Quotes by George A. Birmingham

“A very wise English lady, one who has much experience of life, once said that young Englishmen of good position are lured into marrying music hall dancers, a thing which occasionally happens to them, because they find these ladies more entertaining and exciting than girls of their own class. I do not know whether this is true or not, but if it is it helps to explain the attractiveness of American women. There is always a certain unexpectedness about them. They are always stimulating and agreeable. It is much more difficult to account for the attractiveness of the English man.”

“A man cannot, I think, be both an historian and a gentleman. It is an essential part of the character of a gentleman that he should dislike prying into other people's secrets. The business of the historian, on the other hand, is to rake about if necessary through dust-bins, until he finds out the reasons, generally disreputable, why things are done. A gentleman displays a dignified superiority to the vice of curiosity. For the historian curiosity is a virtue.”