Once Archer and May are engaged, Archer gets to know her better and becomes increasingly frustrated with her innocence and lack of knowledge about the world. During a moment of inner reflection, he uses a pair of metaphors to capture her ignorance:
It would presently be his task to take the bandage from this young woman’s eyes, and bid her look forth on the world. But how many generations of the women who had gone to her making had descended bandaged to the family vault? He shivered a little, remembering some of the new ideas in his scientific books, and the much-cited instance of the Kentucky cave-fish, which had ceased to develop eyes because they had no use for them. What if, when he had bidden May Welland to open hers, they could only look out blankly at blankness?
The first metaphor Archer uses here—describing May’s innocence as a bandage over her eyes—demonstrates how he views her lack of worldly experience to be akin to literal “blindness.” It is notable that he doesn’t blame May for this ignorance, but sees “the generations of women who had gone to her making” who were similarly “bandaged.” In other words, he’s arguing, May is merely continuing the legacy of female ignorance passed down to her by her family.
Archer then shifts the metaphor somewhat, comparing May to “the Kentucky cave-fish, which had ceased to develop eyes because they had no use for them.” Unlike blindness due to a removable bandage, these cave-fish are—and will always be—blind, as it is part of their very being. This metaphor frightens Archer as it means it’s possible that he and May might never be able to be true partners in their relationship.
As Archer states, he learned about the Kentucky cave-fish from “new ideas in his scientific books.” This is an allusion to the writings of Charles Darwin, an evolutionary scientist who referenced the cave-fish in his writings on natural selection.
When Ellen leaves for Boston out of the blue during her emotional affair with Archer, he is distraught. The narrator captures his worried state using a metaphor and imagery:
Archer was dealing hurriedly with crowding thoughts. His whole future seemed suddenly to be unrolled before him; and passing down its endless emptiness he saw the dwindling figure of a man to whom nothing was ever to happen. He glanced about him at the unpruned garden, the tumble-down house, and the oak-grove under which the dusk was gathering.
The metaphor here—in which Archer’s future becomes a scroll “unrolled before him” that contains nothing but “endless emptiness” and “a dwindling figure of a man to whom nothing was ever to happen”—effectively communicates Archer’s hopelessness. Readers understand that, in Archer’s mind, Ellen represents freedom from society’s restrictive rules and the opportunity to have a life fully of his own choosing. Without her, he fears he will be stuck in a suffocating and uneventful marriage with May.
The descriptions in the final line in this passage—phrases such as “the unpruned garden," "the tumble-down house," and "the oak-grove under which the dusk was gathering”—are also notable. The garden and house mirror Archer’s inner state as, in this moment, he feels like a run-down and lackluster version of himself without Ellen. The description of dusk here is also significant, as it represents an ending—the day is coming to a close, as is Archer’s optimism about his future.
In many ways, Archer’s mother (Mrs. Archer) represents the most traditional aspects of New York society. When describing how Mrs. Archer views changes taking place in New York, the narrator uses a potent metaphor:
[P]unctually at about this time Mrs. Archer always said that New York was very much changed. Observing it from the lofty stand-point of a nonparticipant, she was able […] to trace each new crack in its surface, and all the strange weeds pushing up between the ordered rows of social vegetables. […] For New York, to Mrs. Archer’s mind, never changed without changing for the worse.
In this metaphor, New York is described as a vegetable garden wherein the traditionalist elite who happily follow the rules make up “ordered rows of social vegetables” while “strange weeds” (such as those trying to change the rules or make them more progressive) “push up between them.” Mrs. Archer—as the embodiment of tradition—feels that any kind of change is always “for the worse.”
It is notable that the final chapter of the novel takes place 26 years into the future after an enormous amount of change has taken place in New York society—the Metropolitan Museum is now a cultural hub, young men (like Archer’s son Dallas) can pursue careers in politics, architecture, and archaeology rather than just law or business, and they can also marry women who their families might disapprove of (like Dallas marrying Beaufort’s daughter). In showing this, Wharton is suggesting that, though people like Mrs. Archer may fear and resent progressive change, such change is inevitable and should not be resisted.
Near the end of the novel, Archer is becoming increasingly obsessed with Ellen and disinterested in May. While at home together one night, he and May have a tense interaction, during which he metaphorically describes himself as being “dead,” as seen in the following passage:
After he had leaned out into the darkness for a few minutes he heard her say: “Newland! Do shut the window. You’ll catch your death.”
He pulled the sash down and turned back. “Catch my death!” he echoed; and he felt like adding: “But I’ve caught it already. I am dead—I’ve been dead for months and months.”
When May tells Archer that he will “catch [his] death”—an idiom popular at the time meaning to catch a cold or chill—Archer wants to respond that he has already been dead “for months and months.” This language is evocative. Archer doesn’t actually believe that he is dead but feels he has experienced a metaphorical death by being separated from his true love (Ellen) and forced to maintain the façade of a man who is happy in his lackluster marriage.
This metaphor effectively communicates that Archer is not merely a husband who has an affair for the fun of it, but is a man struggling against a society that he feels is killing him. Ellen is a respite from the society he despises, and, without her, he doesn’t even feel alive.
When Archer is at Ellen’s farewell dinner, he becomes aware that everyone at the party (including May) believes that he and Ellen are lovers but are acting as if they do not. The narrator uses a metaphor and a simile to capture Archer’s experience in this scene:
Archer once more disengaged the fact that New York believed him to be Madame Olenska’s lover […] [F]or the first time understood that [May] shared the belief. The discovery roused a laughter of inner devils that reverberated through all his efforts to discuss the Martha Washington ball with Mrs. Reggie Chivers and little Mrs. Newland; and so the evening swept on, running and running like a senseless river that did not know how to stop.
The metaphor here—in which Archer’s inner turmoil is described as “a laughter of inner devils”—captures how crazed he feels knowing that everyone (including his wife) is fiercely judging him for his relationship with Ellen while acting innocent and like nothing unusual is happening.
The simile in this passage—"the evening swept on, running and running like a senseless river that did not know how to stop”—deepens readers’ sense of how out-of-control this evening feels to Archer. Even though he hates it, he takes part in this “senseless” charade, becoming a passive victim of a river that keeps “running and running.” He plays the role of a doting husband bidding farewell to his wife’s cousin despite the fact that everyone knows the situation is far more complicated than that.
