- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): There's just gotta be a place up ahead where men ain't low-down and poker's played fair. If there weren't, what are all the songs about? I'll see y'all there. And we can sing together and shake our heads over all the meanness in the used-to-be.
- [after barely escaping being hung earlier and about to be hanged again, along with several other men, the cowboy sees a man sobbing in the noose next to him]
- Cowboy (segment "Near Algodones"): First time?
- [the man looks at him, confused]
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): Don't let my white duds and pleasant demeanor fool ya. I, too, have been known to violate the statutes of man... and not a few of the laws of the Almighty!
- Alice Longabaugh (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled): Gilbert had a saying for any situation. A ready bit of wisdom. He was very certain.
- Billy Knapp (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled"): He was a doughface?
- Alice Longabaugh (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled): ...He had fixed political beliefs. All of his beliefs were quite fixed. He would upbraid me for being wishy-washy. I never had his certainties. I suppose it is a defect.
- Billy Knapp (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled"): I don't think it's a defect at all. Oh no. Uncertainty. That is appropriate for matters of this world. Only regarding the next are vouchsafed certainty.
- Alice Longabaugh (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled): Yes.
- Billy Knapp (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled"): I believe certainty regarding that which we can see and touch, it is seldom justified, if ever. Down the ages, from our remote past, what certainties survive? And yet we hurry to fashion new ones. Wanting their comfort. Certainty... is the easy path. Just as you said.
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): [Buster blows off the fingers of the right hand of Curly Joe's brother, who screams and clumsily tries to draw with his left] Whoa! Looks like when they made this fella, they forgot to put in the quit. Five fingers at a bullet a piece...
- [turns to the camera, grinning]
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): I ain't got but the one bullet left. Sure hope I don't miss!
- [turning his back to Curly Joe's brother, he points the gun backwards and studies his target on a hand mirror]
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): Let me see here. His heart would be on the left, but in the mirror it'd be on the right... of course, we is both facing the same way and the gun is upside down, so... Yeah, best not play it too fancy.
- [he shoots and Curly Joe's brother collapses to the ground, dead]
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): Cause for reflection!
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): Sir, it seems that you're are a no better a judge of human beings than you are a specimen of one. Just on a brief inventory I'd say you could use yourself a shave and a better disposition. And lastly, if you don't my mind me aspersing your friends... a better class of drinking buddies.
- Englishman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): You know the story, but people can't get enough of them, like little children. Because, well, they connect the stories to themselves, I suppose, and we all love hearing about ourselves, so long as the people in the stories are us, but not us. Not us in the end, especially.
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): I'd like me a splash of whiskey to wash the trail dust off my gullet and keep my singing voice in fettle.
- Cantina Bartender (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): Whiskey's illegal. This is a dry country.
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): [points to the other customers] Well, what are they drinking?
- Cantina Bartender (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): ...whiskey. They's outlaws.
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): [singing] Surly Joe, the gambler, he will gamble nevermore, his days of stud and hold'em they are done. It was long about last April, he stepped into this saloon, but he never really took to anyone! Surly Joe, Surly Joe! Oh, wherever he's damned and now, I don't know! He was slick but I was slicker, he was quick, but I was quicker, and the table stopped his ticker, Surly Joe! Surly Joe, Surly Joe! Won't be missed by anyone, will Surly Joe! Humankind he frowned upon, but not now, his face is gone! Guess your frowning days are over, oh Surly Joe! Surly Joe, Surly Joe! A cedilla on the "c" of Curly Joe! He was mean in days of yore, now they're moppin up the floor oh Surly Joe! Surly Joe, Surly Joe! Where the rest his face has got to, we don't know! He was never any fun, now his grumpy race has run, kisser blown to kingdom come oh Surly Joe!
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): [after killing Curly Joe by kicking a table and making him shoot himself with his own gun] I'm not a devious man by nature... but when you're unarmed, your tactics might gonna be downright Archimedean.
