|
How are u posted:They truly deserve each other. How do you mean? Flashman has constant doubts that Elspeth is actually a bit deeper than she seems, at least as far as carrying on affairs behind his back. The journal extracts (you can debate how self-serving they are supposed to be) tend to support she's almost simple, just very sheltered, in a way, in how she sees the world. They don't make her look good, she comes off as petty, vain, silly, self-centred etc, but nowhere near as bad as Flashman. Remember that for all his likeability and acute observations, he is a rapist, murderer and all round sociopath bastard.
|
#
?
Jul 31, 2021 17:21
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 10, 2024 23:27 |
|
|
i don't think the journal excerpts support the idea of elspeth being dumb at all, so far. she is every bit as crafty and cunning as flashman, they just have a hard time seeing it in each other because they do, against all odds, actually love each other pretty deeply. sheltered, though, yes for sure. due to both her social standing before she married flashman, and being a rich woman in the victorian era, she hasn't had flashman's worldly experience.
|
|
#
?
Jul 31, 2021 17:34
|
|
|
Trin Tragula posted:"Brougham" is unclear, but may be a queeny cheap shot at the recently-ennobled Lord Brougham, who while serving as Lord Chancellor was one of the chief architects of the Great Reform Act and the Slavery Abolition Act a year later, which would not have endeared him to Flashy one bit. He commissioned the original example of the horse-drawn carriage that was of such use to Sherlock Holmes, and his long association with Cannes helped establish it as a popular resort for Europe's well-heeled. I don't have my books to check, but wasn't Brougham one of Flashy's gambling pals from when he humiliated Bismarck? If so, maybe he is identified better in that book. quote:So winter and spring went by, and then in June I had two letters. One was from my Uncle Bindley at the Horse Guards, to say that negotiations were under way to procure me a lieutenancy in the Household Cavalry; this great honour, he was careful to point out, was due to my Afghan heroics, not to my social desirability, which in his opinion was negligible—he was from the Paget side of our family, you see, and affected to despise us common Flashmans, which showed he had more sense than manners. Uncle Bindley appears (or is mentioned) in several books. I am pretty sure he is noted as being from the Flashman side in at least one appearance.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2021 13:50
|
|
|
Genghis Cohen posted:How do you mean? Flashman has constant doubts that Elspeth is actually a bit deeper than she seems, at least as far as carrying on affairs behind his back. The journal extracts (you can debate how self-serving they are supposed to be) tend to support she's almost simple, just very sheltered, in a way, in how she sees the world. They don't make her look good, she comes off as petty, vain, silly, self-centred etc, but nowhere near as bad as Flashman. Jazerus posted:i don't think the journal excerpts support the idea of elspeth being dumb at all, so far. she is every bit as crafty and cunning as flashman, they just have a hard time seeing it in each other because they do, against all odds, actually love each other pretty deeply. I feel like Fraser is going for a kind of Georgette Heyer-esque ditz/cad relationship dynamic with Flashy and Elspeth, though I don't think he pulls it off. One of the things Heyer is really good at is creating characters who are simultaneously very shallow and silly, and unselfconsciously make a lot terrible self-serving and ultimately self-destructive decisions, and who are also quite shrewd, but unaware of the cleverer solutions they find to their problems. That's a difficult tightrope to walk and I think Fraser falls off fairly early on with Lady Flash.
|
|
#
?
Aug 3, 2021 06:18
|
|
|
quote:There’s no doubt that a good gallop before work is the best training you can have, for that afternoon I bowled the best long spell of my life for Mynn’s Casuals against the All-England XI: five wickets for 12 in eleven overs, with Lillywhite leg before and Marsden clean bowled amongst them. I’d never have done that on cold baths and dumbbells, so you can see that what our present Test match fellows need is some sporting female like Mrs Leo Lade to look after ’em, then we’d have the Australians begging for mercy. I do love these traps Don S. so perfectly lays with a smile. quote:“I don’t suppose,” he added, fingering his earring and looking impish at me, “you’d consider playing me a single-wicket match, would you?”  quote:“Well, make it a pint of ale,” says he, and then snapped his fingers. “Tell you what—I’ll name what your stake’s to be, and I promise you, if you lose and have to stump up, it’s something that won’t cost you a penny.” The shamelessness of the man never fails to astound. quote:That was before dinner. By bed-time I wasn’t so sure. It's been argued that Fraser keeps Flashman's character progressing steadily even when he jumps around the chronology but the man who survived the mutiny by adopting more than a half-dozen personas and managed to keep his story straight most of the way through falling into these traps. Next time: It gets worse! Arbite fucked around with this message at 13:59 on Aug 11, 2021 |
|
#
?
Aug 3, 2021 06:19
|
|
|
Genghis Cohen posted:How do you mean? Flashman has constant doubts that Elspeth is actually a bit deeper than she seems, at least as far as carrying on affairs behind his back. The journal extracts (you can debate how self-serving they are supposed to be) tend to support she's almost simple, just very sheltered, in a way, in how she sees the world. They don't make her look good, she comes off as petty, vain, silly, self-centred etc, but nowhere near as bad as Flashman. Remember that for all his likeability and acute observations, he is a rapist, murderer and all round sociopath bastard. I'm not sure how much more clear Fraser can make it that her diary entries aren't supposed to be taken at face value than having her sister constantly calling bullshit.
|
|
#
?
Aug 3, 2021 08:21
|
|
|
The passages about the gallows were so haunting that it was difficult for me to enjoy the next few updates. But now I see the analogy and it’s really interesting.
|
|
#
?
Aug 3, 2021 08:49
|
|
|
 EXTENSIVE CRICKET ANNOTATIONS quote:for that afternoon I bowled the best long spell of my life for Mynn’s Casuals against the All-England XI: five wickets for 12 in eleven overs If the ultimate cricketing achievement is to take a hat-trick, the basic mark of unusually good performance for a bowler is to get five of the opponent's batters out in a single innings, which is half the team. A bowler of Flashy's calibre would enjoy taking "five for" as often as possible (not every match, but depending on opposition he might expect to do it every five or ten matches) and see it as something worthy of a little modest celebration afterwards. Five for 12 means that while he was bowling, the combined score of all the batters who faced his bowling was 12 runs. Remembering that cricket is a batter's game in which it's expected to score runs and unusual to get out, then even in the 1840s when scoring was far lower than it is today, conceding only 12 runs in 11 overs and taking five wickets is a match-winning performance. To do it against All-England is apparently real proof of genuine skill and ability, far more so than his luck/skill/cheating hat-trick against Kent; but see below... (Note, by the way, that Flashy is far more concerned with his personal haul of five for than he is with who actually won the match.) An "over" is the basic unit of cricketing time, consisting of (at the time) five consecutive balls from a particular bowler. In the modern day it is six balls; originally it was four; and there was a 50-year fashion in the Southern hemisphere for eight-ball overs in the middle of the 20th century. quote:Lillywhite leg before This is almost certainly William Lillywhite, father of the cricketing dynasty that would eventually found the eponymous Lillywhites department store, a visit to which until very recently was like a visit to Eden for any child who was mad about sport. It's now an overgrown Sports Direct trading off nostalgia and clueless tourists, which is a massive shame. On the field, Lillywhite is one of the most important bowlers in cricketing history and a leading bowler of his day. His bowling formed a part of the push that led MCC to legalise roundarm bowling, and after that he was generally said to be as good with the ball as Pilch was with the bat. His first-class career lasted nearly 30 years and he played his last match aged 61, then succumbed to illness less than a year after being awarded a well-received benefit match (in which all profits are donated to a player for his retirement). At this point he's at the height of his powers despite being 50 years old; but as a specialist bowler he's not particularly good at batting. It's not nearly the same feather in Flashy's cap to get Lillywhite out as it is to get a recognised batter like Pilch, Felix, or Mynn. quote:Marsden clean bowled Most likely Thomas Marsden, one of the first great Yorkshire cricketers. He was a batting all-rounder who played for Sheffield, the leading club in the county in his lifetime. He was a major crowd attraction and noted single-wicket specialist (of which more in a moment) in his early career, until Pilch beat him twice in big money challenge matches. However, in real life his last first-class match