Quotes from John Buchan

I believe that every man has in his soul a passion for treasure-hunting, which will often drive a coward into prodigies of valour.

It struck me that Albania was the sort of place that might keep a man from yawning.

I would have been content with any job however thankless, in any quarter however remote, if I had a chance of making a corner of the desert blossom and the solitary place glad.

Leadership is only courage and wisdom, and a great carefulness of self.

This is all a tale of an older world and a forgotten countryside. At this moment of time change has come; a screaming line of steel runs through the heather of no-man's-land, and the holiday-maker claims the valleys for his own. But this busyness is but of yesterday, and not ten years ago the fields lay quiet to the gaze of placid beasts and the wandering stars. This story I have culled from the grave of an old fashion, and set down for the love of a great soul and the poetry of life.

It was a strange staging for death, for the woman on the high bed was dying. Slowly, fighting every inch of the way with a grim tenacity, but indubitably dying. Her vital ardour had sunk below the mark from which it could rise again, and was now ebbing as water runs from a little crack in a pitcher.

I'm an economical soul, and if I'm going to be hanged I want a good stake for my neck.

Here were we wretched creatures of men making for each other's throats, and outraging the good earth which God had made so fair a habitation.

The more doubtful the political outlook the fiercer will be the dogmas which men create and contend for.

He felt singularly light-hearted, and the immediate cause was his safety razor. A week ago he had bought the thing in a sudden fit of enterprise, and now he shaved in five minutes, where before he had taken twenty, and no longer confronted his fellows, at least one day in three, with a countenance ludicrously mottled by sticking-plaster.

The secret belongs only to the Maker of good and faithful dogs.

We are all, even the best of us, egoists and self-deceivers, and without a little comfortable make-believe to clothe us we should freeze in the outer winds.

Thirty-nine steps)' was the phrase; and at its last time of use it ran—'(Thirty-nine steps, I counted them—high tide 10.17 p.m.)'. I could make nothing of that.

We must all be fighters and strugglers, Lewie, and it is better to wear out than to rust out. It is bad to let choice things become easily familiar; for, you know, familiarity is apt to beget a proverbial offspring. The

A little thing, lasting only a second, and the odds were a thousand to one that I might have had my eyes on my cards at the time and missed it. But I didn't, and, in a flash, the air seemed to clear. Some shadow lifted from my brain, and I was looking at the three men with full and absolute recognition.

Jock put his shoulder to the framework and the whole thing crumbled inward with a crash of glass. Rotten as touch-wood, he said. This place would never stand a siege.

How will you deal with him? Belses asked. Jock lifted a brawny fist and regarded it lovingly. Knock him out-- truss him up-- whatever the Almighty permits us. Supposing he's not alone? Oh, then, if his trusties are with him, there'll be a bonny rumpus.

I skumringen kom mannen hennes tilbake fra heiene. Det var en mager kjempe som tok ett skritt der andre dødelige trengte tre.

Beklager så meget , sa han. Jeg er ikke helt meg selv i kveld. Saken er nemlig den at jeg er død i dette øyeblikk.

It was strange how fear had gone,now that we knew the worst and had a fighting man by our side.

Our ignorance of the future has been wisely ordained of Heaven. For unless man were to be like God and know everything, it is better that he should know nothing. If he knows one fact only, instead of profiting by it he will assuredly land in the soup.

When a man comes out of great danger, he is apt to be a little deaf to the call of duty.

There was more in those eyes than any common triumph. They had been hooded like a bird of prey, and now they flamed with a hawk's pride. A white fanatic heat burned in them, and I realized for the first time the terrible thing I had been up against. This man was more than a spy; in his foul way he had been a patriot.

Only by the possession of a sense of humour am I saved from insignificance. To