"It's all nonsense to say that the Fifteenth Century can't possibly speak to the Twentieth, because it is the Fifteent…"

"Brisk and prompt to war, soft and not in the least able to resist calamity, fickle in catching at schemes, and always…"

"He took the imperial hand and shook it in the glad-to-see-you-but-keep-off English fashion."

"That cold white candent voice which was more caustic than silver nitrate and more thrilling than a scream."

"Most people have only half developed their single personalities. That a man should split his into four and more; and …"

"Pray for the repose of His soul. He was so tired."

"He seems to have been a serpent of serpents in the bosom of all the nineties. That in itself endears him to one."

"Rolfe's vice was spiritual more than it was carnal: it might be said that he was a pander and a swindler, because he …"

"I have…read it with a good deal of amusement and enjoyment. The latter is due, I suppose, entirely to the subject – f…"

"He was a confidence-man, pauper, tutor, blackmailer, paedophile, translator – and author of seven novels and a number…"