Article: ...and words are all I have to take your heart away.

Henry VII to Anne Boleyn

“But if you please to do the office of a true loyal mistress and friend, and to give up yourself body and heart to me, who will be, and have been, your most loyal servant, (if your rigour does not forbid me) I promise you that not only the name shall be given you, but also that I will take you for my only mistress, casting off all others besides you out of my thoughts and affections, and serve you only. I beseech you to give an entire answer to this my rude letter, that I may know on what and how far I may depend. And if it does not please you to answer me in writing, appoint some place where I may have it by word of mouth, and I will go thither with all my heart. No more, for fear of tiring you.”

George H. Bush to Barbara Bush

“This should be a very easy letter to write — words should come easily and in short it should be simple for me to tell you how desperately happy I was to open the paper and see the announcement of our engagement, but somehow I can’t possibly say all in a letter I should like to. I love you, precious, with all my heart and to know that you love me means my life. How often I have thought about the immeasurable joy that will be ours some day. How lucky our children will be to have a mother like you...”

Napoleon to Josephine

“Since I left you, I have been constantly depressed. My happiness is to be near you. Incessantly I live over in my memory your caresses, your tears, your affectionate solicitude. The charms of the incomparable Josephine kindle continually a burning and a glowing flame in my heart. When, free from all solicitude, all harassing care, shall I be able to pass all my time with you, having only to love you, and to think only of the happiness of so saying, and of proving it to you?”

Beethoven to his "Immortal Beloved"

“Though still in bed, my thoughts go out to you, my Immortal Beloved, Be calm-love me-today-yesterday-what tearful longings for you-you-you-my life-my all-farewell. Oh continue to love me-never misjudge the most faithful heart of your beloved. Ever thine. Ever mine. Ever ours.”

Ernest Hemingway to Marlene Dietrich

“I can’t say how every time I ever put my arms around you I felt that I was home.”

Article: Tribute To Dogs

George Graham Vest - Tribute to Dogs speech in 1855 in the prosecution of a case against a man who killed a dog; a case in which the man accused was found guilty.

Gentlemen of the Jury: The best friend a man has in the world may turn against him and become his enemy. His son or daughter that he has reared with loving care may prove ungrateful. Those who are nearest and dearest to us, those whom we trust with our happiness and our good name may become traitors to that faith. The money that a man has, he may lose. It flies away from him, perhaps when he needs it most. A man's reputation may be sacrificed in a moment of ill-considered action. The people who are prone to fall on their knees to do us honor when success is with us, may be the first to throw the stone of malice when failure settles its cloud upon our heads. 
The one absolutely unselfish friend that man can have in this selfish world, the one that never deserts him, the one that never proves ungrateful or treacherous is his dog.

A man's dog stands by him in prosperity and in poverty, in health and in sickness. He will sleep on the cold ground, where the wintry winds blow and the snow drives fiercely, if only he may be near his master's side.

He will kiss the hand that has no food to offer. He will lick the wounds and sores that come in encounters with the roughness of the world. He guards the sleep of his pauper master as if he were a prince. When all other friends desert you, he remains. When riches take wings, and reputation falls to pieces, he is as constant in his love as the sun in its journey through the heavens. 

If fortune drives the master forth, an outcast in the world, friendless and homeless, the faithful dog asks no higher privilege than that of accompanying him, to guard him against danger, to fight against his enemies. 

And when the last scene of all comes, and death takes his master in its embrace and his body is laid away in the cold ground, no matter if all other friends pursue their way, there by the graveside will the noble dog be found, his head between his paws, his eyes sad, but open in alert watchfulness, faithful and true even in death. 

Photos: A beautiful predator

Golden Eagle at work

Barry Clifford: Roderick

Things were going badly for Roderick.  A shy and awkward slightly

built teenager, he was in more than a few  dead end jobs, literally:

first preparing a burial place for the dead; and later preparing the

dead for a burial. It would and could not last.  After that, he decided to

travel abroad, but that did not work out either for he was deported

from Spain for being a bum and a vagrant.

