They are so dismally sympathetic.

Everywhere I go there are long faces and solemn hand-shakes.

In order to cheer myself I gave a little dinner-party at the club, and the function might have been a depressed wake with my corpse in a coffin on the table.

My sisters, dear, kind souls, follow me with anxious eyes as if I were one of their children sickening for chicken-pox.

They upbraid me for leaving them in ignorance, and in hushed voices inquire as to my symptoms.