University of Virginia Library

Ellen Glasgow's Virginia: Preliminary Notes
by
Oliver Steele

Preliminary Materials of one sort or another for a number of Ellen Glasgow's novels are preserved in the Glasgow Collection of the Alderman Library at the University of Virginia.[1] In one sense, the most important of these are the three drafts of the recently published Beyond Defeat,[2] for they are the only full record of what was apparently Ellen Glasgow's invariable working method in the mature period which begins with Barren Ground. In another sense, however, the preliminary notes for Virginia are the most interesting. For although not nearly so extensive as the Beyond Defeat drafts, they represent the earliest stages of a novel which Ellen Glasgow's critics have placed with Barren Ground and The Sheltered Life as the really solid accomplishments of her career.[3] Indeed, one of the best of her critics has compared Virginia favorably with Maupassant's Une Vie and has said, "Par son contenu et par sa forme, Virginia restera son classique du Sud en évolution."[4] Thus these notes show Ellen Glasgow working

at full strength toward a novel whose power is undeniable, whereas the various drafts of Beyond Defeat show her working during a period of depression and failing power toward a not very distinguished result. In addition they represent a working method, by plot outlines, essentially different from that used in the composition of the later novels, and perhaps characteristic of her early period.

Before discussing what these notes have to tell about Ellen Glasgow's strategy as a writer and about the meaning of Virginia, it is necessary first to say something of the manuscripts from which they were drawn and the style in which they are here presented. For the most part the text is taken from a small black notebook containing one hundred sixty-three pages, all devoted to Virginia.[5] Added to this is a transcript of fifteen loose pages which are from an otherwise lost notebook which must have been exactly the same size as the one which contains the bulk of the material on Virginia.[6] Both manuscripts are in pencil in a hand which seems often hurried and is at times excruciatingly difficult to decipher. Anyone who reads through the notebook which contains most of the material on Virginia will become conscious of what seems a strikingly nervous, elliptical style, reflected perhaps also in the hurried handwriting. There are, to be sure, some pages of fluid and fully elaborated composition, and one would not expect lists of names, articles of clothing, and flowers to be anything but elliptical in their effect. But aside from the few fluid passages, the elliptical quality pervades the entire notebook. This kind of style is perhaps natural for a writer just beginning to set down ideas for scene, character, and action. The earliest notes for Beyond Defeat have this same quality. Perhaps, too, the "nervousness" of the style represents something of the excitement with which a writer elaborates a new idea which has become compelling, but not yet clear. But another factor in the style of these notes was the extremely small notebook (6 7/16" X 3⅝") in which they were written. The fact that there are some fully developed passages proves that the size of the book could not have been of overriding importance for the style of the notes. But probably this small book did provide an appropriate and to some degree encouraging medium for the more important factors that have been mentioned. Since it has been impracticable to present these notes in a line for line reprint of the notebooks, it is hoped that retaining the original and often erratic punctuation of the original will convey some of the flavor of the elliptical style. Four typical pages are reproduced below.

For the most part these notes consist of two chapter by chapter outlines of the novel, in which interest in character and motive and interest in plot are about equally divided. There are also a fairly large number of pages

devoted to the scenery of the novel, including such things as clothing and furniture. In A Certain Measure Ellen Glasgow wrote: The implication seems to be that the process of composition was made fluid by an utter clarity about character and theme. These notes surely contradict that claim, just as they contradict the statement that she never had to "wonder what should come next in my narrative, or whither it was leading me." The process of composition was simply not what she implies it was. But if the passage is taken to refer to the external events of Virginia's life, then the claim is solidly supported by the notes. They show that from the first, Ellen Glasgow had a firm grasp of the events of her heroine's life, a grasp which was to become still firmer in the second chapter outline. And since, in the final form of the novel, Virginia's character and destiny are the life of the story, this early clarity about the sequence of events in Virginia's life was importantly responsible for the structural coherence of the final version.

Although Ellen Glasgow understood Virginia and her history from the first, she was not so clear about some of the other characters in the novel. Indeed, her handling of Miss Priscilla Batte and Miss Willy Whitlow is hardly changed from these early outlines to the final version. But in the case of Cyrus Treadwell, it is clear that at first she planned for him to have an importance in the structure of the novel which would have meant significant changes in his character and, indeed, in the theme of the book. In the early pages of the first outline, Ellen Glasgow identified the theme of the novel as the "transition from an aristocratic to a commercial civilization" (see MS. pp. 2-3). And it appears that she had originally intended Cyrus and his career to be the most overt embodiment of that theme. Consequently she planned a history of Cyrus' rise to power which was to run parallel to Virginia's story throughout the novel. He was to have become a sort of arch-villain of commercial success in a plot which showed him at the end of the war borrowing ten dollars from Gabriel Pendleton and investing it in a herd of hogs, which investment was to become the ignoble basis of his later fortune (p. 35). Then he was to cheat his friend Gabriel by buying from him cheaply some land which he knew was to increase enormously in value (p. 8). By collaborating with a rich carpetbagger, Glade, he was then to acquire a railroad with the help of northern capital (p. 36). But the main part of his history was to have been concerned with a

struggle for power between himself and an industrialist and railroad owner named Goode.[8] Goode is mentioned first on the fourth page of the notebook as "a dogged character, who fights on even after he has lost." Later the bare statement that "Goode has no business head" occurs (p. 17), and toward the middle of the first outline, Ellen Glasgow reminds herself that she needs to have a chapter on Cyrus' "persecution of Goode on account of the Appomattox R. R." (p. 40). Then Goode is mentioned again on page forty-seven, and on the next page Cyrus' "triumph over Goode in the shipping of cotton" is noted. On page fifty-eight Ellen Glasgow records again her intention to devote an entire chapter to Cyrus' struggle with Goode, this time to his final triumph over Goode. This victory is mentioned again toward the end of the first outline (p. 79). And still later is found the assertion that Cyrus is broken by Goode's death because he, Cyrus, has nothing to live for (p. 85).

Throughout the first outline Goode remains an obscure figure, an almost anonymous victim of Cyrus' will to power. At the beginning of the second outline, however, some concrete information is given about him. He is obviously a strong character, a man who single-handed builds a railroad after the war out of discarded rails, a broken down engine, and ties made from his own lumber (p. 101). He fights stubbornly for the life of his railroad (p. 120).

From the clues given about Cyrus' struggle with Goode, one can reconstruct Ellen Glasgow's intention, especially if these clues are taken with some other statements about Cyrus. In the second outline, for instance, Cyrus' method of getting control of the Dinwiddie Railroad is summarized:

And in the first outline there is a reference to a scheme, presumably Cyrus', to crush an enemy by allowing his competitor preferential rates on his railroad (p. 59). A minor episode in Cyrus' history was to have been his gaining control of the local newspaper, The Dinwiddie Bee. This episode is first mentioned on page forty, where Honest Tom Tucker, the name originally given to Tom Peachy, editor of the newspaper, is mentioned. And Cyrus' victory over the editor is recorded early in the second outline (p. 121). One last detail will perhaps help our understanding of what Ellen Glasgow intended with Cyrus. In the second outline a chapter is summarized in which Gabriel Pendleton goes to Cyrus to ask him to make his factory safe by putting up fire escapes and improving the stair case, and Cyrus refuses.

All of these details show that originally Cyrus was to have been a villain of the Machiavellian stripe, a melodramatic and almost allegorical embodiment of the active principle of evil in commerce and materialism.

