Billy and other stories from Wild Animals Ways being personal histories of Billy Atalapha, the Wild Geese of Wyndygoul Jinny Quotes

“He was the biggest fool pup I ever saw, chuck full of life and spirits, always going at racing speed, generally into mischief; breaking his neck nearly over some small matter; breaking his heart if his master did not notice him, chewing up clothing, hats, and boots, digging up garden stuff that he could not eat, mistaking every leg of every chair and table for a lamp-post, going direct from wallow in the pigstye to frolic in the baby’s cradle, getting kicked in the ribs by horses and tossed by cows, but still the same hilarious, rollicking, endlessly good-natured, energetic fool pup, and given by common consent the fit and lasting name of “Silly Billy.”
― Ernest Thompson Seton, Billy and other stories from Wild Animals Ways being personal histories of Billy Atalapha, the Wild Geese of Wyndygoul Jinny

“Everything was in fine shape for the hunt. Everything was fitly ordered and we were well away when a disconcerting element tumbled in among us. With a yap of glee, there, bounding, came that full bull terrier, Silly Billy. Like a June-bug among honey bees, like a crazy schoolboy in a council room, he rollicked and yapped, eager to be first, to be last, to take liberties with Thunder, to chase the Rabbits, to bay the Squirrels, ready for anything but what was wanted of him; to stay home and mind his own business.”
― Ernest Thompson Seton, Billy and other stories from Wild Animals Ways being personal histories of Billy Atalapha, the Wild Geese of Wyndygoul Jinny

“I have always loved the Brownies so much, and so earnestly wished to believe in them, that I have taught myself to do so, and I want other to have that same pleasure.”
― Ernest Thompson Seton, Billy and other stories from Wild Animals Ways being personal histories of Billy Atalapha, the Wild Geese of Wyndygoul Jinny

“Twice nightly they went flying with Mother to the long wet valley through the timber, and though at first they wearied before they had covered thrice the length of the Beaver ponds, their strength grew quickly, and the late Thunder Moon saw them nearly full grown, strong on the wing, and rejoicing in the power of flight. Oh what a joy it was, when the last streak of light was gone from the western world rim, to scramble to the hole and launch into the air – one, two, three- Mother, Brother, and Little Brother to go kiting, scooting, circling, sailing, diving, and soaring – with flutter, wheel, and downward plunge. Then sharp with huger they would dart for the big abounding game – great fat Luna moths, roaring June-bugs, luscious cecropias, and a thousand smaller gave were whizzing and flitting on every side, a plenteous feast for those of wings of speed.”
― Ernest Thompson Seton, Billy and other stories from Wild Animals Ways being personal histories of Billy Atalapha, the Wild Geese of Wyndygoul Jinny

“And who shall tell the history of his bright young jailers at the mill? Little is known but this: the pestilence born of the flies alighted on that home, and when the grim one left it there were two new mounds, short mounds in the sleeping ground that is overlooked by the wooden tower. Who can tell us what snowflake set the avalanche a-rolling, or what was the one, the very spark which, quenched, had saved the royal city from the flames. This only did we know: that the Bats were destroying the bearers of the plague about that house; many Bats had fallen by the gun, and the plague struck in that house where the blow was hardest to be borne. We do not know. It is a chain with many links; we have not the light to see; and the only guide that is always safe to follow in the gloom is the golden thread of kindness, the gospel of Assisi’s Saint.”
― Ernest Thompson Seton, Billy and other stories from Wild Animals Ways being personal histories of Billy Atalapha, the Wild Geese of Wyndygoul Jinny

“Now sped he like a pirate of the air. Now fled she like a flying yacht gold-laden, away, away, and the warm wind whistled, left behind. But the pirate surely wins when the prize is not averse to being taken. Not many a span of the winding stream, not many a wing-beat of that flight ere Atalapha was skimming side by side with a glorified Silver-brown. How rich and warm was that coat. How gentle, alluring the form and the exquisite presence that told without sounds of a spirit that also had hungered.”
― Ernest Thompson Seton, Billy and other stories from Wild Animals Ways being personal histories of Billy Atalapha, the Wild Geese of Wyndygoul Jinny

“The sandflies fluttered over him and the Plovers whistled along the shore as he lay, when the sun arose, but the All-mother was kind, had blown the grass about him; it hid him from the hungry Gull and from the sun’s noon rays. The little tide of mid-ocean rose on the beach but did not reach him in his deathlike sleep. The second tide had risen and gone, and the sun had sunk in the dark western waters before he stirred.”
― Ernest Thompson Seton, Billy and other stories from Wild Animals Ways being personal histories of Billy Atalapha, the Wild Geese of Wyndygoul Jinny

“So I have learned to love and venerate the honker Wild Goose whom Mother Nature dowered with love unquenchable, constructed for her own good ends a monument of faithfulness unchanging, a creature heir of all the promises, so master of the hostile world around that he lives and spreads, defying plagues and beasts, and I wonder if this secret is not partly that the wise and patient mother leads.”
― Ernest Thompson Seton, Billy and other stories from Wild Animals Ways being personal histories of Billy Atalapha, the Wild Geese of Wyndygoul Jinny