{"author":"E.F. Benson","author_id":"E.F.+Benson","total_quotes":24,"quotes":[{"text":"There is a certain amount which I shan't mention publicly,' Elizabeth said. 'Things about Lucia which I should never dream of stating openly.'Those are just the ones I should like to hear about most,' said Diva. 'Just a few little titbits.","author":"E.F. Benson","tags":["gossip","humour"],"id":13551,"author_id":"E.F.+Benson"},{"text":"Miss Mackintosh waved her arms wildly.'Oh, please stop, and let me guess,' she cried. 'I shall go crazy with joy if I'm right. It was an old Peerage, and so she found that Lady Deal was Helena Herman--'Whom she had seen ten years ago at a music hall as a male impersonator,' cried Diva.'And didn't want to know her,' interrupted Miss Mackintosh.'Yes, that's it, but that is not all. I hope you won't mind, but it's too rich. She saw you this morning coming out of your house in your bath-chair, and was quite sure that you were that Lady Deal.'The three ladies rocked with laughter. Sometimes one recovered, and sometimes two, but they were re-infected by the third, and so they went on, solo and chorus, and duet and chorus, till exhaustion set in.'But there's still a mystery,' said Diva at length, wiping her eyes. 'Why did the Peerage say that Lady Deal was Helena Herman?'Oh, that's the last Lady Deal,' said Miss Mackintosh. 'Helena Herman's Lord Deal died without children and Florence's Lord Deal, my Lady Deal, succeeded. Cousins.'If that isn't a lesson for Elizabeth Mapp,' said Diva. 'Better go to the expense of a new Peerage than make such a muddle. But what a long call we've made. We must go.'Florence shall hear every word of it to-morrow night,' said Miss Mackintosh. 'I promise not to tell her till then. We'll all tell her.'Oh, that is kind of you,' said Diva.'It's only fair. And what about Miss Mapp being told?'She'll find it out by degrees,' said the ruthless Diva. 'It will hurt more in bits.'Oh, but she mustn't be hurt,' said Miss Mackintosh. 'She's too precious, I adore her.'So do we,' said Diva. 'But we like her to be found out occasionally. You will, too, when you know her.","author":"E.F. Benson","tags":["humour","misunderstanding","neighbours","satire","tilling"],"id":16987,"author_id":"E.F.+Benson"},{"text":"Miss Mapp moved towards the screen.'What a delicious big screen,' she said.'Yes, but don't go behind it, Mapp,' said Irene, 'or you'll see my model undressing.'Miss Mapp retreated from it precipitately, as from a wasp's nest, and examined some of the studies on the wall, for it was more than probable from the unfinished picture on the easel that Adam lurked behind the delicious screen. Terrible though it all was, she was conscious of an unbridled curiosity to know who Adam was. It was dreadful to think that there could be any man in Tilling so depraved as to stand to be looked at with so little on...Irene strolled round the walls with her.'Studies of Lucy,' she said.'I see, dear,' said Miss Mapp. 'How clever! Legs and things! But when you have your bridge-party, won't you perhaps cover some of them up, or turn them to the wall? We should all be looking at your pictures instead of attending to our cards. And if you were thinking of asking the Padre, you know...'They were approaching the corner of the room where the screen stood, when a movement there as if Adam had hit it with his elbow made Miss Mapp turn round. The screen fell flat on the ground and within a yard of her stood Mr. Hopkins, the proprietor of the fish-shop just up the street. Often and often had Miss Mapp had pleasant little conversations with him, with a view to bringing down the price of flounders. He had little bathing-drawers on...'Hullo, Hopkins, are you ready,' said Irene. 'You know Miss Mapp, don't you?'Miss Mapp had not imagined that Time and Eternity combined could hold so embarrassing a moment. She did not know where to look, but wherever she looked, it should not be at Hopkins. But (wherever she looked) she could not be unaware that Hopkins raised his large bare arm and touched the place where his cap would have been, if he had had one.'Good morning, Hopkins,' she said. 'Well, Irene darling, I must be trotting, and leave you to your--' she hardly knew what to call it--'to your work.'She tripped from the room, which seemed to be entirely full of unclothed limbs, and redder than one of Mr. Hopkins's boiled lobsters hurried down the street. She felt that she could never face him again, but would be obliged to go to the establishment in the High Street where Irene dealt, when it was fish she wanted from a fish-shop... Her head was in a whirl at the brazenness of mankind, especially womankind. How had Irene started the overtures that led to this? Had she just said to Hopkins one morning: 'Will you come to my studio and take off all your clothes?' If Irene had not been such a wonderful mimic, she would certainly have felt it her duty to go straight to the Padre, and, pulling down her veil, confide to him the whole sad story. But as that was out of the question, she went into Twemlow's and ordered four pounds of dried apricots.","author":"E.F. Benson","tags":["artists","humour","neighbours","satire"],"id":22808,"author_id":"E.F.+Benson"},{"text":"Ah, this delicious night air,' she said, luxuriously sniffing in the coolness. 