Certain simple principles had been instilled into him so anxiously (on account of his "queerness") that the mere names of certain transgressions filled him with horror.

He had been always easily impressed by speeches.

He was impressed and startled now, and his intelligence was very alert.
"What ?" he asked at once anxiously.

"Not even if they were hungry?
Mustn't they ?" The two had paused in their walk.
"Not if they were ever so," said Mrs Verloc, with the equanimity of a person untroubled by the problem of the distribution of wealth, and exploring the perspective of the roadway for an omnibus of the right colour.

"Certainly not.