the test of a cook is how she boils an egg. My boiled eggs are fantastic, fabulous. Sometimes as hard as a 100 carat diamond, or again soft as a feather bed, or running like a cooling stream, they can also burst like fireworks from their shells and take on the look and rubbery texture of a baby octopus. Never a dull egg, with me.

Twice in her life she had mistaken something else for it; it was like seeing somebody in the street who you think is a friend, you whistle and wave and run after him, and it is not only not the friend, but not even very like him. A few minutes later the real friend appears in view, and then you can't imagine how you ever mistook that other person for him. Linda was now looking upon the authentic face of love, and she knew it, but it frightened her. That it should come so casually, so much by a series of accidents, was frightening.

I have only ever read one book in my life, and that is White Fang. It's so frightfully good I've never bothered to read another.

Americans relate all effort, all work, and all of life itself to the dollar. Their talk is of nothing but dollars.

always either on a peak of happiness or drowning in black waters of despair they loved or they loathed, they lived in a world of superlatives

One thing about tourists is that it is very easy to get away from them. Like ants they follow a trail and a few yards each side of that trail there are none.

And Left-wing people are always sad because they mind dreadfully about their causes, and the causes are always going so badly.