"Did you ever hear of the S.A. & A.P. Railroad in Texas? Well, that don't stand for Samaritan Actor's Aid Philanthropy. I was down that way managing a summer bunch of the gum and syntax-chewers that play the Idlewild Parks in the Western hamlets. Of course, we went to pieces when the soubrette ran away with a prominent barber of Beeville."


Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Definition: \Sou`brette"\, n. [F.]
A female servant or attendant; specifically, as a term of the
theater, a lady's maid, in comedies, who acts the part of an
intrigante; a meddlesome, mischievous female servant or young woman.