Sublime

to die young was always a waste.

‘Oh, the English,’ Sancho said, ‘forget the English – they never conform to any rules, not even of economics.

whose ninety-one years were chiefly remarkable for being utterly devoid of incident,

‘Are the broads loose in Scotland?’ Naturally, I had to make her repeat it because I could not quite believe my ears, but I had heard right the first time. Her problem was her husband was off to Scotland, and she was anxious he should come back with the knowledge not of what Scotsmen wore under the kilts, but rather their lassies.

But to the Company’s directors in London this branch of their servants’ activities, with all its bizarre and colourful ramifications, would ever be a subject for misunderstanding and suspicion. The ‘country trade’, as it was called, invariably confounded the auditors but enriched the adventurers.