His victory over Goode was surely to have been the defeat of an aristocrat struggling by all honest means to rebuild something of what he and his society had lost at the end of the war. Similarly his crushing of the editor of The Dinwiddie Bee was to have meant the silencing of a public voice which stood for high ideals and noble sentiments, and the intrusion into public life of all manner of crassness and vulgarity. And all of this was to have been accomplished with the same ruthlessness with which Cyrus cheated Gabriel Pendleton of his land and with which he acquired right of way for his railroad. Clearly also Cyrus' gradual commercial success was to have run parallel to Virginia's personal tragedy. It was to have been a public and external mirror of the private and internal story of the novel's heroine.

Almost none of this finds place in the final version of Virginia. Cyrus' character is drastically modified and the history of his unscrupulous rise to power is almost completely eliminated. There were undoubtedly purely practical reasons for Ellen Glasgow's decision not to include an elaborate development of her theme in terms of Cyrus' history. As the outlines show, originally she had planned to devote a number of chapters to that subject, and she probably saw that a treatment of it on the scale she had planned would have meant a book of unconscionable length. Yet, other more substantial reasons must have guided her decision too. She must have seen that so elaborate a treatment of Cyrus and the public victory of commerce and materialism over aristocratic idealism could only weaken the effect of what was from the first her main interest, the character and fate of Virginia. At any rate her decision to abandon Cyrus as villain represents a subtle but important change in the theme announced in the first outline. There she had written:

To a large extent, Ellen Glasgow had abandoned this theme by the time she came to write the final version. For there the emphasis is on a critical, yet sympathetic, examination of the pastoral idealism which formed the character of the aristocratic southern lady. In Virginia this idealism is defeated not so much by materialism as by its own weakness, its inability to respond to the realities of experience, its irrelevance to a life more complex than the pastoral myth of the old South. In this new conception of the theme of the novel, neither Cyrus' history nor his character as evil genius of materialism is very relevant. Consequently his character is reduced from the melodramatic to the realistic level. He is finally characterized by mean-spiritedness and petty tyranny. He becomes a sign of the times, a sign that power had passed from the aristocratic land owner, who could foster a pastoral mythology because he could afford it and protect it, to a new kind of man who was creating a new world and a new mythology. Because such characters as Susan Treadwell and John Henry Pendleton see the demands and opportunities of the new conditions they thrive without losing their humanity. Virginia, on the other hand, lives deep within her myths, seeing neither the demands nor the opportunities of the world around her. She is bewildered by one and frightened by the other. Her tragedy is the pathos of any beautiful but obsolete thing.

What Virginia's myths foster, a passive and self-effacing gentleness, an ability to color the ordinary and often shoddy realities with romance, and an unshakeable devotion to her family, is her strength as a character. But as it gives her strength, it also disastrously inhibits curiosity and intelligence, and it is this defect in her character that lies at the heart of her personal tragedy. Even in the outlines, particularly in the second one, Ellen Glasgow had seen this clearly. At the start of the second outline she notes that she needs to treat the "effect of Virginia's unselfishness on his [Oliver's] character" (p. 92). And that effect is noted later in the outline:

Again in the second outline, Oliver's "irritation at Virginia's lack of artistic sympathy" is noted along with her absorption in "little practical cares" (p. 129). Virginia's strength as a character, her unfailing selflessness and her total devotion to the small affairs of her family, is at the same time her defect, her inability to comprehend her husband's character and ambitions and to provide anything of the stimulation and criticism which he needs.

It was because Ellen Glasgow's understanding of Virginia's fundamental defect was so clear that, between the first and second outlines, she totally changed the character of Margaret Oldcastle, the actress for whom Oliver divorces Virginia. Toward the end of the first outline, Ellen Glasgow had written of Margaret Oldcastle:

But by the beginning of the second outline she had changed this picture of an unscrupulous, passion-driven woman so that she becomes At least now she is allowed good impulses and her lack of control is given a justifying explanation. The final modification, which in fact formed the basis of the actress's characterization in the final version, occurs toward the end of the second outline: These modifications of Margaret Oldcastle's character show Ellen Glasgow progressively sharpening her concept of Virginia as a tragic figure. They show her deciding to make Virginia's tragedy a matter of her own character, rather than of external circumstance. As it turns out, Margaret Oldcastle represents what Oliver needs, and cannot find in Virginia, a tough and lively intelligence and an active, outward-thrusting personality.

One last example will show how, in the process of writing these outlines, Ellen Glasgow made minor characters effective for the development of her theme. Aunt Belinda, the wife of Cyrus Treadwell, is first described as "an idealist crushed by compliant materialism" and by "the triumphal car of success" (p. 31). She is also called a "doting mother," for whom her children had the greatest contempt (p. 32). In the second outline Ellen Glasgow talks of "poor spiritless Mrs. Treadwell" and of her "mental and physical slovenliness" (p. 112), and finally of her terror of her husband and of "her pitiful clinging to little pieces of the past" (p. 114). In the second outline one can see the "crushed idealist" and "doting mother" of the first outline being transformed into the pitiful psychological wreck of the final version. In the process Mrs. Treadwell becomes one of the three women who function as mirrors of the heroine's character and situation. The chief of these is Virginia's mother, who represents what is best in her character and in the pastoral idealism which formed her.[15] Another is Mrs. Tom Peachy, whose eternally cheerful fortitude makes it possible for her to support a husband whose chief occupation since the war has been drinking. She represents something of Virginia's situation after the collapse of Oliver's early ambitions. Then Belinda Treadwell, the darkest of these mirrors, begins to cast her somber light on Virginia at the end of the novel as her tragedy reaches and then passes its crisis. These three women, all creatures of the same myths that give Virginia her consciousness, work out in their lives the implications of the ideal of the southern lady, implications which are developed more subtly in the life of the heroine.

The changes in character and incident which have been discussed so far can all be explained by supposing that during and after the writing of the two preliminary outlines Ellen Glasgow's thinking about the theme of her book became clearer and clearer. On the other hand, the outlines show a confusion about the character of Oliver Treadwell which was never entirely resolved. This lack of clarity about Oliver is the least satisfactory thing about the final version, and the outlines show in direct and simple

terms what the nature of the confusion was.[16] In the first outline it is clear that Ellen Glasgow saw Oliver as an embodiment of the announced theme of the struggle between idealism and materialism. She first describes him as a "Treadwell turned artist" (p. 33), and on the next page clarifies that comment by calling him a "materialist turned romantic." Then about the middle of the first outline she notes "the complete and final adjustment of Oliver to present conditions" and calls this adjustment "materialism triumphant" (p. 67). At the end of the first outline she summarizes her conception of Oliver's character: In fact, this struggle is not of any great importance in Oliver's character, though traces of it remain in the final version to weaken his credibility. At the crucial moment of his life the real struggle is between two forms of idealism. As an artist his idealism is utopian, as Ellen Glasgow herself notes in the second outline (p. 113). That is to say, the thrust of his ambition is outward into the present. He hopes to bring his civilization to a recognition of the truths of reality by a devastating attack on its illusions. His love of Virginia, who represents the illusory view of reality in its most radical form, is directly opposed to his ideals as an artist. Throughout the two outlines and in the final version as well Ellen Glasgow explains Oliver's character in terms of a decline from his original ideals to a complacent acceptance of the cheap values of contemporary society. At the beginning of the first outline she writes: And in the middle of the second outline she adds: Yet his decline is implicit in his marriage to Virginia, which reveals him as a man who has "the temperament of genius without the quality" (p. 9). And Ellen Glasgow fails fully to grasp this fact. She does, in both the outlines and the final version, rather ignore it, and she can write:

One other aspect of Oliver's character never became clear in Ellen Glasgow's mind, and that is his saving grace of cynicism and bitterness.

She treats this quality instead as simply a part of the general degeneration of his character.[21] It is, however, the only thing that saves him from a life both complacent and unauthentic. One critic has supposed that Oliver's prospects at the end of the novel are bleak,[22] and I think Ellen Glasgow would have agreed. Yet if one gets outside the author's absorption in the tragedy of her heroine, his prospects do not look bleak at all. How could they be with a woman so magnificently alive as Margaret Oldcastle. His refusal to accept complacently his failure as a man and as an artist makes possible in the end what looks like a genuine rehabilitation.

