outstretched, and covered with a plentiful white lather--right arm
brandishing aloft one of Paget's best razors, and left thumb and
forefinger grasping my nose. In front of me stood my faithful Hindoo
valet, Verasawmy by name, with a soap-box in one hand, while his other
held up to his master's gaze a small looking-glass, over the top of which
his black face, surmounted by a red turban, was peering at me with grave
and earnest attention.

A wondering pause of a few seconds prevailed, and then one loud, rending,
and continuous peal of laughter and screams shook the universal house.

As if smitten with sudden catalepsy, I was without power to move a single
muscle of my body, and for the space of two minutes remained in a stupor
in the same attitude--immovable, rooted, frozen to the spot where I stood.
At length recovering at once my senses and power of motion, I bounded like
a maniac from the stage, pursued by the convulsive roars of the
spectators, and upsetting in my retreat the unlucky Verasawmy, who rolled
down to the footlights, doubled up, and in a paroxysm of terror and
dismay.

Lieutenant Frederick Gahagan had good reason to bless his stars that in
that moment of frenzy I did not encounter him, the detestable origin of
the abomination that had just been heaped upon my head. I am no two-legged
creature if I should not have sacrificed him on the spot with my razor,
and so merited the gratitude of his regimental juniors by giving them a
step.

I have never since, either in public or private life, appeared in
petticoats again.