Various

“ The Adams' fireplace leans against her. It falls on to her with a tremendous crash.... Lord Gumthorpe comes forward and gazes at the jumbled débris. He is conscious of a sense of despairing conflict—the conflict between contemplative amazement and some natural but well-controlled demand for concrete action. An appalling conviction comes to him that he ought to do something. Under the fallen mess of brick, marble, and wood there are feeble undulations. A phrase keeps running through his mind—"Expressing her primitive virility." ”

“ Lady Gastwyck rises. She is a short dark woman with deep-set eyes and one very remarkable characteristic. She has apparently only one eyebrow. She really has two, but they meet together in one dark straight line, and give her a forbidding aspect. She has a habit of walking with her chin thrust forward and her long arms curved like a boxer's. She advances upon Lord Gumthorpe. ”

“ Lord Gumthorpe drops the fan. He gropes wildly in the fireplace but cannot find it again. Then with an air of helpless resignation he goes back to the window-seat. He gazes at the chequered pattern on the floor and mentally moves his king up one. Lady Gastwyck glances across at him, and it occurs to her that he has aged during the last few minutes. He no longer looks like Philip IV. of Spain, but more like the sub-manager of the White Goods Department of a suburban Bon-Marché. She is anxious that Angela shall not observe this, and hence makes the following appeal. ”

“ It was this practice which saved his life at the greatest crisis of his career.
"I happened to have strained my leg, and I was sitting in the garden, dozing, Egbert by my side, when I was awakened by a hoarse bark from my faithful companion, and, looking down, I perceived him hopping rapidly towards the pond, pursued by an enormous oojoobwa snake, a reptile not dangerous to man, being non-poisonous, but a great scourge among the minor fauna of Assam, owing to its habit of pouncing upon them and swallowing them alive. ”

“ Angela has risen and is looking at Lord Gumthorpe. Lord Gumthorpe is standing with his arms folded. He has just lost a bishop in the dim chiaroscuro of the window-seat and has not heard her outbreak. Suddenly he looks up, and fixes his eyes upon Lady Gastwyck with a new sense of resolution. He advances towards [Pg 247] her, and gazing boldly at her eyebrow, that looks more than ever like a moustache, calls out in a thin cruel voice. ”

“ I hissed—or whatever you do to a sentence without any "s's" in it to make it dramatic. "Your friends cannot save you now. Prepare to—er—come a walk up the hill with me."
"Help! Help!" whispered Myra. She hesitated a moment; then swung herself out of the hammock and went in for her hat.
We climbed up a steep path which led to the rock-village above us. Simpson had told us that we must see the village; still more earnestly he had begged us to see Corsica. The view of Corsica was to be obtained from a point some miles up—too far to go before lunch. ”

“ For the besetting irresoluteness of the Gumthorpes is consuming him. "If only she would——" he is thinking to himself, rapidly reviewing the salient features of his past life. He has not the courage to look at Angela, but his eyes wander in the direction of Lady Gastwyck. ”

“ This snake is particularly addicted to bull-frogs, and, judging from the earnest manner in which he was making for the pond, Egbert was not blind to this trait in its character.
"You may imagine my agony of mind. There was I, helpless. My injured leg made it impossible for me to pursue the snake and administer one where it would do most good. And meanwhile the unequal race was already drawing to its inevitable close. Egbert, splendid as were his other qualities, was not built for speed. He was dignified rather than mobile. ”

“ He decides that the phrase could not apply to it. He returns to the window-seat. A new horror obsesses him. The moon has moved round. The chessboard has been blotted out. In extremis, Lord Gumthorpe falls back on his primitive instincts and rings for the butler. There is an imperceptible pause. Stud glides in and stands in the middle of the room, tears of reverence and respectability streaming down his cheeks.
Lord Gumthorpe. (after an interminable pause) . Your mistress has dropped her fan into the fireplace! ”

