Oh, a very useful philosophical animal, your average tortoise. Outrunning metaphorical arrows, beating hares in races... very handy.

Modesty is only arrogance by stealth.

They felt, in fact, tremendously bucked-up, which was how Lady Ramkin would almost certainly have put it and which was definitely several letters of the alphabet away from how they normally felt.

Sometimes the truth is arrived at by adding all the little lies together and deducting them from the totality of what is known.

They obeyed, as wise men do when a woman puts her foot down . . .

Do you not know that a man is not dead while his name is still spoken?

My agent pointed out one day that I had been quoted by a columnist in some American newspaper, and he noted with some glee that they simply identified me by name without reminding people who I was, apparently in the clear expectation that their readers would know who I am.