Lady Trimblestone did
everything in her power to entertain her guest, and for two or three
days the demon of ennui was banished. At length the lady's vapours
returned; everything appeared changed. Melancholy brought on a
return of alarming nervous complaints--convulsions of the limbs
--perversion of the understanding--a horror of society; in short,
all the complaints that are to be met with in an advertisement
enumerating the miseries of a nervous patient. In the midst of one
of her most violent fits, four mutes, dressed in white, entered her
apartment; slowly approaching her, they took her without violence in
their arms, and without giving her time to recollect herself,
conveyed her into a distant chamber hung with black and lighted with
green tapers. From the ceiling, which was of a considerable height,
a swing was suspended, in which she was placed by the mutes, so as
to be seated at some distance from the ground. One of the mutes set
the swing in motion; and as it approached one end of the room, she
was opposed by a grim menacing figure armed with a huge rod of
birch.
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