Quotes from Elizabeth George Speare

Beside the plain blue homespun and white linen which modestly clothed Aunt Rachel and Judith, Kit's flowered silk gave her the look of some vivid tropical bird lighted by mistake on a strange shore.

HE WAS SITTING ON THE FLAT STONE THAT SERVED as a doorstep, waiting for his supper to cook. The late sun slanted in long yellow bars across the clearing. The forest beyond was already in shadow. Matt was feeling well pleased with his day. That morning he had shot a rabbit. He had skinned it carefully, stretching the fur against the cabin wall to dry.

Matt thought, as though he couldn't count the weeks for himself.

No I have not asked Jesus to join us. All I hope and long for now is that He will ask me to join Him.

He had envied Attean his free, unhampered life in the forest, and the boisterous comradeship in the village.

glancing defiantly from one hostile face to another, Kit found a

I just wish it hadn't happened four days before Thanksgiving. It's going to spoil the holiday to have everyone so gloomy.

Jesus? she breathed. Into Jesus' face came the old smle with which he had so often looked at the children who crowded around him. It is--all right? she whispered. It is all right, Jesus answered. Do not be afraid.

There is no escape if love is not there.

R?spunsul e în inima ta,spuse ea blând.Matale poÈ›i s?-l auzi întotdeauna ,dac? stai s?-l asculÈ›i .

My boy," he said quietly, "we have not forgotten. We feel as you do. In his heart every Jew grieves at our captivity. We have need of patriotism like yours. But we have need also of patience. We must not say we cannot endure what God in His judgment has visited upon us." "But how long—must we endure it for ever?" "God has not spoken His final word. Until He does, it is our part to endure.

She and Prudence sat on a cool grassy carpet. A pale green curtain of branches just brushed the grasses and threw a filigree of shadows, as delicate as the wrought silver, on the child's face.

Watching Prudence, Kit suddenly felt a queer prickling along her spine There was something different about her. The child's head was up. Her eyes were fastened levelly on the magistrate. Prudence was not afraid!

The dress that hung close to her head, waiting for the first rays of the sun to light it into beauty, symbolized the wonder of the past few days.

Day after day Matt tramped the woods alone, trying to shake the doubts that walked beside him like his own shadow.

Miriam felt astonished at herself. It was a new thing for her to step out so independently. Somehow, in the past month a tough little root of determination had been growing in her. Whether it was strong enough to support the desperate plan she had undertaken she would soon find out.

short muscular neck, and a grizzled head

THERE WILL BE no Thanksgiving this week," announced Matthew when he came home at noontime the next day. "It seems we have no authority here in Connecticut to declare our own holidays. His Excellency, the new governor, will declare a Thanksgiving when it pleases him.

What a pity every child couldn't learn to read under a willow tree...

After the keen still days of September, the October sun filled the world with mellow warmth...The maple tree in front of the doorstep burned like a gigantic red torch. The oaks along the roadway glowed yellow and bronze. The fields stretched like a carpet of jewels, emerald and topaz and garnet. Everywhere she walked the color shouted and sang around her...In October any wonderful unexpected thing might be possible.

All the way up the river she's been holding back somehow, waiting. Now you'll both have to wait. I'm not going to disappoint her, Kit. When I take you on board the Witch, it's going to be for keeps.

She snatched at the dream that had comforted her for so long. It was faded and thin, like a letter too often read.

There is no escape if love is not there," Hannah had said. Had Hannah known when she herself had not even suspected? It was not escape that she had dreamed about, it was love.

Tis a strange thing, that the only friends I have I found in the same way, lying flat in the meadows, crying as if their hearts would break.