Page:Memoirs of the Lady Hester Stanhope.djvu/321

 cold blast—let my ashes fly in the air—let the wolves and jackals devour my carcase;—let"—here the   agitation she was in, and which had kept increasing, brought on a severe fit of coughing, and it was a quarter of an hour before she could recover strength enough to speak again. Her exhaustion reduced her to a little calm.

After dinner I saw her again, but now her irritability had passed away. "Take your chair," said she, "here by the bed—turn your back to the window to save your poor eyes from the light—never mind me: there—I am afraid I have overworked them by so much writing. But I know, if you did not write for me, you would be writing or reading for yourself: you are just like my sister Griselda."

She went on:—"You are angry with me, I dare say, because I told you I would not have you near me when I am dying: but I suppose I may do as I please. No English consul shall touch me or my effects: no: when I was going, sooner than that, I will call in all the thieves and robbers I can find, and set them to plunder and destroy everything. But I shall not die so:—I shall die as St. Elias and Isaac did; and, before that, I shall have to wade through blood up to here" (and she drew her hand across her neck), "nor will a spark of commiseration move me. The bab el tobi [gate of pardon] will then be shut; for neither