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246936c
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Now look here, old friend," I said. "I know your bally heart is broken and all that, and at some future time I shall be delighted to hear all about it, but - " "I didn't come to talk about that." "No? Good egg!" "The past," said young Bingo, "is dead. Let us say no more about it." "Right-o!" "I have been wounded to the very depths of my soul, but don't speak about it." "I won't." "Ignore it. Forget it." "Absolutely!" I hadn't seen him so da..
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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c7ef9e4
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I spent the afternoon musing on Life. If you come to think of it, what a queer thing Life is! So unlike anything else, don't you know, if you see what I mean. At any moment you may be strolling peacefully along, and all the time Life's waiting around the corner to fetch you one. You can't tell when you may be going to get it. It's all dashed puzzling. Here was poor old George, as well-meaning a fellow as every stepped, getting swatted all o..
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life
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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0384d05
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It is the opinion of most thoughtful students of life that happiness in this world depends chiefly on the ability to take things as they come. An instance of one who may be said to have perfected this attitude is to be found in the writings of a certain eminent Arabian author who tells of a traveller who, sinking to sleep one afternoon upon a patch of turf containing an acorn, discovered when he woke that the warmth of his body had caused t..
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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aea9fcd
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Just then the kid upset the milk over Freddie's trousers, and when he had come back after changing his clothes he began to talk about what a much-maligned man King Herod was.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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73b784d
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I must say my heart leaped up, as Jeeves tells me his does when he beholds a rainbow in the sky.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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a865e67
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The coops were finished. They were not masterpieces, and I have seen chickens pause before them in deep thought, as who should say: "Now what in the world have we struck here?" But they were coops, within the meaning of the act, and we induced the hens to become tenants."
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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f017cff
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Don't forget that in pushing policemen into duck ponds the follow through is everything.
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uncle-fred
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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a1f64e0
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Have you lost the girl you love?' 'That's what I'm trying to figure out. I can't make up my mind. It all depends what construction you place on the words "I never want to see or speak to you again in this world or the next, you miserable fathead."' 'Did she say that?"
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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fce9ff4
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How did it all end?' 'Oh, I got away with my life. Still, what's life?' 'Life's all right.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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1694db9
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He was like some prophet of old, scourging the sins of the people. He leaped about in a frenzy of inspiration till I feared he would do himself an injury. Sometimes he expressed himself in a somewhat odd manner, but every word carried conviction. He showed me New York in its true colours. He showed me the vanity and wickedness of sitting in gilded haunts of vice, eating lobster when decent people should be in bed. 'He said that the tango an..
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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f115e4e
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It's called "Caliban At Sunset".' 'What at sunset?' 'Caliban.' He cleared his throat, and began: I stood with a man Watching the sun go down. The air was full of murmurous summer scents And a brave breeze sang like a bugle From a sky that smouldered in the west, A sky of crimson, amethyst and gold and sepia And blue as blue as were the eyes of Helen When she sat Gazing from some high tower in Ilium Upon the Grecian tents darkling below. And..
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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7c04683
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I mean to say, I know perfectly well that I've got, roughly speaking, half the amount of brain a normal bloke ought to possess. And when a girl comes along who has about twice the regular allowance, she too often makes a bee line for me with the love light in her eyes. I don't know how to account for it, but it is so." "It may be Nature's provision for maintaining the balance of the species, sir."... "At breakfast this morning, when I was e..
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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819e096
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a chap who's supposed to stop chaps pinching things from chaps having a chap come along and pinch something from him.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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13a18b3
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A hoarse shout from within and a small china ornament whizzing past my head informed me that my old friend was at home.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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431c7f5
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That's good," I said. "And if you have a nice time this morning on the sands with your spade and bucket, you will come and tell me all about it, won't you? I have so little on my mind just now that it's a treat to hear all about your happy holiday." Satirical, if you see what I mean. Sarcastic. Almost bitter, as a matter of fact, if you come right down to it."
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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6b3bf72
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Did you ever tread on your partner's dress at a dance - I'm speaking now of the days when women wore dresses long enough to be trodden on - and hear it rip and see her smile at you like an angel and say, "Please don't apologise. It's nothing," and then suddenly meet her clear blue eyes and feel as if you had stepped on the teeth of a rake and had the handle jump up and hit you in the face?"
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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7be903c
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It was some time before this happened, for he had got a very fine hand indeed. I suppose it wasn't often that the boys of Market Snodsbury Grammar School came across a man public-spirited enough to call their head master a silly ass, and they showed their appreciation in no uncertain manner. Gussie may have been one over the eight, but as far as the majority of those present were concerned he was sitting on top of the world.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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65b35e7
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fine figure of a young fellow as far northwards as the neck, but above that solid concrete.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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6a48191
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A pictorial record of his hopes and despairs would have looked like a fever chart.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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f152cd8
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A little," panted Mrs. Peagrim, who, though she danced often and vigorously, was never in the best of condition, owing to her habit of neutralizing the beneficent effects of exercise by surreptitious candy-eating. "I'm a little out of breath." --
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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757bdc8
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He put the good old cup of tea softly on the table by my bed, and I took a refreshing sip. Just right, as usual. Not too hot, not too sweet, not to weak, not too strong, not too much milk, and not a drop spilled in the saucer. A most amazing cove, Jeeves. So dashed competent in every respect.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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67ed4f3
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They walked on in silence. Katie's heart was beating with a rapidity that forbade speech. Nothing like this very direct young man had ever happened to her before. She had grown so accustomed to regarding herself as something too insignificant and unattractive for the notice of the lordly male that she was overwhelmed. She had a vague feeling that there was a mistake somewhere. It surely could not be she who was proving so alluring to this f..
