While Fricka is
upbraiding him for his rash promise Freia enters, pursued by the giants,
who come to claim their reward. Wotan refuses to let Freia go, and Froh
and Donner come to the protection of their sister. The giants are
prepared to fight for their rights, but the entrance of Loge fortunately
effects a diversion. He has searched throughout the world for something
to offer to the giants instead of the beautiful goddess, but has only
brought back the news of Alberich's treasure-trove, and his forswearing
of love in order to rule the world. The lust of power now invades the
minds of the giants, and they agree to take the treasure in place of
Freia, if Wotan and Loge can succeed in stealing it from Alberich. On
this quest therefore the two gods descended through a cleft in the earth
to Nibelheim, the abode of the Nibelungs. There they find Alberich, by
virtue of his magic gold, lording it over his fellow-dwarfs. He has
compelled his brother Mime, the cleverest smith of them all, to fashion
him a Tarnhelm, or helmet of invisibility, and the latter complains
peevishly to the gods of the overbearing mastery which Alberich has
established in Nibelheim. When Alberich appears, Wotan and Loge
cunningly beguile him to exhibit the powers of his new treasures. The
confiding dwarf, in order to display the quality of the Tarnhelm, first
changes himself into a snake and then into a toad.
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