A maid-servant, who resided many years in a distinguished family in Edinburgh, was repeatedly warned of the approaching death of certain members of that family, by dreaming that one of the walls of the house had fallen. Shortly before the head of the family sickened and died, she said she had dreamed that the main wall had fallen.
A singular circumstance which occurred in this same family, from a member of which I heard it, is mentioned by Dr. Abercrombie. On this occasion the dream was not only prophetic, but the symbol was actually translated into fact.
One of the sons being indisposed with a sore throat, a sister dreamed that a watch, of considerable value, which she had borrowed from a friend, had stopped; that she had awakened another sister and mentioned the circumstance, who answered that “something much worse had happened, for Charles’s breath had stopped.” She then awoke, in extreme alarm, and mentioned the dream to her sister, who, to tranquillize her mind, arose and went to the brother’s room, where she found him asleep and the watch going. The next night the same dream recurred, and the brother was again found asleep and the watch going. On the following morning, however, this lady was writing a note in the drawing-room, with the watch beside her, when, on taking it up, she perceived it had stopped; and she was just on the point of calling her sister to mention the circumstance, when she heard a scream from her brother’s room, and the sister rushed in with the tidings that he had just expired. The malady had not been thought serious; but a sudden fit of suffocation had unexpectedly proved fatal.
This case, which is established beyond all controversy, is extremely curious in many points of view; the acting out of the symbol, especially. Symbolical events of this description have been often related, and as often laughed at. It is easy to laugh at what we do not understand; and it gives us the advantage of making the timid narrator ashamed of his fact, so that if he do not wholly suppress it, he at least insures himself by laughing, too, the next time he relates it. It is said that Goethe’s clock stopped the moment he died; and I have heard repeated instances of this strange kind of synchronism, or magnetism, if it be by magnetism that we are to account for the mystery. One was told me very lately by a gentleman to whom the circumstances occurred.
On the 16th of August, 1769, Frederick II., of Prussia, is said to have dreamed that a star fell from heaven and occasioned such an extraordinary glare that he could with great difficulty find his way through it. He mentioned the dream to his attendants, and it was afterward observed that it was on that day Napoleon was born.
A lady, not long since, related to me the following circumstance: Her mother, who was at the time residing in Edinburgh, in a house one side of which looked into a wynd, while the door was in the High street, dreamed that, it being Sunday morning, she had heard a sound which attracted her to the window; and, while looking out, had dropped a ring from her finger into the wynd below; that she had, thereupon, gone down in her night-clothes to seek it, but when she reached the spot it was not to be found. Returning, extremely vexed at her loss, as she re-entered her own door she met a respectable looking young man, carrying some loaves of bread. On expressing her astonishment at finding a stranger there at so unseasonable an hour, he answered by expressing his at seeing her in such a situation. She said she had dropped her ring, and had been round the corner to seek it; whereupon, to her delighted surprise, he presented her with her lost treasure. Some months afterward, being at a party, she recognized the young man seen in her dream, and learned that he was a baker. He took no particular notice of her on that occasion; and, I think, two years elapsed before she met him again. This second meeting, however, led to an acquaintance, which terminated in marriage.
Here the ring and the bread are curiously emblematic of the marriage, and the occupation of the future husband.
Miss L——, residing at Dalkeith, dreamed that her brother, who was ill, called her to his bedside and gave her a letter, which he desired her to carry to their aunt, Mrs. H——, with the request that she would “deliver it to John.” (John was another brother, who had died previously, and Mrs. H—— was at the time ill.) He added that “he himself was going there also, but that Mrs. H—— would be there before him.” Accordingly, Miss L—— went, in her dream, with the letter to Mrs. H——, whom she found dressed in white, and looking quite radiant and happy. She took the letter, saying she was going there directly, and would deliver it.
On the following morning Miss L—— learned that her aunt had died in the night. The brother died some little time afterward.
A gentleman who had been a short time visiting Edinburgh, was troubled with a cough, which, though it occasioned him no alarm, he resolved to go home to nurse. On the first night of his arrival he dreamed that one half of the house was blown away. His bailiff, who resided at a distance, dreamed the same dream on the same night. The gentleman died within a few weeks.
“This symbolical language, which the Deity appears to have used” (witness Peter’s dream, Acts ii., and others) “in all his revelations to man, is in the highest degree, what poetry is in a lower, and the language of dreams, in the lowest, namely, the original natural language of man; and we may fairly ask whether this language, which here plays an inferior part, be not, possibly, the proper language of a higher sphere, while we, who vainly think ourselves awake, are, in reality, buried in a deep, deep sleep, in which, like dreamers who imperfectly hear the voices of those around them, we occasionally apprehend, though obscurely, a few words of this divine tongue.” (Vide Schubert.)
This subject of sleeping and waking is a very curious one, and might give rise to strange questionings. In the case of those patients abovementioned, who seem to have two different spheres of existence, who shall say which is the waking one, or whether either of them be so? The speculations of Mr. Dove on this subject merited more attention, I think, than they met with when he lectured in Edinburgh. He maintained that, long before he had paid any attention to magnetism, he had arrived at the conclusion that there are as many states or conditions of mind beyond sleep as there are on this side of it; passing through the different stages of dreaming, revery, contemplation, &c., up to perfect vigilance. However this be, in this world of appearance, where we see nothing as it is, and where, both as regards our moral and physical relations, we live in a state of continual delusion, it is impossible for us to pronounce on this question. It is a common remark, that some people seem to live in a dream, and never to be quite awake; and the most cursory observer can not fail to have been struck with examples of persons in this condition, especially in the aged.
With respect to this allegorical language, Ennemoser observes, that, “since no dreamer learns it of another, and still less from those who are awake, it must be natural to all men.” How different too, is its comprehensiveness and rapidity, to our ordinary language! We are accustomed, and with justice, to wonder at the admirable mechanism by which, without fatigue or exertion, we communicate with our fellow-beings; but how slow and ineffectual is human speech compared to this spiritual picture-language, where a whole history is understood at a glance! and scenes that seem to occupy days and weeks, are acted out in ten minutes. It is remarkable that this hieroglyphic language appears to be the same among all people; and that the dream-interpreters of all countries construe the signs alike. Thus, the dreaming of deep water denotes trouble, and pearls are a sign of tears.
I have heard of a lady who, whenever a misfortune was impending, dreamed that she saw a large fish. One night she dreamed that this fish had bitten two of her little boy’s fingers. Immediately afterward a schoolfellow of the child’s injured those two very fingers by striking him with a hatchet; and I have met with several persons who have learned, by experience, to consider one particular dream as the certain prognostic of misfortune.
A lady who had left the West Indies when six years old, came one night, fourteen years afterward, to her sister’s bedside, and said, “I know uncle is dead. I have dreamed that I saw a number of slaves in the large store-room at Barbadoes, with long brooms, sweeping down immense cobwebs. I complained to my aunt, and she covered her face and said, ‘Yes, he is no sooner gone than they disobey him.’ ” It was afterward ascertained that Mr. P—— had died on that