“When men were scattered over the earth, protected by eaves or by the dug-out shelter of a cliff or by the trunk of a hollow tree, it was philosophy that taught them to build houses.”

“The shivering birds beneath the eaves
Have sheltered for the night.”

“If I were asked to name the chief benefit of the house, I should say: the house shelters day-dreaming, the house protects the dreamer, the house allows one to dream in peace.”

“There was earth inside them, and they dug.”

“How would you like to have a thousand brilliantly colored cliff swallows keeping house in the eaves of your barn, and gobbling up insects over your farm at the rate of 100,000 per day? There are many Wisconsin farmsteads where such a swallow-show is a distinct possibility.”

“When the juices of trees have no means of escape, they clot and rot in them, making the trees hollow and good for nothing.”

“I should say: the house shelters day-dreaming, the house protects the dreamer, the house allows one to dream in peace.”

“Woodman, spare that tree!
Touch not a single bough!
In youth it sheltered me,
And I 'll protect it now.”

“Women were different, no doubt about it. Men broke so much more quickly. Grief didn't break women. Instead it wore them down, it hollowed them out very slowly.”

“Image: An Oak Tree. The oak that resists the wind loses its branches one by one, and with nothing left to protect it, the trunk fi nally snaps. The oak that bends lives long er, its trunk grow ing wider, its roots deeper and more tenacious.”