If she had been born a poor woman she would have worked hard for her living, and found an interest, almost an exhilaration, in her labour.

Such gifts as she had would have been applied to the tasks she undertook.

It had frequently given her pleasure to imagine herself earning her livelihood as a seamstress, a housemaid, a nurse.

She knew what she could have put into her service, and how she could have found it absorbing.

Imagination and initiative could make any service absorbing.