'You know we are all jealous of both Charles Cheviots, elder and younger.'
'I often question whether I should not have taken her down and made her ashamed of all the quizzing and teasing at the time of Mary's marriage. But one cannot be always spoiling bright merry mischief, and I am only elder sister after all. It is a wonder she is as good to me as she is.'
'She never remembered our mother, poor dear.'
'Ah! that is the real mischief,' said Ethel. 'Mamma would have given the atmosphere of gentleness and discretion, and so would Margaret. How often I have been made, by the merest pained look, to know when what I said was saucy or in bad taste, and I—I can only look forbidding, or else blurt out a reproof that will not come softly.'
'The youngest must be spoilt,' said Flora, 'that's an ordinance of nature. It ends when a boy goes to school, and when a girl—'
'When?'
'When she marries—or when she finds out what trouble is,' said Flora.
'Is that all you can hold out to my poor Daisy?'
'Well, it is the way of the world. There is just now a reaction from sentiment, and it is the less feminine variety. The softness will come when there is a call for it. Never mind when the foundation is safe.'
'If I could only see that child heartily admiring and looking up! I don't mean love—there used to be a higher, nobler reverence!'