The life of a journalist is poor, nasty, brutish, and short. So is his style

Here was an occasion, she thought, for indulging in that deliberate rudeness which only persons with habitually good manners have the right to commit.

Well,' said Mrs Smiling, 'it sounds an appalling place, but in a different way from all the others. I mean, it does sound interesting and appalling, while the others just sound appalling.

Flora sighed. It was curious that persons who lived what the novelists called a rich emotional life always seemed to be a bit slow on the uptake.

On the whole, Flora liked it better when they were silent, though it did rather give her the feeling that she was acting in one of the less cheerful German highbrow films.

A straight nose is a great help if one wishes to look serious'.

And when April like an over-lustful lover leaped upon the lush flanks of the Downs there would be yet another child in the wretched hut down on Nettle Flitch Field, where Meriam housed the fruits of her shame.