Somerset Quotes

“Are you watching the boats?" Cornelia guessed. She craned her neck to see if there was any excitement on the river.
Heavens no, I'm spying on people," Virginia responded unrepentantly.
-Cornelia E and Virginia Somerset”
― Lesley M.M. Blume, Cornelia and the Audacious Escapades of the Somerset Sisters

“Patsy had asked him if he had had adventures in Paris and he had truthfully answered no. It was a fact that he had done nothing; his father thought he had had a devil of a time and was afraid he had contracted a venereal disease, and he hadn't even had a woman; only one thing had happened to him, it was rather curious when you came to think of it, and he didn't just then quite know what to do about it: the bottom had fallen out of his world.”
― W. Somerset Maugham

“Jocelyn, as the bus rolled along, looked across a space of green grass, elm-bordered, to the grey mass of the Cathedral. Its towers rose four-square against the sky and the wide expanse of the west front, rising like a precipice, was crowded with sculptured figures... About them the rooks were beating slowly and over their heads the bells were ringing for five o'clock evensong...
To his left, on the opposite side of the road to the Cathedral, was another, smaller mass of grey masonry, the Deanery, and in front of him was a second archway.
Once through it they were in a discreet road bordered on each side with gracious old houses standing back in walled gardens. Here dwelt the Canons of the Cathedral with their respective wives and families, and the few elderly ladies of respectable antecedents, blameless life and orthodox belief who were considered worthy to be on intimate terms with them.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, A City of Bells