The Lives of a Bengal Lancer1935

Lieutenant Donald Stone:
[Semi-hysterical after having broke under torture] He left me here, didn't he? He knew what they'd do. He wouldn't come after me, not him. Regiment, Service, Duty. Why should I stand what you did for them? Why should I? Why should any of us? Why?

Lieutenant Alan McGregor:
[McGregor hits him] I told you to forget it.

Lieutenant Donald Stone:
All right Mac. But I still don't understand why.

Lieutenant Alan McGregor:
Why? Well - well, there's some think things they don't teach you in military college - can't, I guess. India is big, you know, there's over three hundred million people, and run by just a handful of men. The - the job comes first. Like old ramrod. You can't let death move you, nor love. And it's like - and how can I tell you what it's all about when I don't know myself?

Lieutenant Forsythe:
The time had come, the walrus said, for many things. Ships, shoes, and ceiling wax, and cabbages and kings.

Lieutenant Alan McGregor:
Oh, shut up!

Lieutenant Forsythe:
You don't like poetry?

Lieutenant Alan McGregor:
How should I know? I never read any.

Lieutenant Forsythe:
Perhaps something more rugged: "Ever the faith endures / England, my England / Take, break us, we are yours / England, my own / Life is good; joy runs high, / Between English earth and sky / Death is death, and we shall die / To the song on your bugles blown / England / To the stars on your bugles blown." If I'd known I was going to say all this, I'd have brought my violin.