Charles Portis

I am struck that LaBoeuf is shot, trampled, and nearly severs his tongue, and not only does not cease to talk, but spills the banks of English!

The chinaman is running them cheap shells on me again.

I mean to kill you in one minute, Ned. Or see you hanged in Fort Smith at Judge Parker's convenience. Which will you have?

The ground's too hard. If they wanted a decent funeral, they should have got themselves killed in summer.

If he is not in a shallow grave somewhere between here and Fort Smith he is gone. Long gone! Thanks to Mr. LaBeouf, we have missed our shot. He barked and the birds have flown. Gone. Gone. Gone! Lucky Ned and his cohort gone. Your fifty dollars gone. Gone the whiskey - seized in evidence. The trail is cold, if there ever was one. I'm a foolish old man who's been drawn into a wild goose chase by a harpy in trouser and a nincompoop. Mr. LaBeouf, he can wonder the Choctaw Nation for as long as he likes. Perhaps the local In'jins will take him in and honor his jibberings by making him chief. You, sister, may go where you like. Our engagement is terminated. I bow out.

At The Green Frog, had a billiard table. Served ladies and men both, mostly men. Tried running it myself for a while, but couldn't keep good help. And I never did learn how to buy meat. Is it him?

That's when I went out to the staked plains of Texas. Shoot buffalo with Vernon Shaftoe and a Flathead Indian named Olly. Well, the Mormons, well they run Shaftoe out of Great Salt Lake City, don't ask me what for. Call it a misunderstanding and leave it go at that. Well, big shaggies, about all gone now. Damned shame. Give three dollars right now for a pickled buffalo tongue.

Ground's too hard. If them men wanted a decent burial, they should have gotten themselves kilt in summer.

You go for a man hard enough and fast enough, he don't have time to think about how many's with him; he thinks about himself, and how he might get clear of that wrath that's about to set down on him

I'm a foolish old man who's been drawn into a wild goose chase by a harpie in trousers and a nincompoop.

That was "Johnny in the Low Ground." There are very few fiddle tunes I have not heard. Once heard they are locked in my mind forever. It is a sadness to me that I have sausage fingers that cannot crowd onto a fretboard... Little fat girls at a cotillion. "Soldier's Joy"!

It astonishes me that Mr. LaBoeuf has been shot, trampled, and nearly bitten his tongue off, and yet not only does he continue to talk but he spills the banks of English.

I'm not a sharper. I am an old man sleeping on a rope bed in a room behind the Chinese grocery. I have nothing.

I don't have to buy that, I confiscate it. I am an officer of the court. Ah, thank you. $100, that's the rate.

As I understand it, Chaney... or Chelmsford, as he called himshelf in Texas... shot the senator's dog. When the senator remonstrated, Chelmsford shot him as well. You could argue that the shooting of the dog was merely an instance of malum prohibitum, but the shooting of a senator is indubitably an instance of malum in se.

I thought you were going to say the sun was in your eyes. That is to say, your EYE.

You are getting ready to show your ignorance now, Cogburn. I don't mind a little personal chaffing but I won't hear anything against the Ranger troop from a man like you.

My Appaloosa will be galloping when that big American stud of yours is winded and collapsed. Now make another joke about it. You are only trying to put on a show for this girl Mattie with what you must think is a keen tongue.

You give out very little sugar with your pronouncements. While I sat there watchin' I gave some thought to stealin' a kiss... though you are very young, and sick... and unattractive to boot. But now I have a mind to give you five or six good licks with my belt.

I am not accustomed to so large a fire. In Texas, we'll make do with a fire of little more than twigs… buffalo chips. Heat the night's ration of beans. And it is Ranger policy never to make your camp in the same place as your cook fire. Very imprudent to make your presence known in unsettled country.

I thought you gonna say the sun was in your eyes. That is to say, your Eye!

It is you who have nothing to offer, Cogburn! A sad picture indeed. This is no longer a manhunt, it is a debauch. The Texas Ranger presses on… alone.

That is not my worry. You have earned your spurs, that is clear enough... . you have been a regular old hand on the trail. But Cogburn is right, even if I would not give him the satisfaction of conceding it. The trail is cold, and I am... considerably diminished.

I would go on in your company if there were clear way to go. But we would be striking out blindly. Chelmsford is gone. We have chased him right off the map. There is nothing for it. I am bound for Texas, and it is time for you to go home too... . The marshal, when he sobers, is your way back.

I was within three hundred yards of Chelmsford once. The closest I have been. With a Sharp's carbine that is within range, but I was mounted and had the choice of firing off-hand or dismounting to shoot from rest, which would allow Chelmsford to augment the distance. I fired mounted... and fired wide.

The Sharp's carbine is an instrument of uncanny balance and precision.