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DUELS --- DULL --- DUMPED (BEING)
DUNKIRK --- DUTY

.
.
.

DUELS

see: "CHALLENGE"
see: "FIGHT"


^

Alexandre Dumas (1802—1870)
French novelist and playwright.

Dumas's quarrel with a rising young politician
became so intense that a duel was inevitable.
As both were superb shots, they decided to
draw lots, the loser agreeing to shoot himself.
Dumas lost. Pistol in hand, he withdrew in
silent dignity to another room, closing the
door behind him. The rest of the company
waited in gloomy suspense for the sound of
the shot that would end Dumas's career.
It rang out at last. They ran to the door,
opened it, and there was Dumas, smoking
revolver in hand. 'Gentlemen, a most
regrettable thing has happened. I missed.'

--_Bartlett's Book of Anecdotes_
edited by Clifton Fadiman and Andrι Bernard [2000 ed.]

^

^^

Humphrey Howarth (c. 1800), British surgeon:

Challenged to a duel, Howarth appeared at the
appointed venue stark naked. His challenger,
understandably nonplussed, asked what he thought
he was doing. Howarth solemly explained that
if any bit of cloth is carried into the body by
gunshot, festering inevitably follows. His opponent
averred it would be ridiculous to fight a naked
man and the duel was called off.

--_Bartlett's Book of Anecdotes_
edited by Clifton Fadiman and Andrι Bernard

^^

^

Charles Augustin Sainte-Beuve (1804—1869)
French critic and literary historian:

Although himself unpugacious, Sainte-Beuve was
once compelled to fight a duel with pistols. At
the critical moment, just as the order to fire
was about to be given, it started to rain. Sainte-
Beuve called for a pause in the proceedings while
he went to his carriage and fetched and opened a
large umbrella. He then faced his opponent with
the umbrella held in his left hand and the pistol
in his right. The opponent protested at the
derogation of the dignity of the occasion. "I
don't mind being killed," Sainte-Beuve responded,
"but I do mind getting wet."

--_Bartlett's Book of Anecdotes_
edited by Clifton Fadiman and Andrι Bernard


^

^^

The most endearing handling of a duel challenge was done by
the much-loved comic author Georges Courteline. Some cocky
would-be writer, wishing to get himself some free publicity,
wrote Courteline an insulting letter demanding satisfaction
for some trumped-up slight. The letter was badly written and
the spelling execrable. Courteline, who could be a caustic
grumbler but beneath whose gruff exterior was a sweetly
human man, took his quaint pen in hand and replied:

"My dear young sir. As I am the offended party, the choice of
weapons is mine. We shall fight with orthography. You are
already dead!"

--Cornelia Otis Skinner (1901—1979)
American author and actress.
_Elegant Wits and Grand Horizontals_ [1962]

^^



DULL

.
.

see "BORING"


The head of dullness loses nothing of the benumbing
and lethargizing influence by reiterated discharges.
--C.C. Colton (1780—1832)
English clergyman and writer.

The worst of it is, dullness is catching.
--Douglas Jerrold (1803—1857)
English playwright and journalist.

It is the dull man who is always sure,
and the sure man who is always dull.
--H.L. (Henry Louis) Mencken (1880—1956)
American journalist and literary critic.

-----

bromide [BROH-myd], noun:
1. A compound of bromine and another element or a
positive organic radical.
2. A dose of potassium bromide taken as a sedative.
3. A dull person with conventional thoughts.
4. A commonplace or conventional saying.

hebetude [HEB-uh-tood], noun:
Mental dullness or sluggishness.
Ex.: While too many Americans slouch toward a terminal funk of
hebetude and sloth, Bendians race ahead with toned muscles,
wide eyes and brains perpetually wired on adrenaline.
--"Wild rides in the heart of central Oregon: Bent out of
shape in Bend,"
_Washington Times_ [11 August 2001]
The adjective is hebetudinous heb-uh-TOOD-n-us; -TYOOD-.

