‘My aunt would never give way to us little ones when she was convinced that we were wrong; and I well remember a prolonged struggle between her and my baby-sister, who was left in her charge one day.... My aunt regarded the sin of drunkenness with the greatest horror; she rarely mentions it in her books, and generally, where it is touched upon, she writes with the deepest pathos, as in _The Great Impostor_. She would only talk of brandy by its French name, and considered it dangerous to take Tincture of Rhubarb, on account of the spirit it contains....