Spanish Prime Minister Antonio Cánovas del Castillo: “May I know the reason for your visit?”
Cholera: “You will see; it is a matter of amour-propre. I came to prove to you that I don’t let you run my hand over your face.”
(La Campana de Gracia, Barcelona, 1884) (Surely I don’t have the idiom quite right.)
Sic Transit Pestilentia 