He was old and wise, which meant tired and disappointed.

Immorality, I know. Immortality, I cannot judge.

The desert was held in a crazed communism by which Nature and the elements were for the free use of every known friendly person for his own purposes and no more.

Isn't it true that the fault of birth rests somewhat on the child? I believe it's we who led our parents on to bear us, and it's our unborn children who make our flesh itch.

We had been hopelessly labouring to plough waste lands; to make nationality grow in a place full of the certainty of God… Among the tribes our creed could be only like the desert grass – a beautiful swift seeming of spring; which, after a day’s heat, fell dusty.

Half a calamity is better than a whole one.

We lived always in the stretch or sag of nerves, either on the crest or in the trough of waves of feeling.