But his soul was mad. Being alone in the wilderness, it had looked within itself and, by heavens I tell you, it had gone mad.

The sea - this truth must be confessed - has no generosity. No display of manly qualities - courage, hardihood, endurance, faithfulness - has ever been known to touch its irresponsible consciousness of power.

The humblest craft that floats makes its appeal to a seaman by the faithfulness of her life.

Any fool can carry on, but a wise man knows how to shorten sail in time.

A task, any task, undertaken in an adventurous spirit acquires the merit of romance.

Fiction is history, human history, or it is nothing.

I have been called romantic. Well, that can't be helped. But stay. I seem to remember that I have been called a realist also. And as that charge too can be made out, let us try to live up to it, at whatever cost, for a change.