It is impossible to express with what acuteness I felt the convict’s breathing, not only on the back of my head, but all along my spine. The sensation was like being touched in the marrow with some pungent and searching acid, it set my very teeth on edge.
– Charles Dickens
Great Expectations, Chapter 28. When Pip and Herbert have to share a coach ride with two convicts, Pip recognizes one of them as the convict he met at the bar. At the time it was practice to transport convicts to the dockyards by stagecoach. When the convict sits behind Pip and breathes all over his neck, Pip describes how unpleasant it was for him. He uses a vivid simile to compare the vileness of the convict’s breath to being “touched in the marrow with some pungent and searching acid.”