Bernard Cornwell Quotes
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You know what the trick of a long life is, Sharpe? Stay out of range.
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'In the short time I've known you, Richard, I've noticed you possess a lamentable tendency to put on shining armor and look for ladies to rescue. King Arthur, God rest his soul, would have loved you. He'd have had you fighting every evil knight in the forest.'
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'Our guide, a fisherman. A good fellow.' 'He doesn't hate us?' 'Hate us?' 'I keep being told how the Spanish hate us, sir.' 'He hates the French, like I do, Sharpe. If there is one constancy in this vale of tears, it is always hate the damned French, always.'
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'They're drunk sods, sir, but they're the best Soldiers in the world. The very best.' And he meant it. They were the elite, the damned, the Rifles. They were Soldiers in green. They were Sharpe's Rifles.
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He asked three things of his men. That they fought, as he did, with a ruthless professionalism. That they stole only from the enemy and the dead unless they were starving. And that they never got drunk without his permission.
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The defenders were hunted down and killed. Even when they tried to surrender, they were killed, for their fortress had resisted and that was the fate of garrisons that showed defiance.
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An archer does not aim, he kills.
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So the books have a greater appeal to a British audience, but that hasn't stopped them making best-seller lists in places like Brazil, Japan and at least a dozen other countries.
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Arthur Wellesley had waited six years for this moment. He was twenty-nine years old and had begun to fear that he would never see battle, but now, at last, he would discover whether he and his regiment could fight, and so he filled his lungs to give the order that would start the slaughter.
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We have honour, Sharpe. That is our private strength, our honour. We're Soldiers, you and I. We cannot expect riches, or dignity, or continual victory. We will die, probably, in battle, or in a fever ward, and no one will remember us, so all that is left is honour.
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'If you believe in a God, miss, pray now.' 'You don't?' 'I believe in the Baker rifle and in the 1796 Pattern heavy cavalry sword, so long as you grind down the back blade so that the point don't slide off a Frog's ribs. If you you don't grind down the back blade, miss, then you might as well just beat the bastards to death with it.'
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'I assume I'm expendable, sir.' 'You're a soldier, aren't you? Of course you're expendable!' Sharpe was still smiling. He was a soldier, and a lady needed recuing, and was that not what soldiers throughout history had done?
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'Don't waste your life, Tom.' 'I think I already have, father.' 'You're just young. It seems like that when you're young. Life's nothing but joy or misery when you're young.'
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And yes, there's a simplicity to writing books because you're not a member of a team, so you make all the decisions yourself instead of deferring to a committee.
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He was not certain why he was sure of defeat. It was, perhaps, that he admired Wellington. The English General had a mind of fine calculation that appealed to Ducos, who did not believe that the vainglorious Marshals of France had the measure of the Englishman. The Emperor, now, he was different. He would out-calculate and outfight any man.
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'She's like a woman, sir, take care of her and she'll take care of you.' 'You'll notice he let Mister Sharpe do the ramming, sir.'
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'You want me to go into a sewer, Mister Sharpe?' Sarah asked in a small voice.'No, miss, I don't', Sharpe said. 'I want you to be in green fields and happy, with enough money to last you the rest of your life. But to get you there I have to go through a sewer.'
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Thank God for the hours of training, thank God that, for all its sometimes stupidity, the British army was the only army that trained its infantry with real ammunition.
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'Our duty, Richard, is to be decorative and stay alive long enough to be promoted. But no one expects us to be useful! Good God! A junior officer being useful? That'll be the day.'
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A man could fight bullets and bayonets, even rockets if he understood the weapon, but no man understood the invisible enemies. Sharpe wished he knew how to propitiate Fate, the soldiers' Goddess, but She was a capricious deity, without loyalty.
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'Your nephew plays.' 'My nephew and his friends practice.' 'He would do better to look to his soul.' 'He has no soul, he's a soldier.'
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Some deaths a man can enjoy, the death of an enemy, and Sharpe was paid to have enemies. Yet he did not wish death on the French. There was more satisfaction in seeing a surrendered enemy, a defeated enemy, than in seeing a slaughtered enemy.
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There's no chance of cheering him up, sir. He likes being miserable, so he does, and the bastard will get over it.
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He had an inspiration and went to the Quinta's kitchen and stole two large tins of tea. He reckoned it was time Kate did something for her country and there were few finer gestures than donating good China tea to riflemen.