I amused myself by playing an arpeggio when Schikaneder came to a pause. He was startled, looked round, and saw me. The second time the pause occurred I did the same; then he stopped and would not go on; I guessed what he was after, and made another chord, upon which he tapped the bells and said: "Hold your tongue!" ("Halts Maul!"), whereupon everybody laughed. I fancy this was the first intimation to many people that he did not play the instrument himself.
The instrument occurs first in the first finale, when Papageno makes the slaves of Monostatos dance and sing to it.
Here it is brought prominently forward, supporting the melody alone, accompanied only pizzicato by the stringed instruments, and in a measure by the chorus; the whole is most innocently simple, and of charming effect.[ 59 ] The bells exercise their power a third time (the magic flute is also; played three times) in the last finale, where the magic instrument aids the despairing Papageno to recall his Papagena, and is treated simply as befits its nature.[ 60 ]
Papageno's chief scene is in the last finale, when he resolves to die for the love of his lost Papagena, and it forms a counterpart to the pathetic scene of Pamina's despair. An expression of good-humour and of true, if not very elevated, feeling prevents the comic situation from becoming farcical.
Papageno's grief is like that of a child, expressed in genuine earnest, yet of a nature to raise a smile on the lips of grownup people. This double nature is well expressed, for example, in the violin passage—[See Page Image]nwhich has something comic in its very accents of grief. The form of this lengthy scene is altogether free. Without alteration of time or measure the music follows the various points of the scene, declamatory passages interrupting the long-drawn threads of melody sometimes with great effect, and descriptive phrases repeated at suitable places to keep the whole together. Thus the characteristic passage—occurs three times to the words: "Drum geschieht es mir schon recht!" "Sterben macht der Lieb' ein End," and "Papageno frisch hinauf, en.de deinen Lebenslauf!" At the close, when he seems really on the point of hanging himself, the time becomes slower, and a minor key serves to express the gloom of despair. But the three boys appear and remind him of his bells; at once his courage rises, and as he tinkles the bells he calls upon his sweetheart to appear with all the confidence and joy of a child. At the command of the boys he looks round, sees her, and the two feather-clothed beings contemplate each other with amazement and delight, approaching nearer and nearer, until at last they fall into each other's arms. The comic point of the stammering "Pa-pa-pa-," uttered by them both, slowly at first, then with increasing rapidity until they embrace with the exclamation, Papageno!" and "Papagena!" was due to Schickaneder's LOVE OF MAN AND WIFE. suggestion.[ 61 ] That the happiness they feel at their reunion should find expression in anticipating the advent of numerous little Papagenos and Papagenas is not only intended as a trait of human nature unrestrained and unrefined in thought and word, but serves to point to the parental joys springing from wedlock as "the highest of all emotions." The duet originally ended with the words (which Mozart did not set to music):—
Wenn dann die Kleinen um sie spielen
Die Eltern gleiche Freude fühlen,
Sich ihres Ebenbildes freun
O, welch ein Gluck kann grosser sein?
The words with which the boys lead Papagena to Papageno—
Komm her, du holdes, liebes Weibchen!
Dem Mann sollst du dein Herzchen weihn.
Er wird dich lieben, süsses Weibchen,
Dein Vater, Freund und Brader sein
Sie dieses Mannes Eigenthum!
were also omitted by Mozart, because serious exhortations and moral reflections would have been out of place here. He has instead succeeded in producing so lively and natural an expression of childlike delight, untouched by any taint of sensual desire, that the hearer feels his own heart full of happiness for very sympathy. The companion piece to this duet is that which Papageno sings with Pamina, after informing her that Tamino, fired with love, is hastening to her release (8). There can be no doubt that Mozart's wish has been to express the loftiest conception of the love of man and wife as an image, however faint and imperfect, of heavenly love; but here again Schikaneder has interposed, and insisted on something popular. We cannot blame him, for Papageno's sphere is that of natural, simple sentiment, not of enlightened morality, and Pamina is an inexperienced girl, who follows her own feelings, and is ready enough to fall into Papageno's vein.