'Night air and gardening are the great tonics. There is nothing so stimulating as bare contact with rich mother earth. You are never so fresh as when you have been grubbing in the soil - black hands, black nails, and boots covered with mud.' She gave her great jovial laugh.'I'm a glutton for air and earth,' she said. 'Positively I look forward to death, for then I shall be buried and have the kind earth all round me. No leaden caskets for me - I have given explicit directions. But what shall I do about air? Well, I suppose one can't have everything.'('Mrs. Amworth').","author":"E.F. Benson","tags":["burial","death","garden-gardening","night","night-air","vampire"],"id":23165,"author_id":"E.F.+Benson"},{"text":"This little colloquy in Adele's box was really the foundation of the secret society of the Luciaphils, and the membership of the Luciaphils began swiftly to increase. Aggie Sandeman was scarcely eligible, for complete goodwill towards Lucia was a sine qua non of membership, and there was in her mind a certain asperity when she thought that it was she who had given Lucia her gambit, and that already she was beginning to be relegated to second circles in Lucia's scale of social precedence. It was true that she had been asked to dine to meet Marcelle Periscope, but the party to meet Alf and his flute was clearly the smarter of the two. Adele, however, and Tony Limpsfield were real members, so too, when she came up a few days later, was Olga. Marcia Whitby was another who greedily followed her career, and such as these, whenever they met, gave eager news to each other about it. There was, of course, another camp, consisting of those whom Lucia bombarded with pleasant invitations, but who (at present) firmly refused them. They professed not to know her and not to take the slightest interest in her, which showed, as Adele said, a deplorable narrowness of mind. Types and striking characters like Lucia, who pursued undaunted and indefatigable their aim in life, were rare, and when they occurred should be studied with reverent affection...Sometimes one of the old and original members of the Luciaphils discovered others, and if when Lucia's name was mentioned an eager and a kindly light shone in their eyes, and they said in a hushed whisper 'Did you hear who was there on Thursday?' they thus disclosed themselves as Luciaphils...All this was gradual, but the movement went steadily on, keeping pace with her astonishing career, for the days were few on which some gratifying achievement was not recorded in the veracious columns of Hermione.","author":"E.F. Benson","tags":["amusement","humour","lucia","satire","social-climber"],"id":27036,"author_id":"E.F.+Benson"},{"text":"Philosophers have argued about the strongest emotion known to man. Some say ‘love’, others ‘hate’, others ‘fear’. I am disposed to put ‘curiosity’ on a level, at least, with these august sensations, just mere simple inquisitiveness.","author":"E.F. Benson","tags":["curiosity","emotion","fear","hate","inquisitiveness","love","philosophers"],"id":33088,"author_id":"E.F.+Benson"},{"text":"Hermy, when she was not otter-hunting, could be very sarcastic, and he had a clear month of Hermy in front of him, without any otter-hunting, which, so she had informed him, was not possible in August. This was mysterious to Georgie, because it did not seem likely that all otters died in August, and a fresh brood came in like caterpillars. If Hermy was here in October she would otter-hunt all morning and snore all afternoon, and be in the best of tempers, but the August visit required more careful steering.","author":"E.F. Benson","tags":["hunting","sarcasm"],"id":81451,"author_id":"E.F.+Benson"},{"text":"The functions of the human frame are, broadly speaking, known. They are a country, anyhow, that has been charted and mapped out. But outside that lie huge tracts of undiscovered country, which certainly exist, and the real pioneers of knowledge are those who, at the cost of being derided as credulous and superstitious, want to push on into those misty and probably perilous places. I felt that I could be of more use by setting out without compass or knapsack into the mists than by sitting in a cage like a canary and chirping about what was known. Besides, teaching is very very bad for a man who knows himself only to be a learner: you only need to be a self-conceited ass to teach.","author":"E.F. Benson","tags":["occult","paranormal","supernatural"],"id":90383,"author_id":"E.F.+Benson"},{"text":"Or do you like being frightened?”Hugh, though generally intelligent, is dense in certain ways; this is one of them.“Why, of course, I like being frightened,” I said. “I want to be made to creep and creep and creep. Fear is the most absorbing and luxurious of emotions. One forgets all else if one is afraid.","author":"E.F. Benson","tags":["emotions","fear","gothic","horror"],"id":95540,"author_id":"E.F.+Benson"},{"text":"The narrator, I think, must succeed in frightening himself before he can think of frightening his reader….","author":"E.F. Benson","tags":["ghost-stories","horror"],"id":116685,"author_id":"E.F.+Benson"}],"pagination":{"page":1,"page_size":10,"total":24,"pages":3,"next":"?page=2\u0026page_size=10"}}