“We will unburden you of your unnecessary genitalia, Mr. Rhodes,” the woman said coldly. “Just think—tomorrow you will be liberated of your desire to escape and assert dominance. It has been decided that you require a testiclectomy.”

[…] could Richard have anticipated that his elder brother, Sir Everard, taking to heart an early disappointment, would have remained a batchelor at seventy-two.

Putting on a mask of black silk and drawing a roquelaire closely about my person, I suffered him to hurry me to my palazzo.

I vainly essayed to command the distorted muscles of my countenance, finding it so fictitiously incrassated with dubious uncertainty, and abounding with cosmetic gushes of extravenated humour.