She did not thwart others in their humors, but she
never doubted of great indulgence from them.
'Some singular habits she had, which, when new, charmed, but,
after acquaintance, displeased her companions. She had
by nature the same habit and power of excitement that is
described in the spinning dervishes of the East. Like them
she would spin until all around her were giddy, while her
own brain, instead of being disturbed, was excited to great
action. Pausing, she would declaim, verses of others, or her
own, or act many parts, with strange catchwords and burdens,
that seemed to act with mystical power on her own fancy,
sometimes stimulating her to convulse the hearers with
laughter, sometimes to melt them to tears. When her power
began to languish, she would spin again till fired to
re-commence her singular drama, into which she wove figures
from the scenes of her earlier childhood, her companions, and
the dignitaries she sometimes saw, with fantasies unknown to
life, unknown to heaven or earth.
'This excitement, as may be supposed, was not good for her. It
usually came on in the evening, and often spoiled her sleep.
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