We might tire of this plain conversation and the buffoon manners of Schmidt and Johann, but the accompanying music is of absorbing interest. Massenet makes much use of counterpoint, which has been broadly defined as the art of combining melodies. A crude but familiar example is that wonder-inspiring piano performance of "Yankee Doodle" in one hand with "Fisher's Hornpipe" in the other. It is interesting to follow the various themes in Massenet's orchestra. Sometimes a bit of the Christmas carol combines with the gruff, reeling song of Bacchus, which, in turn, is blended with a broad and noble theme that always appears in connection with the name of Charlotte. Another theme, that might be characterized as severely intellectual, asserts itself whenever the conversation turns upon Albert, her absent fiancé.
Schmidt and Johann go off arm in arm, lustily singing, "Vivat Bacchus."
Sophia enters the house, while the bailiff retires with the children to an alcove on the veranda, where we see him patiently rehearsing that Christmas carol, word for word.
The music now undergoes a transition, like a dreamer turning in his sleep. There are harp-chords, arpeggios, and trills written soft and "dim."
A richly clad traveler enters the garden, looking about him with evident emotion. It is Werther, returned after years of absence to his native village.
"I know not if I dream or wake," are his first words, while the instruments recall that pastoral motif of the prelude. Birds and trees and the limpid brook are all apostrophized in word and tone, until, with a sunburst of rising chords, there is introduced a new and radiant theme, eulogizing—
"All nature, full of grace,
Queen over time and space;"
while under the spell of his emotions—for Werther is a poet and a dreamer—there comes to him, like the song of angels, that blessed Christmas carol which the children are singing softly and with perfect rhythm.
The already familiar Charlotte-theme announces the heroine's entrance. The girlish costumes of this bourgeoise character are unusually becoming to Madame Eames; they present her in quite a new light, and her first entrance gives a pleasing surprise to the audience.
She is embraced by the children, who love Charlotte dearly, for she is to them both a sister and a mother. Regardless of her best gown, she now goes to a buffet on the veranda and distributes slices of bread and butter. This scene has prompted the epithet, "bread-and-butter opera."