jejune (adj.) [ji-'jun]
Lacking in nutrient content, hence insipid,
dull, lacking in intellectual content.
jejunely (adverb)
jejuneness (noun)

obtund (verb) [ahb-'tκnd]
Make dull or blunt, deaden
adj: obtundent
n: obtundity



DUMPED (BEING)

.
.

see: "LOVE & MARRIAGE (OR NOT)" for related links


-

After A While
by Veronica Shoffstall

After a while, you learn the subtle difference
Between holding a hand and chaining a soul,
And you learn that love doesn't mean leaning
And company doesn't mean security,
And you begin to learn that kisses aren't contracts
And presents aren't promises,
And you begin to accept your defeats
With your head up and your eyes open
With the grace of a woman, not the grief of a child,
And you learn to build all your roads on today
Because tomorrow's ground is too uncertain for plans.
And futures have a way of falling down in midflight.

After a while you learn
That even sunshine burns if you get too much.
So you plant your garden and decorate your own soul,
Instead of waiting for someone to bring you flowers.

And you learn that you really can endure...
That you really are strong.
And you really do have worth.
And you learn and learn...
With every goodbye, you learn.

-

Max: Bob, listen to this. She dumped me. Bob.....
she said she never wants to see me again.
Bob McGraw: Let me tell you something about
women.......... They always say the opposite
of what they mean.
[Max reading letter]
Max: Oh yeah? "If you come within a three
block radius of my house I will have my new
boyfriend, Vito, rip off your head and spit
in your neck."
Bob McGraw: You're right kid.......you've been
dumped.
--Up the Creek (1984)
Tim Matheson .... Bob McGraw
Dan Monahan .... Max




DUNKIRK

.
.

see "WORLD WAR II"
see "PLACES" for related links
see "WAR & PEACE" for related links


After the British deliverance at Dunkirk, Churchill,
in the House of Commons, rallied Britain with his most
memorable speech. "We shall fight on the beaches,
we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight
in the streets and fields, we shall fight in the hills.
We shall never surrender," he declared. Then, as
the House of Commons thundered in an uproar at
his stirring rhetoric, Churchill muttered in a whispered
aside to a colleague, "And we'll fight them with the
butt ends of broken beer bottles because that's
bloody well all we've got!"
--James C. Hume,
_The Wit and Wisdom of Winston Churchill_

-

And so the epic of Dunkirk might have ended, but
in the tradition of British politics it fell to the prime
minister to give an accounting of the Allied armies'
collapse in France. As Edward R. Murrow explained
the background to his American listeners, Churchill's
predecessors were responsible for the shocking lack
of training and equipment that had handicapped the
British Expeditionary Force; at Munich, Chamberlain
had 'purchased a few months of normal living and
normal working, while assuring the country that. . .
time was on the side of the Allies. But they brought
that quiet and complacency in an expensive market.'
Fortunately for Britain and those who stood beside
her in these hours of borrowed time, a new leader
had taken charge, and the meaning of Dunkirk was
about to be perpetuated by one of the great orators
of that or any other day.

Winston Churchill rose in a House of Commons
packed with members and visitors. He reminded
them in detail of what had happened in the wake
of the German breakthrough at Sedan, when
Hitler's armies swept like a sharp scythe around
the right and rear of the armies of the north,
'until all that prevented the enemies' armor from
overrunning the port of Dunkirk was four thousand
Tommies and French poilus defending Calais,
heroic men who held out through four days of
street fighting until only thirty unwounded
survivors remained to be taken off by the navy.
A week earlier, Churchill had feared that no more
than twenty or thirty thousand men might be saved
at Dunkirk, that 'the whole root and core and brain
of the British Army' would have to surrender; yet
despite all the enemy had hurled against them,
the worst had not happened, thanks to the
untiring efforts of the navy and air force. ...

(Churchill continues)...'Yet whatever might come,
we shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end,
we shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas
and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence
and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our
Island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on
the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds,
we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we
shall fight in the hills . . . we shall never surrender,
even if, which I do not for a moment believe, this
Island or a large part of it were subjugated and
starving, then our Empire beyond the seas, armed
and guarded by the British Fleet, would carry on
the struggle, until, in God's good time, the New
World, with all its power and might, steps forth
to the rescue and liberation of the old.'

