"Her ladyship's sight having been defective of late years, occasions her some difficulty in calculating distances.
Three days ago, her ladyship went to look out of the window, and, miscalculating the distance--" Here the butler, with a fine dramatic feeling for telling a story, stopped just before the climax of the narrative, and looked me in the face with an expression of the deepest sympathy.
"And miscalculating the distance ?" I repeated impatiently.
"Put her head through a pane of glass," said the butler, in a soft voice suited to the pathetic nature of the communication.

"By great good fortune her ladyship had been dressed for the day, and had got her turban on.

This saved her ladyship's head.

But her ladyship's neck, sir, had a very narrow escape.

A bit of the broken glass wounded it within half a quarter of an inch of the carotty artery" (meaning, probably, carotid); "I heard the medical gentleman say, and shall never forget it to my dying day, that her ladyship's life had been saved by a hair-breadth.