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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029a083
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Watching you at work, I was reminded of the young lady of Natchez, whose clothes were all tatters and patches. In alluding to which, she would say, "Well, Ah itch, and wherever ah itches, Ah scratches."
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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323faf2
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Mathematicians among my readers do not need to be informed that ". . ." is the algebraical sign representing a blend of wheeze, croak, and hiccough."
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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924dcd0
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How long Archibald slept he could not have said. He woke some hours later with a vague feeling that a thunderstorm of unusual violence had broken out in his immediate neighborhood. But this, he realized as the mists of slumber cleared away, was an error. The noise which had disturbed him was not thunder but the sound of someone snoring. Snoring like the dickens. The walls seemed to be vibrating like the deck of an ocean liner....
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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138b791
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moment blighted Harold discovered that training meant knocking off pastry, taking exercise, and keeping away from the cigarettes, he was all against it, and it was only by unceasing vigilance that we managed to keep him in any shape at all.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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fd7b114
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In private life, Lottie Blossom tended to substitute for wistfulness and pathos a sort of "Passed-For-Adults-Only" joviality which expressed itself outwardly in a brilliant and challenging smile, and inwardly and spiritually in her practice of keeping alligators in wickerwork baskets and asking unsuspecting strangers to lift the lid." --
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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92d2b99
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The first thing to do,' said Psmith, 'is to ascertain that such a place as Clapham Common really exists. One has heard of it, of course, but has its existence ever been proved? I think not.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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6a870fc
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Come on," he said. "Bring the poker." I brought the tongs as well. I felt like it."
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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d853ad3
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He sallied forth, having told all those bally lies with the clear, blue, pop-eyed gaze of a young child.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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97fef69
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There you see two typical members of the class which has down-trodden the poor for centuries. Idlers! Non-producers! Look at the tall thin one with the face like a motor-mascot. Has he ever done an honest day's work in his life? No! A prowler, a trifler, and a blood-sucker! And I bet he still owes his tailor for those trousers!" He seemed to me to be verging on the personal, and I didn't think a lot of it. Old Bittlesham, on the other hand,..
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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78aba8d
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Once in every few publishing seasons there is an Event. For no apparent reason, the great heart of the Public gives a startled jump, and the public's great purse is emptied to secure copies of some novel which has stolen into the world without advance advertising and whose only claim to recognition is that The Licensed Victuallers' Gazette has stated in a two-line review that it is 'readable'.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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38d8183
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She gave the impression of smiling with difficulty, possibly for fear of getting wrinkles.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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550ccc5
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Sippy had described them as England's premier warts, and it looked to me as if he might be about right. Professor Pringle was a thinnish, baldish, dyspeptic-lookingish cove with an eye like a haddock, while Mrs Pringle's aspect was that of one who had had bad news round about the year 1900 and never really got over it. And I was just staggering under the impact of these two when I was introduced to a couple of ancient females with shawls al..
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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e8a52fc
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You never know what is waiting for you around the corner. You start the day with the fairest prospects, and before nightfall everything is as rocky and ding-basted as stig tossed full of doodlegammon.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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7fb22d4
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What you want," I said, "is to look out for a chance and save her from drowning." "I can't swim." That was Freddie Bullivant all over. A dear old chap in a thousand ways, but no help to a fellow, if you know what I mean."
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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ee274f4
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I give you my word that, until I started to tramp the place with this child, I never had a notion that it was such a difficult job restoring a son to his parents. How kidnappers ever get caught is a mystery to me. I searched Marvis Bay like a bloodhound, but nobody came forward to claim the infant. You would have thought, from the lack of interest in him, that he was stopping there all by himself in a cottage of his own.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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a151e1d
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In love with me. Don't be absurd." "My dear old thing, you don't know young Bingo. He can fall in love with anybody." "Thank you!" "Oh, I didn't mean it that way, you know. I don't wonder at his taking to you. Why, I was in love with you myself once." "Once? Ah! And all that remains now are the cold ashes? This isn't once of your tactful evenings, Bertie." "Well, my dear sweet thing, dash it all, considering that you gave me the bird and ne..
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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13dd881
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I've been through a bad time, Bertie, these last weeks. The sun ceased to shine - " "That's curious. We've had gorgeous weather in London." "The birds ceased to sing." "What birds?" "What the devil does it matter what birds?" said young BIngo, with some asperity. "Any birds. The birds round about here. You don't expect me to specify them by their pet names, do you? I tell you, Bertie, it hit me hard at first, very hard." "What hit you?" I s..
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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76b3e0e
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Sex attraction is so purely a question of the taste of the individual that the wise man never argues about it. He accepts its vagaries as part of the human mystery, and leaves it at that.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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02f7d6c
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beggars approached the task of trying to persuade perfect strangers to bear the burden of their maintenance with that optimistic vim which makes all the difference. It was one of those happy mornings.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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5460a4a
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He made a noise like a pig swallowing half a cabbage,
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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c4d6e9a
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When Nature makes a chump like dear old Bobbie, she's proud of him, and doesn't want her handiwork disturbed. She gives him a sort of natural armour to protect him against outside interference. And that armour is shortness of memory. Shortness of memory keeps a man a chump, when, but for it, he might cease to be one.
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P.G. Wodehouse |
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18c008b
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I don't mind people talking rot in my presence, but it must not be utter rot.
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P.G. Wodehouse |