Billy Budd Quotes

“and yet a child’s utter innocence is but its blank ignorance, and the innocence more or less wanes as intelligence waxes.”
― Herman Melville, Billy Budd, Sailor

“You have but noted his fair cheek. A man-trap may be under his fine ruddy-tipped daisies.”
― Herman Melville, Billy Budd, Sailor

“Yes, and sometimes the melancholy expression would have in it a touch of soft yearning, as if Claggart could even have loved Billy but for fate and ban.”
― Herman Melville