Four little girls, dressed in what could be their Sunday finest are out for a walk. Standing on the sidewalk as if posing for a photograph, these four were described by the author of the book in which they appeared as being sad. Granted, one little girl does some to have a sad look on her face, it doesn’t covey an overall dreary mood to me.
In fact, the little girl on the far right reminds me of when a parent over-dresses a child for the out of doors and they practically can’t move for all of the clothing they are encased in – notice the positioning of her arms.
All of the little girls are wearing elaborate hats – they almost seem a bit too fancy – as if they were playing dress-up. The sad little girl, wearing the darker coat also has a scarf and a fur muff. There’s not snow on the ground but their outerwear does seem to indicate that the weather is cold.
The original illustrator of this drawing of four little girls out for a walk is Florence Scovel Shinn (1871-1940). Shinn was responsible for all of the black and white drawings which were included in the 1936 edition of The Adopting of Rosa Marie A Sequel to Dandelion Cottage, a work by Carroll Watson Rankin (1864–1945).
This image is copyright free and in the public domain anywhere that extends copyrights 70 years after death or at least 120 years after publication when the original illustrator is unknown.
