Not exactly Eric Newby

      If you suppose, by the way, that I am unduly susceptible, you should read the recollections of J.A. St John, Esq., who travelled in Abyssinia in the 1840s and appears to have spent most of his time goggling at boobies, on which he was obviously an authority.


Flashman on the March, p.78, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2005.



Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, boobies.

Inner Flashman

He paused again. “Shall I continue?”
       At this point, when it was plain that some beastly folly was about to be unveiled, Inner Flashman would gladly have cried: “Not unless you wish to risk seeing a grown man burst into tears and run wailing into the Abyssinian night!” Outer Flashman, poor devil, could only sit sweating nonchalantly, going red in the face with funk and hoping that Napier might construe it as apoplectic rage at the prospect of having my travel plans upset.


Flashman on the March, p.51, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2005.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, folly.

Infrequent visits

...on my infrequent visits to Paris, which is a greasy sort of sink, not much better than Port Moresby...


Flashman and the Tiger, p.16, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2000.



Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, Paris.

A golden road

‘This is the great Pathway of Expectation, as the hill people say, where you may realize your hopes just by hoping them. The Chinese call it the Baghdad Highway, and the Persians and Hindus know it as the Silk Trail, but we call it the Golden Road.’ And he quoted a verse which, with considerable trouble, I’ve turned into rhyming English:

        To learn the age-old lesson day by day:
        It is not in the bright arrival planned,
        But in the dreams men dream along the way,
        They find the Golden Road to Samarkand.

Flashman at the Charge, pp.286-7, Pan edition, 5th printing, 1979.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Silk Road.

Depressing journeys

I’ve known dreary, depressing journeys, but that* was the limit; I’d sooner walk through Wales.

*travelling as a military prisoner through the Russian steppes

Flashman at the Charge, p.127, Pan edition, 5th printing, 1979.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Wales, walk.

Usually at high speed

[Lord Raglan]‘…In that time, I believe, you have travelled widely?’
    Usually at high speed, thinks I, and not in circumstances I’d care to tell your lordship about…

Flashman at the Charge, p.30, Pan edition, 5th printing, 1979.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,high speed, travel.

The greatest bore

Travelling, I think, is the greatest bore in life, so I’ll not weary you with an account of the journey from Calcutta to Kabul.

Flashman, p.81, Pan edition, 12th printing, 1979.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes, travel, travelling.