"Now, my
dears, you must go to Shepherd's Bush--that is the place, and the only
place where you can live within your means. My friend Constantia
Warren has rooms there, and she says--I have written to her, my
loves--she says if you will let her accompany you in your search she
may be able to secure you a clean, respectable bedroom in a fairly
good locality. Constantia is an excellent woman; she is fifty, and
plain in her tastes, and has no nonsense about her. She has promised
me, for my sake, to accompany you to church in the evenings, and to
see that you wear your veils down when you go out, and that you are
back in your bedroom--you can't afford a sitting-room, so don't think
of it--that you are back in your bedroom by five o'clock in the
evening, as all girls who have any idea of what is correct and proper
are of course in by that hour in London. Now, my dears, Constantia
will be a sort of protectress to you three, and I had better write to
her at once. My dears, it is a relief to me to know you will be near
Constantia, for London is a pit--a pit, and a snare."
Miss Martineau had talked herself quite out of breath, and looked
quite pleading, but the same obstacle which had prevented the girls'
acceding to Mrs.
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