“ I reassured Myra. "From this distance you can't be certain of recognising an island you don't know. Any small cloud on the horizon will do."
"I know it on the map."
"Yes, but it looks quite different in real life. The great thing is to be able to assure Simpson at lunch that the Corsican question is now closed. When we're a little higher up, I shall say, 'Surely that's Corsica?' and you'll say, 'Not Corsica,?" as though you'd rather expected the Isle of Wight; and then it'll be all over. Hallo! ”

“ Stud goes out with the fan. Lord Gumthorpe stands irresolutely warming his hands at the fire. Angela's father from Atlantis, Tennessee, is heard outside in the hall eating cantaloup. The pips rattle against the door. Unable to withstand this further symbol of inevitable doom, Lord Gumthorpe throws himself on to the fire. He is burnt up. The fire is blotted out. Everything is blotted out. ”

“ W. F. Hewer starts us on a pretty problem—how, in these circumstances, will Prudence get on? Of course, she gets on excellently; and soon is as keen a rider to hounds and a judge of horseflesh as any in a neighbourhood where those accomplishments are held in high esteem. Equally of course there are men, nay lords, who fall under the spell of her attraction; but when I tell you that the groom-and-general-horse-master, whom Prudence engaged, and under whose tuition she so prospered, was a gentleman who had seen better days, you will probably have already guessed the end of the tale. ”

“ Cannot some gentler means be yet embraced
That, when the common peril comes upon her,
Such qualities of heart, too rare to waste,
May shield our Country's honour?
O. S.
EGBERT, BULL-FROG.
"Speaking," said my uncle James, "of dogs, did I ever tell you about Egbert, my bull-frog? I class Egbert among the dogs, partly because of his faithfulness and intelligence, and partly because his deep bay—you know how those bull-frogs bark—always reminded me of a bloodhound surprised while on a trail of aniseed. He was my constant companion in Northern Assam, where I was at that time planting rubber. ”

“ It was "whether the discipline of the Army is to be maintained; whether it is to continue to be a neutral force to assist the civil power; or whether in future the House of Commons, representing the people, is to submit its decisions for approval to a military junta.". ”

“ Snakes have very little reasoning power. They cannot weigh cause and effect. Otherwise of course the oojoobwa would have nipped Egbert till he was forced to leave go of the stick. Instead of doing this, he regarded the stick and Egbert as being constructed all in one piece, and imagined that he had happened upon a new breed—of unswallowable frog. He ejected Egbert, and lay thinking it over, while Egbert, full of pluck, continued his journey to the pond.
"Three times in the next two yards did the snake endeavour to swallow his victim, and each time he gave it up ”

“ A couple of natives were breaking in, and would undoubtedly have succeeded in their designs had it not been for Egbert's frantic barking, which aroused the house and brought me down with a revolver. It is almost certain that the devoted animal had made a practice, night after night, of sleeping near the front-door on the chance of something of the sort happening. He was always suspicious of natives. ”

“ There are rumours that the Suffragettes are now preparing to blow up the whole of Ireland, as they find that that little country has during the past few days been distracting public attention from their cause.
An appeal is being made for funds to enable the battlefield of Waterloo to be preserved. A handsome donation has, it is said, been offered by one of our most enterprising railway companies, the only condition made being that the name shall be altered to Bakerloo. ”

“ House listened in significant silence to illustration pointing the moral. In November next four hundred thousand railway men will come to grips with their employers. If they do not obtain satisfactory terms they may simultaneously strike.
"If," their Secretary added, "the doctrine laid down by the Opposition in respect to Ulster is sound it will be my duty to tell the railwaymen to prepare for the worst by organizing their forces, the half million capital possessed by the union to be used to provide arms and ammunition for them."
Business done.—Ominous debate arising on Ulster question. ”

“ Not every one in the country goes to church, but none can escape acquaintance with the Vicar. Hints as to how to deal with him are freely offered, and a variety of excuses for non-attendance have been drawn, ranging from a headache to Quakerism. ”

