Sabine Baring-Gould

“ Thus—a child with a child—Judith and Jamie were on the common one windy, showery day, collecting shells, laughing, chattering, rejoicing over choice snail-shells, as though neither had passed through a wave of trouble, as though life lay serene before them.
Judith had no experience of the world. With her natural wit and feminine instinct she had discovered that Cruel Coppinger loved her. She had also no hesitation in deciding that he must be repulsed. Should he seek her, she must avoid him. They could not possibly unite their lives. ”

“ It is no eucalyptus that ever hangs its leaves; it is a sensitive plant, wincing, closing, at a trifle, feeling acutely, but not for long.
And now Judith had got an idea into her head, that she communicated to Jamie, and her sanguine anticipations kindled his torpid mind. She had resolved to make little shell baskets and other chimney ornaments, not out of the marine shells cast up by the sea, for on that coast none came ashore whole, but out of the myriad snail-shells that strew the downs. ”

“ The climax of constructive genius would be exhibited in the formation of a shepherd and shepherdess, for which Judith was to paint faces and hands; but their hats, their garments, their shoes, were to be made of shells. The shepherdess was to have a basket on her arm, and in this basket were to be flowers, not made out of complete shells, but out of particles of sea-shells of rainbow colors. ”