was in 1841 and he died in February 1843, so for Flashy to get him out at this stage of his career would be kind of like knocking out Muhammad Ali in the year 2000. It's also important to note that we are still four years away from the establishment of the first permanent All-England side. At present, any team who feels like it can style themselves All-England and draw spectators as long as they have some big names; and this All-England side only needs to be All-England enough to oppose Mynn's Casuals, it's not like they're playing Kent or the MCC. It would not be out of character for Flashman to be bigging himself up for taking five wickets against old men and tail-enders who aren't expected to be any good with the bat. quote:“I don’t suppose,” he added, fingering his earring and looking impish at me, “you’d consider playing me a single-wicket match, would you?” Single-wicket is a variant of cricket designed to be played as a challenge match between two leading players (or sometimes teams of two). One player bowls at one batter for a period of time; then they swap over. Its original heyday was in the middle of the 18th century, when a well-promoted single-wicket match could draw far more spectators and gambling than a great match between full teams. It then fell out of favour for about 50 years, but made a storming comeback to its previous levels of popularity after Mynn and Felix saw the opportunity to use it to shore up their often-questionable financial positions. It's always easier to fix a contest between individuals than it is a contest between teams, and so single-wicket is where the real big money and big scandal was during its second heyday. It died out after the retirement of Mynn as county matches and regular All-England tours took its place. Despite occasional attempts, it's never returned as a spectator attraction. The rules of each single-wicket match varied wildly depending on the players and the available location. It was common to play most single-wicket matches on a recognised cricket ground, or at least somewhere with a suitable strip of grass. Unlike baseball, in regular cricket there is no concept of foul territory and a ball may be hit anywhere, including behind the batter; some single-wicket matches restricted where the batters could hit to. Usually there would be several neutral players brought in to be fielders. In single-wicket's original heyday it was common to play with a single innings each of unlimited duration, but in the 19th-century revival it became more usual for each player to have two or more innings, of a few overs each. quote:How many a side?” No fielders was uncommon but not unheard-of, and fitting for a drunken challenge arranged at short notice. "Bounds" means that there will be a boundary line, hitting the ball beyond which will award the batter runs without having to physically run up and down. We're only just beginning to enter the era of cricket's development where it's common for a match to be played on a field with formal boundary lines. For a single-wicket match with no fielders, the boundaries will be very short; as the Don says, to cut down on the bowler tiring from from chasing the ball into the field. In ordinary cricket, a "bye" is when the batter fails to hit the ball, but because of a fielding error, has the opportunity to run anyway. An "overthrow" is when a fielder attempts to throw the ball to another fielder standing near the stumps, and misses, and the ball goes back out into the field and gives the batters a chance to keep running when they would not have done without the error. The byes video also demonstrates how runs are scored in regular cricket. Two batters are on the field at the same time; the playing field has a strip of close-cut grass in the middle with two sets of stumps 22 yards apart and opposite each other. When the batters run, they are trying to make it to a marker line near the opposite set of stumps before the fielders can run them out by either throwing the ball so it hits the stumps, or so it is caught by another fielder standing near the stumps who then touches the ball against the stumps. In single-wicket, it was more usual to put only one stump opposite the batter to mark where the bowler should bowl from; and for the batter to only score a run and be safe from being run out if he were able to run both to the bowler's stump, and then back to his original position. With no fielders, the bowler will then have to chase the ball himself after a hit, and then either run it back to the batter's stumps or throw it from distance. END OF CRICKETING ANNOTATIONS quote:Course, the peelers is shockin’ lax these days—” The Metropolitan Police has only been in existence for 13 years, its jurisdiction has only four years ago been massively enlarged to more or less its current size, its founder Sir Robert Peel is at this moment Prime Minister and at the height of his career, and already people are bemoaning that the Peelers aren't good as they used to be (ironically, but still). Nothing new under the sun, is there? Trin Tragula fucked around with this message at 14:07 on Aug 3, 2021 |
|
#
?
Aug 3, 2021 14:02
|
|
|
quote:It never rains but it pours, though. I was still wrestling with my dilemma next morning when I received another blow, this time through the smirking agency of Miss Judy, the guvnor’s trull. I had been out on the gravel watching Solomon’s gardeners roll the wicket on the main lawn for our match, smoking furiously and drumming my fingers, and then took a restless turn round the house; Judy was sitting in one of the arbours, reading a journal. She didn’t so much as glance up as I walked by, ignoring her, and then her voice sounded coolly behind me: Sadly both Judy and the elder Flashman don't factor much in the papers after the first volume, but by God does she get some satisfying revenge on the younger bastard. quote:She left me in a fine state of rage and apprehension, as you can imagine. It almost passed belief that the idiot heifer Lade had boasted to her protector of her bout with me, but some women are stupid enough for anything, especially when tempers are flying—and now that doddering, vindictive old pander of a Duke would sick his bullies onto me-on top of Tighe’s threats of the previous evening it was the wrong side of enough. Couldn’t the selfish old lecher realise that his flash-tail needed a young mount from time to time, to keep her in running condition? But here I was, under clouds from all directions, still undecided what I should do in my match with Solomon—and at that moment Mynn hove up to bear me away to the pitch for the great encounter. I wasn’t feeling like cricket one little bit. You love to see it. Now back to the real poo poo! quote:We went out to the wicket together, and Felix gave Solomon guard; he took his time over it, too, patting his block-hole and feeling the pitch before him, very business-like, while I fretted and swung my arm. It was spongy turf, I realised, so I wasn’t going to get much play out of it—no doubt Solomon had taken that into account, too. Much good might it do him. It's so nice to see the great and the good of the day doing it to each other instead of the powerless. quote:Feiix said he was run out, no question; it hadn’t been my fault I’d slipped and had Solomon run into me. I said, no, no, I wouldn’t have it, I couldn’t take advantage, and he must carry on with his innings. Solomon was up by now, rubbing his knee, and saying, no, he was out, it couldn’t be helped; his grin was back now, if a bit lop-sided. So we stood there, arguing like little Christians, myself stricken with remorse, pressing him to bat on, until Felix settled it by saying he was out, and that was that. (About time, too; for a moment I’d thought I was going to convince him.) We'll leave Flashman to his indecision for now. I do quite enjoy how the exertions of the whole affair bring everyone's true natures closer to the fore. Even Elspeth, in her own way. Arbite fucked around with this message at 09:59 on Sep 12, 2021 |
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2021 22:28
|
|
|
A little anticipation while we mark out our run-ups:quote:He spoke—at the top of his voice, according to a guest at the hotel—of setting a prize-fighter on to you. It seems he is the backer of...Caunt Benjamin Caunt is currently recognised as the heavyweight boxing champion of England. He stood six feet two inches and weighed 17 stone; his popular nickname "Big Ben" is sometimes said (without any actual evidence, of course) to have inspired the name of the bell (or the clock, or the clock-tower, or all three) at the Palace of Westminster. Right then. Let's get in the mood. