Читать книгу The storm of London: a social rhapsody онлайн
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On the eleventh day of this prison life, Lord Somerville woke with a sharp pain in his side, and as he sat up on his pallet he was seized with giddiness. This was a premonition which filled him with awe. His liver was hopelessly out of order, and no doubt many of his friends’ livers were in the same condition owing to this sedentary life. Hard thinking and solitary confinement would be sure to have a fatal effect on a race accustomed to exercise and deep drinking. The area gossip was ominous, and what Temple recorded to his master boded no good to the Upper Ten, who were suffering from a general attack of dyspepsia. It was a very serious question, a race doomed to sequestration; and there was a fear that eventually London, the well-drained, well-watered, well-lighted and altogether well-County-Councilled, would be turned into a vast lunatic asylum. When ethics meant apoplexy, it was time to halt and loosen the strings of propriety; and it was the duty of the sporting duke, the rubicund brewer, and of all the fastidious do-nothings, to weave for themselves in the seclusion of their chambers a new tissue of principles to suit their abnormal condition. Lionel inquired whether the Bishop had come to any conclusion about his text. Temple did not know about that, but he knew that the prelate had complained of insomnia and sickness, and asked for sal volatile. Lady Pendelton had been heard by her maid to fall on the floor. Was her ladyship better now? had asked Lionel. Yes, but her maid could hear her tottering in her room and moaning piteously.