And so on and on through generations, outliving individuals, customs, dynasties -- all save the landscape it adorns and human nature -- till the appointed day when the wind wins the long battle and rejoices over a reclaimed space, or decay puts the last stroke to his fungus-fingered work.
Ah, one should always think twice before one cuts down a tree! In the evenings it was customary for Sir Henry, Good, and myself to dine, or rather sup, with their Majesties -- not every night, indeed, but about three or four times a week, whenever they had not much company, or the affairs of state would allow of it.
And I am bound to say that those little suppers were quite the most charming things of their sort that I ever had to do with.
How true is the saying that the very highest in rank are always the most simple and kindly.

It is from your half-and-half sort of people that you get pomposity and vulgarity, the difference between the two being very much what one sees every day in England between the old, out-at-elbows, broken-down county family, and the overbearing, purse-proud people who come and 'take the place'.

I really think that Nyleptha's greatest charm is her sweet simplicity, and her kindly genuine interest even in little things.

She is the simplest woman I ever knew, and where her passions are not involved, one of the sweetest; but she can look queenly enough when she likes, and be as fierce as any savage too.
For instance, never shall I forget that scene when I for the first time was sure that she was really in love with Curtis.
It came about in this way -- all through Good's weakness for ladies' society.

When we had been employed for some three months in learning Zu-Vendi, it struck Master Good that he was getting rather tired of the old gentlemen who did us the honour to lead us in the way that we should go, so he proceeded, without saying a word to anybody else, to inform them that it was a peculiar fact, but that we could not make any real progress in the deeper intricacies of a foreign language unless we were taught by ladies -- young ladies, he was careful to explain.