` Never ! Till you tell me how I may rescue you , ' swore the knight , still kneeling . ` Alas , my cruel fate condemns me to remain here till my tyrant is destroyed . ' ` Where is the villain ? ' ` In the mauve salon . Go , brave heart , and save me from despair . ' ' I obey , and return victorious or dead ! ' With these thrilling words he rushed away , and flinging open the door of the mauve salon , was about to enter , when he received ... '' `` A stunning blow from the big Greek lexicon , which an old fellow in a black gown fired at him , '' said Ned . `` Instantly , Sir What 's - his-name recovered himself , pitched the tyrant out of the window , and turned to join the lady , victorious , but with a bump on his brow , found the door locked , tore up the curtains , made a rope ladder , got halfway down when the ladder broke , and he went headfirst into the moat , sixty feet below . Could swim like a duck , paddled round the castle till he came to a little door guarded by two stout fellows , knocked their heads together till they cracked like a couple of nuts , then , by a trifling exertion of his prodigious strength , he smashed in the door , went up a pair of stone steps covered with dust a foot thick , toads as big as your fist , and spiders that would frighten you into hysterics , Miss March . At the top of these steps he came plump upon a sight that took his breath away and chilled his blood ... '' `` A tall figure , all in white with a veil over its face and a lamp in its wasted hand , '' went on Meg . `` It beckoned , gliding noiselessly before him down a corridor as dark and cold as any tomb . Shadowy effigies in armor stood on either side , a dead silence reigned , the lamp burned blue , and the ghostly figure ever and anon turned its face toward him , showing the glitter of awful eyes through its white veil . They reached a curtained door , behind which sounded lovely music . He sprang forward to enter , but the specter plucked him back , and waved threateningly before him a. . . '' `` Snuffbox , '' said Jo , in a sepulchral tone , which convulsed the audience . '' ` Thankee , ' said the knight politely , as he took a pinch and sneezed seven times so violently that his head fell off . ` Ha ! Ha ! '
laughed the ghost , and having peeped through the keyhole at the princesses spinning away for dear life , the evil spirit picked up her victim and put him in a large tin box , where there were eleven other knights packed together without their heads , like sardines , who all rose and began to ... '' `` Dance a hornpipe , '' cut in Fred , as XXXXX paused for breath , `` and , as they danced , the rubbishy old castle turned to a man-of-war in full sail .
Greek Jo Meg Ned Snuffbox anon effigies his-name moat toads