What is "governesses"

Usage examples of "governesses".

Diana and Mary were soon to leave Moor House, and return to the far different life and scene which awaited them, as governesses in a large, fashionable, south-of-England city, where each held a situation in families by whose wealthy and haughty members they were regarded only as humble dependants, and who neither knew nor sought out their innate excellences, and appreciated only their acquired accomplishments as they appreciated the skill of their cook or the taste of their waiting-woman.

With a surfeit of respectable ladies and their daughters, left without a breadwinner by the war against Bonaparte, there was no shortage of governesses or companions.

Previous governesses had limited their conversation on the wine topic to a respectful and doubtless sincere expression of a preference for water.

I have hitherto found all the governesses, even the very best of them, faulty in this particular.

One by one the retired governesses entered, hung their cloaks upon the pegs in the small, dark hallway, and took their places at the table.

When the apples and oranges came round, most of the governesses took two apiece, slipping one or other into little black velvet bags they carried on their laps below the table.

Tante Jeanne, overhearing him, would re-read the accident for his especial benefit, while the governesses recounted personal experiences among themselves, and Miss Waghorn made eager efforts to take part in it all, or tell her little tales of fairies and Cornish cream.

The governesses, charged with life for another twenty-four hours at least, flocked down the creaking stairs.

It spread itself, with various degrees, over many days as opportunity offered, and included Gygi, the gendarme, as well as the little troop of retired governesses who came to the Pension for their mid-day dinner.

They went off together in a party, and the governesses watched them go.