he only offence. There is Indiana Frusk of Apex
City, and Millard Binch, a combination in which the Dickens of
American Notes would have found amusement. Hotels with titles like The
Stentorian are not exaggerated. Miss Spragg's ancestor had invented "a
hair waver"; hence the name Undine: "from undoolay, you know, the
French for crimping," as the simple-hearted mother of the girl
explained to a suitor. Mrs. Wharton has been cruel, with a glacial
cruelty, to her countrywomen of the Spragg type. But they abound. They
come from the North, East, South, West to conquer New York, and thanks
to untiring energy, a handsome exterior, and much money, they "arrive"
sooner or later. With all her overaccentuated traits and the metallic
quality of technique in the handling of her portrait, Undine Spragg is
both a type and an individual--she is the newest variation of Daisy
Miller--and compared with her brazen charmlessness the figures of
Hedda Gabler and Mildred Lawson seem melting with tenderness, aglow
with subtle charm and muffled exaltation. Undine--shades of La Motte
Fouque--is quite the most disagreeable girl in our fiction. She has
been put under a glass and subjected to the air-pump pressure of Mrs.
Wharton's art. She is a much more viable creature than the author's
earlier Lily Bart, the heroine of The House of Mirth. At least Undine
is not sloppy or sentimental, and that is a distinct claim on the
suffrages of the intelligent reader. Furthermore, the clear hard
atmosphere of the book is tempered by a tragic and humorous irony, a
welcome astringent for the mental palate.

In Apex City Undine made up her mind to have her own way. She elopes
and marries a vulgar "hustler," but is speedily divorced. She is very
beautiful when she reaches New York. No emotional experience would
leave a blur on her radiant youth, because love for her is a
sensation, not a sentiment. By indirect and cumulative touches the
novelist evokes for us her image. Truly a lovely apparition, almost
mindless, with great sympathetic eyes and a sweet mouth. She exists,
does Undine. She is not the barren fruit of a satirical pen.
Foreigners, both men and women, puzzle over her freedom, chilliness,
and commercial horse-sense. She doesn't long intrigue their curiosity,
her brain is poorly furnished and conversation with her is not a fine
art. She is temperamental in the sense that she lives on her nerves;
without the hum and glitter of the opera, fashionable resta