from his sleep. His dreams were at times commonplace enough, at

times very strange, at times they were almost formless: he would

be haunted, for instance, by nothing more definite than a certain

hue of brown, which he did not mind in the least while he was

awake, but feared and loathed while he was dreaming; at times,

again, they took on every detail of circumstance, as when once he

supposed he must swallow the populous world, and awoke screaming

with the horror of the thought. The two chief troubles of his very

narrow existence - the practical and everyday trouble of school

tasks and the ultimate and airy one of hell and judgment - were

often confounded together into one appalling nightmare. He seemed

to himself to stand before the Great White Throne; he was called

on, poor little devil, to recite some form of words, on which his

destiny depended; his tongue stuck, his memory was blank, hell

gaped for him; and he would awake, clinging to the curtain-rod with

his knees to his chin.

These were extremely poor experiences, on the whole; and at that

time of life my dreamer would have very willingly parted with his

power of dreams. But presently, in the course of his growth, the

cries and physical contortions passed away, seemingly for ever; his

visions were still for the most part miserable, but they were more

constantly supported; and he would awake with no more extreme

symptom than a flying heart, a freezing scalp, cold sweats, and the

speechless midnight fear. His dreams, too, as befitted a mind

better stocked with particulars, became more circumstantial, and

<<BackPagesTo menuNext>>