This tower, patched unevenly with black ivy, arose like a mutilated finger from among the fists of knuckled masonry and pointed blasphemously at heaven. At night the owls made of it an echoing throat; by day it stood voiceless and cast its long shadow.

He saw in happiness the seeds of independence, and in independence the seeds of revolt.

Noon, ripe as thunder and silent as thought, had fled unfingered.

Mount and begone. The world awaits you.

And there shall be a flame-green daybreak soon. And love itself will cry for insurrection! For tomorrow is also a day - and Titus has entered his stronghold.

The moon slid inexorably into its zenith, the shadows shrivelling to the feet of all that cast them, and as Rantel approached the hollow at the hem of the Twisted Woods he was treading in a pool of his own midnight.

Seeing an Earl as an owl on a mantelpiece, and having part of one's face removed by a cat, both on the same morning, can temporarily undermine the self-control of any man.