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No. III is ushered in by a tender theme for solo violin:
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This is followed by an exposition of five themes of intentional similarity, which depict the varying moods of the hero's courtship. These themes are further enhanced by characteristic and contrasted orchestral tone-color.
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The section further embodies some six motives that are either reminiscences from former or anticipations of subsequent thematic material. Rösch calls attention to an interesting passage at the close of this section, a passage that cannot be justified by any rules of harmony. He suggests that in modern orchestration many seemingly irreconcilable harmonic combinations become perfectly logical if the auditor train himself to follow the harmonic corollary of complex counterpoint "horizontally" instead of "vertically." The passage in question consists of a protracted chord, G flat major, sustained by muted strings, while various instruments of wood super-impose a number of independent themes whose concentrated effect forms chords entirely foreign to the underlying key of G major. The present writer, however, is inclined to regard this hazy film of string-tone as nothing more than a tonic and dominant organ-point with the third of the triad unobtrusively added.
The "program" of No. IV is symbolic of martial strife, the depictment of which, subdivided into three parts together with an introduction, extends almost to the end of the movement, when a coda in two short divisions portrays victory and embodies a hymn of praise. From a musical standpoint, No. IV may be looked upon as that section of the entire symphonic poem in which the leading themes are subjected to systematic and elaborate musical development. In addition, one finds some ten new themes, such as a striking fanfare for trumpets behind the scenes ([No. 27]) and other warlike strains, of which Nos. [28] and [29] represent the missiles of the enemy.