25th_. Rainy. Glad of it. Breakfast late. Miss Etty did not
appear, having been up some hours, I imagine. What for, I wonder? What
can she be about? One thing pleases me in her. If Aunt Tabitha wants
any little attention, a needle threaded, or a dropped stitch taken up,
Miss Etty quietly comes to her aid. It is so entirely a matter of
course, the old lady only smiles, but any service from Flora calls
forth an acknowledgment; it being a particular effort of good nature,
and generally the fruit of a direct appeal. Miss Etty talks more than
she did, too. While I am talking nonsense with Little Handsome, I hear
her amusing my good aunty, and I catch a few words, her utterance
having a peculiar distinctness, and the lowest tones being fine and
clear, like those of a good singer on a pianissimo strain. It is a
peculiarly ladylike articulation; was she born and bred in Ratborough,
I wonder? She never speaks while we are singing. Does she like music,
then? I asked her once, but what sort of answer is "Yes!" to such a
question? And that is all I elicited.
Music again, the forenoon occupation. Miss Flora does not like being
criticized, I find. One must not presume to set her right in the
smallest particular. Singers are proverbially irritable! I am not
certain _I_ could belong to a glee-club, and never get cross or
unreasonable.
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