Page:Memoirs of the Lady Hester Stanhope.djvu/168



December 8.—A most violent storm of rain, thunder, and lightning, kept me prisoner. The courtyards were flooded. When all the house was in confusion from the wet, and clogs were heard clattering on all sides, I entered Lady Hester's room, and remained for about an hour, talking on indifferent subjects, without hearing from her one word in allusion to the state of the weather. At last she said, "Doctor, I find myself better from the thunder!" And when I replied that there were many persons who felt oppressed from an electric condition of the atmosphere and were relieved by its explosion, she observed, with some sharpness, "that I must be a great booby to make such a remark to her, as there was not a servant in the house who did not know that she could always