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9GdvFiE2R5I CRICKETING COMMENTARY BEGINS HERE quote:little Felix spun the bat; I called “blade”, and so it was A cricket bat is asymmetrical with a flat front, a thick edge, and a bladed back. Felix has held the bat upright resting on the ground, spun the handle between his hands and let go. This is an informal cricketing alternative to the toss of a coin, and physics says that "blade" is much more likely to come up than "flat". quote:We went out to the wicket together Cricket has a wonderfully self-confusing way of using the same term to mean several different things dependent on context, and also having many different terms to describe more or less the same thing. So it is that the "wicket" as a physical object can mean either the three stumps and two bails, or the strip of close-cut grass in the middle of the field that the stumps are driven into. The wickets are set up at each end of the wicket; that's the kind of glorious bullshit you're dealing with here. quote:Felix gave Solomon guard Solomon decides where he wants to stand to face the bowling, and then holds his bat upright with its foot on the ground and the edge facing the umpire, whose position is opposite the batter. He then asks for a stump (the typical guard is "middle stump"), and the umpire guides him with moving the bat until it is in line with middle stump. Solomon will then take a few seconds to use his shoe or the bottom of the bat to draw a small line on the ground. Then, as long as he faces each ball with his bat on the line, he will know he's standing in exactly the same place each time. quote:he took his time over it, too, patting his block-hole and feeling the pitch before him It's usually a ritualistic little moment, especially for an apparently poor batter like Solomon preparing to face Flashman. The "block-hole" is the area immediately under and around where the batter stands with his bat on the ground, and his toes next to it. If the bowler aims the ball there, it is very difficult for the batter to play an attacking shot and will only hope to block the ball and prevent himself getting out; thus, "block-hole". quote:It was spongy turf, I realised, so I wasn’t going to get much play out of it—no doubt Solomon had taken that into account, too. Most cricket bowling (with an exception, which we'll come to soon) is designed so that the ball bounces off the ground once before reaching the batter. The harder and drier the grass on the wicket (sorry) is, the faster and higher the ball will bounce, which favours a fast bowler like Flashy. A soft wicket will take a lot of the pace out of the ball as it bounces, putting Flashy at a disadvantage. It favours slower bowlers who flick their fingers or twist their wrists as they bowl to spin it, and cause it to change direction after bouncing. Flashy also shouldn't really be surprised that a temporary wicket in the grounds of a house would be soft and spongy. However, while a lot of the joy of the books is reading about his cunning and cleverness in some regards, he's also a colossally stupid oaf in other regards, so it's very believable that this hasn't occurred to him until now. quote:He wasn’t a bad batter. He blocked my next ball with his hanging guard, played the third straight back to me, and then got a great cheer when he ran two off the fourth. Remember that cricket is the batter's game. If the ball isn't going to hit Solomon's stumps, he can just raise his bat and let it fly harmlessly past. If the ball is going to hit the stumps and Solomon doesn't think he can take the risk of trying to score runs, he can just play a defensive shot and wait for the next one, he doesn't have to run if he hits the ball. quote:I gave him a slower ball, and he pulled it into the trees, so that I had to plough through the chattering mob to reach it, while he ran five This is a bit odd, as is the later reference to hitting the ball to the other side of the house. Originally Solomon appeared to be suggesting that they play on a field with boundary lines, but now they're hitting the ball up hill and down dale and the bowler's having to chase every which way and the batter's running everything, with no suggestion of boundaries. A pull shot is played cross-batted, across the batsman's body, aiming to send the ball away at a 90-degree angle to himself. Again, there is no foul territory and the batter can hit the ball anywhere. quote:Worse still, no fieldsmen meant no catches behind the stumps, which is how fast men like me get half their wickets. The flat face and thick edge of a cricket bat means that a common mistake for a batter is to attempt to hit the ball, almost miss it, and hit it only very slightly with the edge. The ball then flies behind the stumps for the wicket-keeper or slips to catch. Here are some of the more spectacular examples from the 1980s. quote:I heard him yelp, but by then I was lunging after the ball, scooping it up and throwing down the wicket, and then looking round all eager, as though to see where he was. Flashy helpfully says "throwing down the wicket" to give us an example of "wicket" to mean the stumps and bails. Now, this amusing interlude is also a trifle oddly-written for the cricket lover, since (unless it's somehow been omitted again) Fraser doesn't see fit to explicitly mention that Flashman appeals to Felix after running Solomon out. This is a problem, because (as Fraser well knows) since at least the 1740s, the umpire may not give any batter out unless a fielder appeals first, and I'm just left asking myself, why doesn't Felix just say "well, Flashman, you didn't appeal, so it can't be run out"? By the way it goes down, I guess we have to assume that Flashy appealed to Felix, even though it doesn't explicitly say so, and given that he's cheating he surely would have made a point of making a massive appeal like the one that got Mynn out LBW at the start of all this. We're also about 20 years shy of the Victorians' formal invention of the Spirit of Cricket; in the modern game it is well established that a captain can withdraw an appeal from the umpire if he believes it should not have been made, and there are recent examples of batters being injured while running and the fielding side declining to run them out when it could easily have been done. quote:He lobbed with the solemn concentration of a dowager at a coconut shy, and I gloated inwardly, watched it drop, drove with confidence—and mishit the first ball straight down his throat for the simplest of catches. Lob bowling is just about the oldest trick in the book. Its heyday was the underarm bowling era; it's now pretty much definitively dead and obsolete, but even into the 20th century there were good sides throwing the ball to an occasional lob bowler for a bit of something different. Unlike most bowlers, lob bowlers don't necessarily try to bounce the ball on the ground. Instead they try to bowl high, slow, looping deliveries, ideally aiming to land the ball directly on top of the stumps. It died out because as batters' skill increased, it became easier and easier to deal with slow lobs that didn't hit the ground, or didn't spin when they did hit the ground. quote:He was quick, and sure-footed, and his back game was excellent, but I’d noticed that he wasn’t too steady with his forward strokes, so I pitched well up to him, Effective cricket batting requires the batter to move one's feet as part of playing shots; not too early, or you'll move the wrong way, and not too late, or you'll mistime the shot. Cricket batting shots are divided into two types. If the ball is bouncing close to the batter, and low down, the batter will step forward, towards the pitch of the ball, and hit it as soon as possible after the bounce. If the ball is bouncing further away, and higher, the batter will step backwards, away from the pitch of the ball, and leave as much time to play the shot as possible. This observation displays again that while Flashman has some physical skill at the game, he has a distinct lack of cricketing intelligence when he must play honestly and can't cheat. On a spongy pitch with low bounce, there's not much point bowling short. Short bowling relies on the ball coming through with pace and high bounce to intimidate the batter and threaten his body. Flashy should have been pitching the ball well up as soon as he saw Solomon taking his guard and realised how soft the turf was. Instead he's been witlessly thumping away and letting Solomon play back-foot shots like the pull. quote:on side...his off-stump As the batter stands at the wicket, the "off side" is the side away from his legs, and the "on side" (or "leg side", because cricket never saw anything it didn't want to give at least two names to) is the other. quote:I was so nervous that I edged some of them, and would have been a goner if there’d been even an old woman fielding at slip Now the lack of fielders is working in Flashy's favour. However, what works against him is that if Solomon had edged the ball, its pace would have taken it a good distance from the stumps and Solomon could probably have got a run while Flashy chased it down. Because the ball's coming down slowly, when Flashy edges, it stops very quickly and he doesn't have time to run. quote:I got over my first shakes, tried a drive or two Ironically, our favourite cheat/cad/bounder begins to turn his fortunes around with the most conventional, respectable, orthodox shot in the game. Were this several generations later, we might say they were straight out of the MCC coaching manual, not a sentiment often applied to Flashman. To drive the ball is to hit it with a straight bat in the general direction of "back past the bowler", or through the covers on the off side. Polite applause all round. quote:when he sent me a full pitch, I let fly and hit him clean over the house I have been the wicket-keeper and had a front-row seat to watch a good quality batter effortlessly hit some very bad bowling clean over a nearby building and right out of the ground. It's rather demoralising. Especially when, as the only fielder wearing pads and gloves, you get volunteered to go and find the ball. CRICKETING COMMENTARY ENDS HERE
Trin Tragula fucked around with this message at 20:00 on Aug 6, 2021 |
|
#
?
Aug 6, 2021 19:41
|
|
|
This is great, ty! As a kiwi I have a reasonable osmotic cultural knowledge of the game, but getting the expert commentary is fascinating!
|
|
#
?
Aug 6, 2021 20:41
|
|
|
Speaking as an American I almost feel like this is starting to make sense.
|
|
#
?
