Only Ron's dog was watching William. He considered that it had, for a dog, a very offensive and knowing look. A couple of months ago someaone had tried to hand William the old story about there being a dog in the city that could talk. (...) The dog in front of William didn't look as if it could talk, but it DID look as if it would swear.

The second mouse gets the cheese!

There was a man and he had eight sons. Apart from that, he was nothing more than a comma on the page of History. It's sad, but that's all you can say about some people.

Good and bad is tricky," she said. "I ain't too certain about where people stand. P'raps what matters is which way you face." (pp. 348-349)

If my father could have sat up in bed and said goodbye, I'd have pressed the button. I wouldn't have been able to see for crying, but I would have considered that a duty.

Sybil's female forebears had valiantly backed up their husbands as distant embassies were besieged, had given birth on a camel or in the shade of a stricken elephant, had handed around the little gold chocolates while trolls were trying to break into the compound, or had merely stayed at home and nursed such bits of husbands and sons as made it back from endless little wars. The result was a species of woman who, when duty called, turned into solid steel.

The duke had a mind that ticked like a clock and, like a clock, it regularly went cuckoo.