Page:Memoirs of the Lady Hester Stanhope.djvu/297

 misery! what misery!" When she was a little calmed, and I could collect from her what was the matter, she told me that, having fallen into a doze, she awoke with a sense of suffocation from tightness across her chest, and, being unable to ring or call, she thought she should have died: "thus," said she, "am I treated like a dog, with nobody to administer to my wants;" and so she went on in the usual strain. I was suffering at this time from the nettlerash, but treated it lightly, and thought Lady Hester would do so too: until, having unluckily alluded to it, a fresh source of uneasiness was inadvertently started. "Good God, doctor!" she cried, "to come out of doors with a nettlerash on you! go to your house immediately; get to bed, keep yourself warm, and remain there until it is cured. After four or five days, take such and such things; then go to the bath, then take some bark, &c., &c. How many persons have I known go mad and die from it! You treat it as nothing? why, you will drive me crazy. In God's name, never mind me; only go and take care of yourself. You will act in your own usual inconsiderate manner, and I shall have to bury another in this house. Oh, God! oh, God! what am I doomed to!" and then followed fresh cries and fresh lamentations.

Could Sir Francis Burdett have seen all this, and have known that five words of a letter, sent a month