(vocal score, p. 54); afterwards to accompany Kundry's account of the death of Herzeleide:
As I rode by I saw her dying,
and, Fool, she sent thee her greeting;
(V. S. p. 57); after that, again, to accompany Kundry as she hastens to the spring in the wood to get water for the fainting Parsifal (V. S. p. 58); after that to describe the rush of Klingsor's warriors to the ramparts (V. S. p. 120); after that to accompany the thronging of the Flower Maidens to the scene (V. S. p. 156); again to give point to Parsifal's words:
And I, the fool, the coward,
to deeds of boyish wildness hither fled—
(V. S. p. 203); and to accompany—for what reason it is difficult to say—Kundry's threat that she will call the spear against Parsifal if he continues to repulse her (V. S. p. 222); and finally, as an accompaniment to her last words to Parsifal:
For fleddest thou from here,
and foundest all the ways of the world,
the one that thou seek'st,
that path thy foot shall find never;
(V. S. p. 225). No ingenuity can justify the employment of the same motive for so many different purposes. As a matter of fact, after we have once become conscious of it as accompanying Kundry's ride in the first scene of the opera, it is inevitable that we should associate it with her at each subsequent recurrence of it.
Another peculiarity of Wagner's use of the leit-motive may be noted; once or twice he gives a meaning to a theme in the later stages of the Ring that we cannot be sure of it possessing at first. The most striking instance of this is the "Reflection" motive. In Siegfried it is exclusively employed in connection with Mime, and the manner of its employment leaves no room for doubt that the commentators are right in giving it this title. The prelude to Siegfried commences with it; it is used there to suggest to us Mime pondering over the problem of the forging of the sword. It frequently recurs with the same significance in the scene that follows. It is used again all through the scene of questions and answers between the Wanderer and Mime, to suggest the dwarf putting his considering cap on after or during each of the Wanderer's posers. Yet on its first appearance in the Rhinegold (vocal score, p. 151) there is nothing whatever to indicate that the theme is to be taken as symbolical of reflection. It accompanies Mime's plaint to Wotan and Loge—
What help for me?
I must obey
the commands of my brother,
who holds me bondsman to him.