There won't be any coffin, nor any hearse, nor any procession, nor--" "There'll be mourners," broke in Ann.
"They're what makes a funeral," said Paulina Maria, putting on an apron she had brought.

"Folks that's had funerals knows." She cast an austere glance at Belinda Lamb, who colored to the roots of her fair curls, and was conscious of a guilty lack of funeral experience, while Paulina Maria had lost seven children, who all died in infancy.

Poor Belinda seemed to see the other woman's sternly melancholy face in a halo of little coffins and funeral wreaths.
"I know you've had a good deal more to contend with than I have," she faltered.

"I 'ain't never lost anybody till poor--Abel." She broke into gentle weeping, but Paulina Maria thrust a broom relentlessly into her hand.
"Here," said she, "take this broom an' sweep, an' it might as well be done to-night as any time.

Of course you 'ain't got your spring cleanin' done, none of it, Ann ?" "No," replied Mrs.Edwards; "I was goin' to begin next week." "Well," said Paulina Maria, "if this house has got to be all cleaned, an' cookin' done, in time for the funeral, somebody's got to work.