When one looks carefully at the outlines and then at the final version of Virginia, one can see that Oliver interested Ellen Glasgow as a character in his own right, as a type of the gifted but immature artist who has to pass through failure and disillusionment to arrive. Yet so concerned was she with the life of her heroine that she willingly used Oliver as an expedient for elaborating her primary interest. In the process she obscured his motives and character.

It remains now to describe the extent to which these outlines form the basic material of the finished novel. For in spite of the changes and omissions that have been discussed, the shape of the novel is fundamentally that given it in the outlines, and it is fascinating to follow the process by which the details, scenes and descriptions of the outlines were taken into the final version. Some passages were used almost without modification. The description of Miss Priscilla Batte which occupies pages thirteen through sixteen of the first outline is the most considerable of these.[23] But the description of the parsonage and of the Treadwell's home in the loose notes are similarly appropriated.[24] A fairly long passage from the first outline which treats Cyrus as a worshipper of convention is used verbatim,[25] as is another from the same outline which describes the naive assurance of perpetual happiness with which Oliver and Virginia enter marriage.[26]

More interesting even than these examples of unchanged intention from outlines to novel—I have mentioned only a few—are the many passages which acquire a new status as they pass from the outlines into the novel. Perhaps the most interesting of these is a passage from the second outline which was originally planned to come toward the end of the novel after Oliver had asked Virginia for a divorce and she had returned from New York to Dinwiddie:

In a much modified version this passage is used to describe Virginia's state of mind just before her marriage.[28] And one can speculate that Ellen Glasgow found the passage more appropriate for a subtly ironic treatment of young Virginia's idyllic expectations than for the portrait of a woman who had become self-pitying in defeat.

Another interesting example of the transformation of material from the outlines occurs at the end of the first outline. At the end of the second outline Virginia's son "finds her in a city square. Takes her into a cheap restaurant and coaxes her to eat." and the story ends "with the triumph of motherhood and filial love—" (p. 156). Fortunately, the novel does not end with any kind of triumph, but just what kind of triumph Ellen Glasgow had in mind may perhaps be seen in the ending of the first outline, a part of which reads:

Undoubtedly the author realized that Virginia's tragedy had to be genuine, not to be redeemed, or rather cheapened, by a false happy ending. Consequently, in the final version she used the passage quoted, not at the end of the novel, but rather in a scene in which Virginia desperately and pathetically attempts to escape the harsh fact of Oliver's desertion by recreating in fancy her happy youth.[30]

Perhaps the most fascinating thing about the early drafts of a gifted writer is that they sometimes record the stages by which, for the writer, the hypothetical and abstract become concrete and actual. Occasionally we can see characters ceasing to be simply names and descriptions of qualities and features to become instead imitations of life who confront the writer with their own appropriate voices and gestures. William Faulkner once explained that what he did was to follow his characters about and take down what they said. If not every talented writer has Faulkner's uncanny ability to hear his characters saying the right things in the right way, still it is there to some extent, and it is what makes the writer's imitation credible. Even in these early notes one can occasionally see characters begin to claim their own identity and to say the things that they would inevitably say. The most interesting, because it is the clearest, example occurs early in the first outline where Ellen Glasgow is making rather unorganized notes on theme and character. She writes:

In the midst of these unconnected and abstract jottings, Ellen Glasgow hears Gabriel Pendleton, the Christian soldier, speak the regret that he sometimes feels "in the dead of sweltering summer nights."[32] And its very lack of connection with anything around it suggests that it came to her forcefully, as an unmistakable expression of the man's character. Similar examples occur in the second outline, where Ellen Glasgow records the opening lines of one of Virginia's letters to her mother,[33] and catches Cyrus Treadwell in a characteristic retort to an appeal to his nobler nature.[34]

Although I have discussed what seemed to me the most interesting features of these preliminary notes for Virginia, other scarcely less interesting features have been undoubtedly neglected. Those who admire Ellen Glasgow's work will, for instance, find the nine separate versions of the opening scene of the novel fascinating, and they will want to follow the way in which small details of scene, appearance and action are taken into the final version of the novel. In a sense, everything in these notes is significant for an understanding of Ellen Glasgow's imagination and art.

It remains for me to say something of the method used for representing interlineations and deletions in this edition. Interlineations from the notebooks are brought down into the text in italics after the word or words in the text that they are meant to modify or amplify. Deletions in the notebooks are represented in this edition in square brackets. Occasionally I have not been able to decipher Ellen Glasgow's hand. On such occasions, a conjectural reading has been supplied within pointed brackets.[35]

Notebook No. 2

• (1) Ellen Glasgow arbutus in market first of April & 15th of April, 1911— Also bluets & bleeding hearts Houses full filled with quiet
• (2) Gabriel Pendleton Pocahontas Tabb Honest Tom Peachy Hetty Treadwell Last of March— poplar-tulips— little green leaves breaking out around the last years cups— Maple in bud— Elms, oaks, chestnuts not budding till later The transition from an aristocratic to a commercial civilization bluets in April— arbutus late March & April
• (3) Virginia [Pendleton] Ballard— Jinny [her mother] Belinda, [Pendleton— David Pendleton— Ballard— ] Theme— The struggle between idealism and materialism in the South of the last thirty years. The transition from an aristocratic to a commercial civilization Mrs Pendleton a lady with [bright] soft & anxious eyes, Gabriel Ballard— The sense of complex & changing life—
• (4) Hester— Hetty Treadwell Mrs Susan Julia Agnes— Sarah Agnes— Mrs Belinda Page Sarah Jane Treadwell— Major Tom Tucker, editor of Dinwiddie Bee; Philistia— Goode— (William John Henry Capehart, The picture

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  of an honest man— dull, slow, truthful— Goode— a dogged character, who fights on even after he has lost—
• (5) The Treadwells Notes for "Virginia," Blair Virginia Capehart, [Blair] David Capehart, [Blair] Mrs Capehart (Julia) John Henry Capehart— Oliver Treadwell, Cyrus Treadwell, Robert [Lawrence] Treadwell, Hannah Treadwell Aunt Prissy— Margaret Rivers Judith Kean Ould Priscilla Batte— Peter Batte Sukey Hawk— Buzzard— Memminger.
• (6) He believed in the Church with the largest congregation as instinctively as he trusted the bank with the biggest capital. The [new] problem of the new South sprawled in the alley at his back gate— Clash between materialism & idealism in the constructive civilization of the South— Like most men who have suffered much oppression, his ambition was not to relieve the oppressed, but to become an oppressor.
• (7) The Morning of Life, Noon— The Declining Day, Shows the clash between idealism and materialism in the South— The worship of success against the worship of the past or culture, & the finer attributes— Embody these ideas in David Capehart & Cyrus Treadwell— & their families— Show the distinction in their attitude to money, to society, to the negro, to their own families, to life in general, to (8) religion— Follow the marriage of these opposing temperaments in Virginia Capehart & Oliver Treadwell— Incident of the railroad & the coal fields— Buys David's [share, knowing that the] farm knowing that its value is to enormously increased and a railroad to be built there— Cotton mills— cheap labor— Dinwiddie—
• (9) Oliver's character is developed from an ardent rebel against the powers that be into a complacent servitor of them— His first treachery to his art has its effect upon his whole moral nature— gradual deterioration of character. A socialist while he was poor— a capital as soon as he acquired any capital— Shows gradual veering of sympathy— The temperament of genius without the quality
• (10) Virginia the victim of transition I remember hearing something unladylike about her. I think it was that she had a marriage settlement [contract]— Everybody felt very sorry for her husband & they weren't surprised him he drank himself to death some years later
• (11) The great delusion about Cyrus— to open the county & develope its resources— The ideal of the financial interest. grows gradually— A legend [h] growing around him.
• (12) Virginia, the Southern woman of the old regime— I'm thinking about those men I killed, [Belinda] Lucy Honest Tom Tucker used as a tool by Cyrus— Editor of Dinwiddie Bee— In his thin black alpaca coat S. J. The firmness firmness of Cyrus could not bend her nor the tears of [Lucy] Belinda wilt her—
• (13) Pocahontas Batte— Miss [Prissy] Pokey, a plump & frilly person in black alpaca [ca] muslin organdie cap & cameo broach, who had survived the war & even reconstruction with a considerable amount of spirit & unsubdued & something like two hundred & forty solid pounds of flesh— like the majority of destitute [wom] maiden ladies of her day she had turned naturally to teaching as the only quiet (14) & [ladylike] honourable respectable occupation which requires neither an outlay of money nor a preparation of mind. The fact that she was the single surviving child of a gallant Confederate general (who had fallen at Gettysburg) was sufficient recommendation of her ability in the eyes of her contemporaries [& she had] and there (15) were few young ladies in Dinwiddie who had not been trained in reading, writing ("up to the right, down to the left, my dear—) at Miss Batte's Female Academy. It was felt generaly that no girl who had been taught there could ever go wrong or become advanced when she came outside— It is true that she might be a little weak at geography, but (16) but her moral education would firmly be grounded upon on [the] such fundamental verities as the [supremacy] superiority of man & the aristocratic [impeccability])?

