Britain

"They met more traders ascending the river, all of whom were shocked and thrilled to learn that, after such an absence, the expedition had survived. Lewis felt well enough to participate in these chats, asking if Jefferson was alive, if he’d won reelection, and how things were going with Britain and Spain and France. (Not well.) The captains tried to process two-plus years of national news, received in a few minutes over a campfire. Clark wrote the headlines in his journal: “Mr. Burr and General Hamilton fought a duel, the latter was killed, etc., etc.” The traders, despite embarking on their own dangerous journeys, gave the party gifts they hadn’t tasted in a long time, including chocolate and biscuits and whiskey. They wanted to fete these famous men. At some point on the Missouri, the Corps began to grasp that they were celebrities. Lewis had lived on “pure water” at Fort Clatsop. Now strangers were handing him bottles of wine."

"That summer, while Congress was out of session, Jefferson read a book that suggested the someone would be British: *Voyages from Montreal* by Alexander Mackenzie. In the book, which quickly dominated imperial conversations around the globe, Mackenzie described leading a small group across the northern part of North America, negotiating the Rockies and reaching the Pacific. This time, Jefferson didn’t need to rouse his imperial paranoia. Mackenzie spelled his plans out, urging Britain to build a series of trading posts. The region, he wrote, was “fit for colonization.”"

"Our parent company would be based in Holland because of that country’s attractive tax environment. An Irish company would hold boo’s intellectual property rights, while a string of companies in France, Germany, Sweden, the US and Britain would hold our assets in each of those countries. Patrik loved this sort of work, but Kajsa"

"Churchill led Britain into total war without much thought for the morrow: he said he had ‘only one single purpose – the destruction of Hitler – and that his life was much simplified thereby’. —ROBERT TOMBS"

"On June 16, 1940, France collapsed. Britain stood alone, under constant air attack and threat of invasion, while Germany controlled all of Europe. “Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties,” Churchill exhorted, “and so bear ourselves that if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, ‘This was their finest hour.’"

"Biographies of great figures must tackle the essential question: what was the foundation of their genius? In Churchill’s case, it was his extraordinary gift of expression. Perhaps it is possible for a leader to conceive large ideas without the ability to express them, but a leader unable to articulate such thoughts cannot inspire others to share them. Churchill was able to describe his timeless, heroic Britain so clearly that the entire nation rose to the level of his vision."

"“I said . . . my technical advisers were of opinion that the best method of dealing with German invasion of the island of Britain was to drown as many as possible on the way over and knock the others on the head as they crawled ashore.”"

"In 1961 Rupert moved into the former Federation of Northern and Southern Rhodesia and Nyassaland (Zambia, Zimbabwe and Malawi), where he had to operate via Britain because of South African exchange-control regulations. That same year he formed a partnership company in Malaysia. Two years later be bought Sullana in Switzerland and formed a partnership in Ireland, which became the largest factory in that country. In the Netherlands he obtained a share in Schimmelpenninck cigars."

"As we eventually entered the English Channel, we were struck by the horrors of war. Those sights came to balance my boyish interest in military achievements and warlike heroes for the rest of my life. M/S Industria frequently changed course between various shipwrecks where masts and smokestacks stuck up from the sea. We saw the white cliffs of Dover, though without the significance they would later hold for me as a symbol of freedom for Britain's decisive contribution where tyranny faltered."