A fair complexion is unbecoming to a sailor: he ought to be swarthy from the waters of the sea and the rays of the sun.

Without a decisive naval force, we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious.

The Mediterranean has the colors of a mackerel, changeable I mean. You don’t always know if it is green or violet—you can’t even say it’s blue, because the next moment the changing light has taken on a tinge of pink or gray.

Seafarers go to sleep in the evening not knowing whether they will find themselves at the bottom of the sea the next morning.

Take back your golden fiddles, and we’ll beat to open sea.

Many, many steeples would have to be stacked one on top of another to reach from the bottom to the surface of the sea. It is down there that the sea folk live.

But look, our seas are what we make of them, full of fish or not, opaque or transparent, red or black, high or smooth, narrow or bankless—and we are ourselves sea, sand, coral, seaweed, beaches, tides, swimmers, children, waves.

The power which the sea requires in the sailor makes a man of him very fast, and the change of shores and population clears his head of much nonsense of his wigwam.

The breaking of a wave cannot explain the whole sea.

The sea hath fish for every man.

Never trust her at any time when the calm sea shows her false alluring smile.

Ashore it’s wine, women, and song; aboard it’s rum, bum, and concertina.

You never enjoy the world aright, till the sea itself floweth in your veins, till you are clothed with the heavens, and crowned with the stars.