“They would all be sorry... particularly the duck.”

“Death strode away, stopped, and came back. He pointed a skeletal finger at The Duck Man.WHY, he said, ARE YOU WALKING AROUND WITH THAT DUCK?"What duck?"AH. SORRY.”

“Since early morning he had been swimming in the river, in company with his friends the ducks. And when the ducks stood on their heads suddenly, as ducks will, he would dive down and tickle their necks, just under where their chins would be if ducks had chins, till they were forced to come to the surface again in a hurry, spluttering and angry and shaking their feathers at him, for it is impossible to say quite all you feel when your head is under water.”

“The party and the Krikkit warship looked, in their writhings, a little like two ducks, one of which is trying to make a third duck inside the second duck, whilst the second duck is trying very hard to explain that it doesn't feel ready for a third duck right now, is uncertain that it would want any putative third duck anyway, and certainly not whilst it, the second duck, was busy flying.”

“I'm sorry," Billy says, "but I felt it was too organized. I like ellipses and teeny jottings and spontaneous poems and particularly all those devices like long lists of melancholy things.”

“All along the backwater,Through the rushes tall,Ducks are a-dabbling,Up tails all!Ducks' tails, drakes' tails,Yellow feet a-quiver,Yellow bills all out of sightBusy in the river! ”