Lloyd Osbourne

“ Making papa like you wasn't an affair of touching a button. And, if anything, he was more ferocious than ever about losing the Vincents, and his dislike of Mr. Marsden had become a monomania. That's the trouble about a man who's been good-natured all his life, and never had an enemy except the legislature; when at last he finds one he won't let it go. I believe papa actually enjoyed being a Marsden-phoboist. ”

“ They averaged a war a year—not big ones, of course, because they don't occur so often, but little ones in unheard-of places—Herzegovina, Macedonia, Georgia, Morocco. No revolution was complete without Mr. Marsden and his gun, and he always saved the thing from being cold-blooded by siding ferociously with the party he was with. The detested enemy was always in front of Mr. Marsden's wonderful gun, and the people behind it were invariably the downtrodden patriots who were throwing off the despot's yoke. ”

“ He had some crackers in his kit, and a bottle of fizz water, and we had a sort of lunch, and grew chummier and chummier; even Olaff licking the crumbs off his hand and growing quite friendly—which I thought was a good sign, as Olaff is a regular Bernard Shaw on character, and sees right through people. I told Mr. Marsden he ought to be tremendously complimented; and he said he was, and anybody could see he loved dogs, and really appreciated Great Danes. Nothing would discourage me more about a man than if he didn't, and there's a heap in that old saying about "Love me, love my dog." ”