That moment when French culture was at its most refined, most searching

I've finally understood what this house is about, this extraordinary attempt to make one space after another work without discomfort or falsity. You want to make a perfect stage set for conversation, enlightenment, for that moment when French culture was at its most refined, most searching.

E. de Waal, Letters to Camondo (2021), 111

A separate pantry for decanting wine

In this house one room leads onwards, unfolds, interlocks. I stand in your library and can go in three directions. The grand salon leads to four other spaces. There are alcoves and spiral staircases from bedrooms up to the servants' rooms so that clothes can appear and disappear. You catch sight of a winding staircase arcing up, bisected by a balcony. There is a hidden suite of rooms for the butler, a silver chamber, a separate pantry for decanting wine.

I think your bathroom might be the only room with one door.

E. de Waal, Letters to Camondo (2021), 52

Who would dream of building such high rooms with such spectacular volumes for a cup or a dish or a bowl

When I was a boy, I would walk up the stairs and then more stairs [at the V&A]. You had to be resourceful to navigate your way through Medieval Metalwork, and not get lost in Enamels. You reached the top. There were very few places you could see out or even sense the museum below you, the spaces seemed completely self-contained, one enfilade gallery after another after another. In each direction there were armies of vitrines holding pots. Who would dream of building such high rooms with such spectacular volumes for a cup or a dish or a bowl.

There were very few visitors. Sometimes the warders were asleep.

E. de Waal, The white road (2015), 329

You are lucky to get two minutes of the attention of a margrave who lives for killing stags or boar in inventive ways

If you are interested in in optics or mineralogy or funding a dictionary of philosophy, you are lucky to get two minutes of the attention of a margrave who lives for killing stags or boar in inventive ways. You are n some endless corridor of some windy schloss, and there is the clatter of men, scratching themselves, impatient for the off with their noise and weapons and rolling obscenities, and you are trying to tell His Serene Highness that you need money - a great deal of money - for a wind-furnace to test the melting point of iron ore.

E. de Waal, The white road (2015), 139

It took a French priest in the provinces to send the Emperor of China some wine

Through Lang, on the second day of the third month of 1709, Pere d'Entrecolles sent the Kangxi Emperor sixty-six bottles of wine 'and other imported Western rarities'. The Emperor was very pleased and told Lang that in future all offerings should be recorded in detail. This was noted in hs vermillion endorsements.

The Emperor got a lot of presents, delicate  scientific instruments and grand artefacts, inlaid and gilded and resplendent. It took a French priest in the provinces to send the Emperor of China some wine.

E. de Waal, The white road (2015), 103-4

I'm not confident about Jesuits and untidiness

My photocopy of his [Pere d'Entrecolles] letters now resembles a palimpsest. I've underlined almost everything, and written notes slant-ways on his comments, in taxis and on my knee in the street and leaning against trees. There are stains. Possibly noodles. I hope he'd understand, but I'm not confident about Jesuits and untidiness.

E. de Waal, The White road (2015), 52

None of the sensible Ephrussi children would go so far as that

It was understood that none of the sensible Ephrussi children would go so far as that [suicide]. Melancholy had its place. A café. It shouldn't be brought home.

E. de Waal, The Hare with Amber Eyes (2010), 133