Roy Norton

“ For an hour I sat bidding an unfaltering good-bye to the service that I had loved, and all the dreams that had arisen from it; but my hand did not falter when, after turning on the lights, I wrote my resignation from the United States Navy. The least I could give to that strange, silent, unemotional man, whose pride had held him aloof, but whose love had followed me from the hour of my birth, was obedience to his last request. ”

“ I put you into the United States Navy because I am, first of all, an American, and believe that, next to the fealty due God Himself, there comes none other equal to that which a man owes his country. Also, I wished you to be a gentleman of the Navy, for no blackguard can therein survive. This letter will never be given you if you fail. It will not be put into your hands if I survive the woman who has been to me, regardless of all others, the greatest woman that God ever gave to man, your mother. ”

“ There had been but one proviso in his retainer and instructions (for of this I learned from the lips of the architect himself, years later) , that one room should be fitted to suit a sailor; that it should overlook the sea, and be within sound of the perpetual waves; that it should be a room to which a wearied mariner, come to rest, might enter as a haven, and with downcast eyes, as if ashamed of sentiment, he had concluded: "For that room, sir, shall belong, always, to my son, and, if God is so kind, to his sons when all of us are gone." ”