Eric Knight > Quotes

“When human beings are ill, they often make a show of their injuries and parade them so that others may see and give them sympathy. It is just the reverse with an animal living in its natural state. Asking no sympathy, deeming rather that weakness of any kind is something to be ashamed of, it crawls away into some hidden corner and there, alone, it awaits the outcome – either recovery or death.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“To chase a dog is merely to teach it to run away.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“And there’s a funny thing about honesty; there’s no two ways about it. There’s only one way about it. Honest is honest.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“But the stream had now carried her down towards the village. The boys on the bridge saw the spectacle of a dog being whirled by the current. They shouted and hallooed. With the cruelty of the young that sometimes gets free rein, they picked stones from the roadbed and flung them at her. As her body was whirled under the bridge, they ran across to the downstream side and continued their senseless pelting.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“She submitted patiently to all the handling of Hynes, as if she knew there were no use making any protest – but each day, just before four o’clock in the afternoon, something waked in her, and the training of a lifetime called her. She would tear against the wires of her pen or dash at the fence and try to leap it. She had not forgotten.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“Joe trotted beside his father, who walked quickly. He was thinking that he would never be able to understand why grown-ups were so hard-hearted just when you needed them most.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“There are breeds of hunting dogs that are never so happy as when a gun is sounded. But not a collie. It seems as if this breed, having worked so long as man’s companion, has learnt that such sharp, savage sounds may mean hurt.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“Lassie was so well known in the village. It was because, as the women said, “You can set your clock by her”.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“You’re an impertinent baggage,” he said. “But there’s some hope for you. You know, you’re just like I was when I was your age. You’re like me, that’s what you are. You take after me – the only one of the family that does! So there’s some hope for you.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“The collie heard the word “lass,” and barked at it. The pedlar shook his head. “Nay, that’s the pity of it. Ye can understand some o’ man’s language, but man isn’t bright enough to understand thine. And yet it’s us that’s supposed to be most intelligent!”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“There was a blur that flashed past her knees and then Priscilla stood, looking down the road, watching the dog go steadily at a lope as if it knew it had a long, long way to go. So she lifted her hand. “Goodbye, Lassie,” she said, softly. “Goodbye and – good luck!”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“It is not, Dan. For I’ve tried it. I take her on the string – and not that she doesn’t follow bonnie and mind me. But she does it, Dan – ye know what I think?” “What?” “Well, like she’s just doing it because she’s sorry for us. We’ve been kind to her, and she wouldn’t want to hurt our feelings, so she just puts up with us. Like she’s too polite to run unless we tell her to go—” “Ah, now, no dog can be full of things like that – like human things—” “Nay, my Herself is, Dan. Ye don’t know that dog. Dan!”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“He raced on down High Street, and now Lassie seemed to catch his enthusiasm. She ran beside him, leaping high in the air, barking that sharp cry of happiness that dogs often can achieve. Her mouth was stretched wide, as collies so frequently do in their glad moments, and in a way that makes collie owners swear that their dogs laugh when pleased.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“The two of them stared at the dog behind the wire. Lassie stood, ignoring them as if she were a queen and they were beings so far beneath her that she could not see them.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“happy She’s”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“The tiny cottage, far out on the highway from any town, was a cheap place to live. In the little plot of land about it, Fadden grew a stock of vegetables. He had a flock of chickens, several ducks, and a goose “fattening for Christmas”. This last was their largest and most lasting joke. Some years before, Fadden had traded a dozen early hen eggs for one tiny gosling. Carefully, he had raised it, boasting about what a fine plump bird it would be by Christmas time. It had become just that – marvellous and plump. And a few days before the holiday of holidays, Fadden had taken his hatchet, and he had sat indoors a long time, regarding it. Finally his wife, understanding, had looked up patiently. “Dan,” she said. “I just don’t think I’d favour goose this year. If you did a chicken instead – and—” “Aye, Dally,” Fadden had said. “It would be a tarrible waste – one big goose for just the two on us. Now a chicken would be just right—” And so the goose was spared.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“Slowly, he walked up the path with the dog and opened the door. Everything in the cottage was as it had been before – his mother getting the evening meal ready, his father brooding in front of the fire, as he did for hours these days since there was no work. “She’s… she’s come home again,’’ Joe said.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“Not with all his brain development can man tell how a bird or an animal can be crated, taken miles away in darkness, and when released, strike back towards its home. Man only knows that animals can do what he can neither do himself nor explain.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“T’watter’s”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“That’s what I wanted to say. Ye mustn’t think we’re over hard on thee. We don’t want to be. It’s just – well – back of it all, a chap’s got to be honest, Joe. And never thee forget that, all thy life, no matter what comes. Ye’ve got to be honest.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“Generally, when a man raised an especially fine dog, some day it would stop being a dog and instead would become something on four legs that was worth money. It was still a dog, of course, but now it was something else, too, for a rich man might hear of it, or the alert dealers or kennelmen might see it, and then they would want to buy it. While a rich man may love a dog just as truly as a poor man, and there is no difference in them in this, there is a difference between them in the way they must look at money.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“She had no fear of dogs. It was man she wished to leave behind, and her senses told her they were not near. But now she feared him more than ever. Not only could his hands chain and pen one up, but he could make the terrifying thunder noises that hurt the ears and that somehow reached out like a long, invisible whip and brought pain such as that which now tore at her.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“And, as for the younger generation! The Duke could – and often would – lecture for hours on the worthlessness of everyone born in the twentieth century. This last was curious, for, of all his relatives, the only one the Duke could stand (and who could also stand the Duke, it seemed) was the youngest member of his family – his twelve-year-old granddaughter, Priscilla.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“So, dimly, and then more clearly, the new idea came into Lassie’s mind. She leapt, and fell back again. The fence was six feet high, much too high for a collie to leap. A greyhound or a borzoi could have sailed over it easily.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“Lassie”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“From the festering sore the thorn had worked its way. Little by little, Lassie licked it clear and then cleaned the wound. She looked about her. Slowly she struggled to her feet. Her bad hind leg hung, not touching the ground. Slowly she limped from her hiding place. Hobbling across the field, she went downhill to where her nose told her there was water. She found the tiny streamlet, lowered her head, and lapped. It was the first time she had drunk for a week. Greedily she took the water. She lay down by the stream, but her head now stayed erect. Her nose lifted, and she gave the sharp, protesting cry. She stood and faced to the south. Then she looked back to the gorse clump. At last, she turned and hobbled again up the hill. Now some of the stiffness was gone from her body and she managed to go quite freely on three legs. Returning to the gorse clump, she crawled into the shelter and lay there, patiently, waiting for the night.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“Hi”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“Ah, war – machine wars. Bullets took them all. The brave and the cowardly, the weak and the fine strong ones like Dannie. And it wasn’t the dying that took bravery, then, for cowards could die. It was the living that took bravery – living in that mud and rain and cold and keeping the spirit strong through it all. That was the bravery.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“So the dogs stood for a moment – the one prone under Lassie’s stiff paw, the other cleaning himself with an air that seemed to say: “I didn’t have anything to do with this whole affair at all!”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home

“nor answered any of their commands.”
― Eric Knight, Lassie Come-Home