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  supremacy of the Episcopal church. Her education would be firmly grounded on the [two beliefs] such fundamental verities in the superiority of men & the aristocratic supremacy of the Episcopal Church— Cyrus interests Goode—
• (17) In the dark ages, before the South had committed itself, with the other advanced nations, to the worship of businessmen A stigma on wealth— Major Dabney— who would have done anything on earth for his wife except worked for her— Goode has no business head.
• (18) Moraly Cyrus—He was a captain in that vast army of the majority, which fights for the prevailing belief under the delusion that its prevalen[t]ce is a proof of its soundness. Had he lived in an other period of history earlier century he would have been [the] conspicuous as the first of the Inquisitors or the last of the witch-finders according to the habits of the period society in which he was placed— (19) He had accepted his religion with the same comfortable reliance upon authority with which he accepted the cut of his coat or the number of inches to his hat. He was one of those— & how, many are there— who imagined that he was a Christian because he bent his knee to the squat god of public opinion— Sunday was associated in his thoughts with the [a] (20) [outward & visible] popular fetishes of [solid symbols] of a white tie & a roast of beef— Had the roast of beef been absent at dinner he would have felt precisely the same sensations that he would have experienced had the sermon been left out of the service— Such things as fashions in clothes, [mor] religion & morality he accepted without [any] investigation
• (21) B Miss [Ch] Matty Whitson— full of ghoulish stories of deaths & burials— loves sick chambers— & talks of illness— She was perhaps the only unmarried woman in Dinwiddie who had not thought of teaching as a livelihood— The first sign of the awakening of Dinwiddie to the interests of the present was when the more prosperous [Cy] citizens began to cart their old mahogany to the auction man & to fill the (22) vacant places with Victorian sets upholstered in pale satin covers. toward the close of a burning June [after] day Miss Pocahontas Batte came out upon the little square porch of her Female Academy & [offered] gave presented a piece of sponge cake [at to the back of] to her green parrot. [that hung in a cage under] The parrot, having had his eye on her [ever s] through [a lattice of his] the [microphylla] rose, [which] climing— from under her ivy (23) She went to the seed tray, [ro] spoke severely to her as she appeared in the threshold— & began to swing furiously on his perch under [a flower climbing] microphylla rose which clambered over a lattice of the same hue as himself—
• (24) 1 chapter— Miss Pocahontas bidding goodbye to the girls at gate of her Female Academy— microphylla musk cluster rose— Green parrot—Oliver passes. Virginia & Sarah Jane— Sarah Jane was sometimes so clever as to appear almost immodest— A thorough Treadwell. The temperament but not the quality of genius in speaking of Oliver—
• (25) Book First The Morning of Life 1— Honeysuckle May afternoon at sunset in Dinwiddie— Virginia at the gate of the little garden— Honeysuckle trellis— Virginia the Southern woman of the old order brought into modern conditions. Brought up to believe that love is the aim & end of her life— Dedicated herself to service for love— Gay, vivid, bouyant— with dark brown hair & eyes the colour of wild hyacinths— (26) Sees Oliver Treadwell who has just returned to go into his uncle's bank. First love. Hester— The town— always underneath— the development of the town goes on The woman who yields. [On a burning June afternoon] On a burning May afternoon, when the very dust in the street was fragrant with roses & honeysuckle flakes of light
• (27) II— The Spirit of the Past. The Capehart's house— on that evening— David— Mrs Capehart— Idealists. who never see a thing as it is, but always embroider it with sentiment & their inherent belief that somehow

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  things are always for the best. David, losing his eyesight, has opened a cleaning & pressing business [at] in the basement of his house— Clergyman who went into army— of the old school of faith— Virginia & Mrs Capehart (28) go out with strawberries & cream for poor parishion— pass Oliver again— Darkening town— flickering light. see next chapter for Gabriel & marketing— introduce in this.
• (29) III— Reconstruction [The Spirit of the] Virginia's Inheritance David's history— war— Returning after surrender— Sells watch chain for twenty union dollars. & gives ten to another soldier (Cyrus Treadwell) Poverty— Type of religious idealist— Remembers Vir crying for bread & her mother, after bearing it as long as she could, putting on her bonnet & going out to borrow a piece from a neighbor— cover the reconstruction period in this chapter.
• (30) Mrs. Pendleton has to stop Gabriel from going to market because he gives away the basket on the way home— "I'm so sorry there's nothing but bread & butter, dear, but your father gave away the fish when he was bringing it home from market
• (31) IV— [Cyrus Treadwell The Spirit of the] With the Oleanders The House in Lombard Street Shows the Treadwells. when Hester & Oliver go home for supper— Describe house & family— Mrs Treadwell an idealist crushed by compliant materialism Aunt Prissy Batte— unquenchable idealist— Cyrus— Cyrus, Junior— Hester— The two oleanders in green tubs— Aunt Susan crushed under the triumphal car of success— (32) The doting mother Mrs Treadwell— whom her children had the greatest contempt for— [Cyrus]. Her one social interest the sewing woman Miss Willy Whitlow— gossip—Cyrus' idea that he was not doing his paternal duty unless he was interfering with his children's pleasures— The inability of the young to make allowances
• (33) V Variation from Type [The Spirit of the Present] A Stranger in Philistia [The Treadwells—] Oliver— the Romantic [Romanticism] A Treadwell turned artist— Describes his return to Dinwiddie, & the effect of the town on him— A Treadwell robbed of provincialism. His conversation with his uncle, with his aunt. with Hester— attracted to Virginia— His thin, eager face, with its rich colouring & dark hair, & weak mouth— His (34) mouth a traitor to the Treadwell spirit— His anti-capitalistic spirit while he is in poverty— Enthusiasm of youth— A materialist turned romantic. His thin, eager face, with its impetuous desires/decisions, its look of unquenchable enthusiasm— Generous to a fault, but unlike the Treadwells, who have no impulses, acting on impulse entirely—
• (35) VI Cyrus's Adventure A Great Man Cyrus— his reflections When David gave him ten dollars, came to Dinwiddie & on the way invested it in hogs— fortune started with a herd of hogs— The sense of property— no real values in life except the values of property— Imagination works only through the medium of dollars & cents— His gradual rise to the most prominent financial figure in Dinwiddie Borrows money & buys street railway, (36) issues upon the property additional securities (stocks & bonds) until he has paid back borrowed money, etc— The Dinwiddie & [Mid] Central R. R. offered for sale by receiver on June 1st— bought by Cyrus & Grade— Glade— a rich carpet bagger borrowed money from banks in North— "Melons"— Adored money, not for what it represented— an imaginery value— but for what it was a tangible object— to grasp & caress
• (37) VII— An honest Man The Spirit of the Present— [Hester] Susan and John Henry Hester carries the Treadwell spirit into love— The development of the new civilization. Cyrus, who stands for convention <and> thus for morality Respect for the powers of the police— Highly venerated in Dinwiddie— typifies [business] financial success— Dry, vacuum, a machine— Describe town
• (38) Attraction of the clever woman for the honest slow witted man— Boy shouting in the street— "Grant & Greeley fought for the prize, Grant whipped Greeley—" Cyrus' victory over Goode— was director or trustee in practically

