I don't understand German myself. I learned it at school, but forgot every word of it two years after I had left, and have felt much better ever since.

I want a house that has got over all its troubles; I don't want to spend the rest of my life bringing up a young and inexperienced house.

What I am looking for is a blessing not in disguise.

Give an average baby a fair chance, and if it doesn't do something it oughtn't to a doctor should be called in at once.

It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do.

That the boat did not upset I simply state as a fact. Why it did not upset I am unable to offer any reason. I have often thought about the matter since, but I have never succeeded in arriving at any satisfactory explanation of the phenomenon. Possibly the result may have been brought about by the natural obstinacy of all things in this world. The boat may possibly have come to the conclusion, judging from a cursory view of our behaviour, that we had come out for a morning's suicide, and had thereupon determined to disappoint us. That is the only suggestion I can offer.

Life works upon a compensating balance, and the happiness we gain in one direction we lose in another.