Opera Stories from Wagner
By Florence Akin
Mimi and Alberich Stop to Quarrel Too Long
While Mimi and Alberich quarreled, Siegfried came from the dragon’s cave, bearing the helmet and the ring.
He heard no sound save the rustling of the leaves and the song of the bird.
Again he sat down in the shadow of a tree.
“Little bird, can you not help me to find a true friend?” asked Siegfried.
“Each year you have your mate and your little birdlings in the nest. You sing songs with the other birds.
“I have never known a father or a mother, a sister or a brother. I am lonely.
“Is there nowhere in all this world some one whom I may love? Some one who will love me?”
Then the wood-bird began to sing a pretty love-song of a maiden sleeping on the crest of a mountain, encircled by fire.
Sweetly he sang:–"Only he who knows no fear may claim her for his bride.”
Siegfried sprang to his feet. “I do not know fear. I have tried with all my might to learn it. Oh, help me to find the mountain where she sleeps!”
The little bird flew away in the opposite direction from where the wicked Nibelungs stood quarreling, and Siegfried joyously hurried after.
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