Page:Memoirs of the Lady Hester Stanhope.djvu/224

 to suspect that her secretary had been endeavouring to ascertain whether she was consumptive, and how long she was likely to live. To dispel such a suspicion, she made a great effort, got up, and went and sat in the garden. Before she left her room, her wailings were for some moments heart-rending. "Oh, God, have mercy! oh, God, have mercy!" she cried; "only keep those beasts away: who is to take care of me, surrounded as I am with those horrible servants?—only take care they don't rob me."

While she remained in the garden, her chamber was put to rights (a process which it much required, in consequence of her long confinement); and, at her earnest request, I superintended the performance. "Overlook them," she said, "or they will rob me." But oh! what a sight!—such dust, such confusion, such cobwebs! Never was a lady's room seen before in such a condition: bundles, phials, linen, calico, silk, gallipots, clothes, étuis, papers, were all lying about on the floor, and in the corners, and behind and under the scanty furniture; for all this while she had been afraid to get the chamber put into order, lest her servants should take advantage of the opportunity to plunder her.

When she returned to her room from the garden, she was raving. "You had better leave me to die," she cried, "if I am to die; and, if I am not, oh!