But the convict who acted the clerk had probably at some time been on some private or provincial stage, and he imagined that our performers, one and all, had no notion of acting and did not move on the stage as they ought to. And he paced the stage as we are told the classic heroes used to in the past: he would take one long stride, and before moving the other leg, stop short, throw his head and his whole body back, look haughtily around him and take another stride. If such deportment is absurd in the classical drama, in an army clerk in a comic scene it is even more ridiculous. But our audience thought that probably it was as it ought to be and took for granted the long strides of the lanky clerk without criticising them. The clerk had hardly reached the middle of the stage before another knock was heard: the woman was in a flutter again. Where was she to put the clerk? Into a chest which stood conveniently open. The clerk creeps into the chest and she shuts the lid on him. This time it is a different sort of visitor, a lover, too, but of a special kind. It is a Brahmin, and even dressed as one. There is an overwhelming burst of laughter from the audience. The Brahmin was acted by the convict Koshkin, and acted beautifully. He looked like a Brahmin.