The characteristics of the Sabaean are great squareness and boldness in outline.
With the triumph of High Church principles at the Restoration it was natural that a loyal clergy should desire to emphasize this squareness, and the consequent exaggeration of the square top of the cap necessitated a further stiffening.
Full closes and repeated sentences no longer confuse the issue, but in their absence we begin to notice the incessant squareness of the ostensibly free rhythms. The immense amount of pageantry, though (as in Tannhauser) good in dramatic motive and executed with splendid stage-craft, goes far to stultify Wagner's already vigorous attitude of protest against grand-opera methods; by way of preparation for the ethereally poetic end he gives us a disinfected present from Meyerbeer at the beginning of the last scene, where mounted trumpeters career round the stage in full blast for three long minutes; and the prelude to the third act is an outburst of sheer gratuitous vulgarity.
