Page:Beethoven's Ninth Symphony (Grove).djvu/28

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kept veiled. He will reveal to us the secret of his inmost grief; and we shall see that, great and noble and stupendous as he is, his heart can be a prey to pangs as bitter and as unassuageable as those which wrack the fondest woman. And this he does as no one but himself ever could do. The Strings begin a passage consisting of repetitions of the following phrase of two bars:—

This passage—which, like the somewhat analogous one in the first movement of the Seventh Symphony, may be regarded as a "pedal point" on D—commences pianissimo, and gradually increases in tone through sixteen bars, till it reaches a double forte; while over it—in the touching accents of Oboes, Clarinets, and Flutes—is heard the following most affecting wail:—