"I don't approve of all this. Not at all. Not at all. These children
have had a more elaborate Christmas than mine. They've had as good a
dinner, a handsomer tree, and as many presents as some well-off people.
It's all nonsense, putting notions in their heads when they're as poor
as poverty itself and have their living to make. I don't approve of it.
Not at all."

She bristled so stiff and shook her head so vigorous that the little jet
ornaments on her bonnet just tinkled like bells, and one fell off.

Mrs. Christopher Pryor is one of the people who would like to tell the
Lord how to run this earth. She could run it. That He lets the rain fall
and sun shine on everybody alike is a thing she don't approve of either.
As for poor people, she thinks they ought to be thankful for breath, and
not expect more than enough to keep it from going out for good.

She's very decided in her views, and never keeps them to herself. It's
the one thing she gives away. Everything else she holds on to with such
a grip that it keeps her upper lip so pressed down on her under lip that
she breathes through her nose most of the time.

She's a very curious shape. Being stout, she has to hold her head up to
keep her chin off her fatness; and she goes in so at the waist, coming
out top and bottom, that you would think something in her would get
jammed out of place. You really would.

There are seven daughters. No sons. The boys call their place Hen-House.
There is a husband, but nobody seems to notice him; and when with his
wife, he always walks behind.