Flashman gets snakey

      ‘Colonel Fwashman!’ he cried. ‘You are a viper!’
       I turned at that, making myself go red in the face in righteous wrath, but I knew what I was about; he was getting no blow or challenge from me – he shot too damned straight for that.
       ‘Indeed, my lord,’ says I. ‘Yet I don’t wriggle and turn.’

Flashman in the Great Game, p.17, Pan edition, 4th printing, 1979.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Lord Cardigan, viper.

A proud father introducing his son

…little Havvy (the first fruit of our union, a guzzling lout of seven)

Flashman in the Great Game, p.14, Pan edition, 4th printing, 1979.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,children, son.

You can't fight fate

…but you can’t fight fate, especially when he’s called Palmerston.

Flashman in the Great Game, p.14, Pan edition, 4th printing, 1979.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,fate, Palmerston.

Enterprising lads

I’ve seen a deal of war, and agree with Sherman that it’s hell, but the Mutiny was the Seventh Circle under the pit. Of course it had its compensations: for one, I came through it, pretty whole, which is more than Havelock and Harry East and Johnny Nicholson did, enterprising lads that they were. (What’s the use of a campaign if you don’t survive it?)…

Flashman in the Great Game, p.13, Pan edition, 4th printing, 1979.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,campaign, war.

Long legs and a thumping slice of luck

…I’ve sweated and scampered through during fifty inglorious years of soldiering. Leastways, I know they were inglorious, but the country don’t, thank heaven, which is why they rewarded me with general rank and the knighthood and a double row of medals on my left tit. Which shows you what cowardice and roguery can do, given a stalwart appearance, long legs and a thumping slice of luck…

Flashman in the Great Game, p.13, Pan edition, 4th printing, 1979.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,knighthood, soldiering.

Endless pictures of German royalty

They don’t often invite me to Balmoral nowadays, which is a blessing; those damned tartan carpets always put me off my food, to say nothing of the endless pictures of German royalty and that unspeakable statue of the Prince Consort standing knock-kneed in a kilt.

Flashman in the Great Game, p.11, Pan edition, 4th printing, 1979.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,kilt, Prince Albert.

At my time of life

I’ve too many vivid memories of Central Asia; at my time of life Scarborough is far enough east for me.

Flashman at the Charge, p.288, Pan edition, 5th printing, 1979.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Central Asia, Scarborough.

Deeply-felt sentimental mood

And then they were thundering away back on the Samarkand road, cloaks flying, and Kutebar turning in the saddle to give me a wave and a roar. And it’s odd – but for a moment I felt lonely, and wondered it I should miss them. It was a deeply-felt sentimental mood which lasted for at least a quarter of a second, and has never returned, I’m happy to say.

Flashman at the Charge, p.287, Pan edition, 5th printing, 1979.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Samarkand, farewells.

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.

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Flashman, Flashman quotes,Silk Road.

Songs and dreams

‘All holy songs are made of dreams,’ says he.

Flashman at the Charge, p.286, Pan edition, 5th printing, 1979.

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Flashman, Flashman quotes,holy song, dream.

A windy streak

I’ve often wondered since, if chaps like Chinese Gordon and Bobs and Custer always went about feeling the way I did that night – not knowing what fear was? It would account for a lot, you know. But God help anyone who’s born that way; I’m sorry for ’em. You can’t know any real peace of mind, I think, unless you’ve got a windy streak in you.

Flashman at the Charge, p.284, Pan edition, 5th printing, 1979.

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Flashman, Flashman quotes.

All men fear

It is no sin to be fearful, any more than it is a sin to be one-legged or red-haired. All men fear – even Yakub and Kutebar and all of them. To conquer fear, some need love, and some hate, and some greed, and some even – hasheesh.

Flashman at the Charge, pp.283-4, Pan edition, 5th printing, 1979.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,fear, sin.

As only a coward can

I detested her in that moment, as only a coward can when he hears the truth to his face.

Flashman at the Charge, p.283, Pan edition, 5th printing, 1979.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,coward, detest.