Aug 7, 2021 07:00
|
|
|
It's really a lot like baseball, except there's only a single base and you have the wicket behind you that the pitcher wants to knock over. It's just the several hundred years of weird history and jargon and strategy that makes it seem impenetrable. It's really kinda fascinating, because the development behind cricket just seems so alien in a lot of ways. I would have never thought of having a major sport depend on literally knocking something off of a peg behind the batter -- what if it's a windy day? -- versus, say, a small net that the batter defends so the bowler is essentially scoring a goal. Or having pitches that are meant to hit the ground before they get to the batter -- it's just so unpredictable based on conditions that are going to vary depending on location or weather. I say this not to poo poo on cricket, mind you, it's just that it seems like it's from a different sort of philosophy altogether versus what I'm used to.
|
|
#
?
Aug 7, 2021 18:32
|
|
|
quote:The thought of him murmuring greasily beside her at the taffrail while she got drunk on moonlight and flattery fairly maddened me, and I banged his next delivery against the front door for another three runs—and as I waited panting for his next ball, there under the trees was the beast Tighe, hat down on his brows and thumbs hooked in his weskit, staring at me, with his cudgel-coves behind him. I swallowed, missed the next ball, and saw it shave my bails by a whisker. It's made very clear how ruinous it would be for Flashman to be exposed as dealing with Tighe's like, but the book never tries to make clear how damaged Flashman's social position may be by having his wife travel overseas with another gentleman. Presumably having her father around as chaperone would keep that limited but I have to imagine her never coming back would turn him into an into an laughingstock in that and any other era. quote:Would you believe it, his next three balls were as squint as a J-w’s conscience? Ugh. quote:He was dead beat with running, labouring like a cow in milk, and couldn’t keep direction at all. I let ’em go by, while the crowd groaned in disappointment, and when his next one looked like going wide altogether I had to play at it, like it or not; I scrambled across, trying desperately to pull it in his direction, muttering to myself: “If you can’t bowl me, for Christ’s sake catch me out, you ham-fisted buttock,” and in my panic I stumbled, took a frantic swipe—and drove the confounded ball miles over his head, high into the air. He turned and raced to get under it, and there was nothing I could do but leg it for the other end, praying to God he’d catch it. It was still in the air when I reached the bowler’s crease and turned, running backwards to watch; he was weaving about beneath it with his mouth open, arms outstretched, while the whole field waited breathless—down it came, down to his waiting hands, he clutched at it, held it, stumbled, fumbled—and to my horror and a great shriek from the mob, it bounced free—he made a despairing grab, measured his length on the turf, and there was the bloody ball rolling across the grass away from him.  Saying fair's fair doesn't quite seem applicable but it couldn't happen to a worse fellow. quote:I was staring up at the sky, with Felix in between, peering down anxiously, and behind him Mynn’s beefy face saying: “Get his head up—give him air. Here, a drink”—and a glass rattling against my teeth and the burning taste of brandy in my mouth. There was the deuce of a pain in the back of my head, and more anxious faces, and I heard Elspeth’s voice in distant, shrill inquiry, amidst a babble of chatter. I imagine that's been said about the game a thousand thousand times for a thousand thousand reasons. quote:“but there’s nothing for it. Pay up, look pleasant—that’s the damnable thing about being English and playing against foreigners; they ain’t gentlemen.” I doubt if Solomon heard him; he was too busy beaming, with his arm round my shoulders, calling out that there was champagne and oysters in the house, and more beer for the groundlings. So he’d won his bet, without winning the match—well, at least I was clear where Tighe was concerned, for…and then the horrid realisation struck me, at the very moment when I looked up and saw that red weskit on the outskirts of the crowd, with the boozy, scowling face above it—he was glaring at me, tight-lipped, shredding what I guessed was a betting-slip between his fingers. He nodded at me twice, ominously, turned on his heel, and stalked away. Elspeth, how's he gonna do it? quote:Extract from the diary of Mrs Flashman, June—, 1843] Dammit, Elspeth, now I'm starting to treasure you!  But I must end this on a despondant note, for there is no more real cricket to be found in this text. All we have left is more Victorians faffing about and who could possibly care about that ? My sincerest respects to the author for making these games riviting for the unaware and deeply rewarding for the informed. Thank you for reading and joining me on this wickety journey. Please post the most saccharine cricket tributes you can.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TzChDaKHZQ&t=7s Arbite fucked around with this message at 14:00 on Aug 11, 2021 |
|
#
?
Aug 7, 2021 22:27
|
|
|
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjZHfEIEJ54
|
|
#
?
Aug 8, 2021 00:20
|
|
|
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D33Z04r8DJM
|
|
#
?
Aug 8, 2021 00:21
|
|
|
For me the cricket part of this book is the golden standard of sports writing. I listened this as an audiobook and, not knowing anything about cricket, the narrator and author managed to keep me coherent and riveted about the game.
|
|
#
?
Aug 8, 2021 09:43
|
|
|
Not sure there's much to annotate there.Arbite posted:Please post the most saccharine cricket tributes you can. Oh Aggers, do stop it...
|
|
#
?
Aug 8, 2021 22:22
|
|
|
Oh man, Aggers and Johnners on TMS. Absolute classic.
|
|
#
?
Aug 8, 2021 23:50
|
|
|
Thank you for your tributes. A fine game indeed.  Haaaaah. Well, I suppose I've covered three chapters, might as well see where these folks go once they've set down the bat. quote:It was one thing to decide to go on Solomon’s cruise, but quite another to get safe aboard; I had to spend ten days lurking in and about London like a gunpowder plotter, starting at my own shadow and keeping an eye skinned for the Duke’s pluggers—and Daedalus Tighe’s. You may think I was over-timid, and the danger none so great, but you don’t know what people like the Duke were capable of in my young days; they thought they were still in the eighteenth century, and if you offended ’em they could have their bullies thrash you, and then trust to their title to keep them clear of the consequences. I was never a Reform Bill man myself, but there’s no doubt the aristocracy needed its comb cutting. Flashman could be referring to either of the then forthcoming 1867 or 1884 Reform Bills, both of which had the effect of widening the franchise further to the middle and lower classes. The Reform Act of 1832 had done away with many of the infamous Rotten Boroughs where as few as seven voters could send two MPs to Westminster. quote:In any event, it required no great arithmetic to decide to flee the country for a spell. It was sickening to have to give up the Life Guards, but if Tighe spread a scandal about me it might well force me to resign anyway—you could be an imbecile viscount with a cleft palate and still fit to command in the Household Brigade, but if they found you were taking a bookie’s tin for favours, heaven help you, however famous a soldier you were. So there was nothing for it but to lie doggo until the boat sailed, and make one furtive visit to Horse Guards to tip Uncle Bindley the bad news. He quivered with disbelief down the length of his aristocratic spine when I told him. Ahhh! Who? I feel like there should be enough clues to figure out which duke if GMF had a historical one in mind. Is there anywhere with a roster of peers for 1842? quote:was involved, but that it was all a misunderstanding, and Bindley sniffed again and said he had never known a time when the quality of the House of Peers was quite so low. He would speak to Wellington, he said, and since it was advisable for the family’s credit that I should not be seen to be cutting the painter, he would see if some official colour couldn’t be given to my Far Eastern visit. The result was that a day or two later, at the room over the pawn-shop where I was hiding out, I got a note instructing me to proceed forthwith to Singapore, there to examine and approve the first consignment of Australian horses which would be arriving next spring for the Company’s Indian Army. Well done, old Bindley; he had his uses. A gridiron here refers to an East Indiaman, which would also hardly prove to be the worst ship Flashman would have to flee Britain upon.  quote:The rest of the appointment was to match; the saloon, where we dined, couldn’t have been bettered for grub, liquor and service—even old Morrison, who’d been groaning reluctantly, I gathered, ever since he’d agreed to come, had his final doubts settled when they set his first sea meal before him; he was even seen to smile, which I’ll bet he hadn’t done since he last cut the mill-hands’ wages. Solomon was a splendid host, with every thought for our comfort; he even spent the first week pottering about the coast while we got our sea-legs, and was full of consideration for Elspeth—when she discovered that she had left her toilet water behind he had her maid landed at Portsmouth to go up to Town for some, with instructions to meet us at Plymouth; it was royal treatment, no error, and drat all expense.  Sadly this hideous obervation is also the first indication that more's going on with Soloman's ship'n crew than trading. quote:The other thing was that the Sulu Queen, while she was fitted like a floating palace, carried ten guns, which is about as many as a brig will bear. I said it seemed a lot for a pleasure-yacht, and Solomon smiled and says: All right, that's about all I can take right now. Tune in next time for coasts pleasant and ominous. Arbite fucked around with this message at 09:59 on Sep 12, 2021 |
|
#
?
