“To the Hesitating Purchaser:"If sailor tales to sailor tunes, Storm and adventure, heat and cold,If schooners, islands, and maroons And Buccaneers and buried GoldAnd all the old romance, retold, Exactly in the ancient way,Can please, as me they pleased of old, The wiser youngsters of to-day:-So be it, and fall on! If not, If studious youth no longer crave,His ancient appetites forgot, Kingston, or Ballantyne the brave,Or Cooper of the wood and wave: So be it, also! And may IAnd all my pirates share the grave, Where these and their creations lie!”

“She always did like tales of adventure-stories full of brightness and darkness. She could tell you the names of all King Arthur's knights, and she knew everything about Beowulf and Grendel, the ancient gods and the not-quite-so-ancient heroes. She liked pirate stories, too, but most of all she loved books that had at least a knight or a dragon or a fairy in them. She was always on the dragon's side by the way.”

“All night I streched my arms acrosshim, rivers of blood, the dark woods, singingwith all my skin and bone ''Please keep him safe.Let him lay his head on my chest and we will belike sailors, swimming in the sound of it, dashedto pieces.'' Makes a cathedral, him pressing againstme, his lips at my neck, and yes, I do believehis mouth is heaven, his kisses falling over me like stars.”

“Happy, happy Christmas, that can win us back to the delusions of our childish days; that can recall to the old man the pleasures of his youth; that can transport the sailor and the traveller, thousands of miles away, back to his own fire-side and his quiet home!”

“I say, sailor, we are both marooned on this beach.”

“I'm much too much the popular pet ever since I sang 'Every Nice Girl Loves A Sailor' at the village concert last year. I had them rolling in the aisles. Three encores, and so many bows that I got a crick in the back.""Spare me the tale of your excesses," I said distantly."I wore a sailor suit.""Please," I said, revolted.”