And this essential and primal truth Evelyn revealed to him and the very spirit and sense of maidenhood, the centre and receptacle of life, the mysterious secret of things, the awful moment when the whisper of the will to live is heard in matter, the will which there is no denying, the surrender of matter, the awaking of consciousness in things. And united to the eternal idea of generation, he perceived the congenital idea which in remotest time seems to have sprung from it—that life is sin and must be atoned for by prayer. Evelyn's interpretation revealed his deepest ideas to himself, and at last he seemed to stand at the heart of life.
Suddenly his rapture was broken through; the singer had stopped the orchestra.
"You have cut some of the music, I see," she said, addressing the conductor.
"Only the usual cut, Miss Innes."
"About twenty pages, I should think."
The conductor counted them.
"Eighteen."
"Miss Innes, that cut has been accepted everywhere—Munich, Berlin, Wiesbaden—everywhere except Bayreuth."
"But, Mr. Hermann Goetze, my agreement with you is that the operas I sing in are to be performed in their entirety."
"In their entirety; that is to say, well—taken literally, I suppose—that the phrase 'In their entirety' could be held to mean without cuts; but surely, regarding this particular cut—I may say that I spoke to Sir Owen about it, and he agreed with me that it was impossible to get people into the theatre in London before half-past seven."