"It is not given to me to hear what you hear," replied the sterile ascetic to the genius. "I will await the time when you can repeat to me the word that Nature speaks to you."
"Ah!" Stelio resumed, "to be able to restore to melody its natural simplicity, its ingenuous perfection, its divine innocence; to draw it, living, from its eternal source, from the true mystery of nature, the inmost soul of the Universe! Have you ever reflected upon the myth connected with the infancy of Cassandra? She had been left one night in the temple of Apollo; and in the morning she was found lying on the marble floor, wrapped in the coils of a serpent that licked her ears. And from that day she understood all the voices of Nature in the air, all the melodies of the world. The power of the great seeress was only a high musical power; and a part of that Apollonian virtue entered the souls of the poets that coöperated in the creation of the tragic Chorus. One of those poets boasted of understanding the voices of all birds; another was able to hold converse with the winds; another comprehended perfectly the language of the sea. More than once I have dreamed that I too was lying on the marble floor, folded in the coils of that serpent. The magic of that old myth must be renewed, Daniele, in order that we may create the new art.
"Have you ever thought what might be the music of that species of pastoral ode sung by the Chorus in Œdipus Tyrannus, Œwhen Jocasta flees, horror-struck, and the son of Laïus still cherishes the illusion of a last hope? Do you recall it? Try to imagine the strophes as if they were a frame, within which an expressive dance-figure is animated by the perfect life of melody. The spirit of Earth would rise before you: the consoling apparition of the great common Mother at the unhappiness of her stricken, trembling children—a celebration, as it were, of all that is divine and eternal above Man, who is dragged to madness and death by blind and cruel Destiny. Try now to conceive how this song has helped me in the writing of my great tragedy to find the means of the highest and at the same time the simplest expression."
"Do you purpose, then, to reëstablish the ancient Chorus on the stage?"
"Oh, no! I shall not revive any ancient form; I intend to create a new form, obeying only my instinct and the genius of my own race, as did the Greeks when they created that marvelous structure of beauty, forever inimitable—the Greek drama. For a very long time, the three practicable arts of music, poetry, and dancing have been separated; the first two have developed toward a superior form of expression, but the third is in its decadence, and I think that now it is impossible to combine them in a single rhythmical structure without taking from one or another its own dominant character, which has already been acquired. If they are to blend in one common effect, each must renounce its own particular effect—in other words, become diminished. Among the things most susceptible of rhythm, Language is the foundation of every art that aspires to perfection. Do you think that language is given its full value in the Wagnerian drama? Do you not think that the musical conception itself often loses some of its primitive purity by being made to depend on matters outside the realm of music? Wagner himself certainly realizes this weakness, and shows it when he approaches a friend in Bayreuth, covering his eyes with his hand, that he may abandon his sense of hearing entirely to the virtue of the pure sound of the voice."
"This is all new to me," said Glauro, "yet it rejoices and intoxicates me as we rejoice when we hear something that has been long foreseen and felt by presentiment. Then, as I understand, you will not superpose the three rhythmic arts, but will present them each in its single manifestation, yet all linked by a sovereign idea, and raised to the supreme degree by their own significant energy?"
"Ah, Daniele! how can I give you any idea of the work that lives within me?" Stelio exclaimed. "The words you use in trying to formulate my meaning are hard and mechanical."
They stood at the foot of the Rialto steps. The gale swept over them; the Grand Canal, dark in the shadow of the palaces, seemed to bend like a river hastening to a cataract.
"We cannot remain here," said Glauro, leaning against a door; "the wind will blow us down."
"Go on; I will overtake you. Only a moment," cried the master, covering his eyes with his hand, and concentrating his soul upon sound alone.