When we travel we find how greatly our boyhood dreams are outstripped by reality. - R. A. Lafferty

Man-a-bleeding, but they broke out of that place! You say it can't be done, but they did it. Their expectations had been too high, and no second-rate Hell could hold them. In a way it was their greatest feat. No one else had ever broken out of there before.

Foreman, you’re the historian,” Thomas said. “It’s tha same damned thing they killed me for the first time, isn’t it?”
“Same damned thing, Thomas.

Roadstrum had a way of putting it on a little thick himself. "Be there a man among you who doubts my demesne or destiny, then I have fared in vain," he said. "I bare my throat to the treacherous steel —" "All right, all right," the three tough crewmen capitulated. We're with you all the way and in everything. Only spare us the 'act.'"