Iolanthe's Wedding

"This is my work--this is what I brought into being--I'm the father of this," and so on.

She tried to shake him off and turned scarlet.

Aha, ashamed of him.

Then the ladies got the table ready for coffee. Fresh brown waffles, preserves after the Russian fashion, gleaming damask, knives and spoons with buckhorn handles, the fine blue smoke of charcoal puffing up from the chimney of the brass coffee machine, making everything still cosier.

We sat there drinking our coffee. Old Krakow blustered, the Baroness smiled a fine melancholy smile, and Iolanthe made eyes at me.

Yes, gentlemen, made eyes at me. You may be at the time of life when that sort of thing happens to you none too rarely. But just you get to be well on in your forties, conscious to the very depths of your soul of your fatness and baldness, and you'll see how grateful you'll be even to a housemaid or a barmaid for taking the trouble to ogle you. And a thousand t