The rest of the family, some to work, some to play, and some to run errands, had been dismissed into the large outside.
The big house was tranquil.

The afternoon sun, which had got round to the kitchen window, blazed in there through a fringe of icicles that hung from the low eaves of the kitchen roof, and sent a long strip of bright prismatic rays across the floor and through the door on to the rag carpet under the dining-room table.

Ever and anon, as the ladies sewed, the sound of sleigh-bells came to them, distant, then nearer, then near, with the trotting of horses' feet as they passed the house, then again more distant.

The dining-room window faced the road, but one could not see through it without standing upright.
"Mamma," said Sophia, "it is quite clear we can never make an ordinary servant out of Eliza; but if we try to be companionable to her we may help her to learn what she needs to learn, and make her more willing to stay with us." It was Mrs.Rexford's way never to approach a subject gradually in speech.

If her mind went through the process ordinarily manifested in introductory remarks it slipped through it swiftly and silently, and her speech darted into the heart of the subject, or skipped about and hit it on all sides at once.
"Ah, but I told her again and again, Sophia, to say 'miss' to the girls.
She either didn't hear, or she forgot, or she wouldn't understand.