The turban will prevent anyone seeing how short the hair is.

Here is a little bottle of black dye, with which you had better colour it, before fixing it with the wax." Stanley's hair had not been cut for some time before he had been captured by the Burmese and, in the two months that had since elapsed, it had grown very long; and could therefore be turned up as the officer suggested.

Putting on his usual garments, he sat at his place, at the door of the cell, until the guard brought up his evening meal.

Having eaten this, he dyed his hair and, half an hour later, turned it up, plastering it with wax, and tied a bit of fibre round where the turban would come.
By this time it was getting dusk.

He sat at the door at the top of the steps, until he saw that the courtyard was deserted; the guard at the gate having gone outside, to enjoy the coolness of the air.
Then he ran down the steps, took two bamboo poles about ten feet in length, and two short pieces of the same wood no thicker than his finger and, hurrying up the steps with them, laid them down against the side of the room.