19 quotes found
“A journey is an achievement, Maria, just as much as a mathematical proof.”
“She enjoyed the sights and sounds of the dockside ports were places of freedom.”
“The jungle is alive. Its dangerous as a living nightmare and brimful of hostility.”
“I pride myself on making my own decisions, sir," she said. "I do not welcome gentlemen making them for me.”
“Maria didnt fear the sea but, as taught by her father, she respected its power. In her experience the ocean had no intent to drown travellers.”
“There was something about Maria Graham that you could believe in a slice of home. If not unique in her travelling, she was at least extraordinary.”
“Over the drop, a luminous pond lay below them like a pale magic lantern. It was as if the moon had plummeted into the water and smashed open. Engulfed in darkness, with only a scatter of stars abov...”
“A flock of small birds took off from the wall of the fort. They moved like a length of dark silk caught by the breeze as they headed out to sea. Behind them, the sky was the colour of forget-me-not...”
“He noticed that he felt calmer now she was here, still in that grey dress with her dowdy hat, the air around her redolent with orchid oil. Perhaps all women in England had this effect. Perhaps they...”
“A vision of the little house in Soho flickered across his minds eye, his mother at a desk, writing in her journal, with hazy sunlight streaming through the morning windows. The woman inhabited a wo...”
“There was something indomitable about Maria like Britannia. Hed heard that she kept her head during a Chilean earthquake the year before when men of greater age and experience had panicked. Afterw...”
“The moon was low but not full. The men set out along the dock in conversation. As they dropped onto the dark beach, Simmons declared, There can be no better place in the world than this.Henderson h...”
“It had occurred to her many times that on board it didnt matter where you were coming from or where you were heading. Each voyage had its own charisma. Like writing a book word by word or crossin...”
“It was as if she was a dream, like London, which he could not entirely grasp and of which he was not worthy. He wanted to be part of it but had forgotten how. It seemed extraordinary and strange th...”
“The smell of roasting meat rose from the street stalls in a sizzle and a fiddle player begged for coin as he rasped a haunting melody. Life could not be more perfect.”
“The daily chocolate left Will in high spirits, so that some days he believed he could wheel with the gulls that fished the foaming water close to shore. Now that he felt so free, it came to him tha...”
“Her eyes betrayed no shock at the sights of the quay as they unfolded not the sweating deckhands, the prostitutes crowding the ship, the hubbub of stalls, including one where three slaves were for...”
“Today is the anniversary of my husbands death," Maria announced. It was a dramatic statement, but the occasion seemed to demand it. "And I am going to leave.”
“It often horrified the English community that she spent her time with local farmers and horse traders, eccentrics and mystics, but she valued expertise over convention and had long believed if you ...”
