lies on the hearth again, and, realising his desperate situation, calls on his father the Volsung for aid, is musically and dramatically splendid in its colour and force. As he thinks of Sieglinda a feeling of spring again comes into the music; thus is strengthened the beautiful music she is given; then comes the avowal of love, and the flying open of the door. Outside, the trees are seen in the moonlight, the dripping green leaves glistening; and Siegmund sings a spring-song never to be beaten for freshness (though, as I have pointed out, not equal in musical significance to Walther's song in the _Mastersingers_); there comes the magnificent scene of the plucking out of the Sword; the recognition of the two as brother and sister; and the final impassioned outburst which ends the scene as with a blaze of fire. This Act will ever be accounted one of Wagner's most magnificent and fully inspired. The superb vocal writing, the beauty and sheer strength of the orchestral parts, the gorgeous colouring, and the human passion blent with the sense of the green yet fiery spring, all go to make up a thing unique in opera. A tide of life rushes through it all; and the man's technical accomplishment was so fine and complete that he found immediate incisive expression for every shade of emotion, or complex blend of emotions, and every sensation. The jealous, savage ferocity of Hunding is there; Siegmund's and Sieglinda's despair, hope and final burst of ecstatic joy; and at the same time we seem to smell the fresh, wet earth and leaves and to see the sparkling moonlight. III The Second Act opens in a wild and rocky place amongst the mountains. Siegmund and Sieglinda have fled; Hunding is in hot pursuit; and now Wotan stands, the mighty war-god, brandishing his spear, and calling his daughter Brünnhilda, the Valkyrie, to favour and aid Siegmund. She joyfully assents and goes off, and Wotan exults. He persists in deceiving himself: Brünnhilda, his own daughter, was created to execute his purposes: the Runes make him accountable for her actions, just as he is now for Siegmund's and in the later operas for Siegfried's. As in the _Rhinegold_, Fricka instantly bids him remember what and _how_ he is. As the goddess of covenants, laws, she wants vengeance wreaked on Siegmund and Sieglinda: they have broken the most sacred of all covenants in the eyes of a woman, the marriage covenant. Vainly Wotan pleads that the Valkyrie works unaided: she presses him, until at last he swears a sacred oath on his spear that Siegmund shall die. Brünnhilda comes in, whooping her war-call, but her voice drops at the sight of Fricka. Fricka, who thoroughly despises all the Valkyrie maidens as being born out of true wedlock, tells her to take her orders from Wotan, and goes off triumphant. Wotan, deeply despondent, terrifies Brünnhilda with his grief; she casts down her spear and shield and kneels before him, imploring him to tell the cause.