“ For example, a singer called Hewlett or Ball laboured under a serious disadvantage when competing with artistes blessed with melodious appellations such as Bellincioni or Sammarco.
Mr. Ben Davies observed that Welsh singers wore terribly hampered by the poverty of their nomenclature. Two out of every three bore the surname Davies, and at least one in three of our Welsh male soloists was christened Ivor. Ivor was a good name in itself, but it was becoming terribly hackneyed.
Mr. Henry Bird thought that all musicians should be at liberty to assume names provided they were appropriate. ”

“ A lecturer who knows every inch of the country within a forty-mile radius of London will discourse at intervals on the respective merits of each popular district. A list of the principal residents in each will be available, together with a computation of the chances of a newcomer being called on by any ladies with a title. ”

“ A well-known horticulturist has invented a system by which the names of flowers can be taught in the shortest possible time, especially as the flowers have been carefully selected to exclude all but the fashionable. ”

“ For country householders who are at present burning oil, but think they would like an illuminant made of petrol or acetylene, a lecture will be given by an expert, who will examine all the myriad plants on the market and offer his opinion as to the least unsatisfactory. ”

“ It is so often asserted that a Varsity career unfits one for success in the bigger world that it is satisfactory to read that the Prince of Wales's income from the Duchy of Cornwall was £85,719 last year, as compared with £81,350 in the previous year. ”

“ Such assistance is of the highest value, since many persons otherwise capable enough are unable to manage rural ways at once or deal with even such ordinary difficulties as neighbours' visits, invitations to garden parties, dinners, &c., political confessions, the retention of servants, the lighting system, the Vicar's calls, and so forth. ”

“ The words I used—you will find them reported in The Wastepaper Gazette for that week—were as follows: "We must then take these statements of Mr. Thomson-Thomson to be nothing but the blustering artifice of a rhetorical hireling." You will, I am sure, appreciate the difference between the two versions. If you do not, I may add that I am prepared to endorse the opinion expressed in the accurate version and to raise the question in the House of Commons at an early opportunity.
I am sending a copy, of this letter to the Press, as your reply will doubtless be irrelevant. ”

“ There are many other living characters, of which old Remnant, the sexton, with his queerly American business notions of religion and dislike of the "riff-raff," is too nicely absurd and human not to have been drawn from life. ”

“ The private soldier has his conscience as well as the commissioned officer. In cases of industrial dispute Tommy Atkins would find in speeches made to-day by noble Lords and hon. Members justification for refusal to shoot down members of his own class with whose position he had conscientious sympathy.
J. H. Thomas, Organising Secretary of Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants, put this in briefer phrasing when he said, "General Gough may feel keenly the Ulster situation. Tommy Atkins will feel not less keenly the industrial situation." ”

“ Justice Scrutton has fined a man for saying "Hear, hear," in court, and there is something approaching a panic among our Comic Judges lest some colleague on a lower plane of humour should fine somebody, for laughing in court. ”

“ ORANGES AND LEMONS. IV.—Before Lunch.
I found Myra in the hammock at the end of the loggia.
"Hallo," I said.
"Hallo." She looked up from her book and waved her hand. "Mentone on the left, Monte Carlo on the right," she said, and returned to her book again. Simpson had mentioned the situation so many times that it had become a catch-phrase with us. ”

“ Delius was strongly opposed to any change of nomenclature being made compulsory. He was quite sure that he would not compose nearly so well under, e.g., the alias of De Lara. In any case, artists should be safeguarded against the appropriation of their names by others. ”

“ Resignations tendered had been withdrawn. Familiar military command "As you were" obeyed.
That all very well. Opposition, upon whom crowning mercy had fallen from beneficent heavens, naturally indisposed to treat unexpected boon in niggardly spirit. Bonner Law insisted on business being set aside and opportunity provided for rubbing in the salt. Lively debate followed. ”