From Dead Man's Watch, by G. D. H. and Margaret Cole:

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[Witty Typography dept. (i.e., the final use of all-caps in the excerpt).]

Next door but one to the post office stood one of those forlorn confectioners, with three or four plates of dismal buns and a notice, DEVONSHIRE TEAS. CREAM SENT TO ANY PART OF THE WORLD, of the kind with which wayside villagers make optimistic bids to stay the speeding stream of cars. In it were two rickety tables with vases of paper flowers, at one of which a non-descript man was facing a DEVONSHIRE TEA.

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"Nice little tin Lizzie he's got, I don't think," said the girl. "Must pay being a whatever-is-it*."

[*Police doctor.]

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[For those keeping score: I believe this is our second generic reference to "uncles" within the week.]

"Bittaford, when you were living with your Uncle Percy, had he got a beard?"

"No, of course he hadn't," said Ronald, as though uncles were soil upon which beards would not grow.

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"The what sort of hoppers?"

"Pentecostal. They're the International Bible something-or-other, really; but that's what they're called. When the Spirit moves them, they hop--all at once."

[Later.]

"I like them even less when they're Pentecostal what-ever-it-is."

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"He's got the loveliest head you ever saw, like pictures of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob all together, with a long white beard and long white hair that's very thick and curls over his collar.... When you see him sitting down you think goodness me, that's a real church saint and no mistake. And then he gets up and you see his legs are tiny...and his beard looks as if it would be tickling his knees all the time, and he just looks an old comic. And he's got a little squeaky voice like a young pig's."

[Now, that is one of the protagonists' description of a minor character called Mr. Cole; and Mrs. Cole is given a description that is no more flattering. When we recall that the authors of this book are a husband-and-wife team named Cole--who were cosmopolitan socialists who probably bore little resemblance to these small-town "Pentecostal Hoppers"--I think the humor gets taken to the next level!]

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It was not well; it was very far from well, Wylie reflected crossly, as he tried to pick some coherent sense out of the confusion of Mrs. Devene's italics and her melodramatic mind.

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