For she, the only daughter, put no restraint on herself in the reserved presence of her mother.

She kissed her boisterously, asked how she was, as if she were the mother, the other the child.

Indeed, she took the liberty sometimes of calling the old lady "Henrietta"-- that was her name--or even "Hetty." Then, when grandmother pointed to us and exclaimed reproachfully, "Why, Sophie!" our aunt could always disarm her with gay jests.
Though the two were generally at a distance, their existence made itself felt again and again either through letters or presents or by their coming to Berlin, which always brought holidays for us.
These journeys were accomplished under difficulties.

Our aunt had always used an open carriage, and was really convinced that she would stifle in a closed railway compartment.

But as she would not forego the benefit of rapid transit, our grandmother was obliged, even after her daughter's marriage, to hire an open truck for her, on which, with her faithful maid Minna, and one of her dogs, or sometimes with her husband or a friend as a companion, she established herself comfortably in an armchair of her own, with various other conveniences about her.