That gnarled old man

. . . at that moment an audible snore erupted from the General’s corner of the cab. He was leaning back, his great head sunk forward on his chest, his hat tilted over his eyes, breathing stertorously; one great mottled hand lay palm down on the seat beside him; Mr Franklin could see the shiny white streak of a wound running from wrist to little finger, and there was a star-shaped scar of what might have been an old bullet-hole in the loose flesh between thumb and forefinger. He shivered; he had looked Sir Harry up in Who’s Who and read incredulously through the succinct list of campaigns and decorations — that gnarled old man sleeping there had seen Custer ride into the broken bluffs above Little Big Horn, and fought hand-to-hand with Afghan tribesman more than seventy years ago; he had ridden into the guns at Balaclava and seen the ranks form for Pickett’s charge at Gettysburg; he had known Wellington and Lincoln — and now he was snoring gently in the corner of a motor car in the busy heart of modern London, and all the glory and horror and fear and bloodshed were small, dimly-remembered things of no account, and when he woke his one concern would not be the fate of nations or armies or his own life in the hazard, but the welfare of one wilful young woman who he was trying to save from her own folly in his strange, unscrupulous way.


Mr American, pp.431-2, Pan Books, paperback edition 1982.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, unscrupulous.

No electorate likes that

‘He was a decent fellow — far too decent for politics. He wouldn’t have lasted, you know, after the war. Men like him never do; people decide they’re too clever, and besides, they feel obliged to ’em, and no electorate likes that. No, you’d have got rid of him, if Booth hadn’t.


Mr American, p.392, Pan Books, paperback edition 1982.



Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, Abraham Lincoln.

Sincerely mourned

…I doubt if any man in the history of the United States was more deeply or sincerely mourned — and I ain’t forgetting friend Abraham, either. He was even more detested in Dixie than J.B., and he was just a politician, while J.B. was a fighting man and a rebel, a combination which no American could resist.


Flashman and the Angel of the Lord, p.348, Harper Collins, 1995.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, mourn.

Flashman the non-Founding Father

      It’s understandable, to be sure: they have to live with their ancestors’ folly and pretend that it was all for the best, and that the monstrous collection of platitudes which they call a Constitution, which is worse than useless because it can be twisted to mean anything you please by crooked lawyers and grafting politicos, is the ultimate human wisdom. Well, it ain’t, and it wasn’t worth one life, American or British, in the War of Independence, let alone the vile slaughter of the Anglo-Saxon-Norman-Celtic race in the Civil War. But perhaps you need to stand on Cemetery Ridge after Pickett’s charge to understand that.
      I put these thoughts to Lincoln, you know, after the war, and he sat back, cracking his knuckles and eyeing me slantendicular.
      “Flashman the non-Founding Father is a wondrous thought,” says he.

Flashman and the Angel of the Lord, p.105, Harper Collins, 1995.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, constitution.

Lincoln on Flashman

…and you have the seal of the greatest American who ever lived! Didn’t Lincoln say: ‘When all other trusts fail, turn to Flashman”?

Flashman and the Redskins, p.260, Pan Books edition, 1983.

Tags:Flashman, Flashman quotes, fail.

Dander good and high

He stopped, frowning. ‘Also, if there’s one thing can get my dander good and high, it’s a big-mouthed Kentuckian hill rooster with his belly over his britches and a sass-me-and-see-what-happens look in his eye.’

Flash For Freedom!, p.244-45, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Abraham Lincoln, bully.

Likely big fellow he is

    They clattered down the steps, Buck swearing at the others, and as the door closed and the exclamations started flying, Lincoln turned and looked at me. His forehead just a little damp.
   ‘The ancients, in their wisdom, made a great study of rhetoric,’ says he. ‘But I wonder did they ever envisage Buck Robinson? Yes, they probably did.’ He pursed his lips. ‘He’s a big fellow, though – likely big fellow he is. I – I think I’d rather see Cicero square up to him behind the barn than me. Yes, I rather think I would.’

Flash For Freedom!, p.240, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Abraham Lincoln, Cicero.

A great orator

   ‘And I’m warning you, Buck!’ Lincoln’s voice was suddenly sharp. ‘Oh, I know you, I reckon. You’re a real hard-barked Kentucky boy, own brother to the small-pox, weaned on snake juice and grizzly hide, aren’t you? You’ve killed more niggers than the dysentery, and your grandmother can lick any white man in Tennessee. You talk big, step high, and do what you please, and if any “legal beanpole” in a store suit gets in your way you’ll cut him right down to size, won’t you just? He’s not a practical man, is he? But you are, Buck – when you’ve got your gang at your back! Yes, sir, you’re a practical man, all right’
    Buck was mouthing at him, red-faced and furious, but Lincoln went on in the same hard voice.
   ‘So am I, Buck. And more – for the benefit of any shirt-tail chewbacon with a big mouth, I’m a who’s-yar boy from Indiana myself, and I’ve put down better men than you just by spittingteeth at them. If you doubt it, come ahead! You want these people – you’re going to take them?’ He gestured towards Cassy. ‘All right, Buck – you try it. Just – try it.
    The rest of the world decided that Abraham Lincoln was a great orator after his speech at Gettysburg. I realized it much earlier, when I heard him laying it over that gun-carrying bearded ruffian who was breathing brimstone at him.

Flash For Freedom!, p.239, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Abraham Lincoln, hoosier boy.

