Excerpt from Ips That Pass in the Night Such a little restless Spirit, striving to express itself now in this direction, now in that; yet always actuated by the same constant force, the desire for work. Bernardine seemed to have no special wish to be useful to others; she seemed just to have a natural tendency to work, even as others have a natural tendency to play. She was always in earnest; life for little Bernardine meant something serious. Then the years went by. She grew up and filled her life with many interests and ambitions. She was at least a worker, if nothing else; she had always been a diligent scholar, and now She took her place as an able teacher. She was self-reliant, and, perhaps, somewhat conceited. But, at least, Bernardine the young woman had learnt something which Bernardine the young child had not been able to learn: She learnt how to smile. It took her about six and twenty years to learn; still, some people take longer than that; in fact, many never learn. This is a brief summary of Bernardine Holme's past. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.