The Tremendous Adventures of Major Gahagan

I think it but right that in making my appearance before the public I should at once acquaint them with my titles and name. My card, as I leave it at the houses of the nobility, my friends, is as follows:—

MAJOR GOLIAH O’GRADY GAHAGAN, H.E.I.C.S., Commanding Battalion of Irregular Horse, AHMEDNUGGAR.

Seeing, I say, this simple visiting ticket, the world will avoid any of those awkward mistakes as to my person, which have been so frequent of late. There has been no end to the blunders regarding this humble title of mine, and the confusion thereby created. When I published my volume of poems, for instance, the Morning Post newspaper remarked “that the Lyrics of the Heart, by Miss Gahagan, may be ranked among the sweetest flowrets of the present spring season.” The Quarterly Review, commenting upon my “Observations on the Pons Asinorum” (4to, London, 1836), called me “Doctor Gahagan,” and so on. It was time to put an end to these mistakes, and I have taken the above simple remedy.

I was urged to it by a very exalted personage. Dining in August last at the palace of the T-l-r-es at Paris, the lovely young Duch-ss of Orl-ns (who, though she does not speak English, understands it as well as I do), said to me in the softest Teutonic, “Lieber Herr Major, haben sie den Ahmednuggarischen-jager-battalion gelassen?” “Warum denn?” said I, quite astonished at her R—l H—ss’s question. The P-cess then spoke of some trifle from my pen, which was simply signed Goliah Gahagan.