All belly and beard

Admiral Tegethoff, a bluff old sport, all belly and beard, munched her knuckles and gave glad welcome to the begrimed and ragged peon whom she presented as the hoch und wohlgeboren Sir Harry Flashman, former aide, champion, and all-round hero of the campaign . . .



Flashman on the March, p.5, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2005.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, champion.

No half-measures

      One of the lessons I'd impress on young chaps is this: if you want to pull a bluff, do it with your might, no half-measures. However unlikely the ploy, if your neck is brazen enough, it's odds on you'll get away with it. Take the time I was caught in flagrante in a Calcutta hotel by an outraged husband and sold him on the idea I was a doctor sounding her chest, or the occasion when they found me climbing through Jefferson Davis's skylight and I pretended to be a workman come to fix his lightning-rod. A moment's guilty hesitation and I'd have been done for; indignant astonishment at being interfered with saw me through.

Flashman and the Tiger, p.115, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2000.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, bluff.

bristle up the courage

…a strange recklessness had come over me. I was beyond caring, I suppose, but I remember I stood muttering to myself before a mirror as I brushed my hair: ‘Come on, Flashy, my boy, they haven’t got you yet…. you’re still here ain’t you? Your backside is better enough for you to run again, if need be – bristle up the courage of the cornered rat, put on a bold front, and to hell with them. Bluff my boy – bluff, shift and lie for the sake of your neck and the honour of Old England.

Flash For Freedom!, p.257, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,courage, rat.