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  every corporation in Dinwiddie President of the bank & owns control of the Va Midland R. R.
• (39) VIII [When Idealist Meets Materialist] The Feet of Progress— Cyrus— His one generous deed— Returns money to David— Pleasant sensation as a benefactor— Reflection that such sensations are, after all, expensive— For love in its ethereal aspect he had as little capacity as an Ancient Roman— Appetite he [could] was not unknown (familiar) to him, but the borderline between appetite (40) & desire was still intact. He worshipped the squat god of public opinion. What everybody did was right— Ad chapter in here relating to his persecution of Goode on account of the Appomattox R. R. & to Honest Tom Tucker— Cyrus' Dream—
• (41) IX. White Magic Virginia & Oliver— first love— They meet again at a church-festival— & in the box-tree walk to Mrs Page's Transmuted all discords—
• (42) X— Oliver Revolts— Against being teller in a bank— His ambition as a playwright— A quarrel with his uncle— He is ordered to leave the house & goes— His views regarding socialism outrage Cyrus— to whom the red flag represents the Anti-Christ of Economic Equality. "His mouth makes him a Socialist." says Aunt Prissy
• (43) Cyrus & the railroad
• (44) Miss Pokeys XI— Aunt Prissy's Strategy Brings Virginia & Oliver together in her little house— Goes to work to bring Oliver back to orthodoxy— horror at finding certain books in his room— To make him happy in her way— "Well, marriage will steady him anyway."
• (45) Ad chapter about the financial development of Cyrus— Sarah Jane. The trouble is you'll get down on your knees to him & that's a mistake. Ideals are good working propositions only when everybody is an idealist. There's no use not seeing things as they are in the beginning because we are obliged to come to it in the end—
• (46) XII Two Kinds of Woman— Abby [Carr] Glade & Virginia— Abby, the fast, sparkling, horsy type— Her father— engaged in financial schemes with Cyrus— Between them they have bought the Dinwiddie & Southside R. R. & control the town financially— Cyrus & business life of Dinwiddie— Abby the flirt. "She'll make eyes or burst. It aint her fault she (47) was just born man crazy." Veers between Oliver and Goode & Cyrus
• (48) XIII— Oliver surrenders Accepts position on railroad in West Virginia in order to marry— Still holds his advanced theories & still remains true to his art— The Treadwell hope that marriage will steady him— Cyrus & his triumph over Goode in the shipping of cotton— Honest Tom Tucker
• (49) XIV Virginia Prepares Herself for the Future— Leads up to day of wedding— Deals with town, too— Accepts his views with less enthusiasm but more loyalty— They both look upon marriage as a[n] miraculous act which would, somehow, make not only themselves but everything else different for the future— After that there would be no more vain longings, no (50) spring restlessness, no hours of mere drab dreariness when the interests of life seem to crumble from mere inertia or disenchantment with living. After that day they would be always happy, always eager, always bouyantly alive— XVI Chapters
• (51) Book Second Noon— 1— Virginia's Letters
• (52) II. The Return— After three years with two children— a boy & a girl— Evening in [the] her [little house in] old home— Sarah Jane & John Henry— Conversation between Virginia & Sarah Jane. Virginia spoils her children to death— Typical Southern mother— perfectly maternal where her children are concerned— Wears herself out in useless self-sacrifices— (53) The "angel Children," vilely spoiled, Virginia, who never sees them as they are—
• (54) III— Oliver's Ambition. His play— Absorbed in his books— Drains her & then, according to the artistic temperament becomes coolly quiet.

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• (55) IV. The Risk Borrows money in order to stage it. Goes to see production— Virginia's suspense— Waiting—
• (56) V A Journey that Ends in a Surprise— Failure & loss of money— Virginia goes to him— finds him crushed & dispirited in a little hotel in Philadelphia or New York—
• (57) VI Debt— Return to Dinwiddie— Poverty Oliver's bitterness—
• (58) Add chapter Cyrus's Victory— over Goode—
• (59) [VII— John Henry's Honor— Refuses to acquesing in scheme by which the railroad allows rebates to one man in order to crush another— Scene with family. [Hester's] respect. Sarah Jane]
• (60) VIII— Virginia's Mettle. The hunt— begins on horseback. Recovers her ascendency— but at too great a cost— Arrives first at the death with flowing hair— He was one of the men upon whom habit acts as an irritant rather than instead of as a a sedative. The pursuit of novelty— a characteristic of the artistic temperament—
• (61) IX— The Hand of a Child— Plans to go with him to New York— Where she knows Abby will be— but child's illness diphtheria prevents. Oliver goes without her.
• (62) X Acquiescence— Gives in to life— Accepts motherhood as her end.
• (63) XI Oliver Proves Himself a Treadwell— Success of his play— Gradual yielding of convictions— Writes a play in which he adjusts his talent to the public tastes— The pleasure of popularity— His views gradually change— He begins to grow conservative & Philistine—
• (64) XII The Problems of the New South Wrecking of a train by a discharged negro— a mulatto who is really the son of Cyrus— violent race feeling the result— Old washer woman comes to house for clothes. Threats of lynching— Cyrus refuses to interfere when the old washer woman comes to him— (65) XIII Two Solutions— Cyrus refuses to interfere— David goes fishing— Meets fleeing negro. Goes into little cabin— Gives his life for him— Gabriel goes fishing in the Appomattox— Describe his day. In the middle of his lunch he is interrupted by a fleeing negro, pursued by a party of toughs & His old fighting spirit (66) arises in him— He knocks one man in the head, takes his gun & fights to the death— While the negro flees—
• (67) XIV Noiseless Years— Virginia adjusts herself to life— Materialism truimphant The complete & final adjustment of Oliver to present conditions— Effect on her— Grows middle-aged— Sees her youth slipping— slipping— pitiful efforts to hold it— The bitter years—
• (68) XV.
• (69) The Declining Day— 1— [Noiseless Years]
• (70) [II— Two Children—]
• (71) III— Another Treadwell Success. The House in Lombard Street— discuss Oliver. Sarah Jane & John Henry— Rules him by indirect influence. Much cleverer [than he but he never suspects it—] As better she is frankly dominant— A Treadwell every inch— [The woman who makes his play—]
• (72) S. J. the president of womans clubs literary societies. Very literary— remarks Dinwiddie— —even reads Browning for pleasure—
• (73) IV. Middle-Age [Sees her youth leaving her— Strives to hold it—] Her children— The woman who makes Oliver's success— The primitive instinct of motherhood exaggerated John Henry & Sarah Jane— Contrast marriages—
• (74) V. The Great Play— [Meets Margaret Auld, the woman] The beginning of his passion for the Star—
• (75) VI. The Man's Side— He has remained young while she has grown old— They belong to different generations already— He handsome, greyhaired, bright eyed, alert, active— She wrinkled, timid, & uncongenial to him— The revival of his youth— And this love brought the sense of [exaltation,] power the