Aug 11, 2021 13:59
|
|
|
Arbite posted:Ahhh! Who? I feel like there should be enough clues to figure out which duke if GMF had a historical one in mind. Is there anywhere with a roster of peers for 1842? As I feel I haven't really contributed to the thread yet, I spent some time on Wikipedia looking at the holders of various Ducal titles contemporaneous for 1842. While there's nothing that really nails it down (and I get the feeling it's probably just a stereotype of an old Duke), there is one possible candidate that might have some link: Henry Somerset, 7th Duke of Beaufort, was roughly the right age (50) and had roughly the right career for the Duke's character. Interestingly, he also shows up in Black Ajax, a historical novel by GMF that features Flashy's dad, Buck Flashman, as a major character (though at the time of that . Should be noted though that Black Ajax isn't part of the main Flashman series, I just thought it was an interesting note.
|
|
#
?
Aug 11, 2021 14:47
|
|
|
you know it's bad when you welcome the racism only so there won't be any more cricket
|
|
#
?
Aug 13, 2021 00:24
|
|
|
quote:However, these thoughts were soon dispelled in the interest of the voyage. I shan’t bore you with descriptions, but I’m bound to say it was the pleasantest cruise of my life, and we never noticed how the weeks slipped by. Solomon had spoken of three months to Singapore; in fact, it took us more than twice as long, and we never grudged a minute of it. Through the summer we cruised gently along the French and Spanish coasts, looking in at Brest and Vigo and Lisbon, being entertained lavishly by local gentry—for Solomon seemed to have a genius for easy acquaintance—and then dipping on down the African coast, into the warm latitudes. I can look back now and say I’ve made that run more times than I can count, in everything from an Indiaman to a Middle Passage slaver, but this was not like any common voyage—why, we picnicked on Moroccan beaches, made excursions to desert ruins beyond Casablanca, were carried on camels with veiled drivers, strolled in Berber market-places, watched fire-dancers under the massive walls of old corsair castles, saw wild tribesmen run their horse races, took coffee with turbanned, white-bearded governors, and even bathed in warm blue water lapping on miles and miles of empty silver sand with palms nodding in the breeze—and every evening there was the luxury of the Sulu Queen to return to, with its snowy cloths and sparkling silver and crystal, and the delicate Ch*nk stewards attending to every want in the cool dimness of the saloon. Well, I’ve been a Crown Prince, once, in my wanderings, but I’ve never seen the like of that voyage. Pity the three of them couldn't just make it work between them. quote:Afterwards, when he came to sit on the deck for an iced soda, I noticed Elspeth glancing at his splendid shoulders in a lazy sort of way, and the glitter in his dark eyes as he swept back his moist black hair and smiled at her—he’d been the perfect family friend for months, mind you, never so much as a fondling paw out of place—and I thought, hollo, he’s looking damned dashing and romantic these days. To make it worse, he’d started growing a chin-beard, a sort of n***** imperial; Elspeth said it gave him quite the corsair touch, so I made a note to roger her twice that night, just to quell these girlish fancies. All this reading Byron ain’t good for young women.  quote:“You have been in some terrible places, Harry—well, if ever you chance to be wrecked there”—and he nodded at the green shore—“pray that you have a bullet left for yourself.” He glanced to see that Elspeth was out of earshot. “The fate of any stranger cast on those shores is too shocking to contemplate; they say the queen has only two uses for foreign men—first, to subdue them to her will, if you follow me, and afterwards, to destroy them by the most fearful tortures she can devise.” We'll talk more about Madagascar and Ranavalona in detail when the book progresses some more. quote:But from the sea it looked placid enough. Tamitave was apparently a very large village of yellow wooden buildings set out in orderly rows back from the shore; there was a fairish-sized fort with a great stockade some distance from the town, and a few soldiers drilling outside it. While Haslam was ashore, I examined them through the glass—big buck n***** in white kilts, with lances and swords, very smart, and moving in time, which is unusual among black troops. They weren’t true n******, though, it seemed to me; when Haslam was rowed out to the ship again there was an escorting boat, with a chap in the stern in what was a fair imitation of our naval rig: blue frock coat, epaulettes, cocked hat and braid, saluting away like anything—he looked like a Mexican, if anything, with his round, oily black face, but the rowers were dark brown and woolly haired, with straight noses and quite fine features. You know, after censoring that word half a hundred times last book entirely in reference to Indians and now this... God, Racism's a big dumb convoluted dumb big mess. quote:That was the closest I got to the Malagassies, just then, and you may come to agree that it was near enough. Solomon seemed well satisfied with whatever business he had done ashore, and by next morning we were far out to sea with Madagascar forgotten behind us.  And with the promise of the crown jewel of the east in sight we'll leave it for now. Arbite fucked around with this message at 14:26 on Aug 18, 2021 |
|
#
?
Aug 13, 2021 04:34
|
|
|
Flashman comes off as positively romantic in this book. Definitely a change of pace from the last.
|
|
#
?
Aug 13, 2021 07:41
|
|
|
quote:That’s one side of it. I wasn’t to know, then, that Singapore was the last jumping-off place from civilisation into a world as terrible as it was beautiful, rich and savage and cruel beyond belief, of land and seas still unexplored where even the mighty Royal Navy sent only a few questing warships, and the handful of white adventurers who voyaged in survived by the speed of their keels and slept on their guns. It’s quiet now, and the law, British and Dutch, runs from Sunda Strait to the Solomons; the coasts are tamed, the last trophy heads in the long-houses are ancient and shrivelled, and there’s hardly a man alive who can say he’s heard the war gongs booming as the great robber fleets swept down from the Sulu Sea. Well, I heard ’em, only too clearly, and for all the good I’ve got to say of the Islands, I can tell you that if I’d known on that first voyage what I learned later, I’d have jumped ship at Madras. Sandy Mitchell loves loves loves this last line, using it in virtually every Ciaphas Cain short story and novel. quote:But I was happily ignorant, and when we slipped in past the green sugar-loaf islands one fine April morning of ’44, and dropped anchor in Singapore roads, it looked safe enough to me. The bay was alive with shipping, a hundred square-riggers if there was one: huge Indiamen under the gridiron flag, tall clippers of the Southern Run wearing the Stars and Stripes, British merchantmen by the bucketful, ships of every nationality—Solomon pointed out the blue crossed anchors of Russia, the red and gold bars of Spain, the blue and yellow of Sweden, even a gold lion which he said was Venice. Closer in, the tubby junks and long trading praus were packed so close it seemed you could have walked on them right across the bay, fairly seething with half-naked crews of Malays, Chinese, and every colour from pale yellow to jet black, deafening us with their high-pitched chatter as Solomon’s rowers threaded the launch through to the river quay. There it was bedlam; all Asia seemed to have congregated on the landing, bringing their pungent smells and deafening sounds with them. As ever, Fraser shows his skill at making a beautiful journey in very few words. From Flashman stepping on the boat to settling into the mansion less than 3700 words have been used and that's with the long Malagasy prelude. quote:Old Morrison was all for it; he had gluttonised to such a tune that he’d put on flesh alarmingly, and all he wanted to do was lie down, belching and refreshing his ill nature in a hot climate. Elspeth, on the other hand, must be up and doing at once; she was off almost before she’d changed her shift, carried in a palki by menials, to pay calls on what she called The Society People, find out who was who, and squander money in the shops and bazaars. Solomon pointed her in the right directions, made introductions, and then explained apologetically that he had weeks of work to do in his ’changing-house at the quays; after that, he assured us, we would set off on our tour of his possessions, which I gathered lay somewhere on the east coast of the peninsula. This book is the first time I felt Fraser was starting to play the same notes too often on Flashman being a terrible person. It's like he felt the need every few pages to smack the reader with "He's bad!" but ran out of new or at least new and timeless transgressions. quote:I took a long slant, to get my bearings, and then plunged in, slavering. There were eight cross-streets in the Mayfair section, where all the fine houses were, and a large upland park below Governor’s Hill where Society congregated in the evening—and, by Jove, wasn’t it wild work, though? Why, you might raise your hat to as many as a hundred couples in two hours, and when you were fagged out with this, there was the frantic debauch of a gig drive along Beach Road, to look at the ships, or a dance at the assembly rooms, where a married woman might even polka with you, provided your wife and her husband were on hand—unmarried ladies didn’t waltz, except with each other, the daring little hussies.  And with that utter happenstance let's call it for now. Arbite fucked around with this message at 14:26 on Aug 18, 2021 |
|
#
?
