Quotes from James Herriot

First job I had to do was pass the stomach tube on a horse. Got it into the trachea instead of the oesophagus. Couple of quick pumps and down went the horse with a hell of a crash—dead as a hammer. That's when I started these grey hairs.

mind. So much for Herriot as a judge of character. I couldn't have been more wrong, but Paul had fought his secret battle with a courage which had deceived everybody.

And as I methodically trimmed the overgrown nails, wrathful bubbles escaped on either side of the bandage along with his splutterings. If dogs could swear I was getting the biggest cursing in history. I

To say I had a hangover next morning would be failing even to hint at the utter disintegration of my bodily economy and personality. Only somebody who had consumed two or three quarts of assorted home made wines at a sitting could have an inkling of the quaking nausea, the raging inferno within, the jangling nerves, the black despairing outlook.

Maybe ye don't know it, Mr. Herriot, but this is the best time of your life.' 'Do you think so?' 'Aye, there's no doubt about it. When your children are young and growin' up around ye—that's when it's best. It's the same for everybody, only a lot o' folk don't know it and a lot find out when it's too late. It doesn't last long, you know.

clear-skinned

When a lonely, penniless old woman dies people don't rush up to you in the street to tell you.

I thought of the object lesson which I thought he had given me, but in fact it was a lesson of another kind and one which I have never forgotten; that there are countless people like Paul who are not what they seem.

But I'm having the agony. I've been dreading this happening for so long. I haven't been able to sleep for thinking about it. It seems so cruel and unjust for this to strike a helpless animal—a little creature who's never done anybody any harm.

After that first crowded day I retired to one of those green-tiled sanctuaries and lathered myself with a new bar of a famous toilet soap which Helen had put in my bag. I have never been able to use that soap since. Scents are too evocative and the merest whiff jerks me back to that first night away from my wife, and to the feeling I had then. It was a dull, empty ache which never really went away.

Those were dreadful words. "Not many minutes" was a common phrase in Yorkshire and could mean anything up to two hours.

the mutually depending, trusting and loving association between man and animal.

Klaipeda is, of course, the old Lithuanian port of Memel, and I have previously read that when the Russians took over, a proportion of the native population was deported and replaced by Russians. I am unable to ascertain the extent of this, and since Klaipeda is now part of the Soviet Union, I shall refer to all the people I meet as Russians.

auscultate the chest and thoroughly palpate the abdomen.

Finally they got me in, half lying across the back seat. My face was pressed against the side window and from the outside it must have been a grotesque sight with the nose squashed sideways and a solitary dead-mackerel eye staring sightlessly into the night.

It was the first time I had had the opportunity of drinking champagne by the pint and it was a rewarding experience. I

The Poems of Robert W. Service.

one of his luxuries was to wake up in the middle of the night so that he could turn over and go to sleep again.

Remember to wear your identity discs at all times. We had two prangs last week – couple of fellers burned beyond recognition and neither of 'em was wearing his discs. We didn't know who they were.

All things bright and beautiful, All creatures great and small, All things wise and wonderful, The Lord God made them all. Cecil Frances Alexander 1818-1895

Northern Pennines.

the feeling of cold emptiness, of having nothing to offer, made the journey a misery.

I thought afresh that a nice cat washing his face by the hearth gave extra comfort to a room

a realisation of my blessings began to return when I slid into bed and Helen, instead of shrinking away from me as it would have been natural to do, deliberately draped her feet and legs over the human ice block that was her husband. The bliss was unbelievable. It was worth getting out just to come back to this.