Haste would have been undignified for a Tibetan government official whatever his mission, and in any case the rough track that passed for the main street of Chamdo was heavily iced.

Billie, what kind of a lad is that young Coke up at Washurst? He addressed an old college friend. . . . He's one of those Ohio Cokes—regular thing—father millionaire—used to be a barber—good old boy.

Ursula could not believe the air in her nostrils. It seemed conscious, malevolent, purposive in its intense murderous coldness.

To witness some queer, shy, misshapen, greyheaded, self-important, little discoverer of great discoveries, ridiculously adorned with the wide ribbon of some order of chivalry and holding a reception of his fellow-men, or to read the anguish of Nature at the “neglect of science” when the angel of the birthday honours passes the Royal Society by, or to listen to one indefatigable lichenologist commenting on the work of another indefatigable lichenologist, such things force one to realise the unfaltering littleness of men.