Aug 16, 2021 23:19
|
|
|
So far, the only things that have stopped Flashy from chasing tail were being locked up/physically prevented or fighting/running for his life. And even those didn't' stop him for long. And because, despite his eternal protests, he does like adventure; he'd die of boredom (or more likely, found some way to screw it up), if he'd gotten the Life Guards commission. I'm recalling something I read once about people who "find themselves" in battle, and I think that's true of him. Not that he finds courage or brotherhood, or any of the things you're Supposed to find, but that adventure draws him, no matter what. Cobalt-60 fucked around with this message at 08:42 on Aug 17, 2021 |
|
#
?
Aug 17, 2021 08:39
|
|
|
quote:“Good God,” says he, “you ain’t been in bazaar-town, surely? My dear chap, if I’d known you wanted to see the sights, I’d have arranged an escort—it ain’t the safest place on earth, you know. Not quite your style, either, I’d have thought.” Aladdin going from East Asian to Arabic in the tellings is no great revelation but I am curious about the chronology there. quote:“Welcome to my miserable and lowly dwelling,” says he, doubling over as far as his belly would let him. “That is what the Chinese always say, is it not? In fact, I think my home is perfectly splendid, and quite the best in Singapore—but I can truthfully say it has never entertained a more beautiful visitor.” This was to Elspeth, who was gaping round at the magnificence of lacquered panelling, gold-leafed slender columns, jade ornaments, and silk hangings, with which Whampoa’s establishment appeared to be stuffed. “You shall sit beside me at dinner, lovely golden-haired lady, and while you exclaim at the luxury of my house, I shall flatter your exquisite beauty. So we shall both be assured of a blissful evening, listening to what delights us most.” Tee hee. And this Whampoa fellow is hanging a lampshade on himself in a way that quite works in the story considering why and who he's doing it for. (We'll talk more about this historical figure later). quote:here were quite a few in the party, apart from us three and Solomon—Balestier, the American consul, I remember, a jolly Yankee planter with a fund of good stories, and Catchick Moses, a big noise in the Armenian community, who was the decentest Jew I ever met, and struck up an immediate rapport with old Morrison—they got to arguing about interest rates, and when Whampoa joined in, Balestier said he wouldn’t rest until he’d made up a story which began “There was a Chinaman, a Scotchman, and a Jew”, which caused great merriment. It was the cheeriest party I’d struck yet, and no lack of excellent drink, but after a while Whampoa called a halt, and there was a little cabaret, of Chinese songs, and plays, which were the worst kind of pantomime drivel, but very pretty costumes and masks, and then two Chinese dancing girls—exquisite little trollops, but clad from head to foot, alas. For the love of God, Whampoa... Also: Author's Note posted:Catchick Moses the Armenian and Whampoa the Chinese were two of the great characters of early Singapore. Catchick was famous not only as a merchant, but as a billiards player, and for his eccentric habit of shaving left-handed without a glass as he walked about his verandah. He was about 32 when Flashman knew him; when he made his will, at the age of 73, seven years before his death, he followed the unusual procedure of submitting it to his children, so that any disputes could be settled amicably during his lifetime.  Singapore's long and fascinating multicultural history has filled volumes, so I'll just throw in this one fun fact: It's the only city/city-state in modern history if not ever to be expelled against its will from another country and into long-term independence. quote:He looked at me, and I can’t think why, but I felt a chill of sudden fear—not of him, but of what he was saying. Before I could speak, though. Elspeth was back, to exclaim again over her present, and prattle her thanks, and he stood smiling down at her, like some benign, sherry-soaked heathen god. Sadly 'the Juarez business' would only be explored briefly and in the aftermath during the second-to-last book. So, with these ominous signs amid impossible opulance let's pause for onw.
|
|
#
?
Aug 18, 2021 16:20
|
|
|
quote:In any event, I didn’t sleep well after Whampoa’s party, and was in a fine fit of the dismals next day, as a result of which Elspeth and I quarrelled, and she wept and sulked until Solomon came to propose a picnic on the other side of the island. We would sail round in the Sulu Queen, he said, and make a capital day of it. Elspeth cheered up at once, and old Morrison was game, too, but I cried off, pleading indisposition. I knew what I needed to lift my gloom, and it wasn’t an al fresco lunch in the mangrove swamps with those three; let them remove themselves, and it would leave me free to explore China Town at closer quarters, and perhaps sample the menu at one of those exclusive establishments that Solomon had mentioned; the Temple of Heaven was the name that stuck in my mind. Why, they might even have dainty little waitresses like Whampoa’s, to teach you how to use your chopsticks. He can paint more than a landscape in a few words, that's for sure. quote:“This is Madame Sabba,” says the waiter. “She will conduct you, if your excellency will permit…?” Rather different than how his encounter with 'Lakshimibai' went, but as he says he was a very different man by then. Also his last bit of advice is pretty sound. quote:He kept me ahead of the field for a good quarter of a mile, I reckon, through deserted streets and lanes, over fences and yards and ditches, and never a glimpse of a human soul, until I turned a corner and found myself looking down a narrow alley which obviously led to a frequented street, for at the far end there were lanterns and figures moving, and beyond that, against the night sky, the spars and masts of ships under riding lights. This time instead of being saved by a blood-brother he's saved by strangers. But who would be hanging around 1840's Singapore with Victorian heroics enough to name their companion Jingo? Tune in next time!
|
|
#
?
Aug 21, 2021 09:02
|
|
|
Just had the thought "imagine a gay Flashman" and realized it'd just be Evil Roger Casement
|
|
#
?
Aug 22, 2021 09:32
|
|
|
quote:And then I opened my eyes, and saw an amazing sight. In front of me was crouching a squat, hideously-featured native, naked save for a loin-cloth, gripping a long bamboo spear. Alongside him stood a huge Arab-looking chap, in white ducks and crimson sash, with a green scarf round his hawk head and a great red-dyed beard rippling down to his waist. There were a couple of other near-naked natives, two or three obvious seamen in ducks and caps, and kneeling at my right side a young, fair-haired fellow in a striped jersey. As motley a crowd as ever I opened eyes on, but when I turned my head to see who was poking painfully at my wounded shoulder, I forgot all about the others—this was the chap to look at. Now here's a fine juxtaposition. The savior appears looking impossibly fine and reassuring as can be... while accompanied by someone an ally he literally calls an 'ignorant savage,' liberally using racist slurs, and singing a song that to call bawdy would be woefull inadequate. And we ain't seen nuthin' yet of this guy's breadth. quote:I yelped with pain and he clicked his tongue reprovingly. Fascinating. Here again we see Fraser only using comedy funetiks for the British and the Irish accents but it's emanating from a 'Red-bearded Arab.' There's probably a profound conclusion to be drawn regarding the author's sincere and deeply held views but this book is already taking long enough. quote:“We ought to let Mackenzie look at him, J.B.,” says the fair chap. “He’s looking pretty groggy.” Always quick to recover his stronger instincts, our Flash. quote:“You know Whampoa, do you?” says J.B. “Well, that settles it. Lead on, Stuart. By the way,” says he to me, as they picked up the palki, “my name’s Brooke—James Brooke—known as J.B. You’re Mr…?” *Gasp* Elspeth, what has become of you? quote:[Extract from the diary of Mrs Flashman, July—, 1844] This book is playing on so many levels... Anyway, believe it or not, it's been all of one chapter since our last Elspeth extract where Harry decided it was best to hop aboard. I've mentioned it before but GMF's marvelous economy of words allows him to do things such as leave the reader the impression they got the whole story of The Mutiny in half of a 336 page paperback and it's only going to be honed further. We will delve more deeply in both Whampoa and James Brooke next time! Arbite fucked around with this message at 21:19 on Aug 27, 2021 |
|
#
?
