Gilbert Keith Chesterton

“ The hill, like a cluster of domes, though smooth and even bare in its lower contours was topped with a tangle of spanning trees that sat above them like a bird brooding over its nest. The wood was larger and vaguer than the clump that is the crown of the hill at Chanctonbury, but was rather like it and held much the same high and romantic position. ”

“ Mine was bad, partly because I'm not a poet as you are; but almost as much because I was trying to make up another song at the same time. And it went to another tune, you see."
He looked out over the rolling roads and said almost to himself:
"In the city set upon slime and loam They cry in their parliament 'Who goes home?' And there is no answer in arch or dome, For none in the city of graves goes home. Yet these shall perish and understand, For God has pity on this great land. Men that are men again; who goes home? Tocsin and trumpeter! Who goes home? ”

“ Patrick laughed, but not without a shade of confusion. "I hope you got back your car all right," he said. "This is really nothing for speed; but it's an uncommonly good little climber, and it seems to have some climbing to do just now. And even more wandering."
"The roads certainly seem to be very irregular," said Dorian, reflectively.
"Well," cried Patrick, with a queer kind of impatience, "you're English and I'm not. You ought to know why the road winds about like this. Why, the Saints deliver us!" he cried, "it's one of the wrongs of Ireland that she can't understand England. ”

“ If you ask me in a general, synthetic sense what I think of rum--well, I think it's rather rum."
"You find it a trifle sweet, I suppose," said Dalroy, with some bitterness. "Sybarite! By the way," he said abruptly, "what a silly word that word 'Hedonist' is! The really self-indulgent people generally like sour things and not sweet; bitter things like caviar and curries or what not. It's the Saints who like the sweets. At least I've known at least five women who were practically saints, and they all preferred sweet champagne. ”

“ Such dance around the trysting-place The moonstruck lover leads; Which superstition I should scout; There is more faith in honest doubt, (As Tennyson has pointed out) Than in those nasty creeds. But peace and righteousness (St. John) In Roundabout can kiss, And since that's all that's found about The pleasant town of Roundabout, The roads they simply bound about To find out where it is. "Some say that when Sir Lancelot Went forth to find the Grail, Grey Merlin wrinkled up the roads For hope that he should fail ”

“ The motor car stopped before yet a fourth arsenal of Mr. Crooke and his pharmacy, and Dalroy went in. Before Pump and his companion could exchange a word, the Captain came out again, with a curious expression on his countenance, especially round the mouth.
"Mr. Wimpole," said Dalroy, "will you give us the pleasure of dining with us this evening? Many would consider it an unceremonious invitation to an unconventional meal; and it may be necessary to eat it under a hedge or even up a tree; but you are a man of taste, and one does not apologise for Hump's rum or Hump's cheese to persons of taste. ”