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  infinite possibilities the belief in the ideal which had come to him when he fell in love with Virginia (76) It was not only first love that brought this awakening— It was last love, also—
• (77) VII The Woman's Side— She had builded her life upon love and when that crumbled her house of life collapsed— Idealism crushed by materialism— The old by the new— She felt as if she had ever known him— had never even seen him— as if an impenetrable wall (—the wall of sex) had separated them from the first minute— She was left behind (78) like a bit of a romance the art or the morality (or the law) of the last century— She had no place in the present. Her ideals were the ideals of an older (another) generation— While Oliver had moved forward she had remained stationary in the spot in which he had first met her—
• (79) VIII— Jenny's Escapade— Falls in love with actor & elopes. Cyrus's Victory—
• (80) IX— [Harry] Her Son— Like her— Inherits her point of view & her idealism— goes to College— She goes with Oliver to New York where his play is staged —The Home.
• (81) X— A Night of Triumph— Hears him pitied for having an old & dowdy wife—
• (82) XI— The Star— Margaret Auld— Her passion for Oliver— Their meeting. Virginia goes to see her— The actress makes up her mind to [sepa] give him up—
• (83) XII— The Other Woman's Side— Her last love— her last hold on youth— Life slipping, slipping from her, and the one thing she had wanted she had never had— To feel a great passion for the first time at forty— To watch the lives it burns up, To feel one's self burning to a cinder— And to know that the last chance of happiness is offered one— at forty!
• (84) XIII— Love the Destroyer— He comes to her & she yields—
• (85) XIV. Home— Virginia returns to Dinwiddie— Oliver does not write to her— waiting— All the individual anguish made not the faintest impression upon the universe— John Henry & Sarah Jane— Cyrus broken by Goode's death— His life is empty. Nothing to live for—
• (86) XV. The Blow— The Divorce— Her son is in Europe— Daughter unsympathetic Cyrus— His attitude
• (87) XVI— Flight—Goes to New York on day of their marriage
• (88) XVII. Love the Builder— The Master Builder—Her wanderings & her son— Hope sang again like an imprisoned bird in her breast— She felt herself strong to face life— To pity, to suffer & to love in the future as she had pitied, suffered & loved in the past— a [thrill like the thrill of first love was in her moved her]
• (89) [A magic like that magic of first love] The magic & the exaltation of first love pulsed was returned to her in her veins while she stood there— & in the midst of the arid space of the square— She smelt the scent of honey suckle [blooming] blooming on that June afternoon [almost thi almost] thirty years ago—
• (90) In Oliver materialism & idealism struggle & materialism conquers in the end—
• (91) [Son of Cyrus] Oliver— A variation from the Treadwell type— a materialist turned romantic— A creature of generous impulse— but variable. Selfish & fickle— A charming egoist— Hatred of Cyrus— who stands for Respectability— The Bohemian in Oliver meets the Philistine in Cyrus— Always making and breaking good resolutions A strong spirit and a weak will & character. His tendency to borrow money which he forgets to return (92) His extravagance & Virginia's economy cigars, wines food Relation between art & morality— When he sacrifices his art to popularity a gradual deterioration sets in— The effect of Virginia's unselfishness on his character—

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• (93) On the burning June afternoon when Virginia's romance begins Miss Pocahontas Batte [sto] was feeding her green parrot on the little square porch of her Female Academy— At her side a lattice as green as the parrot was [cov] mantled in a luxuriant musk cluster-roses, & through the cloud of blooms, She could see the hot dust that stretched away like golden (94) veil over the [little] city of Dinwiddie— Through this veil, bringing a part of it with him, there appeared suddenly the figure of a strange young man in a dog-cart— from the ["I declare] end of Lombard Street, [he drove toward her down the length of] which was deserted save for an old negro woman in a red turban, who (95) squatted [in th] on the curbing he drove straight toward her, revealing as he approached a remarkably fresh looking face [under] with a pair of [smiling] searching dark eyes that
• (96) Virginia— A wide brow with thick, arched eyebrows above a pair of hyacinth blue eyes— A grave oval face, with a sweetly curving [mouth,] lips which gave an expression of smiling archness to her mouth— Dark brown hair [sweeping in p] sweeping in two shining wing-like waves from the parting [on] above her forehead— dew washed eyes. Very religious
• (97) Lisle thread & silk gloves— for men— windsor ties flower bonnets Leghorn, Milan— Wrap of pale gray cashmere lined with rose— & trimmed with Spanish lace— black grosgrain silk— trimmed in solk passementerie— "bouffant" drapery in the back dolman— small [bott] bonnet of black lace— figured ottoman— cotton ottoman also (98) felt bonnet trimmed with seal-skin bonnet tulle for party dresses— black lace shawl black ottoman silk— chenille fringe— [Jerseys] Jersey— alpaca— plus scarf on table
• (99) Love him but don't think about him— That's the whole trouble— women think too much— for, men have learned how to love a woman & yet not think about her— Va does not see the untidiness of the town— Its effect on Oliver
• (100) Lumber—Goode who owns lumber tracts. (101) XXX Discarded rails— makes his own ties from his own lumber— An old broken down engine and some discarded rails. Cyrus capitalizes the road & makes a fortune— Gains control of Dinwiddie R. R.— When people refuse right of way through their lands— brought the cases into court, & when lands were condemned bought them for practically nothing—
• (102) Chapter III. When Youth meets Youth. Virginia's awakening— eyes like
• (103) 1— The Dream. II— The Reality. III. The Adjustment—
• (104) Margaret Auld— A woman of forty-three, with good impulses utterly uncontrolled— Has never denied herself & having broken the old-fashioned bondage of duty has as yet accepted no other discipline from life—
• (105) On a flowery May afternoon in the year 1881 Miss Pocahontas Tabb having learned the lesson in Arithmetic she would teach her junior class in the morning, stood feeding her [lit] green & red parrot on the little square porch of the Dinwiddie Female Academy— Beyond the cage <there rose> at her right hand a green lattice supported a luxuriant musk cluster rose, in full bloom & fragrance, &
• (106) On a [fragrant] flowery May afternoon some thirty years ago, (in the year 1881) the large green & red parrot (dozing in his cage beneath the musk cluster rose on the [little] porch of Miss Pocahontas Tabb's Female Academy, was aroused from his [light pleasant] slumber by the appearance of a [new,] rapidly driven [gig] cart, in the almost deserted streets of Dinwiddie
• (107) On a burning afternoon [at the end of] May the green parrot that dozed with one eye open under the climbing musk cluster rose on the lattice at the end of the small square porch of Miss P-----, F----- A------ ---------- [above this the a line thin lines of lettering on a black] surface

