But fear and fascination are yokefellows, oxen out of step but pulling in the same direction…
It isn’t where you’re born in this world, it’s what you do.
Everything at the moment, my dear, no doubt seems disgusting. I know the mood too well. But being in that mood, Ross, is like being out in the frost. If we do not keep on the move we shall perish.
Demelza was beginning to feel like a lion tamer who has been putting his pets through their paces and finds them getting out of hand.
Monthly, out of common courtesy, he went to inquire after the invalid Charles, who refused either to die or get better.
I could say how well he dances, but that isn’t true, for he dances like that big friendly bear I saw last Christmas.
…Here, beast, you shall be the chairman, and mind you call us to order.” He leaned forward and dropped the cat on the empty seat.
If every one of you was to clean before his own front door, all would be clean of cow flops.
That reminds me of when you used to call and see us before Christmas, the year before last. Somehow–somehow life was all dark and secret and beautiful then.
In the depths of horror and despair, one comes to a new steadiness. There is no farther to fall.
All men were born in the same way: no privilege existed that was not of man’s own contriving.
I’ve interrupted a party. Is it in celebration of the peace or in honor of the next war?
Did I behave myself tonight, Ross?’ she asked. ‘Did I behave as Mrs Poldark should behave?’‘You misbehaved monstrously,’ he said, ‘and were a triumph.
Do you believe we are masters of ourselves, or merely dance like puppets on strings having the illusion of independence?
It isn’t very pretty to have been made a fool of by one’s own feelings,’ he said. ‘To take childish promises and build a–a castle out of them…
But was any future, anyone’s future, unfraught by hazards of some sort? The only security was death. So long as one wanted to go on living on had to accept the risks. Well, she accepted them…