On Marriage and Getting Run Over by a Train

Bertie: "Is Mr. Corkadale still alive?"

Aunt Dahlia: "Died years ago. Got run over by a municipal tram."

Bertie: "Don't blame him. I'd have done the same myself in his place. Only course to pursue when you are married to a woman like that."

From P. G. Wodehouse, Jeeves and the Tie that Binds

On Backhanded Compliments

"It may be that you are not yourself luminous, but you are a conductor of light. Some people without possessing genius have a remarkable power of stimulating it."

Holmes to Watson
From Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the Baskervilles