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  announced above that the odd little three cornered roof was drawn like a hood over the stout, white
• (108) Dinwiddie— Book First. The Morning of Life— Book First The Car of Progress— Book Second. Noon— Book Third— The Declining Day— Dinwiddie having lost taste during its adversity, celebrated its returning prosperity by the reckless purchase of [ghastly] Victorian sets of furniture filled pawn-shops with old mahogany—
• (109) Virginia Chapter 1— Honeysuckle— Miss Pocahontas Tabb on porch of Female Academy— Oliver passes— June afternoon— Describe Dinwiddie & Miss [Batte.] Tabb Two girls appear— while they stand there Oliver (of whom they have been talking, passes again— Love at first sight. Virginia & Sarah Jane go home— Conversation between them in which S. J. shows an interest in Oliver— Give atmosphere of town on June afternoon. Honeysuckle on trellis in Pendleton's garden— Va stands under it & dreams. Mingling of fragrance with her thoughts of love—
• (110) II— The Spirit of the Past— Evening in Pendleton's home— Describe house— very poor, but with great charm— David & Belinda Pendleton— Two visionary idealists, who never see anything as it is, but always through their optimistic temperament— Va & her mother go out to carry (strawberries) or raspberries to an old parishioner— Pass Oliver again in the darkening street— The flickering gas lamps in the street (perhaps oil—) John Henry— On them the religion of tradition still kept its hold— David gives away the marketing goes to market—
• (111) III— Virginia's Inheritance— David's Gabriel's history— A soldier in war which broke out [sev] a year after his ordination. Then returns penniless— Sells his watch & gives half of the money to Cyrus— His life as a poor clergyman in an impoverished community— Simple faith & goodness his characteristics— Believes in everybody— from the beggar in the street to Cyrus—
• Chap VI— Moves forward several afternoons & leads up to Cyrus— Goes to Cyrus to ask him to take John Henry at bank & finds he has given Oliver place
• (112) IV— The House with the Oleanders (on Lombard Street.) The same Evening— Describe house when Cyrus enters. His wife, son, daughter— Entrance of Oliver as conversation at supper—Mrs Cyrus upstairs talking to Oliver— The contempt they all feel for poor spiritless Mrs Treadwell— S. J. the intellectual— Mrs Treadwell's mental & physical slovenliness— Sue ashamed of the table—
• (113) V— A Stranger in Philistia— Oliver in the environment of Cyrus' home. His sensation of being smothered— Doubts as to whether he dare decline to be teller in the bank. Finds his aunt & Miss Matty Whitlow together. Mrs T——'s one enjoyment— Oliver's theory of art. A lie the only sin in an artist— Quarrels with Cyrus & leaves his house— Engages room & bed & gets position on Dinwiddie Bee for 25 a month— Full of Romantic Utopian ideals, which he loses later in life—
• (114) Oliver VI— the Romantic The Car of Progress— Cyrus, the great man— His history— The legend about him in Dinwiddie. Not yet reached his full financial growth at fifty— The possibility of the failure of the Dinwiddie Chemical Co; His half contempt, respect for Gabriel— Goode & the R. R. His one weakness— He saves Gabriel little fortune from the wreck— Oliver ruined by his mother's selfish maternal instinct— Mrs Cyrus— Her terror of her husband— Her pitiful clinging to little pieces of the past Oliver leaves her house—
• (115) [Market] VII— [S. J. Goes to Market] The Spirit of the Present Sarah Jane & John Henry— Two really fine types— The clever woman attracted by the dull man, who has a sentiment about Virginia— Makes up her mind to marry him— S. J. the perfectly practical, [Oliver's progress Sacrifice for art] unsentimental type— S. J. the woman who sees men & things as they are &

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  accepts them with humorous sympathy— Va who idealises them & is impatient of imperfection— S. J. S. J. who understands everybody except her mother—
• (116) VIII. White Magic (—change to next) A love scene as a church lawn party— Oliver & his sacrifice for art— [This chapter takes Oliver after his quarrel with Cyrus—] [Aunt Poky visits him in his] Virginia & her clothes— How little she dressed on— Draw Gabriel very carefully—
• (117) IX— Oliver [the] Dreamer— Variation from Type— Shows him in his one room at Mrs Peachey's —wife of honest Tom Peachey, editor of the Bee— The paper dragging on a voiceless existance— Rebels against the code of precept to which Cyrus subscribes— Unfettered by tradition. Aunt Poky visits him in his rooms & strives to win him back to orthodoxy— Passionately moral— His white heated & uncritical altruism—
• (118) X— The Romance of a Materialist. Cyrus The R. R—Raised subscriptions to the stock of the Dinwiddie & [Midland—] Southside, to the amount of $150.000—Contrasts him again with Gabriel—
• (119) XI— Under the Parrot's Eye—Oliver meets Virginia at Miss Tabbs— His struggles— gradual triumph of love over his work— poverty— The temptation— The Peacheys— Determines to conquer his love) yet knows all the time that it is conquering his resolve— Walks home with Virginia— The ideal woman— who inspires men—
• (120) XII— The Market Two Women— Abby & Virginia— The Goodes & Cyrus— Abby comes to see Virginia— She, too, has a fancy for Oliver— Their conversation— Goode's fight for the life of his R. R— All meet in the market— Describe it—
• (121) XIII— The Wheels of the Car— Cyrus gains control of the editor of The Bee— Cyrus at home— Mrs Treadwell & Miss Matty— Miss Willy.
• (122) XIV— Oliver in Revolt— Revolts against social conditions, against money, against Cyrus' ways of making money— Struggles against love & what the yielding to it means— Work on the Bee— Walks about town— Into country— The Peacheys— Oliver's misery—
• (123) XV. The Keeper of Ideals— Gabriel Pendleton— Goes to Cyrus to ask him to put fire-escapes & improve the staircase in factory— & is met by a refusal, but an offer to contribute to the organ in his church— The Pendletons—
• (124) XVI— Oliver Surrenders— He askes Va to marry him & then tells Cyrus— He will accept his offer of a position in a R. R. in W. Va. J. H. has place in bank. Resigns his freedom in the ferver of love— Expects love to make up for everything he gives up & marriage to make a different character of him— —a character not averse to R. R. work.
• (125) Book II— Noon— 1— Virginia's Letters. Long, sweet, very womanly letters to S. J., her mother & father. Shows her utter selflessness in little unconscious ways. Describes [th] Oliver & the two children— "A thousand thanks for the little flannel bands— They were just what I wanted." "Though Oliver is the most generous man living— The other day when the wife of Mr. Raeburn (he is manager of traffic, you know) died, he sent the most gorgeous wreath you can imagine—
• (126) II— The Wisdom of Sarah Jane— John Henry's Dream— Dwell on the difference between the ideal & the actual. Va the dream, Sarah J. the actual. Happier with S. J. than he could have been with Va. The softened intellectual— rules J. H.
• (127) III— The Return. Va on the evening of her return— Anxiety about the children— The tiny house— Her conversations with her father & mother & with S. J.
• (128) IV— The Idealist as Mother— Her utter lack of wisdom where the children are concerned— Foolish sacrifices— Cannot see that Oliver is not as absorbed in domesticity as she is—

