... still his philanthropy was of that gunpowderous sort that the difference between it and animosity was hard to determine.

By the by, who ever knew a man who never read or wrote neither who hadn't got some small back parlour which he would call a study!

I must be taken as I have been made. The success is not mine, the failure is not mine, but the two together make me.

Why then we should drop into poetry.

It was understood that nothing of a tender nature could possibly be confided to old Barley, by reason of his being totally unequal to the consideration of any subject more psychological than gout, rum, and purser's stores.

That, they never could lay their heads upon their pillows; that, they never could tolerate the idea of their wives laying their heads upon their pillows; that, they never could endure the notion of their children laying their heads upon their pillows; in short, that there never more could be, for them or theirs, any laying of heads upon pillows at all, unless the prisoner's head was taken off.

It was the beginning of a day in June; the deep blue sky unsullied by a cloud, and teeming with brilliant light. The streets were, as yet, nearly free from passengers, the houses and shops were closed, and the healthy air of morning fell like breath from angels, on the sleeping town.