"All Sir Garnet"

Meet the modern major general:

Lest anyone think that Brit silliness was invented by Monty Python.
General Stanley, from The Pirates of Penzance by Gilbert and Sullivan.
Played brilliantly and with astonishing lung power, by one George Rose, from one of my top five movies of all time. Celebrity junkies, look for Kevin Klein and... sigh, Linda Ronstadt.
Based on Field Marshal Garnet Joseph Wolseley, 1st Viscount Wolseley KP GCB OM GCMG VD PC.
King shit Brit general of the late 19th century - and an early advocate of the machine gun.
And, so squared-away that, during the '90's, the expression among the lads for... squared-away was "All Sir Garnet".
Was re-reading "The Social History of the Machine Gun" by John Ellis and Sir Garnet floated back into my awareness - this time by means of a statement he'd made to Hiram Maxim: "You Yankees beat all creation. There seems to be no limit to what you are able to do".
There's something else he said to Maxim but it's in another machine-gun history book that I can't find.
In effect, Sir Garnet tells Maxim to keep working on his machine gun until it is simple enough to be taken down with no tools whatsoever.
In closing, and by way of not laughing in the face of all the neo-con idiots whose pants got pulled down today, here's something I just found while trolling for Wolseley lore; his eulogy for Robert E. Lee:

“His character has been subjected to that ordeal, and who can point to any spot upon it? His clear, sound judgment, personal courage, untiring activity, genius for war, and absolute devotion to his State mark him out as a public man, as a patriot to be for ever remembered by all Americans. His amiability of disposition, deep sympathy with those in pain or sorrow, his love for children, nice sense of personal honour and genial courtesy endeared him to all his friends. I shall never forget his sweet winning smile, nor his clear, honest eyes that seemed to look into your heart whilst they searched your brain. I have met many of the great men of my time, but Lee alone impressed me with the feeling that I was in the presence of a man who was cast in a grander mould, and made of different and of finer metal than all other men. He is stamped upon my memory as a being apart and superior to all others in every way: a man with whom none I ever knew, and very few of whom I have read, are worthy to be classed. I have met but two men who realize my ideas of what a true hero should be: my friend Charles Gordon was one, General Lee was the other.”

Definitely a classy guy.

In fact, when I know what is meant by "mamelon” and “ravelin”,
When I can tell at sight a Mauser rifle from a javelin,
When such affairs as sorties and surprises I’m more wary at,
And when I know precisely what is meant by “commissariat”,

All Sir Garnet.