`` And now for the story . Where shall I begin ? '' `` At the very beginning , Aunty . You see I know nothing at all except her name . Tell me who she was and why she put her wedding dress away here . '' `` Poor Eliza ! '' said Aunt dreamily . `` It is a sorrowful story , Amy , and it seems so long ago now . I must be an old woman . Forty years ago -- and I was only twenty then . Eliza Laurance was my cousin , the only daughter of Uncle Henry Laurance . My father -- your grandfather , Amy , you do n't remember him -- had two brothers , each of whom had an only daughter . Both these girls were called Eliza after your great-grandmother . I never saw Uncle George 's Eliza but once . He was a rich man and his daughter was much sought after , but she was no beauty , I promise you that , and proud and vain to the last degree . Her home was in a distant city and she never came to Wyther Grange . `` The other Eliza Laurance was a poor man 's daughter . She and I were of the same age and did not look unlike each other , although I was not so pretty by half . You can see by the portrait how beautiful she was , and it does her scant justice , for half her charm lay in her arch expression and her vivacious ways . She had her little faults , of course , and was rather over much given to romance and sentiment .
This did not seem much of a defect to me then , Amy , XXXXX I was young and romantic too .
At after although by except for in of that unlike