Mrs.Moon was an old woman before she was five-and-fifty; and before she was five-and-twenty Juliana's youth had withered away in the sour and sordid atmosphere born of perishing gentility and acrid personal remark.
And their household gods looked down on them, miniatures and silhouettes of Moons and Quinceys, calm and somewhat contemptuous presences.

From the post of honour above the mantelshelf, Tollington, attired as an Early Victorian dandy, splendid in velvet waistcoat, scarf and chain-pin, leaned on a broken column symbolical of his fortunes, and smiled genially on the ruin he had made.
That was how Miss Quincey came to St.Sidwell's.

And now she was five-and-forty; she had always been five-and-forty; that is to say, she had never been young, for to be young you must be happy.

And this was so far an advantage, that when middle-age came on her she felt no difference..