Though past thirty, she was still comely, and when she looked pleasant, it was not an unpleasant face.

Yet there lurked in it possibilities of passion that made you tremble, especially considering that she had the charge of growing children.

You did not wonder at her supremacy in the nursery, but you wondered very much that any mother could have allowed her to acquire it.
For the rest, Phillis had entered the family as Letitia's wet-nurse, with the sad story of most wet-nurses.

Her own child having died, she took to her foster-child with such intensity of devotedness as to save Mrs.
Grey all trouble of loving or looking after the little creature from henceforward.

And so she staid, through many storms and warnings to leave, but she never did leave--she was too necessary.