[2] Figaro, 24th August, 1890.
[3] Pronounced in German like the French Maleine.
[4] Preface to Théâtre, p. 2.
[5] In Swedenborg's mysticism, the literal meanings of words are only protecting veils which hide their inner meanings. See "Le Tragique Quotidien" (in Le Trésor des Humbles) pp. 173-4. That Maeterlinck was meditating the famous chapter on "Silence" in The Treasure of the Humble when he wrote Princess Maleine may be inferred from Act ii. sc. 6: "I want to see her at last in presence of the evening.... I want to see if the night will make her think. May it not be that there is a little silence in her heart?"
[6] Schlaf's Maeterlinck, p. 31.
[7] Suggested, perhaps, by the strangling of Little Snow-white in Grimm's story.
[8] Preface to Théâtre, pp. 4-5.