It is said that many children who live in the central provinces, away from the ocean, have a great longing to see it. I who had never been away from the monotonous country surrounding us looked forward eagerly to seeing the mountains.

But it is true that sometimes an enveloping darkness aids one to clearer vision; as in a panorama building, for example, where the obscurity about the entrance prepares one better for the climax, and gives the scene depicted a more real and vivid appearance.

The moon of a bright silver, which dazzles by its shining, illumines a world which surely is no longer ours; for it resembles in nothing what may be seen in other lands.

I still held fast to my determination to become a minister; it still seemed to me that that was my duty. I had pledged myself, in my prayers I had given my word to God. How could I therefore break my vow?

My sister and my brother, of whom I have not spoken before, were considerably older than I; it seemed almost as if we belonged to different generations.

It is with the approach of winter that cats...wear their richest fur and assume an air of sumptuous and delightful opulence.

Cats are possessed of a shy, retiring nature, cajoling, haughty, and capricious, difficult to fathom. They reveal themselves only to certain favored individuals, and are repelled by the faintest suggestion of insult or even by the most trifling deception.