ts beauty, she wishes to cut off all
chance of its future resumption.

In order to determine whether this sentiment of passionate virginity
(which in effect makes the marriage vow of fidelity retroactive) is not,
in the present condition of the world, a trifle overstrained, I have
submitted the question to two refined women for whom I have a high
regard. To my surprise they both declared that Svava, whatever she may
have said to the contrary, did not love her _fiance_; that her sorrow
and even her indignation were just and natural; but that her somewhat
over-conscious purity--her _virginite savante_, as Balzac phrases it in
"Modeste Mignon," and her inability to give due weight to ameliorating
circumstances were unwomanly. I confess I am not without sympathy with
this criticism. Svava, though she is right in her vehement protest
against masculine immorality, is not charming--that is, according to our
present notion of what constitutes womanly charm. It is not unlikely,
however, that like Leonarda she is meant to anticipate a new type of
womanhood, co-ordinate and coequal with man, whose charm shall be of a
wholly different order. The coquetry, the sweet hypocrisy, nay, all the
frivolous arts which exercise such a potent sway over the heart of man
have their roots in the prehistoric capture and thraldom; and from the
point of view of the woman suffragists, are so many reminiscences of
degradation. I fancy that Bjoernson, sharing this view, has with full
deliberation made Svava boldly and inexorably truthful, frank as a boy
and as uncompromisingly honest as a man.

She has sufficient use for this masculine equipment (I am speaking in
accordance with the effete standards) in the battle which is before her.
Dr. Nordan, the family physician, her parents, and those of her
_fiance_, take her to task and endeavor to demonstrate to her the
consequences of her unprecedented demand. She learns in the course of
this prolonged debate that she has been living in a fool's paradise. She
has been purposely (and with the most benevolent intention) deceived in
regard to this question from the very cradle. Her father, whom she has
believed to be a model husband, proves to have been unworthy of her
trust. The elder Christensen has also had a compromising intrigue of the
same kind; and it becomes obvious that each male creature is so
indulgent in this chapter toward every other male creature, because each
knows himself to be equally vulnera