--Richard M. Ketchum
Historian and author.
_The Borrowed Years 1938-1941_


. . . and specifically regarding the rescue...Among
them, as J.B. Priestley told his radio audience,
were the little steamers that once carried day-
trippers on holiday to seaside resorts, with
'the gents full of high spirits and bottled beer,
the ladies eating pork pies, the children sticky
with peppermint, and these Brighton Belles and
Brighton Queens, summoned to rescue the
troops, were creating an English epic by
making excursion trips into hell and coming
back glorious. By no means all of them
returned: the good ship Gracie Fields, which
used to ply the ferry run to the Isle of Wight,
was one that paddled and churned away —
forever.' Of something like 850 vessels
involved, at least 235 were lost.

...During nine frantic and heroic days, between
May 26 and June 4, some 338,000 Allied troops
were rescued from almost certain disaster in
what Winston Churchill properly called 'the
deliverance.'

... Even so, it was not yet over. Until the final
hours, Ramsey's flotilla kept coming, and as
late as June 5 the boats were still taking
Frenchmen off the beaches. A young lieutenant
commanding a motor torpedo boat took a last
look at the harbor before turning for home. 'The
whole scene,' he remembered, 'was filled with
a sense of finality and death; the curtain was
ringing down on a great tragedy.' David Divine,
a free-lance writer who took a little motor sailer
to Dunkirk, had been stranded on a sandbar
and in the final hours of the evacuation he
picked up a ride home on the White Wing, a
thiry-foot launch, when he saw what must be
a thousand French soldiers silhouetted by the
flash of exploding shells. They were waiting
patiently to board a ship when it suddenly
exploded and vanished from sight. With their
last hope of rescue gone, the Frenchmen
turned around and headed through the gunfire
toward the shattered town. It was, Divine said,
'quite the most tragic thing I have ever seen in
my life.'

--Richard M. Ketchum
Historian and author.
_The Borrowed Years 1938-1941_

-

This little steamer, like all her brave and battered sisters, is immortal.
She'll go sailing proudly down the years in the epic of Dunkirk. And
our great-grandchildren, when they learn how we began this war by
snatching glory out of defeat, and then swept on to victory, may also
learn how the little holiday steamers made an excursion to hell and
came back glorious.
--J.B. [John Boynton] Priestley (1894—1984)
English novelist, playwright and critic.
Radio broadcast [5 June 1940].



DUTY

.
.

see: "RESPONSIBILITY"
see "CHARACTER" for other related links


Do daily and hourly your duty; do it patiently and thoroughly.
Do it as it presents itself; do it at the moment, and let it be its
own reward. Never mind whether it is known and acknowledged
or not, but do not fail to do it.
--James H. Aughey (1828—1911)
American clergyman.

In doing what we ought we deserve no
praise, because it is our duty.
--Augustine, St. of Hippo (354—430)
Christian theologian and bishop of Hippo in
Roman Africa [396—430].

The first duty toward children is to make them happy. If you have not
made them happy, you have wronged them; no other good they may
get can make up for that.
--Charles Buxton (1823—1871)
English author.

We don't have to be "successful," only valuable.
We don't have to make money, only a difference,
and particularly in the lives society counts least
and puts last.
--William Sloane Coffin, Jr. (1924—2006)
American clergyman and peace activist.
_Credo_ [2004], "Faith, Hope, Love"

Duty is not collective; it is personal.
--Calvin Coolidge (1872—1933)
American Republican statesman and President [1923—1929].

He that undertakes the education of a child
undertakes the most important duty of
society.
--Thomas Day (1748—1789)
English author.
In James Kerr (ed.)
_An Account of the Life and Writings of Thomas Day_ [1791].

Where duty is plain delay is both foolish and
hazardous; where it is not, delay may be both
wisdom and safety.
--Tryon Edwards (1809—1894)
American theologian.
In _A Dictionary of Thoughts_, [1908].

