What would you call this figure?
"One afternoon at six, when Dulcie was sticking her hat-pin within an eighth of an inch of her medulla oblongata, she said to her chum, Sadie--the girl that waits on you with her left side:..."

She's doing brain surgery without a license! Within an
eighth of an inch of pithing herself. No, I'm not lisping.
In Comparative Anatomy, we "pithed" frogs before dissecting
them, by sticking a needle into spinal cord, just below the
base of the skull. Sounds like that's what Dulcie is doing.
Committing suicide rather than lose her hat!