Letters form a by-path of literature, a charming, but occasional, retreat for people of cultivated leisure.

There is nothing in the world so incomprehensible as the joke we do not see.

English civilization rests largely upon tea and cricket, with mighty spurts of enjoyment on Derby Day, and at Newmarket.

It is difficult to admonish Frenchmen. Their habit of mind is unfavorable to preachment.

No man pursues what he has at hand. No man recognizes the need of pursuit until that which he desires has escaped him.

I am eighty years old. There seems to be nothing to add to this statement. I have reached the age of undecorated facts - facts that refuse to be softened by sentiment, or confused by nobility of phrase.

We have but the memories of past good cheer, we have but the echoes of departed laughter. In vain we look and listen for the mirth that has died away. In vain we seek to question the gray ghosts of old-time revelers.