And he was right in his thoughts.

The world would now have called Linda the more lovely of the two, and certainly the more feminine in the ladylike sense of the word.

If, however, devotion be feminine, and truth to one selected life's companion, if motherly care be so, and an indomitable sense of the duties due to one's own household, then Gertrude was not deficient in feminine character.
'You find me greatly altered, Harry, do you not ?' said she, taking his hand frankly, and perceiving immediately the effect which she had made upon him.

'I am a steady old matron, am I not ?--with a bairn on each side of me,' and she pointed to her baby in the cradle, and to her other boy sitting on his grandmother's knee.
Harry said he did find her altered.

It was her dress, he said, and the cap on her head.
'Yes, Harry; and some care and trouble too.