She had no affection to bestow on any doll, nor any woolly lamb, nor apparently on any human person; unless, perhaps, there was the possibility of a friendly inclination towards Uncle Zerviah, who would not have understood the value of any deeper feeling, and did not therefore call the child cold-hearted and unresponsive, as he might well have done.
This she certainly was, judged by the standard of other children; but then no softening influences had been at work during her tenderest years.

Aunt Malvina knew as much about sympathy as she did about the properties of an ellipse; and even the fairies had failed to win little Bernardine.

At first they tried with loving patience what they might do for her; they came out of their books, and danced and sang to her, and whispered sweet stories to her, at twilight, the fairies' own time.

But she would have none of them, for all their gentle persuasion.

So they gave up trying to please her, and left her as they had found her, loveless.