It was a nasty look. It made me feel as if I were something the dog had brought in and intended to bury later on, when he had time.

The test of a great golfer is his ability to recover from a bad start.

Mr Howard Saxby, literary agent, was knitting a sock. He knitted a good deal, he would tell you if you asked him, to keep himself from smoking, adding that he also smoked a good deal to keep himself from knitting.

And, anyway, no matter how much you may behave like the deaf adder of Scripture which, as you are doubtless aware, the more one piped, the less it danced, or words to that effect, I shall carry on as planned.

As for Gussie Finknottle, many an experienced undertaker would have been deceived by his appearance and started embalming on sight.

They pointed out that the friendship between the two artists had always been a byword or whatever you called it. A well-read Egg summed it up by saying that they were like Thingummy and what's-his-name.

I pressed down the mental accelerator. The old lemon throbbed fiercely. I got an idea.