As I say, I have also enjoyed it myself. It is not, indeed, without its flashes of genuine sagacity; even Bob’s stockbroker view of the sexual duel, given such a male as Kirby and such females as Becky, is probably more sound than not. But the chief fascination of the story, I am bound to say, lies in its very deficiencies as a human document and a work of art--in its naïve lack of humor, its elaborate laboring of the obvious, its incredible stiltedness and triteness. There are passages that actually suggest Daisy Ashforth. For example: “She was biting her nails while talking to Delaher, and biting them after he left. _Then she put on white cotton gloves to prevent this nervous habit._” Again (Kirby has abandoned Becky for another girl, Charlotte, formerly his stenographer): “_May I say something to you?_” she whispered at last. “What is it, Charlotte?” “I want a child, and a child with you.” Somehow, this “May I say something to you?” gives me vast delight: the respectful politeness of the perfect stenographer surviving into the most confidential of moments! No such child is achieved--Charlotte, in fact, dies before it can be born--, and so we miss her courteous request for permission to name it after its father. But she and Kirby, alas, sin the sin, and what is worse, they sin it under his mother’s roof. What is still worse, they do it with her knowledge and connivance. She is greatly taken, in fact, with Charlotte, and advises Kirby to marry her. I quote her argument: “If Byron had mistresses he was also a rider and a fencer and a poet; and if Webster may have been a drinker, he was great as a lawyer and a speaker. If Charlotte has had extra-marital relationships, she is a capable housekeeper, a good secretary, a woman skilled in many things; and she has all kinds of virtues, like humor and self-control, and the spirit of happiness, and an essential honesty.” I leave the rest to posterity! What will it make of Masters as novelist? When it turns from the heroic and lovely lines of “Ann Rutledge” to the astounding banalities of “Mirage” what will it say? III. IN MEMORIAM: W. J. B.