“I am a king's daughter,And if I cared to care,The moon that has no mistressWould flutter in my hair.No one dares to cherishWhat I choose to crave.Never have I hungered,For that I did not haveI am a kings daughter,And I grow old withinThe prison of my person,The shackles of my skin.And I would run awayAnd beg from door to door,Just to see your shadowOnce, and never more. ”

“I am no king, and I am no lord,And I am no soldier at-arms," said he."I'm none but a harper, and a very poor harper,That am come hither to wed with ye.""If you were a lord, you should be my lord,And the same if you were a thief," said she."And if you are a harper, you shall be my harper,For it makes no matter to me, to me,For it makes no matter to me.""But what if it prove that I am no harper?That I lied for your love most monstrously?""Why, then I'll teach you to play and sing,For I dearly love a good harp," said she.”

“My son, your ineptitude is so vast, your incompetence so profound, that I am certain you are inhabited by greater power than I have ever known.”

“I would have chosen any other than this for my prison. A rhinoceros is as ugly as a human being, and it too is going to die, but at least it never thinks that it is beautiful.”

“I have been mortal, and some part of me is mortal yet. I am full of tears and hunger and the fear of death, although I cannot weep, and I want nothing, and I cannot die. I am not like the others now, for no unicorn was ever born who could regret, but I do. I regret.”

“I am what I am. I would tell you what you want to know if I could, for you have been kind to me. But I am a cat, and no cat anywhere ever gave anyone a straight answer.”

“But I must go on," said the Lady Amalthea, "for it is never finished. Even when I wake, I cannot tell what is real, and what I am dreaming as I move and speak and eat my dinner. I remember what cannot have happened, and forget something that is happening to me know. People look at me as though I should know them, and I do know them in the dream, and always the fire draws me nearer, though I am awake—”