If any one crosses his legs in her presence, she faints; if a cat strays into the room, she will have convulsions; if a knife is put across a fork, she will not sit down to table; if there are roses outside in the garden, she will perceive the smell through double window-panes, and faint, so that no flowers can be kept in the room where she may happen to be.

You must not let anybody in a blue dress sit down at the same table as herself, for that colour is horrible to her, and she has convulsions the moment she sees it.
Finally, you will do well to talk of nothing at all in her presence, for the slightest thing is likely to upset her nerves.
"Ah! next comes the Countess Kereszty.

She is an excellent woman.

She has a tall, muscular, masculine figure, with thick, broad eyebrows.

She never speaks in a voice lower than what is usually required for commanding a regiment; while her gruffest voice is sufficient to utterly embarrass a nervous man, especially as she has a trick of perpetually interrupting the person talking to her with her 'How--why--wherefore's ?' and, when she begins to laugh, the whole room trembles.