slipped away to pleasant days gone
by; and Mrs. Pearce would come and talk to her, standing respectfully,
and reminding her of little things which Aunt Victoria had forgotten,
or alluding with mysterious nods and shakings of the head to other
things which Beth was not to hear about. When this happened Beth
always withdrew. She was becoming shy of intruding now, and delicate
about overhearing anything that was not intended for her; and when she
had gone on these occasions, the two old ladies would nod and smile to
each other, Prentice in respectful approval, and Aunt Victoria in
kindly acknowledgment. Prentice wore a cap and front like Aunt
Victoria, but of a subdued brown colour, as became her humble station.

Beth took charge of the housekeeping as soon as they arrived, made
tea, arranged the groceries in the cupboard, and put the key in her
pocket; and Aunt Victoria, who was sitting upright on a high
Chippendale chair, knitting, and enjoying the dignity of the old
attitude after her journey, looked on over her spectacles in pleased
approval. Before they went to bed, they read the evening psalms and
lessons together in the sitting-room, and Aunt Victoria read prayers.
When they went upstairs they said their private prayers, kneeling
beside the bed, and Aunt Victoria made Beth wash herself in hot water,
and brush her hair for half-an-hour. Aunt Victoria attributed her own
slender, youthful figure and the delicate texture of her skin to this
discipline. She said she had preserved her figure by never relaxing
into languid attitudes, and her complexion by washing her face in hot
water with fine white soap every night, and in cold water without soap
every morning. She did not take her fastidious appetite into
consideration, nor her simple, regular life, nor the fact that she
never touched alcohol in any shape or form, nor wore a tight or heavy
garment, nor lost her self-control for more than a moment whatever
happened, but Beth discovered for herself, as she grew older, that
these and that elevated attitude of mind which is religion, whatever
the form preferred to express it, are essential parts of the
discipline necessary for the preservation of beauty.

In the morning Beth made breakfast, and when it was over, if crusts
had accumulated in the cupboard, she steeped them in hot milk in a
pie-dish, beat them up with an egg, a little butter, sugar, currants,
and candied peel, and some nutmeg grated, for a bread-pudding, whic