“The poverty of the villages is almost picturesque from the windows of a coach that is not stopping.”

“The trouble is that people hate coaches, and for good reason. Coach travel is a dismal and humiliating experience. When I take the bus, as I sometimes must, from Oxford to Cambridge, I arrive feeling almost suicidal.”

“The wheels where enormous wooden affairs, the back ones rounding up over the windows of the coach.”

“Just to be heading away from the sea, to be immersed in a beautiful landscape again, to hear the sound of crows, was such a welcome change, and all to be seen so very appealing, a land of peace and plenty, every field perfectly cultivated, hillsides bordering the river highlighted by white limestone cliffs, every village and distant château so indisputably ancient and picturesque.”

“It is almost another kind of love, being loved. It is the same heat but from another room; it is the same sound but from a high window...”

“Poor? What does that matter? When poverty creeps in at the door, love flies in through the window.”