Country people do not behave as if they think life is short; they live on the principle that it is long, and savor variations of the kind best appreciated if most days are the same.

Indeed, if "biology is chemistry with history," as somebody has said, then nature writing is biology with love.

No birdcall is the musical equal of a clarinet blown with panache.

There often seems to be a playfulness to wise people, as if either their equanimity has as its source this playfulness or the playfulness flows from equanimity; and they can persuade other people who are in a state of agitation to calm down and smile.

Poetry is engendered in solitude, so what better meter for it than the clip of a buckskin horse?

Men greet each other with a sock on the arm, women with a hug, and the hug wears better in the long run.

Many people have believed that they were Chosen, but none more baldly than the Texans.