didn't." One
day she let me put my hand into her bosom; I sniffed. "What's there to
smell?" said she. I have some idea that she used to watch me closely,
when I was with her sister, as she was always looking after her, and
before she kissed me, would open the door suddenly or go out of the
room, and then return. I've seen the other sister just outside the door
of the room, when suddenly opened.

The big sister must have been five feet nine high, and large in
proportion; the impression on my mind, is that she was two and twenty:
that age dwells in my recollection, and that my mother remarked it. She
had brown hair and eyes, I recollect well the features of the woman.
Her lower lip was like a cherry, having a distinct cut down the middle,
caused she said by the bite of a parrot, which nearly severed her lip
when a girl. This feature I recollect more clearly than anything else.
My mother remarked that though so big, she was lighter in tread, than
anyone in the house, her voice was so soft, it was like a whisper or a
flute; her name was I think Betsy.

I had none of the dash, and determination towards females, which I had
in after life; was hesitating, fearful of being repulsed, or found
out, but was coaxing and wheedling. Betsy used to take charge of my two
little sisters (there was no regular nursery then), and used to sit with
them in a room adjoining our dining room; it had a settee, and a large
sofa in it, we usually breakfasted there. She waited also at table, and
did miscellaneous work. I am pretty certain that we had then no man in
the house. I used to lie down on the sofa in this room. One day I talked
with her about her lip, put my head up and said: "Do let me kiss it."
She put her lips to mine, and soon after if I was not kissing her
sister, I was kissing her regularly, when my mother was out of the way.

One day when she went up to her bed-room, I went softly after her, as
I often did, hoping to hear her piddling. Her door was ajar, one of
my little sisters was in the room with her, I expect I must have had
incipient randiness on me. She taught the child to walk up stairs in
front of her, holding her up, and in stooping to do so, I had glimpses
of her fat calves. At the door, I could not see her wash, that was done
at the other side of the room, but I heard the splash of water, and to
my delight, the pot moved, and her piddle rattle. The looking-glass was
near the window. Then she moved to the glass, and brus