Aug 23, 2021 11:38
|
|
|
Arbite posted:Singapore's long and fascinating multicultural history has filled volumes, so I'll just throw in this one fun fact: It's the only city/city-state in modern history if not ever to be expelled against its will from another country and into long-term independence. That said, if Lee Kwan-Yew’s memoirs are to be believed, he engineered Singapore getting thrown out of the Federation of Malaya so as to ensure an ethnic Chinese majority in the bit that he was going to be running.
|
|
#
?
Aug 23, 2021 12:12
|
|
|
Arbite posted:Anyway, believe it or not, it's been all of one chapter since our last Elspeth extract where Harry decided it was best to hop aboard. I've mentioned it before but GMF's marvelous economy of words allows him to do things such as leave the reader the impression they got the whole story of The Mutiny in half of a 336 page paperback and it's only going to be honed further. Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin books are also very good for this -- they will pass a month and a thousand sea-miles in the break between one paragraph and the next, and refer offhand to huge events with a sentence or two. I wonder if it's a British thing, like their tendency for understatement. Excited for James Brooke. Before this book, I'd only ever heard of him from the episode about him from Behind the Bastards, which makes him seem like, well, an enormous bastard, which contrasts with what even Flashman seems to think of him. Phenotype fucked around with this message at 16:09 on Aug 24, 2021 |
|
#
?
Aug 24, 2021 16:07
|
|
|
Phenotype posted:Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin books are also very good for this -- they will pass a month and a thousand sea-miles in the break between one paragraph and the next, and refer offhand to huge events with a sentence or two. I wonder if it's a British thing, like their tendency for understatement. No, Glen Cook does it too. In one passage in the Dread Empire series he goes through two years of war in three pages and leaves you feeling you know what happened to all the characters and how every battle went down.
|
|
#
?
Aug 24, 2021 16:36
|
|
|
quote:“I blame myself,” says Whampoa, sipping his sherry. “For years one does business with a man, and if his credit is good and his merchandise sound, one clicks the abacus and sets aside the doubts one feels on looking into his eyes.” He was enthroned behind his great desk, impassive as Buddha, with one of his little tarts beside him holding the Amontillado bottle. “I knew he was not safe, but I let it go, even when I saw how he watched your golden lady two evenings since. It disturbed me, but I am a lazy, stupid and selfish fool, so I did nothing. You shall tell me so, Mr Flashman, and I shall bow my unworthy head beneath your deserved censure.”  Manzanilla is a drink made in an incredibly small section of Cadiz southern Spain. This dryest of the dry Sherry's fits Whampoa's personality perfectly. Speaking of:  Hoo Ah Kay (胡亞基), was better known by the name of his hometown of Whampoa, near Canton. He migrated to Singapore and did extremely well for himself. At this point in time he would be in his late 20s and better days were coming. Before he passed in 1880 he would have been named honorable consul for Japan, Russia and China, named to the legislative and later executive councils of the colony, and been awarded the 'Call me God' of the Order of St Michael and St George. And of course, the man was known for his lavish hospitality.  quote:Most of it came from old Morrison, who had been abandoned on the bay island where the party had picnicked. He had gone to sleep, he said—full of drugged drink, no doubt, and had come to in the late evening to find the Sulu Queen hull down on the horizon, steaming away east—this was confirmed by the captain of an American clipper, one Waterman, who had passed her as he came into port. Morrison had been picked up by some native fishermen and had arrived at the quay after nightfall to pour out his tale, and now the whole community was in uproar. Whampoa had taken it upon himself to get to the bottom of the thing—he had feelers everywhere, of course—and had put Morrison to bed upstairs, where the old goat was in a state of prostration. The Governor had been informed, with the result that brows were being clutched, oaths sworn, fists shaken, and sal volatile sold out in the shops, no doubt. There hadn’t been a sensation like it since the last Presbyterian Church jumble sale. But of course nothing was done. While not immediately decisive, this fascinating little meeting shows an absurdly disparate group who share little beyond the ability to communicate, all being fairly heard (pay no attention the lack of Jingo). Doublethink's a hell of a thing. quote:You may wonder what I was thinking while all this hot air was being expelled, and why I wasn’t taking part as a bereaved and distracted husband should—wild cries of impotent rage and grief, prayers to heaven, vows of revenge, and all the usual preliminaries to inaction. The fact was, I had troubles enough—my shoulder was giving me gyp, and having not recovered from the terror I’d faced myself that night, I didn’t have much emotion left to spare, even for Elspeth, once the first shock of the news had worn off. She was gone—kidnapped by that half-caste scum, and what feelings I had were mostly about him. The slimy, twisting, insinuating hound had planned all this, over months—it was incredible, but he must have been so infatuated with her that he was prepared to steal her, make himself an outcast and outlaw, put himself beyond the bounds of civilisation for good, just on her account. There was no sense in it—no woman’s worth that. Why, as I sat there, trying to take it in, I knew I wouldn’t have done it, not for Elspeth and a pound of tea—not for Aphrodite herself and ten thousand a year. But I’m not a rich, spoiled dago, of course. Even so, it was past belief. Unlike the myriad times Ciaphas Cain would claim to be thinking of his reputation before diving heroically into danger, I quite believe Flashman when he takes about appearances. quote:I ground my teeth and cursed the day I’d ever set eyes on her, but above all, I felt such hatred of Solomon as I’ve never felt for any other human being. That he’d done this to me—there was no fate too horrible for the greasy rat, but precious little chance of inflicting it, so far as I could see at the moment. I was helpless, while that bloody wop steamed off with my wife—I could just picture him galloping away at her while she pretended maiden modesty, and the world roared with laughter at me, and in my rage and misery I must have let out a muffled yowl, for Brooke turned away from his map, strode across, dropped on one knee beside my chair, gripped my arm, and cries: Real-rear end James Brook posted:“A captive damsel! Does it not conjure up images of blue eyes and auburn hair of hyacinthine flow! And after all, a fat old Dutch frau may be the reality! Poor creature, even though she be old, and fat, and unamiable, and ugly, it is shocking to think of such a fate as a life passed among savages!” quote:“An unexplored island the size of Europe,” says Catchick mournfully. “And even then you are only guessing. If he has gone east, it may as well be to the Celebes or the Philippines.” Now that's a man who knows how to run a room! Tune in next time to learn just what's been revealed. Arbite fucked around with this message at 22:39 on Aug 27, 2021 |
|
#
?
Aug 27, 2021 21:28
|
|
|
b----r is bugger, presumably
|
|
#
?
Aug 27, 2021 21:39
|
|
|
Yep.
|
|
#
?
Aug 27, 2021 22:09
|
|
|
Thank you both.
|
|
#
?
