meanwhile, society girl violet ray of new york writes to a friend that miranda, who she sees as provincial, is "really too horrible." another boarder, wannabe aesthete louis leverett (quite possibly a self-satire by james) gushes in his letter that "the great thing is to live, you know," amid much precious verbiage about the good, the true and the bee-a-u-tiful. an english boarder, evelyn vane, pens a scoffing note that louis is always talking about the color of the sky, but she doubts if he's ever seen it except through a window-pane; and the german sees leverett's "decadence" as further evidence that the english-speaking world is weak and ripe for takeover.