The joyful tinge is quickly lost in the sombre hue of another phase of war-song that has a touch of funeral trip (though it is all in 3/4 time):
A melody in the minor plays first in a choir of horns and bassoons, later in united strings, accompanied by soft rolls of drums and a touch of the lowest brass. Harp and higher woodwind are added, but the volume is never transcendent save in a single burst when it is quickly hushed to the first ominous whisper. Out of this sombre song flows a romance of tender sentiment, tranquillo in strings, followed by the wood. The crossing threads of expressive melody
rise in instant renewal of stress and agitation. The joy of battle has returned, but it seems that the passion of love burns in midst of the glow of battle, each in its separate struggle, and both together in one fatal strife. The sombre melody returns in full career, dying down to a pause.[61]
Molto sostenuto, in changed rhythm of three slow beats, comes "Penthesilea's Dream of the Feast of Roses." Over a thick cluster of harmonies in harp and strings the higher wood sing a new song in long drawn lyric notes with ravishing turns of tonal color,—a
dual song and in many groups of two. The tranquil current of the dream is gradually disturbed; the main burden is dimmed in hue and in mood. Faster, more fitful is the flow of melody, with hostile intruding motive below; it dashes at last into the tragic phase—Combats; Passions; Madness; Destruction—in very rapid tempo of 2/2 rhythm.
In broad, masterful pace, big contrary figures sweep up and down, cadencing in almost joyous chant, gliding, indeed, into a pure hymn, as of triumph (that harks back to the chorussing song in the beginning).