Lady Astor was giving a costume ball and Winston Churchill asked her what disguise she would recommend for him. She said, "Why don't you come sober, Mr. Prime Minister?"
When the noted playwright George Bernard Shaw sent him two tickets to the opening night of his new play with a note that read: "Bring a friend, if you have one," Churchill promptly wired back: "I'll be there for the second performance, if there is one."
Once at a social gathering, Gladstone said to Disraeli, "I predict, Sir, that you will die either by hanging or of some vile disease". Disraeli replied, "That all depends, sir, upon whether I embrace your principles or your mistress."
It is said that Dorothy Parker and Clare Booth Luce arrived at a door simultaneously. Clare motions Parker ahead and says:
"Age before beauty"
Parker sweeps through the door without a pause and says over her shoulder:
"And pearls before swine."