It was woman that taught me cruelty, and on woman therefore I have exercised it.

Now, it is well known, that a man may with more impunity be guilty of an actual breach either of real good breeding or of good morals, than appear ignorant of the most minute point of fashionable etiquette.

It is only when I dally with what I am about, look back and aside, instead of keeping my eyes straight forward, that I feel these cold sinkings of the heart.

'Tis an old tale, and often told; But did my fate and wish agree, Ne'er had been read, in story old, Of maiden true betray'd for gold, That loved, or was avenged, like me!

What a strange scene if the surge of conversation could suddenly ebb like the tide, and show us the real state of people's minds.

Independently of the curious circumstance that such tales should be found existing in very different countries and languages, which augurs a greater poverty of human invention than we would have expected, there is also a sort of wild fairy interest in them, which makes me think them fully better adapted to awaken the imagination and soften the heart of childhood than the good-boy stories which have been in later years composed for them.

A Christmas gambol oft could cheer The poor man's heart through half the year.