No sight more inspiring

      I felt duty bound to crawl out and see them off in the morning, raw and misty as it was; there’s no sight more inspiring or heart-warming than troops marching out to battle when you ain’t going with them.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.279, Pan Books edition, 1983.

Tags:Flashman, Flashman quotes, inspiring.

A lucky song

…Custer himself led them off in his cracked baritone until the rafters rang and feet stamped and the glasses swung in rhythm as they roared out in chorus:

              We’ll beat the bailiffs out of fun,
              We’ll make the mayor and sheriffs run,
              We are the boys no man dare dun,
              If he regards a whole skin!
              In place of spa we’ll drink down ale,
              And pay no reckoning on the nail,
              No man for debt shall go to jail,
              While he can Garryowen hail!

They didn’t notice I wasn’t singing; I was remembering the remnants of the Light Brigade in that grisly hospital shed by Yatla, croaking out those self-same words in pathetic pride at having done what no horse-soldiers had ever done before. I thought of the pale fierce faces and the horrid wounds, and the unspeakable hell we’d come through, and the ghastly cost—and I wondered if it was a lucky song to sing, that’s all.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.278, Pan Books edition, 1983.

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Foe of mankind

Conscience, you see? Note that; It’s a bigger foe of mankind than gunpowder.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.274, Pan Books edition, 1983.

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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.

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The half-Flashman

…she writhed against me for five delicious seconds, and as I changed my grip to the half-Flashman—one hand on her right tit, t’other clasping her left buttock, and stand back referee—she slipped smoothly from my embrace.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.270, Pan Books edition, 1983.

Tags:Flashman, Flashman quotes, grip.

Lincoln on Flashman

…and you have the seal of the greatest American who ever lived! Didn’t Lincoln say: ‘When all other trusts fail, turn to Flashman”?

Flashman and the Redskins, p.260, Pan Books edition, 1983.

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Dressed so tight

…fashionable women in the 70s dressed so tight they could barely sit down, and hers was a perfect hourglass shape—a waist I could gladly have spanned with my two hands, but for her upper and lower works you’d have needed the help of the lifeboat crew.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.261, Pan Books edition, 1983.

Tags:Flashman, Flashman quotes, figure.

Waiting at Fort Lincoln

“Well,” says he, “if you should change your mind, just remember, there’s always a good horse, a good gun—aye, and a good friend—waiting for you at Fort Lincoln.” He shook my hand.
      “George,” says I earnestly, “I shan’t forget that.” I don’t forget holes in the road or places I owe money, either.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.258, Pan Books edition, 1983.

Tags:Flashman, Flashman quotes, farewell.

All for a decent play myself but

…I heard sniffing and supposed it was Libby or Elspeth piping her eye. Then the sniff became a baritone groan, and when I looked, so help me it was Custer himself, with his hand to his brow, bedewing his britches with manly tears.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.256, Pan Books edition, 1983.

Tags:Flashman, Flashman quotes, tears.

Ill-suited to peacetime

I reflected, watching him that night, how the best soldiers in war are so often ill-suited to peacetime service…

Flashman and the Redskins, p.255, Pan Books edition, 1983.

Tags:Flashman, Flashman quotes, soldier.

More horse soldiering than most

He knew he was a good soldier—and he was you know, when he was in his right mind. I’ve seen more horse soldiering than most, and if my life depended on how a mounted brigade was handled, I’d as soon see George Custer in command as anyone I know. His critics, who never saw him at Gettysburg and Yellow Tavern, base their case on one piece of arrant folly and bad luck, when he let his ambition get the better of him.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.255, Pan Books edition, 1983.

Tags:Flashman, Flashman quotes, George Custer.

Aren't you Flashman?

      “I don’t believe it!” cries he eagerly. “Aren’t you Flashman?”
      “So I am,” says I warily, wondering if he was married.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.252, Pan Books edition, 1983.

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Common Scotch mania

Elspeth was all for it; she suffered from the common Scotch mania for improvement and progress through machinery and tracts…

Flashman and the Redskins, p.251, Pan Books edition, 1983.

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Exchanging governments

      1876 being the hundredth anniversary of the glorious moment when the Yankee colonists exchanged a government of incompetent British scoundrels for one of ambitious American sharpers…

Flashman and the Redskins, p.251, Pan Books edition, 1983.

Tags:Flashman, Flashman quotes, revolution.

As always

And, as always, I thought what the devil, if I’m wrong, and have been misjudging her all these years, and she’s as chaste as morning dew—so much the better. If she’s not—and I’ll be bound she’s not—what’s an Indian more or less?

Flashman and the Redskins, p.249, Pan Books edition, 1983.

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Bakery admonishment

Of all the cake-headed tricks...

Flashman and the Redskins, p.246, Pan Books edition, 1983.

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Out from under

I was out from under the canopy like a startled stoat...

Flashman and the Redskins, p.244, Pan Books edition, 1983.

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Astonishing rumbles

…he gave one of his astonishing rumbles, like a bull in a brothel.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.238, Pan Books edition, 1983.

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Dinner in style

The chiefs came to dinner in style, six of them all in buckskins and feathers, led by the famous Oglala, Red Cloud, a grim savage with a face you could have used to split kindling.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.235, Pan Books edition, 1983.

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The days of beads and looking-glasses

Washington reached the conclusion you’d expect: treaty or no, the Sioux would have to give way. Allison’s task was to persuade them to surrender the hills in return for compensation, and that, to him, meant fixing a price and telling ’em to take it or leave it. He didn’t doubt they would take it; after all, he was a Senator, and they were a parcel of silly savages who couldn’t read or write; he would lecture them, and they would be astonished at his eloquence, pocket the cash without argument, and go away. It didn’t seem to weigh with him that to the Sioux the Black Hills were rather like Mecca to the Muslims, or that having no comprehension of land ownership, the idea of selling them was as ludicrous as selling the wind or the sky. Nor did he suspect that, even if their religious and philosophic scruples could be overcome, their notion of price and value had developed since the days of beads and looking-glasses.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.233, Pan Books edition, 1983.

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Some natural law

There is some natural law that ensures that whenever civilization talks to the heathen, it is through the person of the most obstinate, short-sighted, arrogant, tactless clown available. You recall McNaughten at Kabul, perhaps? Well, Allison could have been his prize pupil.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.232, Pan Books edition, 1983.

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One of the hazards of Washington

Any gang of politicos is like the eighth circle of Hell, but the American breed is specially awful because they take it seriously and believe it matters; wherever you went, to dinner or an excursion or to pay a call, or even take a stroll, you were deafened with their infernal prosing—I daren’t go to the privy without making sure some seedy heeler wasn’t lying in wait to get me to join a caucus.

Flashman and the Redskins, p.229, Pan Books edition, 1983.

Tags:Flashman, Flashman quotes, politicos.