Words versus axe-handles

   ‘Well, you can handle a team, surely?’ cries the merry Senator. ‘Why not make your fortune out of axe-handles?’
   ‘Well, sir, I’ll tell you,’ says Lincoln, and everyone listened, grinning. ‘I’ve just put the return on axe-handles at one thousand per centum. But I’m a politician, and sometime lawyer. Axe-handles aren’t my style; my stock-in-trade is spoken words. You may believe me, words can be obtained wholesale a powerful sight cheaper’n axe-handles – and if you take ’em to the right market, you’ll get a far richer return for ’em than a thousand per centum. If you doubt me – ask President Polk.’

Flash For Freedom!, pp.130-31, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Abraham Lincoln, words.

Making gold in a gold rush

    ‘You are the cynic, Abraham,’ says one. ‘What will the Tennessee wiseacres say of the New Eldorado?’
    When the laughter died down, Lincoln shook his head. ‘If they are real Tennessee wiseacres, Senator, they won’t “say nuthin’”. But what they’ll do – if they’re real wiseacres – is buy themselves up every nail, every barrel-stave, every axe-handle, and every shovel they can lay hold on, put ‘em all in a cart with as many barrels of molasses as may be convenient, haul ‘em all up to Independence of the Kanzas, and sell them to the fortunate migrants at ten times their value. That’s how to make gold out of a gold strike.’

Flash For Freedom!, p.130, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Abraham Lincoln, gold rush.

Ready-made from Cincinnati

‘No,’ says Lincoln. ‘He was a man of principle and conscience. His only mistake lay in his inability to perceive that I have both commodities also, but I didn’t buy mine ready-made from Cincinnati, and I don’t permit either to blind me to reality, I hope.

Flash For Freedom!, p.130, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Abraham Lincoln.

Strange talk

   ‘Your conscience is troubling you,’ says someone.
   ‘By thunder, there is no lack of people determined to make my conscience trouble me,’ says Lincoln. ‘as though I can’t tend my own conscience, they must be forever running pins into it. There was this gentleman the other day, a worthy man, too, and I was ill-advised enough to say to him much what I’ve said tonight: that nigras, while deserving our utmost compassion and assistance, were nevertheless, a nuisance. I said they were the rock on which our nation had been splitting for years, and that they could well assume, the proportions of a national catastrophe – through no fault of their own, of course. I believe I concluded by wishing the whole parcel of them back to Africa. He was shocked: “Strange talk this,” says he, “from the sponsor of a bill against slavery.” “I’d sponsor a bill to improve bad drains,” says I. “They’re a confounded nuisance, too.” A thoughtless remark, no doubt, and a faulty analogy, but I paid fro it. “Good God,” cries he, “you’ll not compare human souls with bad drains, surely.” “Not invariably,” says I, but I got no further, because he stalked off in a rage, having misunderstood me completely.’

Flash For Freedom!, p.129, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Abraham Lincoln.

Disciples of Jesus

‘I tell you, sir, to listen to some of our friends, I could believe every plantation and barracoon from Florida to the river is peopled by the disciples of Jesus. Reason tells me this is false; the slave being God’s creature and a human soul, is no better than the rest of us. But if I said as much to Cassius Clay he would try to prove me wrong at the point of his bowie knife.’

Flash For Freedom!, p.129, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Abraham Lincoln, Cassius Clay.

Strange in the twentieth century

I also carried away from that table an impression of Mr Lincoln’s views on slaves and slavery which must seem strange in the twentieth century since it varies somewhat from popular belief. I recall, for example, that at one point he described the negroes as ‘the most confounded nuisance on this continent, not excepting the Democrats’.

Flash For Freedom!, p.128, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Abraham Lincoln.

A good dissembler

I said it had been, but fortunately I was a good dissembler.
   ‘You must be,’ says he. 'And I speak as a politician, who knows how difficult it is to fool people.’
   ‘Well,’ says I, ‘my own experience is that you can fool some people all the time – and all the people sometimes. But I concede that it’s difficult to fool all the people at the same time.’

Flash For Freedom!, p.128, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Abraham Lincoln.

Education and evil-doing

‘Well, now,’ says Lincoln, ‘why not? Some of the greatest villains in history have been educated men. Without that education they might have been honest citizens. a few years at college won’t make a bad man virtuous; it will merely put the polish on his wickedness.’
….’Why at this rate, you will equate learning with evil-doing,’ cries someone. ‘What must your view be of our leading justices and politicians? Are they not virtuous men?’
   ‘Oh, virtuous enough,’ says Lincoln. ‘But what they would be like if they had been educated is another matter.’

Flash For Freedom!, p.127, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Abraham Lincoln.

Washington tea parties

     ‘You mean to say the women fight and torture and slay on behalf of their men folk? There can be no other country where this happens.’
     And Lincoln, very droll, inquites of him: ‘Have you attended any political tea parties in Washington lately, sir?’

Flash For Freedom!, p.127, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Abraham Lincoln.

Infinitely greater

…I liked Abe Lincoln from the moment I first noticed him, leaning back in his chair with that hidden smile at the back of his eyes, gently cracking his knuckles. Just why I liked him I can’t say; I suppose in his own way he had the makings of as big a scoundrel as I am myself, but his appetites were different, and his talents infinitely greater. I can’t think of him as a good man, yet as history measures these things I suppose he did great good. Not that that excites my admiration unduly…

Flash For Freedom!, pp.126-27, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Abraham Lincoln.

Honest Abe

He was an unusually tall man, with the ugliest face you ever saw, deep dark eye-sockets and a chin like a coffin, and a black cow’s lick of hair smeared across his forehead.

Flash For Freedom!, p.126, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Abraham Lincoln.