Alice and Virginia sighed over the contrast with bygone hopes, but their own careers made it seem probable that Monica would be better off 'in business' than in a more strictly genteel position.

And there was every likelihood that, at such a place as Weston, with her sister for occasional chaperon, she would ere long find herself relieved of the necessity of working for a livelihood.
To the others, no wooer had yet presented himself.

Alice, if she had ever dreamt of marriage, must by now have resigned herself to spinsterhood.
Virginia could scarce hope that her faded prettiness, her health damaged by attendance upon an exacting invalid and in profitless study when she ought to have been sleeping, would attract any man in search of a wife.

Poor Isabel was so extremely plain.

Monica, if her promise were fulfilled, would be by far the best looking, as well as the sprightliest, of the family.