Reminiscences of a Veteran; Being Personal and Military Adventures in Portugal, Spain, France, Malta, New South Wales, Norfolk Island, New Zealand, Andaman Islands, and India Volume 2 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1861 edition. Excerpt: ..." You see, Sir, how she looks down upon you; but, when the young lady is grown up, how much you ought to feel yourself beneath her, for your conduct this day. Had you bestowed an approving eye on a person who might have appreciated your attention," (fanning herself very violently), "and have understood it, the thing would have been more pardonable." After rallying the unfortunate wight most unmercifully, the schoolmistress then ascended a sort of platform, and commenced haranguing the male masques generally on the dissoluteness of the times, when a lady could not take an evening's walk with her establishment without being subject to be stared out of countenance by a rude set of boobies, calling themselves gentlemen, and now and then indulging in a hit at some of the most prominent characters in the masquerade. With affected disdain, Colonel B----now retired from the room with his charge, amidst loud plaudits, bobbing and curtseying in a most edifying manner. A commissariat ofiicer with his wife, in the character of ballad singers, were also very good. They sang, or rather screamed some excellent comic songs and ditties, which he accompanied on the fiddle. It was a long time before it was discovered who they were. He was so well disguised with a wooden-leg, and a horrid gash across his face, made by drawing a horse-hair across it, giving his face altogether a most maudlin and grotesque appearance. The lady in a mobcap and dirty old bonnet slung across her arm, with the rest of her dress to correspond was no less remarkable. No street singers ever made more doleful faces, or screamed more discordantly, yet they were both excellent musicians, and the comic effect of some of their slang songs setting the company...