No man can always be right. So the struggle is to do one's
best; to keep the brain and conscience clear; never to be
swayed by unworthy motives or inconsequential reasons,
but to strive to unearth the basic factors involved and
then to do one's duty.
--Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890—1969),
American Army General, supreme Allied commander WWII,
NATO commander, American President [1953—1961].
In a letter to Mamie Doud Eisenhower [15 February 1943].

-

What I must do is all what concerns me,
not what the people think.
--Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803—1882)
American philosopher and poet.
"Self-Reliance" _Essays_, First Series [1841]


You will always find those who think they
know your duty better than you know it.
--Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803—1882)
American philosopher and poet.

-

Be not diverted from your duty by any idle reflections the
silly world may make upon you, for their censures are not
in your power, and consequently should not be any part
of your concern.
--Epictetus (55—135)
Greek philosopher.

When I'm not thank'd at all, I'm thank'd enough:
I've done my duty, and I've done no more.
--Henry Fielding (1707—1754)
English novelist and dramatist.
_The Life and Death of Tom Thumb the Great_, act I, sc. 3 [1731]

People tend to forget their duties but remember
their rights.
--Indira Gandhi (1917—1984)
Prime Minister of India [1966-1977]
and [1980-1984]. She was assasinated
by Sikh extremists.

I hate to see a thing done by halves; if it be right,
do it boldly; if it be wrong, leave it undone.
--Bernard Gilpin (1517—1583)
English theologian.

The two highest achievements of the human
mind are the twin concepts of 'loyalty' and
'duty.' Whenever these twin concepts fall
into disrepute — get out of there fast! You
may possibly save yourself, but it is too late
to save that society. It is doomed.
--Robert A(nson) Heinlein (1907—1988)
American science-fiction writer.

I have another duty equally
sacred . . . My duty to myself.
--Henrik Ibsen (1828—1906)
Norwegian playwright.
_A Doll's House_ [1879], Act III

For of those to whom much
is given, much is required.
--John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1917—1963)
American Democratic statesman, President of the U.S. [1961—1963].

Duty is the sublimest word in our language. Do your duty
in all things. You cannot do more. You should never wish
to do less.
--Robert E. Lee (1807—1870)
American Confederate general.
Lines inscribed beneath his bust in the Hall of Fame
at the former campus of New York University.

I could not love thee, Dear, so much,
Loved I not honour more.
--Richard Lovelace (1618—1657)
English poet.
"To Lucasta, Going to the Wars" [1649]

If we believe a thing to be bad, and if we have
a right to prevent it, it is our duty to try to
prevent it and to damn the consequences.
--Lord Milner (1854—1925)
British colonial administrator.
[Speech in Glasgow, 26 November 1909],
in Connie Robertson
_The Wordsworth Dictionary of Quotations_, p. 280 [1998].

England expects that every man will do his duty.
--Horatio Nelson (1758—1805)
British naval commander.
[Signal sent from his flagship commencing the
Battle of Trafalgar on 21 October 1805.]

I know this — a man got to
do what he got to do.
--John Ernst Steinbeck (1902—1968)
American novelist.
_The Grapes of Wrath_ [1939] ch. 18

So many worlds, so much to do,
So little done, such things to be.
--Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809—1892)
English poet.
"In Memoriam A. H. H." [1850]

The only obligation which I have a right to
assume is to do at any time what I think
right.
--Henry David Thoreau (1817—1862)
American essayist, poet, and practical philosopher.
_Civil Disobedience_ [1849]

Every living creature that comes into the world has
something allotted to him to perform, therefore he
should not stand an idle spectator of what others
are doing.
--Sarah Kirby Trimmer (1741—1810)
English author of children's books, educational
works, and textbooks.
_Fabulous Histories_ [1821]

To act with common sense according to the
moment, is the best wisdom I know; and the
best philosophy is to do one's duties, take
the world as it comes, submit respectfully
to one's lot; bless the goodness that has
given us so much happiness with it,
whatever it is; and despise affectation.
--Horace Walpole (1717—1797)
English writer and connoisseur.

I fancy that it is just as hard to do your duty
when men are sneering at you as when they
are shooting at you.
--Woodrow Wilson (1856—1924)
American Democratic statesman and President [1913—1921].


end page



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