The Toys Of Peace And Other Papers, By Saki

“A man stood one winter night watching and listening, as though he waited for some beast of the woods to come within range of his vision, and, later, of his rifle."

“Never, in any novel that she had read, had a defenceless young woman been confronted with a situation like this."

“In the course of half an hour or so everything that it was permissible to say about Bertie had been said some dozens of times."

“Bread and Butter wins! Good old Bread and Butter."

“Beast!"

“… any one will admit that it was an embarrassing predicament to have your only available guest-room occupied by a leopard…"

“… all that Lena will find when she comes home late in the afternoon will be a placidly defunct Louis."

“When one has nothing left to one but memories, one guards and dusts them with especial care."

“He got a message one day telling him that his wife had been kidnapped and smuggled out of the country."

“If one’s soul was really enslaved at one’s mistress’s feet how could one talk coherently about weakened tea?"

“If you say things like that, quite loud, in a Tube lift, they always sound like epigrams."

“Once back at the Louvre and the girls are mine!"

“I have always looked forward to the romance of a European war…” A portrait of Saki, his beliefs and his attitude to World War I, by his friend Rothay Reynolds.