- Posse Leader (segment "Near Algodones"): Now this here is your opportunity to speak your piece before your sentence is carried out.
- Cowboy (segment "Near Algodones"): That pan-covered son of a bitch back at the bank don't hardly fight fair, in my opinion.
- Posse Leader (segment "Near Algodones"): ...okay. That it?
- Cowboy (segment "Near Algodones"): I reckon it is.
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): [checks his hat after being shot and finds a bullet entry hole on the front and a bloody exit hole on the back] Well... that ain't good.
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): Misanthrope? I don't hate my fellow man, even when he's tiresome and surly and tries to cheat at poker. I figure that's just a human material, and him that finds in it cause for anger and dismay is just a fool for expecting better.
- Posse #1 (segment "Near Algodones"): [the Cowboy is about to get hanged] Can I have your horse?
- Posse #2 (segment "Near Algodones"): No, me.
- Posse Leader (segment "Near Algodones"): You wanna give one of these boys your horse? Save scrapping over it after you pass?
- Cowboy (segment "Near Algodones"): I don't want any of 'em to have it.
- Posse #1 (segment "Near Algodones"): Selfish bastard.
- Prospector (segment "All Gold Canyon"): You measly skunk! You shot me in the back!
- [sobbing as he checks the wound]
- Prospector (segment "All Gold Canyon"): It went clean through! He didn't hit nothing important! He didn't hit nothing *important*! Nothing important! Just guts is all you had!
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): [after gunning down everyone in the cantina Buster notices a survivor crawling on the floor] It appears the vitals of this lucky son-of-a-gun remain unpunctured. Sloppy shootin' on my part.
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): [ruefully] Another young fella with something to prove. I gotta set myself up in the undertaking business. Stop doing all the skill work so another man can profit. But then, do I want to wear a black suit?
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): [as he sees a survivor of the cantina shootout crawling outside, wounded] The coup-de-grâce I'll leave to the wolves and Gila monsters!
- Trapper (segment "The Mortal Remains"): You're bounty hunters.
- Englishman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): Literal man! Cruel man!... yes, fine: bounty hunters. An ugly title, really... as if emolument were the point. Is the cobbler not paid for his shoes? It's an honest calling!
- Trapper (segment "The Mortal Remains"): So... him on the roof, he was wanted?
- Englishman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): Oh, Mr. Thorpe was very much wanted... judging by what the are paying for him!
- [the Englishman and the Irishman chuckle]
- Trapper (segment "The Mortal Remains"): What did he do?
- Englishman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): I don't know. Does it matter?
- [addressing the Lady]
- Englishman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): Just as you said, Madame, there are two kinds of people. In our business they are: dead or alive.
- Posse Leader (segment "Near Algodones"): Do you have anything to say before your sentence is carried out?
- Cowboy (segment "Near Algodones"): [wakes up on a horse with his hands tied behind his back and a noose around his neck] Sentence? What's my sentence?
- [Posse members chuckle]
- Englishman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): They're so easily taken when they are distracted, people are. So I'm the distractor, with a little story, a little conversation, a song, a sparkle... and Clarence does the thumping while their attention is on me.
- Irishman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): He is very good, this one. You should see him.
- Englishman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): No, *he* is good!
- Irishman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): [shrugs] I *can* thump.
- [first lines]
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): [atop his horse in bright white duds] A song never fails to ease my mind out here in the West, where the distances are great and the scenery monotonous. Additionally, my pleasing baritone seems to inspirit ol' Dan here and keep him in good heart during the day's measure of hoof clops. Ain't that right, Dan?
- [his horse neighs]
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): Maybe some of y'all have heard of me. Buster Scruggs, known to some as the San Saba Songbird. I got other handles, nicknames, appellations, and cognomens. But this one here I don't consider to be even halfway earned.
