In "Among the Isles of Shoals" she says: "After winter has fairly set
in, the lonely dwellers at the Isles of Shoals find life quite as much
as they can manage, being so entirely thrown upon their own resources
that it requires all the philosophy at their disposal to answer the
demand.... One goes to sleep in the muffled roar of the storm, and
wakes to find it still raging with senseless fury.... The weather
becomes of the first importance to the dwellers on the rock; the
changes of the sky and sea, the flitting of the coasters to and fro,
the visits of the sea-fowl, sunrise and sunset, the changing moon, the
northern lights, the constellations that wheel in splendor through the
winter night,--all are noted with a love and careful scrutiny that is
seldom given by people living in populous places.... For these things
make our world: there are no lectures, operas, concerts, theatres, no
music of any kind, except what the waves may whisper in rarely gentle
moods; no galleries of wonders like the Natural History rooms, in
which it is so fascinating to wander; no streets, shops, carriages; no
postman, no neighbors, not a door-bell within the compass of the
place!... The best balanced human mind is prone to lose its elasticity
and stagnate, in this isolation. One learns immediately the value of
work to keep one's wits clear, cheerful, and steady; just as much real
work of the body as it can bear without weariness being always
beneficent, but here indispensable.
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