Deus vult engraved on the blade

. . . in addition to my Joslyn and cartridge-belt I had a dagger and a sword from the citadel’s armoury — not one of their sickle-blades but a straight cross-hilted weapon with Deus vult engraved on the blade — a Crusader sword, bigod, and why not, for if it was seven hundred years out of date it was still in a Christian land.



Flashman on the March, p.88, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2005.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, Crusader.

A Flashy brag

. . . now that Napier was asking if there was anything more he could do for me, I did what I’d done so often, and put on a Flashy brag, the bravado of despair, I guess it is, the fraudsters instinct for playing out the charade.
     “I’d be obliged for a revolver and fifty rounds, sir. Oh, and a box of cheroots, if you have one to spare.”


Flashman on the March, pp.64-5, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2005.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, bravado.

A pint of port

So there he was, reputation blasted, and nothing for it, you’d have thought, but to order a pint of port and a pistol for breakfast or join the Foreign Legion.


Flashman and the Tiger, p.247, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2000.



Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, port.

Strange rhythms

      I forced myself to look unmoved down his barrel, with my bowels doing the polka — by God he was fast with a barker...


Flashman and the Angel of the Lord, p.218, Harper Collins, 1995.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, hand.

An imposing old file

 From all I’d heard in the past three days, I’d formed a picture of John Brown as a towering figure with flowing white locks, glaring like a fakir and brandishing an Excelsior banner in one fist and a smoking Colt in t’other; what I saw was an elderly man, spare and bony in an old black suit, like a rather seedy farmer come to town for market. He had a long aquiline nose, large ears, and deep-set eyes under heavy brows. An imposing old file, you’d have said, but nothing out of the ordinary — until you met the gaze of those eyes, clear bright grey and steady as a rock. Gunfighter’s eyes, was my first thought, but they weren’t cold; you knew they could twinkle or blaze (and I was to see ’em do both), but what I remember most was their level certainty. No one was ever going to make this man drop his gaze, or talk him out of anything.

Flashman and the Angel of the Lord, pp.206-07, Harper Collins, 1995.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, certainty.

Flash interior design

…there’d be nothing for it but clap a pistol in his mouth and call in the decorators.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.273, Pan Books edition, 1983.

Tags:Flashman, Flashman quotes, pistol.