A Room with a View by E. M. Forster

“The Signora had no business to do it,” said Miss Bartlett, “no business

at all. She promised us south rooms with a view close together, instead of

which here are north rooms, looking into a courtyard, and a long way apart.

Oh, Lucy!”

“And a Cockney, besides!” said Lucy, who had been further saddened by

the Signora’s unexpected accent. “It might be London.” She looked at the

two rows of English people who were sitting at the table; at the row of

white bottles of water and red bottles of wine that ran between the English

people; at the portraits of the late Queen and the late Poet Laureate that

hung behind the English people, heavily framed; at the notice of the English

church (Rev. Cuthbert Eager, M. A. Oxon.), that was the only other

decoration of the wall. “Charlotte, don’t you feel, too, that we might be in

London? I can hardly believe that all kinds of other things are just outside. I

suppose it is one’s being so tired.”