The Wit And Wisdom Of Discworld

that pets are allowed.
    *
    Many of the things built by the architect and freelance designer Bergholt Stuttley (‘Bloody Stupid’) Johnson were recorded in Ankh-Morpork, often on the line where it says ‘Cause of Death’. He was, people agreed, a genius, at least if you defined the word broadly. Certainly no one else in the world could make an explosive mixture out of common sand and water. A good designer, he always said, should be capable of anything. And, indeed, he was.

 
    T RUTH! Justice! Freedom! And a Hard-boiled Egg!
    Commander 8am Vimes of the Ankfe-Morpork City Watch bad it all. But now he’s back in his own rough, tough past without even the clothes he was standing tip in when the lightning struck.
    Living in the past is hard. Dying in the past is incredibly easy. But he must survive, because he has a job to do. He must track down a murderer, teach his younger self how to be a good copper and change the outcome of a bloody rebellion. There’s a problem: if he wins, he’s got no wife, no child, no future.
    A Discworld Tale of One City, with a full chorus of street Urchins, ladies of negotiable affection, rebels, secret policemen and other children of the revolution.
    Plain old Sam Vimes had ended up with a dress uniform that at least looked as though its owner was male. But the helmet had gold decoration, and the bespoke armourers had made a new, gleaming breastplate with useless gold ornamentation on it. Sam Vimes felt like a class traitor every time he wore it. He hated being thought of as one of those people that wore stupid ornamental armour. It was gilt by association.
    *
    ‘If I had a dollar for every copper’s funeral I’ve attended up here,’ said Colon, ‘I’d have … nineteen dollars and fifty pence.’
    ‘Fifty pence?’ said Nobby.
    ‘That was when Corporal Hildebiddle woke up just in time and banged on the lid,’ said Colon.

    Privilege just means ‘private law’. Two types of people laugh at the law: those that break it and those that make it.

    Sweeper took a deep, long breath. ‘I like building gardens,’ he said. ‘Life should be a garden.’
    Vimes stared blankly at what was in front of them. ‘Okay’ he said. ‘The gravel and rocks, yes, I can see that. Shame about all the rubbish. It always turns up, doesn’t it…’
    ‘Yes,’ said Lu-Tze. ‘It’s part of the pattern.’
    ‘What? The old cigarette packet?’
    ‘Certainly. That invokes the element of air,’ said Sweeper.
    ‘And the cat doings?’
    ‘To remind us that disharmony, like a cat, gets everywhere.’
    ‘The cabbage stalks? The used sonky?’ †
    ‘At our peril we forget the role of the organic in the total harmony. What arrives seemingly by chance in the pattern is part of a higher organization that we can only dimly comprehend. This is a very important fact, and has a bearing on your case.’
    ‘And the beer bottle?’
    For the first time since Vimes had met him, the monk frowned.
    ‘Y’know, some bugger always tosses one over the wall on his way back from the pub on Friday nights. If it wasn’t forbidden to do that kind of thing, he’d feel the flat of my hand and no mistake.’
    ‘It’s not part of the higher organization?’
    ‘Possibly. Who cares?’
    *
    The Night Watch. They were in the Night Watch because they were too scruffy, ugly, incompetent, awkwardly shaped or bloody-minded for the Day Watch. They were honest, in that special policeman sense of the word. That is, they didn’t steal things too heavy to carry. And they had the morale of damp gingerbread.
    *
    ‘A copper doesn’t keep flapping his lip. He doesn’t let on what he knows. He doesn’t say what he’s thinking. No. He watches and listens and he learns and he bides his time. His mind works like mad but his face is a blank. Until he’s ready’
    *
    Dr Lawn opened his back door and Vimes brushed past, the body over his shoulders.
    ‘You minister to all sorts, right?’ said Vimes.
    ‘Within reason, but—’
    ‘This one’s an Unmentionable,’ said Vimes. ‘Tried to kill me. Needs some medicine.’
    ‘Why’s he unconscious?’ said the doctor.
    ‘Didn’t want to take his medicine.’
    *
    Apart from the curfew and manning the gates, the Night Watch didn’t do a lot. This was partly because they were incompetent, and partly because no one expected them to be anything else. They walked the streets, slowly, giving anyone dangerous enough time to saunter away or melt into the shadows, and then rang the