I am an incorrigible devotee to solitude, and am never so cheerful, I believe, or so unruffled by small difficulties as when I'm alone. There's a sort of obligation to be polite and pleasant to yourself when nobody else is round.

Just as I came out into the rue, an omnibus came by - pas complet, so I sprang in, without that prayer and fasting which should chasten the mind before risking it in a French omnibus.

How little we realize things till they come upon us personally. I believe I have been a perfect fiend of indifference, even intolerance, of deaf people, and now it's me. Well, I am determined to become the most Delightful Deaf Old Lady that ever existed and I am practicing to that end.

But I should like to take these things on full gallop, instead of dawdling along gaping at them. I get fearfully tired, and a very little Abbey goes a long way with me.

... the fact that the idea don't come freshly on us makes it necessary for it to be better in order to be good at all. The first rose must have driven the first smeller perfectly wild, but every rose since has smelt just as well.

I tried the plan of talking incessantly myself, so as to hide the fact I didn't hear anything they said, the result was nobody paid the slightest attention to my (doubtless brilliant) remarks.

I am an incorrigible devotee to solitude, and am never so cheerful, I believe, or so unruffled by small difficulties as when I'm alone. There's a sort of obligation to be polite and pleasant to yourself when nobody else is round.