The Cask of Amontillado Quotes

“A million candles have burned themselves out. Still I read on.”

“I continued, as was my wont, to smile in his face, and he did not perceive that my smile now was at the thought of his immolation.”

“The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as best I could; but when he ventured upon insult, I vowed revenge.”

“At length I would be avenged; this was a point definitely, settled—but the very definitiveness with which it was resolved precluded the idea of risk. I must not only punish but punish with impunity.”

“A wrong is unredressed when retribution overtakes its redresser.”

″‘Come,’ I said, with decision, ‘we will go back; your health is precious.‘”

“It was about dusk, one evening during the supreme madness of the carnival season, that I encountered my friend.”

″‘I shall not die of a cough.’ ‘True – true,’ I replied.”

“For the half of a century no mortal has disturbed them.”

“A moment more and I had fettered him to the granite.”

“In painting and gemmary, Fortunato, like his countrymen, was a quack–but in the matter of old wines he was sincere.”

“Ha! ha! ha!–he! he!–a very good joke indeed–an excellent jest. We shall have many a rich laugh about it at the palazzo–he! he! he!–over our wine–he! he! he!”

“There came forth in reply only a jingling of the bells. My heart grew sick–on account of the dampness of the catacombs.”

“He had a weak point–this Fortunato...”

“His eyes flashed with a fierce light. He laughed and threw the bottle upwards with a gesticulation I did not understand.”

“I had finished a portion of the last and the eleventh; there remained but a single stone to be fitted and plastered in.”

“The man wore motley. He had on a tight-fitting parti-striped dress, and his head was surmounted by the conical cap and bells.”

″‘You jest,’ he exclaimed, recoiling a few paces. ‘But let us proceed to the Amontillado.‘”

“Its walls had been lined with human remains, piled to the vault overhead, in the fashion of the great catacombs of Paris.”

“A moment more and I had fettered him to the granite.”