“And in any case...there are no more supernatural noises nowadays...”

“Nowadays you can go anywhere in the world in a few hours, and nothing is fabulous any more.”

“Supernatural is a dangerous and difficult word in any of its senses, looser or stricter. But to fairies it can hardly be applied, unless super is taken merely as a superlative prefix. For it is man who is, in contrast to fairies, supernatural; whereas they are natural, far more natural than he. Such is their doom.”

“In any case civilisation has made mankind if not more bloodthirsty, at least more vilely, more loathsomely bloodthirsty.”

“Given a decent start any girl can beat a man nowadays.”

“It was a saying about noble figures in old Irish poems—he would give his hawk to any man that asked for it, yet he loved his hawk better than men nowadays love their bride of tomorrow. He would mourn a dog with more grief than men nowadays mourn their fathers.”