Lapham’s Quarterly

Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board.

The Mediterranean has the colors of a mackerel, changeable I mean. You don’t always know if it is green or violet—you can’t even say it’s blue, because the next moment the changing light has taken on a tinge of pink or gray.

But look, our seas are what we make of them, full of fish or not, opaque or transparent, red or black, high or smooth, narrow or bankless—and we are ourselves sea, sand, coral, seaweed, beaches, tides, swimmers, children, waves.

Of all objects that I have ever seen, there is none which affects my imagination so much as the sea or ocean. A troubled ocean, to a man who sails upon it, is, I think, the biggest object that he can see in motion, and consequently gives his imagination one of the highest kinds of pleasure that can arise from greatness.

The sea hath fish for every man.

The sea receives us in a proper way only when we are without clothes.

The wonderful sea charmed me from the first.

I must be a mermaid, Rango. I have no fear of depths and a great fear of shallow living.

Ashore it’s wine, women, and song; aboard it’s rum, bum, and concertina.

The sole business of a seaman onshore who has to go to sea again is to take as much pleasure as he can.