To visit a new country for the first time is great fun; but it is even greater fun to introduce somebody else to a country that you know.

To visit a new country for the first time is great fun; but it is even greater fun to introduce somebody else to a country that you know.

I can't abide cats myself, but of course we have to have one in the kitchen to deal with the mice. I insisted on getting a black one, because anything else shows the dirt so in London.

Scots are born exiles, and Scotland the perfect country to be exiled from. Do not imagine that I am running down Scotland. Far from it. ... No, what I mean is that Scotland's beauties, though undeniable, are obvious ones, easy to carry in the heart, easy even to describe to the benighted members of less fortunate races. Lakes, islands and mountains, heather and rowan, broad straths and narrow glens - these are jewels easily worn in the memory.

librarianship is one of the few callings in the world for which is it still possible to feel unqualified admiration and respect.

When there is a world scarcity of any commodity, whether it's food or free speech, then the whole world must go on rations in order that eventually the whole world may have it again in plenty.

And I am a mockery, who was God before.