XXIV. MÉLISANDE'S GENTLENESS
As Golaud's still unvanquished doubts and suspicions torture him into harsh interrogations, and he asks her if she loved Pelléas "with a forbidden love," an oboe and two flutes recall, p et doux, the Rapture motive. Later, in succession, we hear (on a solo violin over flute and clarinets) the Pelléas theme (page 289, measure 2), the motive of Gentleness, for the last time (page 290, measure 3), and the Mélisande theme (pages 290-292). As Mélisande recognizes Arkël, and asks if it be true "that the winter is coming," a solo violin, solo 'cello, and two clarinets play an affecting phrase (page 294, measure 5). She tells Arkël that she does not wish the windows closed until the sun has sunk into the sea, and the orchestra accompanies her in a passage of curiously delicate sonority (page 295, measure 6).
The final scene of the act is treated with surpassing reticence, dignity, and simplicity, yet with piercing intensity of expression. Nothing could be at the same time more sparing of means and more exquisitely eloquent in result than Debussy's setting of the scene of Mélisande's death—it is music which dims the eyes and subdues the spirit. The pianissimo-repeated chords in the divided strings which accentuate Arkël's warning words (page 304, measure 8); the blended tones of the harp and the distant bell at the moment of dissolution (page 306, measure 11); Arkël's simple requiem over the body of the little princess, with the grave and tender orchestral commentary woven out of familiarly poignant themes (pages 308-309); the murmurous coda, with its muted trumpet singing a gentle dirge under an accompaniment of two flutes (page 310, measure 7),—these things are easy to
XXV.
value, but they may not easily be praised with adequacy.
Concerning felicities of structural and technical detail in the work as a whole, this has not been the place to speak; but if curious appreciators, or others who are merely curious, should perhaps be induced, by what has been written here, to explore for themselves Debussy's beautiful and in many ways incomparable score, the purpose of this study will have been achieved.