- [unrolls his WANTED poster]
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): "Misanthrope"? I don't hate my fellow man, even when he's tiresome and surly and tries to cheat at poker. I figure that's just a human material, and him that finds in it cause for anger and dismay is just a fool for expecting better. Ain't that right, Dan?
- [his horse neighs heartily]
- His Mother (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled"): What are you doing, Israel?
- Whipped Boy (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled"): Walking backwards. I'm gonna walk the rest of the way to Oregon backwards.
- His Mother (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled"): Don't do that.
- Whipped Boy (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled"): Why not?
- His Mother (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled"): I said don't do that!
- His Father (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled"): Don't do that!
- [gives the boy a couple swats across his backside with a switch - he complies and turns around]
- Englishman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): I must say... it's always interesting watching them after Clarence has worked his art. Watching them negotiate... the passage.
- Frenchman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): Passage?
- Englishman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): From here to there. To the other side. Watching them try to make sense of it, as they pass to that other place. I do like looking into their eyes as they try to make sense of it.
- [stares at the Frenchman]
- Englishman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): I do.
- [stares at the Lady]
- Englishman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): I do.
- Trapper (segment "The Mortal Remains"): Try to make sense of what?
- Englishman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): [stares at the Trapper] All of it.
- Lady (segment "The Mortal Remains"): And do they ever... succeed?
- Englishman (segment "The Mortal Remains"): [smiles] How would I know? I'm only watching!
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): I got to set myself up, in the undertaking business. Stop doing all the skill work, so another man can profit. But, then, do I want to wear a black suit?
- Bailiff (segment "Near Algodones"): [brings the shackled Cowboy before a judge sitting on a rocking chair on a porch, grabs his hat off his head and throws it on the ground] No hats in the presence of Judge Hobby!
- Judge (segment "Near Algodones"): What'd this sumbitch do?
- Cowboy (segment "Near Algodones"): Sir, I...
- Bailiff (segment "Near Algodones"): [interrupts] HOLD YOUR TONGUE!
- [turns to the judge, acting sociably]
- Bailiff (segment "Near Algodones"): Sumbitch is a stock-rustler, Your Honor.
- Judge (segment "Near Algodones"): Alleged?
- Bailiff (segment "Near Algodones"): Yes, sir.
- Cowboy (segment "Near Algodones"): Sir, I never...
- Bailiff (segment "Near Algodones"): [interrupts again] HOLD YOUR TONGUE!
- [turns back to the judge]
- Bailiff (segment "Near Algodones"): He was caught driving rustled beeves.
- Judge (segment "Near Algodones"): Good enough. Hang him.
- Mr. Arthur (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled"): [facing down a gathering Indian war party] If they catch you, it won't be so good. After they take off every stitch of your clothes and have their way with you, they'll stretch you out with a rawhide, and then they'll drive a stake through the middle of your body into the ground, and then they'll do some other things. And we can't have that...
- Mr. Arthur (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled"): [as the Indians prepare for a second attack] They got the lay of the land now. This time they'll come with a purpose. You all right, Miss?
- Alice Longabaugh (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled): Yes, Mr. Arthur!
- Mr. Arthur (segment "The Gal Who Got Rattled"): They ain't gonna do this all day. This will tell the tale.
- [points rifle]
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): Well don't let my white duds and pleasant demeanor fool ya. I too have been known the violate the statutes of man... and not a few of the laws of the Almighty.
- Cantina Bad Man (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): You ain't no outlaw, and we don't drink with tinhorns.
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): Sir? It seems that you are no better a judge of human beings than you are a specimen of one. Just on a brief inventory, I'd say that you could use yourself a shave and a brighter disposition. And lastly, if you don't mind me aspersing your friends, a better class of drinking buddy.
- Cantina Bad Man (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): [stands up from the table, tucks vest behind the grip of his pistol] Your shooting iron work?
- Buster Scruggs (segment "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs"): [abruptly shoots the lout in the head] Appears to do, yes.