I had been there before; I knew all about it.

She told me later that she had made a kind of note of me in her mind, as, scanning the shelf for a particular book, one will sometimes have one's attention caught by another, take it down, glance at the title page and saying "I must read that, too, when I've the time," replace it and continue the search.

He lay back for a little in his bed thinking about the smells of food . . . of the intoxicating breath of bakeries and dullness of buns. . . . He planned dinners, of enchanting aromatic foods . . . endless dinners, in which one could alternate flavour with flavour from sunset to dawn without satiety, while one breathed great draughts of the bouquet of old brandy.

Professional reviewers read so many bad books in the course of duty that they get an unhealthy craving for arresting phrases.

At first it was impressive, but after half and hour deadly monotonous. It was like everything German - overdone.

We possess nothing certainly except the past

Yes, cider and tinned salmon are the staple diet of the agricultural classes.