Seattle is not an overly friendly city. It is a civil city, but not altogether friendly. People from outside mistake the civility for friendliness. Seattle is full of people who have their own lives to live. They won't waste their time being friendly. But they are civil.

Books admitted me to their world open-handedly, as people for their most part, did not. The life I lived in books was one of ease and freedom, worldly wisdom, glitter, dash and style.

Spells of acute loneliness are an essential part of travel. Loneliness makes things happen.

When I want an opinion, I'll get it from my peers - from men of vision, like our great railroad builders... Stanford, Huntington, Dinsmore... fellows with imaginations broad enough to span the continent.

Seattle is this curious liberal island.

Seattle is a liberal city, its politics not so much blue in the American, not the British, sense as deep ultramarine, and its manners are studiously polite.

In an underdeveloped country don't drink the water. In a developed country don't breathe the air.