But although Mrs. Ellsworthy wept and lamented, although she tried both persuasions and scoldings, and finally left the cottage in a state of deep offence, vowing within herself that she would never trouble her head again over the affairs of such silly and obstinate girls, she could not in the least shake Primrose's quiet resolve. Primrose said over and over again: "Two things are absolutely indispensable--we must be independent, and we must keep together. I can think of no better plan than this--it may fail, but we can but try it--we are certainly going to try it." Mrs. Ellsworthy kept up her offence for twenty-four hours, then she began to soften, and to agree with her husband, whose solitary remark was, "My dear, you cannot coerce the children, and upon my word it's a plucky notion, and if those girls are brave enough to carry it out they must have real stuff in them." "They may have plenty of stuff, and the plan may be as plucky as you like, Joseph," replied his excitable little wife. "I am quite willing to admire it in the abstract, but I am quite determined, if I have any influence whatever, to prevent them carrying it through." Then she went off to Miss Martineau, invading the schoolmistress in the sacred hour when she was engaged with her pupils. Mrs. Ellsworthy carried Miss Martineau away from her school, and shutting the door of that lady's little parlor, clasped the governess's thin hands, and poured her troubles into her ears. "Joseph calls it plucky," said Mrs. Ellsworthy at the end of her narrative. But Miss Martineau's face was perfectly aghast. "Plucky!" she ejaculated. "Dear Mrs. Ellsworthy, pardon me, but your husband is a man--what can a man know about the intricate workings which go on within the breast of a perverse girl? Plucky!--I call it wicked--I call it wanting in all decorum, in all right sense. Primrose Mainwaring has disappointed me deeply; she showed undue temper when I spoke to her here the other day--oh yes, this thing must be prevented by main force, if necessary."