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“Near the stream a man was standing; he was an ordinary man, and yet he seemed to tower above the landscape without being unusually tall; his hair was bright as gold, and his eyes, more lustrous still, reflected the silvery blue sky and shone like opals. In his hands he held a golden lyre, and around him a warm golden cloud seemed to rise, on a transparent aura of light, like the glow of the sunset. In front of him there stood a creature of the woods, a satyr, with pointed ears, cloven hoofs, and human eyes, in his hairy hands holding a flute made out of a reed.

“Presently the satyr breathed on his flute and a wonderful note trembled in the air, soft, low, and liquid. The note was followed by others, and a stillness fell upon Nature; the birds ceased to sing, the grasshoppers were still, the bees paused. All Nature was listening and the Princess was conscious in her dream that there were others besides herself listening, unseen shapes and sightless phantoms; a crowd, a multitude of attentive ghosts, that were hidden from her sight. The melody rose and swelled in stillness; it was melting and ravishing and bold with a human audacity. As she listened it reminded her of something; she felt she had heard such sounds before, though she could not remember where and when. But suddenly it flashed across her that the music resembled Albrecht’s song; it was Albrecht’s song, only transfigured as it were, and a thousand times more beautiful in her dream than in reality. More beautiful, and at the same time as though it belonged to the days of youth and spring which Albrecht had never known. The satyr ceased playing and the pleasant noises of the world began once more. The shining figure who stood before him looked on the satyr with divine scorn and smiled a radiant, merciless smile. Then he struck his lyre and Nature once more was dumb.

“But this time the magic was of another kind and a thousand times more mighty; a song rose into the air which leapt and soared like a flame, imperious as the flashing of a sword, triumphant as the waving of a banner, wonderful as the dawn and fresh as the laughing sea. And once more Princess Kunigmunde was aware that the music was familiar to her. She had heard something like it in the chapel that evening, when in the darkness Franz had played and sung the hymn that he had composed in her honour. Only now it was more than human, unearthly and divine. As soon as he ceased an eclipse seemed to darken the world, a thick cloud of rolling darkness; there was a crash of thunder, a flash of lightning, and out of the blackness came a piteous, human cry, the cry of a creature in anguish, and then a faint moaning.

“Presently all was still, but the dark cloud remained, and she heard a mocking laugh and the accents of a clear, scornful voice (she recognised the voice, it was the voice of Albrecht), and the voice said: ‘Thou hast conquered, Apollo, and cruelly hast thou used thy victory; and cruelly has thou punished me for daring to challenge thy divine skill. It was mad indeed to compete with a god; and yet shall I avenge my wrong and thy harshness shall recoil on thee. For not even gods can be unjust with impunity, and the Fates are above us all. And I shall be avenged; for all thy sons shall suffer what I have suffered; and there is not one of them that shall escape the doom and not share the fate of Marsyas the Satyr, whom thou didst cruelly slay. The music and the skill which shall be their inheritance shall be the cause to them of sorrow and grief unending and pitiless pain and misery. Their life shall be as bitter to them as my death has been to me. Their music shall fill the world with sweetness and ravish the ears of listening nations, but to them it shall bring no joy; for life like a cruel blade shall flay and lay bare their hearts, and sorrow like a searching wind shall play upon their souls and make them tremble, even as the scabbard of my body trembled in the breeze; and just as from that trembling husk of what was once myself there came forth sweet sounds, so shall it be with their souls, shivering and trembling in the cold wind of life. Music shall come from them, but this music shall be born of agony; nor shall they utter a single note that is not begotten of sorrow or pain. And so shall the children of Apollo suffer and share the pain of Marsyas.