little stuck-up, and their sympathy, thrown back on themselves, began
to cool.

The real facts of the case, however, were these: Primrose, Jasmine and
Daisy would have been very pleased to see Poppy Jenkins, or old Mrs.
Jones, who sometimes came in to do choring, or even the nice little
Misses Price, who kept a grocery shop at the other end of the village
street; they would also have not objected to a visit from good, hearty
Mrs. Fry, the doctor's wife, but had they admitted any of these
neighbors they must have seen Miss Martineau, and Miss Martineau, once
she got a footing in the house, would have been there morning, noon
and night.

Poor Jasmine would not have at all objected to crying away some of her
sorrow on kind Mrs. Fry's motherly breast; Primrose could have had
some really interesting talk which would have done her good with the
Misses Price; they were very religious people, and their brother was a
clergyman, and they might have said some things which would comfort
the sore hearts of the young girls. Little Daisy could have asked some
of her unceasing questions of Poppy Jenkins, and the three would
really have been the better for the visits and the sympathy of the
neighbors did not these visits and sympathy also mean Miss Martineau.
But Miss Martineau at breakfast, dinner, and tea--Miss Martineau, with
her never-ending advice, her good-natured but still unceasingly
correcting tone, was felt just at first to be unendurable. She was
sincerely fond of the girls, whom she had taught to play incorrectly,
and to read French with an accent unrecognized in Paris, but Miss
Martineau was a worry, was a great deal too officious, and so the
girls shut themselves away from her and from all other neighbors for
the first month after their mother's death.