Dam’ few crowned heads

      And their Christianity don't run to morality, not far at least. They lie and deceive with a will, drink to excess, slaughter each other for amusement, and the women couple like stoats. The corollary to their adage that ‘a virtuous woman is a crown to husband’ is that there are dam’ few crowned heads in Abyssinia, and hear, hear! say I, for ’twould be a cruel shame to have all that splendid married pulchritude going to waste.



Flashman on the March, p.22, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2005.


(With thanks to Dundrillon for suggesting this quote.)


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Jingling her loot

      “Och, isn’t he the wee duck?” sighs she, jingling her loot as he hobbled away. “Aye, weel, mony a mickle mak’s a muckle, as Papa used to say.” She slipped it into her bag and broke into civilised speech.


Flashman and the Tiger, p.229, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2000.


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Curmudgeonly grunts

…the curmudgeon only grunted: “The Sikh speaks, the cobra spits — who grows fat on the difference?”


Flashman and the Mountain of Light, p.56, Fontana Paperback edition, 1991.


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Chinese proverb

Be patient, and at last the mulberry leaf will become a silk robe.



Flashman and the Dragon, p.172, Fontana Paperback edition, 1986.



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Ill thoughts and spit

‘Let the ill think ill,’ says I easily. ‘The spittle of a durwan* will not drown a soldier.’

* Door-keeper.

Flashman in the Great Game, p.74, Pan edition, 4th printing, 1979.

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A loss for once

I would have given a pension to see him at a loss for once. But I was to see it for nothing.

Flashman, p.117, Pan edition, 12th printing, 1979.

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