Gilbert Keith Chesterton

“ C'est elle qui--Mais oui, mais oui, c'est elle qui sauvera encore le monde."
"France!" repeated MacIan, and his eyes awoke again in his head like large lamps lighted.
"Yes, France!" said Turnbull, and all the rhetorical part of him came to the top, his face growing as red as his hair. "France, that has always been in rebellion for liberty and reason. France, that has always assailed superstition with the club of Rabelais or the rapier of Voltaire. France, at whose first council table sits the sublime figure of Julian the Apostate. ”

“ On all that luxurious crest of life the risen and victorious sun was beating, burnishing it all like gold, and every bird that rose with that sunrise caught a light like a star upon it like the dove of the Holy Spirit. Imaginative life had never so much crowded upon MacIan. ”

“ When the Highlander began to pull really hard upon the oars, Turnbull craned his dripping red head out of the boat to see the goal of his exertions. It was a sufficiently uninviting one; nothing so far as could be seen but a steep and shelving bank of shingle, made of loose little pebbles such as children like, but slanting up higher than a house. On the top of the mound, against the sky line, stood up the brown skeleton of some broken fence or breakwater. ”

“ Louis to Our Lady of Lourdes."
"France at least," cried Turnbull, throwing up his sword in schoolboy triumph, "in which these things are thought about and fought about. France, where reason and religion clash in one continual tournament. France, above all, where men understand the pride and passion which have plucked our blades from their scabbards. Here, at least, we shall not be chased and spied on by sickly parsons and greasy policemen, because we wish to put our lives on the game. Courage, my friend, we have come to the country of honour." ”

“ Turnbull gave one glance at the crucifix--a glance at once sympathetic and bitter, in which was concentrated the whole of Swinburne's poem on the same occasion.
O hidden face of man, whereover The years have woven a viewless veil, If thou wert verily man's lover What did thy love or blood avail? Thy blood the priests mix poison of, And in gold shekels coin thy love. Then, leaving MacIan in his attitude of prayer, Turnbull began to look right and left very sharply, like one looking for something. ”

“ MacIan did not even notice the incongruous phrase "my friend", but nodding again and again, drew his sword and flung the scabbard far behind him in the road.
"Yes," he cried, in a voice of thunder, "we will fight here and He shall look on at it."
Turnbull glanced at the crucifix with a sort of scowling good-humour and then said: "He may look and see His cross defeated."
"The cross cannot be defeated," said MacIan, "for it is Defeat." ”

“ A rainy twilight was clearing to cold silver over the moaning sea, when the battered boat that had rolled and drifted almost aimlessly all night, came within sight of land, though of land which looked almost as lost and savage as the waves. ”

“ Somehow one can never really manage to be an atheist."
Turnbull stood staring at the sea; but his shoulders showed that he heard, and after one minute he turned his head. But the girl had only brushed Evan's hand with hers and had fled up the dark alley by the lodge gate.
Evan stood rooted upon the road, literally like some heavy statue hewn there in the age of the Druids. It seemed impossible that he should ever move. Turnbull grew restless with this rigidity, and at last, after calling his companion twice or thrice, went up and clapped him impatiently on one of his big shoulders. ”

“ Then he turned and saluted his enemy once more, and the two stood up and fought till the foam flowed over their knees.
Then MacIan stepped backward suddenly with a splash and held up his hand. "Turnbull!" he cried; "I can't help it--fair fighting is more even than promises. And this is not fair fighting."
"What the deuce do you mean?" asked the other, staring.
"I've only just thought of it," cried Evan, brokenly. "We're very well matched--it may go on a good time--the tide is coming up fast--and I'm a foot and a half taller. You'll be washed away like seaweed before it's above my breeches. ”

“ Turnbull strode sturdily to the edge of the cliff and looked out, his companion following, somewhat more shaken by his recent agitation.
"If that's the view you take," said Turnbull, "and I don't say you are wrong, I think I know where we shall be best off for the business. As it happens, I know this part of the south coast pretty well. And unless I am mistaken there's a way down the cliff just here which will land us on a stretch of firm sand where no one is likely to follow us." ”

“ Indeed, the silence and the sunrise had their healing effect, for when the extraordinary lady spoke again, her tone was more friendly and apologetic. "I'm not really ungrateful," she said; "it was very good of you to save me from those men."
"But why?" repeated the obstinate and dazed MacIan, "why did you save us from the other men? I mean the policemen?" ”

“ Then leaving MacIan and the policemen equally and instantaneously nailed to the road, he ran a little way along it, leapt off on to a part of the beach, which he had found in his journey to be firmer, and went across it with a clatter of pebbles. His sudden calculation was successful; the police, unacquainted with the various levels of the loose beach, tried to overtake him by the shorter cut and found themselves, being heavy men, almost up to their knees in shoals of slippery shingle. ”

“ Then, for the first time, Turnbull twisted round his red bear to get a glimpse of his companion, who was a foot or two behind, and remarked abruptly: "Mr. MacIan, we've been going the wrong way to work all along. We're traced everywhere, because everybody knows about us. ”

“ God knows that if there is a God He has turned His big back on everything. God knows I have had no pleasure in my life, though I am pretty and young and father has plenty of money. And then people come and tell me that I ought to do things and I do them and it's all drivel. They want you to do work among the poor ”