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• (129) The Treadwell V— [Oliver] as an Artist Absorbed in his play— Irritation at Virginia's lack of artistic sympathy. Her little practical cares sometimes get on his nerves—
• (130) VI— The Risk— Borrows money in order to stage his play—
• (131) VII— The Failure— Mrs Cyrus steals money from her husband to give Virginia to go to Oliver— Or sells the one thing which is really hers— an old silver sugar bowl belonging to the Tabbs.
• (132) VIII— The Devil of Compromise. The effect of failure & poverty on Oliver— Tries his hand at a different sort of play— Gradual yielding to public standards— His whole character shows the results of his compromise—
• (133) The Treadwell IX— [Legend] Myth [Cyrus Triumphant]. Cyrus— The great man— The legend regarding Cyrus as benefactor
• (134) X— The Idealist in Business— (John Henry—)
• (135) XI— The Mettle of Virginia— Conflict between Va & Abbey— The foxhunt— Arranges to go to New York with Oliver.
• (136) XII— The Hand of a Child. Harry's illness— Dyptheria Quarantines herself— The mother stronger than the wife— Mrs Cyrus rises to the occasion—
• (137) XIII— Oliver Proves Himself a Treadwell. His growing cynicism— Sees through himself— his limitations— Realises that he is not a genius.
• (138) XIV. Acquescence—
• (139) XV. The Problem of the New South.
• (140) XVI. The Two Solutions—
• (141) Book Third The Declining Day— 1— The Haven of Philistia. Cyrus goes to Mrs P. His one generous act—
• (142) II— The Price of Comfort.
• (143) III. The Great Play.
• (144) IV— Youth the Immortal [The] (Recrurdescence) A second awakening like that of adolescence —yet how different from youth's white rage for perfection.
• (145) V— The Man's Side. His second youth— He has outgrown her by half a lifetime— Like an institution that has been outgrown. The two ways— Knowing & seeing the good, yet unable to choose it— The light— He felt the suddenly the compelling need of some definite resistant force to lean back on— of some hard & narrow morality, some dogmatic unyielding religion— [A second awakening like the awaken]
• (146) VI— The Woman's Side. She was not old— only forty-five— Yet life had worn her out and left her only a shell— Sue, with her six children had kept her youth and her interests; but then, Sue had never given herself— The inviobility of her soul had preserved the freshness of her body— Life slipping, slipping— She had given, but never demanded— Had made the way too easy, had never held him to his ideals. The sense of a changed world that comes to women past their first youth.
• (147) VII— Jenny's Romance—
• (148) VIII— Her Son—
• (149) IX— A Treadwell Success—
• (150) X. The Star—
• (151) XI. The Other Woman's Side. Generous in fits, impulsive, kindhearted— forty-three— Not voluptuous— a hard working intellectual actress, who had kept passion outside of her life.
• (152) XII. Love (as Materialist.) The Destroyer.
• (153) XIII— Home— She had asked only one thing of life— the traditional position of woman— She had never rebelled against the circumscription of her lot— rather had she embraced its very limitations— The position which [tradition & natu] society had assigned to women, she had accepted not only

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  with resignation, but with rejoicing— & this was her reward— At the end she was stranded on the wreck of the one thing to which she had given herself—
• (154) XIV. The Voice of Dinwiddie Cyrus perfectly dried up, like a withered fruit— No longer any capacity for enjoyment— Hard, cold to the end— Cyrus after his wife's death— Loss of his passive presence— Misses somebody to bully— S. J.'s fine character & happy marriage founded on cheerful common-sense— Cyrus after a lifetime of relentless grasping seeking to buy salvation by donations to churches— The myth completed. Death of Goode wrecks him— not death of wife
• (155) XV— Flight.
• (156) XVI. Love as 'Idealist' Builder— In her distracted flight her son finds her in a city square. Takes her into a cheap restaurant & coaxes her to eat— Ends with the triumph of motherhood & filial love— "Give people— give women something to build their happiness on except emotion."
• (157) Epilogue John Henry walking instreets of Dinwiddie. Thinks of the past to alter S----- J the [future] present which has already forgotten it— Is life but an endless cycle— "[She's] He's a fine fellow, & she's at last got something strong enough for her to cling to. That's what she's always wanted & thank god, she's found it at last." We are that way. J. H stout, plethoric, phlem— Do you remember my old verities— "A parrot will do—
• (158) Cyrus Treadwell— Type of constructive materialist. James Treadwell, a narrower & weaker edition of his father— Sarah Jane— A conscientious materialist, Cyrus cannot crush her. Mrs Treadwell, a victim to the greatness of Cyrus— Oliver— in whom the opposing forces of materialism & idealism are at war— David [Cape] Pendleton the visionary spiritual idealist, Mrs Pendleton, who never sees any fact as it is— Virginia, type of romantic idealist— John Henry Pendle (159) ton — conscientious idealist. Cyrus who justifies all iniquities with "that's business." "You don't understand business." Mrs T— soft and yet unadaptable woman, with a certain liquid quality of tone formless— "She put all of her eggs into one basket, & having summed up the tragedy of Virginia's life in this homely phrase J. H. proceeded to light his pipe
• (160) Virgil's "Sense of tears in mortal things." (ineluctable?) plight. fend- ruinous. Dissonance— Dishearten— shaded-tipped Coral-tinted lily-shaped buds in the buckeye tree. kindling—diapered— ponderous anecdotes.
• (161) April 5th little-new green leaves sprinkling the poplars— [M] Silver Maple[s] twigs budding in green leaves— Buckeye & horse chestnut buds just swelling— draped overskirt Three graduated bows of ribbon with matched ends fastened down the left side of the overskirt innumerable rows of black velvet ribbon—
• (162) [Men] history as a list of [mere] dates or a general on horseback. Dinwiddie Disson Penhallow not Va Calloway— Beverly— Ballard— Blair— Broadnax Grammar— Peachey— Peterkin— Pocahontas Broadnax Cassowary—
• (163) Polonaise— 1884 Figured cotton ottoman— dotted mull. Cashmere— chambray— round hats "a bonnet is more positively full toilette— bonnets— short bang— Straw bonnet with tie-strings of green satin ribbon & & green leaves in a bunch— Jet plastron—

Loose Notes, not from Notebook No. 2

• (1) Ellen Glasgow passport No. 403731
• (2) Gathered April 1st at Reveille— Violets— <hyathius—> Jonquils— blood root, hepatica— all blooming in March— also— bridal wreath— peach & pear blooms— peas not quite out. Cru Cruicform church ailanthus Tinpot Alley Cockade Alley [Past]

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• (3) Dinwiddie Miss Pocahontas' house. Little square wing on right— square porch with gabled pediment— paling fence, stone steps leading past Linden trees. Mule cars down Washington & Sycamore. Smoke of factories poor. horse-chestnut— park— & white willow oaks— yew trees on great very old [brick]wall (4) Washington Street square grey house, square porches office in yard High Street— Two marble hounds on steps— Statues in the yard— From Bolingbroke into North Sycamore— up into Bank— one block long— then becomes High— Down at beginning of High Street— (5) Rectory. terraced to street. stone steps to street— twelve steps to street— Long porch, frame— gambril roof dormer windows outside chimney [a his large ailanthus] palonia purple ailanthus upon great trees just in front of porch— roots you can sit on— honeysuckle— elm— ivy covered— one grave at side of church— broad butresses— five dormer-windows in rectory— old brick cornices palonia tree at back (6) with ivy— flagstones in front of three wooden steps. 4 stucko columns to porch big bed of mint under window— back of house north, front south just at back of church, divided by a paling fence— near the head of High St. Long Market crooks & becomes Short Market (7) High Street House in South Sycamore red brick. Square porch front & side— (brick) Tall black wrough iron gates at two sides opening into [half-cir] half circular walk crescent shaped, edged by box— spruce, magnolia, holly, crepe myrtle in front— guilder rose— Virginia Central Park, filled with buttercups elms & maples & half a block from house
• (8) House in Bolingbroke Street— Old red brick— [thro] four marble steps— Colonial doorway wide hall, curved stairway Put High Street in Bolingbroke Small granite porch, three steps, iron railing up steps to door— two green tubs of oleander—
• (9) From the Market to Old Street— Short Market Street in High Street— Down High to Bank, to Sycamore. To Bolingbroke. South Sycamore— Miss Priscilla, who mentally translated history into figures— as a list of dates— or into illustrations as a general on horseback— Capitalists in New York interested in revitaling the South
• (10) Magnolia tree, crêpe myrtle— [bare]gress Bear— bridal wreath— Walk edged by pointed bricks— & bordered by wall-flowers— stone steps leading from the street into yard— Box tunnel. for their own advantage found him an invaluable instrument director or trustee in<any>corporation
• (11) population of Petersburg in 1880, was 21656— in town.
• (12) The Turks say "God gives, but He does not carry home." (13) One may perform heroic actions while dodging stones, but one can hardly execute a work of art in such an attitude— Martyrdom, which is good for religion is bad for literature— Dat aint de pint, honey— de pint is— is it pleasant? —"Fielding's "No woman can be truly gentle etc (14) The flat moments not the high ones fill a life— (15) Napoleon at Warsaw, "From the sublime to the ridiculous is only one step—"

Notes