Aug 27, 2021 22:39
|
|
|
quote:“If you will forgive my interruption,” says Whampoa, “I have information which I believe may be vital to us, and to the safety of the beautiful Mrs Flashman.” He ducked his head at me. “A little time ago I ventured the humble opinion that her abductor would not sail beyond the Indies waters; I had developed a theory, from the scant information in my possession; my agents have been testing it in the few hours that have elapsed since this deplorable crime took place. It concerned the identity of this mysterious Don Solomon Haslam, whom Singapore has known as a merchant and trader—for how long?” Ho-ho! quote:He broke off, for Catchick Moses had let fly one of his amazing Hebrew exclamations, and was staring at Whampoa, who nodded placidly. True when this was set, true when it was written, true today. quote:“But consider!” cries Catchick. “If it were as you say, would any sane man adopt an alias so close to his own name? Wouldn’t he call himself Smith, or Brown, or—or anything?” Very slowly (by the standards of the series) we're given the picture of who this mysterious rescuer James Brooke really is. quote:“If he is the man you are looking for,” says Catchick. “Whampoa may be wrong.” And so this fascinating meeting draws to a close with the Whampoa among other things having risen even further in everyone's esteem. quote:I wasn’t thinking that far ahead, I confess, and I didn’t know James Brooke at this moment for anything but a smiling madman in a pilot-cap, with an odd taste in friends and followers. If I’d known him for what he truly was, I’d have been in an even more agitated condition when our discussion finally ended, and I was helped up Whampoa’s staircase to a magnificent bedchamber, and tucked in between silk sheets, bandaged shoulder and all, by his stewards and Dr Mackenzie. I hardly knew where I was; my mind was in a perfect spin, but when they’d left me, and I was lying staring up at the thin rays of sunlight that were breaking through the screens—for it was now full day outside—there broke at last the sudden dreadful realisation of what had happened. Elspeth was gone; she was in the clutches of a n***** pirate, who could take her beyond the maps of Europeans, to some horrible stronghold where she’d be his slave, where we could never hope to find her—my beautiful, idiot Elspeth, with her creamy skin and golden hair and imbecile smile and wonderful body, lost to me, forever. Aww, that's rather... quote:and just then there was a scratching at my door, and when it opened, there was Whampoa, bowing from his great height on the threshold. He came forward beside the bed, his hands tucked into his sleeves, and looked down at me. Was my shoulder, he asked, giving me great pain? I said it was agony. Nevermind. Well, the next course of action seems rather set, tune in next time for the departure and a full explanation of who the mysterious J.B. really is.
|
|
#
?
Aug 30, 2021 18:06
|
|
|
quote:For four days I was confined in Whampoa’s house with my gashed shoulder, recuperating, and I’ve never had a more blissfully ruinous convalescence in my life. It would have been interesting, had there been time, to see whether my wound healed before Whampoa’s solicitous young ladies killed me with their attentions; my own belief is that I would have expired just about the time the stitches were ready to come out. As it was, my confinement was cut short by the arrival and swift departure of H.M.S. Dido, commanded by one Keppel, R.N.; willy-nilly, I had to sail with her, staggering aboard still weak with loss of blood, et cetera, clutching the gangway not so much for support as to prevent my being wafted away by the first puff of breeze. Here we have a perfect view of Morrison's misery but he's been written so abominably well in this and other books that you can still get some schadenfreude. quote:I left him lamenting, and went off to nurse my shoulder and reflect gloomily that there was no help for it—I would have to be first in the field when the pursuit got under way. The fellow Brooke, who—for reasons that I couldn’t fathom just then—seemed to have taken on himself the planning of the expedition, obviously took it for granted that I would go, and when Keppel arrived and agreed at once to put Dido and her crew into the business, there was no hanging back any longer. Here we go... quote:“Who’s J.B.?” he cried. “You can’t mean it! Who’s J.B.? You don’t know? Why, he’s the greatest man in the East, that’s all! You’re not serious—bless me, how long have you been in Singapore?” What a lovely thought.  Author's Note posted:Stuart’s enthusiastic description of Brooke and his adventures is perfectly accurate,’ so far as it goes (see The Raja of Sarawak, by Gertrude L. Jacob, 1876, The Life of Sir James Brooke, by Spenser St John, 1879, Brooke’s own letters and journal, and other Borneo sources quoted elsewhere in these foot-notes. Also Appendix B). The only error at this point is a minor one of Flashman’s, for “Stuart’s” name was in fact George Steward; obviously Flashman has again made a mistake of which he is occasionally guilty in his memoirs, of trusting his ears and not troubling to check the spelling of proper names. Let's let 'Steward' finish then. quote:“Very commendable,” says I. “But isn’t that the East India Company’s job—or the navy’s?” Always recognizing and trying to avoid those with perchance for trouble. So, the legendary James Brooke, the real 'Man who would be King,' who literally just had a major Malay motion picture about him filmed in Sarawak and released this past June. Born in India he returned to the UK for his later education, then joined the Bengal army and saw action in their first war with the Burmese. Wounded and needing years to recover in England, he tried his hand at small trading in the Far East but was largely unsuccessful until his inheritance came in and he bought the 142-ton schooner The Royalist.  (For scale, the world-famous Bluenose was 254 long tons.) With this and some crew he sailed into Borneo and immediately began to insert himself in local affairs, helping to quell an ongoing revolt as his first major act and being offered governorship of Sarawak in 1841. By the time of this book he had been awarded the land as sovereign. quote:It was a question which was still vexing me four days later when the Dido, under sweeps, came gliding over a sea like blue glass to the mouth of the Kuching river, and I saw for the first time those brilliant golden beaches washed with foam, the low green flats of mangrove creeping to the water’s edge among the little islands, the palm-fringed creeks, and in the distant southern haze the mountains of Borneo. We'll continue with this bit of private colonialism next time!
|
|
#
?
Sep 1, 2021 21:24
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 10, 2024 23:27 |
|
|
quote:But when we went ashore to Brooke’s house, “The Grove”, as it was called, the great man hardly referred to Paitingi’s momentous news—I discovered later that this was delicacy on his part; he didn’t want to distress me by even talking about Elspeth’s plight. Instead, when we had been conducted to that great shady bungalow on its eminence, commanding a view of the teeming river and landing-places, he sat us down with glasses of arrack punch, and began to talk, of all things, about—roses. Well, Fraser certainly isn't trying to portray Brooke as an ultra-enlightened progressive in the 'finest' colonial tradition. Blind Man's buff is dry Marco Polo. Also: Author's note posted:Angela Georgina Burdett-Coutts (1814-1906), “the richest heiress in all England, enjoyed a fame…second only to Queen Victoria.” She spent her life and the vast fortune inherited from her grandfather, Thomas Coutts the banker, on countless charities and good causes, endowing schools, housing schemes, and hospitals, and providing funds for such diverse projects as Irish famine relief, university scholarships, drinking troughs, and colonial exploration; Livingstone, Stanley, and Brooke were among the pioneers she assisted. She was the first woman to be raised to the peerage for public service, and numbered among her friends Wellington, Faraday, Disraeli, Gladstone, Daniel Webster, and Dickens, who dedicated “Martin Chuzzlewit” to her.  quote:“Perhaps, one of these days, when I return to England, you will present me,” says he, gulping, and shovelled her picture into a drawer. Well, well, thinks I, who’d have thought it: the mad pirate-killer and rose-fancier, spoony on Angie Coutts’s picture—I’ll bet that every time he contemplates it the local Dyak lasses have to scamper for cover. I'm sure you don't need me to explain that one. quote:“It is never mentioned, of course,” says Stuart, uncomfortably, “but it is as well you should know—in case, in conversation, you unwittingly made any reference that might…well, be wounding. It was in Burma, you see, when he was in the army. He received an…incapacitating injury in battle. It was put about that it was a bullet in the lung…but in fact…well, it wasn’t.” Timelessly terrible, our Flash. quote:It was an appropriate thought, for that same evening, after dinner at The Grove, we held the council at which Brooke announced his plan of operations. It followed a dinner as formal in its way as any I’ve ever attended—but that was Brooke all over: when we had our pegs on the verandah beforehand he was laughing and sky-larking, playing leap-frog with Stuart and Crimble and even the dour Paitingi, the bet being that he could jump over them one after another with a glass in one hand, and not spill a drop—but when the bell sounded, everyone quieted down, and filed silently into his great room. quote:I don’t remember much of the meal, except that the food was good and the wine execrable, and that conversation consisted of Brooke lecturing interminably; like most active men, he had all the makings of a thoroughgoing bore. Well, with that bit of syncretism let's pause that awful conversation for now.
|
|
#
?
Sep 4, 2021 09:02
|
|