Back in England, he tried singing with a rock and roll band but was

quickly dropped and became very disillusioned. Now he found himself in
London on a cold January evening, drunk, and propped against the wall 
of a subway station platform playing a harmonica. A very tall man, called
long John ( he was 6’ 7” in height) came to be passing by and liked what
he heard. They talked a bit, sang a bit, and promised they would meet 
again and did. The tall man eventually became his manager.
That was in the year of 1964.

By 2013, Roderick had already sold over 100 million records and had a

personal fortune of over £130 million pounds. By then, everyone knew

him as Rod Stewart.

By Barry Clifford

Photos: Do Not Trespass Here !!!!

Article on words that move.....

Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce - On Surrender to US Army (1877)



Tell General Howard I know his heart. What he told me before, I have it in my heart. I am tired of fighting. Our Chiefs are killed; Looking Glass is dead, Ta Hool Hool Shute is dead. The old men are all dead. It is the young men who say yes or no. He who led on the young men is dead. It is cold, and we have no blankets; the little children are freezing to death. My people, some of them, have run away to the hills, and have no blankets, no food. No one knows where they are - perhaps freezing to death. I want to have time to look for my children, and see how many of them I can find. Maybe I shall find them among the dead. Hear me, my Chiefs! I am tired; my heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands I will fight no more forever. 

Chief Joseph - Thunder Traveling to the Loftier Mountain Heights – 1877

Oliver Cromwell Speech - Dissolution of the Long Parliament

Dissolution of the Long Parliament by Oliver Cromwell given to the House of Commons, 20 April 1653

It is high time for me to put an end to your sitting in this place, which you have dishonored by your contempt of all virtue, and defiled by your practice of every vice; ye are a factious crew, and enemies to all good government; ye are a pack of mercenary wretches, and would like Esau sell your country for a mess of pottage, and like Judas betray your God for a few pieces of money.  

Is there a single virtue now remaining amongst you? Is there one vice you do not possess? Ye have no more religion than my horse; gold is your God; which of you have not barter'd your conscience for bribes? Is there a man amongst you that has the least care for the good of the Commonwealth?

 Ye sordid prostitutes have you not defil'd this sacred place, and turn'd the Lord's temple into a den of thieves, by your immoral principles and wicked practices? Ye are grown intolerably odious to the whole nation; you were deputed here by the people to get grievances redress'd, are yourselves gone! So! Take away that shining bauble there, and lock up the doors.

In the name of God, go!

Julius Caesar Speech to Brutus by Cassius

(Cassius is trying to persuade his friend Brutus that Julius Caesar is a tyrant)

Cassius:
 Why, Caesar, he doth bestride the narrow world 
like a Colossus, and we petty men 
walk under his huge legs and peep about
 to find ourselves dishonourable graves.
 Men at some time are masters of their fates:
 The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
 but in ourselves, that we are underlings. 
Brutus and Caesar; why should that name be sounded more than yours?
 Write them together, yours is as fair a name; 
sound them, it doth become the mouth as well;
 weigh them, it is as heavy; conjure with 'em and Brutus will start a spirit as soon as Caesar. 
Now, in the names of all the gods at once,
 upon what meat doth this our Caesar feed,
 that he has grown so great? Age, thou art shamed! 
Rome, thou hast lost the breed of noble bloods!
 When went there by an age, since the great flood,
 but it was famed with more than with one man?
 When could they say till now, that talk'd of Rome,
 that her wide walls encompass'd but one man?
 Now, is it Rome indeed and is it room enough,
when there is in it but one only man.
 O, you and I have heard our fathers say,
 there was a Brutus once that would have brook'd
 the eternal devil to keep his state in Rome
 as easily as a king.

Sourced

Photos: Crocodile menu.....

For later....