Flashman on Ireland

Gladstone was standing brooding ove a basin in a nonconformist way, offensively sober as usual, when I staggered in middling tight.
       “Hollo, old ’un says I. “Marching orders at last, hey? Ne’er mind, it happens to all of us. It’s this damned Irish business, I suppose — ” for as you know, he was always fussing over Ireland; no one knew what to do about it, and while the Paddies seemed to be in favour of leaving the lace and going to America, Gladstone was trying to make them keep it; something like that.
      “Where you went wrong,” I told him, “was in not giving the place back to the Pope long ago, and apologising for the condition it’s in.”

Flashman and the Tiger, p.293, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2000.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, William Gladstone.

Hunting in Ireland

‘Tell ye what, Flashman; I don’t know much about fightin’, but it strikes me that this Russian business is like huntin’ in Ireland – confused and primitive, what, but damned interestin’!’

Flashman at the Charge, pp.92-3, Pan edition, 5th printing, 1979.

Tags:
Flashman, Flashman quotes,Charge of the Heavy Brigade, James Scarlett.