Spare me sir, for your fanciful tales of fortune are too much for my ribs to bear.
Furious in his turn at this revelation, and ignoring Josephine's plea to spare Ralph, Sir Joseph has the sailor "loaded with chains" and taken to the ship's dungeon.
Juliet Fletcher Newcastle Upon Tyne Spare a thought for Sir Philip Dilley ("Floods chief: I might have been in Barbados but I wasn't away", 7 January).
It has only recently been revealed that in order to try to spare the dying Labour MP Sir Alfred Broughton from being brought into the Commons for the vote of confidence which precipitated the 1979 general election, Harrison approached his opposite number in the Conservative whips' office, Bernard Jack Weatherillll.
My husband and I joked that one day we would travel from doctor's office to doctor's office asking, "Please sir, can you spare a bypass surgery?" Our fear ran so deep we had nothing left to do but laugh as we imagined a future in which our daughter lacked any dignity and literally begged for life-saving treatment.
Sir Garfield Barwick was not spared Whitlam's invective; the former Prime Minister described him as "evil".
Indeed, my dear Sir, it was concealed only to spare us both needless pain: I could not have borne to reject that Counsel it would have killed me to take".
Spare and straight-backed and equipped with merciless spectacles, Sir Stafford Cripps, chancellor from 1947 to 1950, was known as a practised ascetic.
Feste does a somersault, Sir Toby Belch, taking his surname literally, never lacks for a spare flask and Sir Andrew Aguecheek, a caricature for openers, is overly dandified.
Philip's spare and elegant appearance is known from the famous portraits by Titian and by Sir Anthony More.
