I took new pleasure in the thought that in a piece of wild pasture land like this one may get closest to Nature, and subsist upon what she gives of h… - Sarah Orne Jewett

Her hospitality was something exquisite; she had the gift which so many women lack, of being able to make themselves and their houses belong entirely to a guest's pleasure, — that charming surrender for the moment of themselves and whatever belongs to them, so that they make a part of one's own life that can never be forgotten.

Do you know that I have understood something lately better than I ever did before — it is that success and happiness are not things of chance with us, but of choice. I can see how we might so easily have had a dull summer here. Of course it is our own fault if the events of our lives are hindrances; it is we who make them bad or good. Sometimes it is a conscious choice, but oftener unconscious. I suppose we educate ourselves for taking the best of life or the worst, do Snot you?

It was mortifying to find how strong the habit of idle speech may become in one’s self. One need not always be saying something in this noisy world.