A Second Book of Operas

by Henry Edward Krehbiel

The vengeance of her gods shall be glutted; it is to that end she invokes the power of love to strengthen her weakness. A passion like his will not down—that she knows. To her comes the High Priest: Samson's strength, he says, is supernatural and flows from a vow with which he was consecrated to effect the glory of Israel. Once while he lay in her arms that strength had deserted him, but now, it is said, he flouts her love and doubts his own passion. There is no need to try to awaken

[figure: a musical score excerpt]

jealousy in the heart of Dalila; she hates Samson more bitterly than the leader of his enemies. She is not mercenary, like the Biblical woman; she scorns the promise of riches which the High Priest offers so she obtain the secret of the Hebrew's strength. Thrice had she essayed to learn that secret and thrice had he set her spell at naught. Now she will assail him with tears—a woman's weapon.

The rumblings of thunder are heard; the scene is lit up by flashes of lightning. Running before the storm, which is only a precursor and a symbol of the tempest which is soon to rend his soul, Samson comes. Dalila upbraids her lover, rebukes his fears, protests her grief. Samson cannot withstand her tears. He confesses his love, but he must obey the will of a higher power. "What god is mightier than Love?" Let him but doubt her constancy and she will die. And she plays her trump card: "Mon coeur s'ouvre a ta voix," while the fluttering strings and cooing wood-winds insinuate themselves into the crevices of Samson's moral harness and loosen the rivets that hold it together:—

[figure: a musical score excerpt to the words "My heart, at thy dear voice">[

Herein lies the strength and the weakness of music: it must fain be truthful. Dalila's words may be hypocritical, but the music speaks the speech of genuine passion. Not until we hear the refrain echoed mockingly in the last scene of the drama can we believe that the passion hymned in this song is feigned. And we almost deplore hat the composer put it to such disgraceful use. Samson hears the voice of his God in the growing and again hesitates. The storm bursts as Dalila shrieks out the hate that fills her and runs toward her dwelling.

Beethoven sought to suggest external as well as internal peace in the "Dona nobis" of his Mass in D by mingling the sounds of war with the prayer for peace; Saint-Saens pictures the storm in nature and in Samson's soul by the music which accompanies the hero as he raises his hands mutely in prayer; then follows the temptress with faltering steps and enters her dwelling. The tempest reaches its climax; Dalila appears at the window with a shout to the waiting Philistine soldiery below. The voice of Samson cuts through the stormy night: "Trahison!"

Act III.—First scene: A prison in Gaza. Samson, shorn of his flowing locks, which as a Nazarite he had vowed should never be touched by shears, labors at the mill. He has been robbed of his eyes and darkness has settled down upon him; darkness, too, upon the people whom his momentary weakness had given back into slavery.

"Total eclipse!" Saint-Saens has won our admiration for the solemn dignity with which he has invested the penitent confession of the blind hero. But who shall hymn the blindness of Manoah's son after Milton and Handel? From a crowd of captive Hebrews outside the prison walls come taunting accusations, mingled with supplications to God. We recognize again the national mood of the psalmody of the first act. The entire scene is finely conceived. It is dramatic in a lofty sense, for its action plays on the stage of the heart. Samson, contrite, humble, broken in spirit, with a prayer for his people's deliverance, is led away to be made sport of in the temple of Dagon. There, before the statue of the god, grouped among the columns and before the altar the High Priest and the lords of the Philistines. Dalila, too, with maidens clad for the lascivious dance, and the multitude of Philistia. The women's choral song to spring which charmed us in the first act is echoed by mixed voices. The ballet which follows is a prettily exotic one, with an introductory cadence marked by the Oriental scale, out of which the second dance melody is constructed—a scale which has the peculiarity of an interval composed of three semitones, and which we know from the song of the priestesses in Verdi's "Aida":—

[figure: a musical score excerpt]