“He looked haggard and careworn, like a Borgia who has suddenly remembered that he has forgotten to shove cyanide in the consommé, and the dinner-gong due any moment.”

“He felt like a man who, chasing rainbows, has had one of them suddenly turn and bite him in the leg.”

“At that moment the gong sounded, and the genial host came tumbling downstairs like the delivery of a ton of coals.”

“He was a tubby little chap who looked as if he had been poured into his clothes and forgotten to say 'when'!”

“He was a Frenchman, a melancholy-looking man. His aspect was that of one who has been looking for the leak in a gas pipe with a lighted candle.”

“In your walks about London you will sometimes see bent, haggard figures that look as if they had recently been caught in some powerful machinery. They are those fellows who got mixed up with Catsmeat when he was meaning well.”

“A melancholy-looking man, he had the appearance of one who has searched for the leak in life's gas-pipe with a lighted candle.”