follow her about in shoals, whenever she cometh abroad, from getting up
and riding. But her presence infallibly commands a reverence. She is,
indeed, as the Americans would express it, something awful. Her person
is a burden to herself, no less than to the ground which bears her.

"To her mighty bone she hath a pinguitude withal which makes the depth
of winter to her the most desirable season. Her distress in the warmer
solstice is pitiable. During the months of July and August she usually
renteth a cool cellar, where ices are kept, whereinto she descendeth
when Sirius rageth. She dates from a hot Thursday, some twenty-five
years ago. Her apartment in summer is pervious to the four winds. Two
doors in north and south direction, and two windows fronting the rising
and the setting sun, never closed, from every cardinal point catch the
contributory breezes. She loves to enjoy what she calls a quadruple
draught. That must be a shrewd zephyr that can escape her. I owe a
painful face-ache, which oppresses me at this moment, to a cold caught,
sitting by her, one day in last July, at this receipt of coolness. Her
fan in ordinary resembleth a banner spread, which she keepeth
continually on the alert to detect the least breeze.

"She possesseth an active and gadding mind, totally incommensurate with
her person. No one delighteth more than herself in country exercises and
pastimes. I have passed many an agreeable holiday with her in her
favorite park at Woodstock. She performs her part in these delightful
ambulatory excursions by the aid of a portable garden-chair. She setteth
out with you at a fair foot-gallop, which she keepeth up till you are
both well breathed, and then she reposeth for a few seconds. Then she is
up again for a hundred paces or so, and again resteth,--her movement, on
these sprightly occasions, being something between walking and flying.
Her great weight seemeth to propel her forward, ostrich-fashion. In this
kind of relieved marching I have traversed with her many scores of acres
on those well-wooded and well-watered domains.

"Her delight at Oxford is in the public walks and gardens, where, when
the weather is not too oppressive, she passeth much of her valuable
time. There is a bench at Maudlin, or rather, situated between the
frontiers of that and ----'s College,--some litigation, latterly, about
repairs, has vested the property of it finally in ----'s,--where at the
hour of noon she is ordinarily to be f