you must learn to live as I do - in the face of constant criticism, opposition and censure. That, sir, is the English way.

I know magicians and I know magic and I say this: all magicians lie and this one more than most.

And the name of the one shall be Fearfulness. And the name of the other shall be Arrogance... Well, clearly you are not Fearfulness, so I suppose you must be Arrogance.' This was not very polite.

You mean to say he became mad deliberately?' ...Nothing is more likely,' said the duke.

All books are doors; and some of them are wardrobes.

It was an old fashioned house --the sort of house in fact, as Strange expressed it, which a lady in a novel might like to be persecuted in.

Unfortunately, Childermass's French was so strongly accented by his native Yorkshire that Minervois did not understand and asked Strange if Childermass was Dutch.