in Rugby football instead of three and Robert listened as to an
oracle. They had not been so friendly for weeks. And an hour before-!
Yes, men were different.

And Rosalie found that her sisters, too, knew how different and how
superior men were. Flora and Hilda seemed to Rosalie always to be
talking about men. Flora used to come into the schoolroom while
Rosalie was at her lessons and talk to Hilda. Rosalie was very fond
of her lessons and Hilda was an uncommonly good teacher and took a
great interest in leading Rosalie along the paths she had herself
so recently followed. But directly Flora came in, Hilda's interest
was entirely diverted to what Flora had to say and to what she had
to say to Flora, and it was always about men,--boys or men. Rosalie
would at once be put to learning passages or working out exercises
and Flora and Hilda would go over to the window and talk. They
talked mostly in whispers with their heads close together; they
laughed a good deal; they showed one another letters. Often they
came over to the table and wrote letters. And they used to look up
from their whisperings and say, "Go on with your lessons, Rosalie."

But it was very difficult to go on while they whispered and laughed
and it was also very troublesome to have Hilda's most interesting
explanations suddenly cut short by the entrance of Flora. Rosalie
began to have the habit of saying "Oh, dear!" and going "Tchk!" with
her tongue when Flora came in. Also restlessly to say "Oh, dear!"
and go "Tchk!" when the whisperings and the laughing about men went
on and distracted her attention while she tried to do her exercises.

A new aspect of men began to grow out of this. Rosalie began to
feel rather aggrieved against boys and ten. They interfered.