"She tried hard to keep herself a stranger to her poor old father's slight income by the use of the finest production of steel, whose blunt edge eyed the reely covering with marked greed, and offered its sharp dart to faultless fabrics of flaxen fineness."
—Ros trying to convey the primary occupation of her protagonist Delina Delaney, which is needlework
"Sympathise with me, indeed! Ah, no! Cast your sympathy on the chill waves of troubled waters; fling it on the oases of futurity; dash it against the rock of gossip; or, better still, allow it to remain within the false and faithless bosom of buried scorn."
—The confusing monologue that opens Irene Iddesleigh, spoken by the title character
"Have you ever visited that portion of Erin's plot that offers its sympathetic soil for the minute survey and scrutinous examination of those in political power, whose decision has wisely been the means before now of converting the stern and prejudiced, and reaching the hand of slight aid to share its strength in augmenting its agricultural richness?"
— The equally confusing opening to Delina Delaney
"I expect I will be talked about at the end of a thousand years."
—Ros summing up her Small Name, Big Ego
