The way that the story of Undine discussed marriage was very telling about the way that women were looked at during this time. Throughout the section of the story that we read, how Undine changes and defers to her husband shows how women, no matter how powerful they might have been before, needed to become secondary to their husbands. I first noticed this when the story mentions how the three people who knew Undine best were waiting for “some whimsical vagary of her capricious spirit [to] burst forth” (pg. 102). The paragraph goes on to mention that she was “mild and gentle” (pg.102) which is a complete change from her previous personality. This change only comes the day after she is married to the knight Huldbrand, which hints that marriage has caused her change of spirit. The shift in Undine has two different representations because she is both a woman and a water spirit. I believe that calming her personality can represent men taming both women and nature. This story places men at the top of all hierarchies, they are the ones who control the estate and can impact how nature itself acts. During the 19th century, the man was the head of the family and the woman was supposed to answer to him, but this show of power was also extended to nature in some ways. As a water spirit, Undine acts like water, she’s unpredictable and wild. But once she is married and gains a soul, she calms and is “tamed”. Huldbrand notices this when they go to a stream and see it “rippling along in gentle waves, without a trace of its former wildness and swell” (pg. 103). Since Undine can control a certain body of water, that water would represent how she is feeling and her personality because it is an extension of her. In this case, this stream represents Undine and her new disposition. Before being married, the stream and Undine were free and wild, as nature tends to be, but after they are both subdued. This shows that men at this time were trying to find ways to control women and nature.