Chapter V (1)

DREAMS, OMENS, WARNINGS, PRESENTIMENTS, AND SECOND SIGHT.

The subjects here set forth for consideration (by which no slight progress will be made in exhibiting such facts as serve to unfold and make manifest more plainly the purpose of this treatise), are very wide in their scope. A large volume might with no great difficulty be compiled upon each separate subject; for the examples of remarkable dreams and supernatural omens which are already on record, are exceedingly numerous,[108] while the warnings and presentiments of danger and death, which are still often vouchsafed, have been so notably providential in their purport, that many of the mercifully-bestowed Glimpses of the Supernatural, brought before the Editor’s notice, can only be attributed generally to the goodness of Almighty God, and particularly either to the intercession of His Saints, the effectual fervent prayers of those still in the flesh, or the direct intervention of His Holy Angels, the guardians and guides of Christians.

Some dreams, especially those of an ordinary character, appear to consist of the mere revival of old memories and associations regarding persons and events which have long passed out of the mind, and seem to have been forgotten. It is often quite impossible to trace the manner in which, or the method by which, dreams arise; and certainly many of the facts connected with them do not appear referable to any coherent principle with which it may truly be said that man is perfectly acquainted. They are mysterious; they are strange; they are supernatural. At the same time it is impossible not to remember how frequently the sacred and divine writings record examples of dreams, by which the Will of God was directly made known of old to some of His favoured servants. The case of King Abimelech, warned against taking Abraham’s wife (whom he had untruly called his sister), is an early instance in point.[109] So, too, are the warnings and directions given by Almighty God to Jacob and Laban. The dreams of Joseph likewise illustrate the principle which may be readily discovered and comprehended by the help of Scripture, viz. that some dreams, whatever others may be, are certainly from God, and ought not to be disregarded. For the Almighty expressly pledged Himself to make known His Will to His prophets both by dreams and in visions.[110] And it was by the former that He appeared to Solomon, graciously and mercifully offering him a response to any request he might make. “Ask what I shall give thee.” The dreams and visions of Daniel, the Hebrew Prophet, likewise of S. Joseph of Nazareth, both with regard to the Blessed Virgin and the malice of Herod; the warning dreams of the Three Eastern Kings; that of Pilate’s wife, and others equally remarkable, are familiar to us all. So that, whatever theories may be excogitated by some, it is impossible for Christians to hold any novel and fantastic ideas, which would sweep away those links which in dreams and visions may still bind together the natural with the supernatural, and by which, from time to time, in the present day, warnings and necessary lessons may sometimes be mercifully vouchsafed and imparted.

A considerable difficulty has been experienced by the Editor, not only in testing recent examples which have been brought before him, but in inducing those who supplied him with them, to allow the use and support of their names.[111] In the cases to be given, he has spared no reasonable trouble in their investigation; and, where they are not matters of history (received and recognized by those who are satisfied with an application of the ordinary laws of evidence), the reader may rely on the fact that they have not been embodied in this volume without the most anxious inquiry and careful sifting of their truth and accuracy.

Thus much as to his purport and intent. Now let the examples of remarkable dreams be put on record; after a brief reference has been made to the belief and expressions of opinion of certain early Christian writers, obviously formulated upon the basis of scriptural assertions and sacred examples of old.

When the body sleeps, as Tertullian remarks,[112] it takes its own peculiar refreshment, but that refreshment not being adapted to the soul, which does not rest, she during the inactivity of the bodily members employs her own. Then in his treatise “On the Soul,”[113] he proceeds to distinguish between the hallucination of dreaming and insanity. Dreaming is agreeable to the course and order of Nature, he maintains; but he rejects the doctrine of Epicurus, in which dreams are disparaged as idle and fortuitous. He further expresses his conviction that future honours, dignities, medical remedies, thefts and treasure have been revealed by dreams--testimonies to which are both numerous and strong. Many dreams, specially those which are vain, frivolous, impure, and turbulent, may be attributed to demons. Others, again, proceed from God or holy angels, as one portion of prophecy.

Lactantius, in a short passage of his well-known “Tract,”[114] expresses his conviction of divine agency in dreams. He maintains that the undoubted testimony of History presents mankind with several most remarkable verifications of dreams; and he repeats what Tertullian had already maintained, viz. that part of the economy of prophecy depends upon them. He holds that Virgil’s evidence may be admitted, that dreams are neither always true nor always false.

Again, S. Cyprian states that he was divinely instructed in a dream to mix a little water with the wine for the Holy Eucharist.[115] On the general subject, S. Basil warns those who may be ready to attribute too great importance to dreams, to rest contented with the written revelation of Almighty God in Holy Scripture.[116] S. Bernard, the last of the Fathers, treats of dreams at great length in his remarkable sermon “On Sleep,” which is full of sage advice of the same nature as that set forth by S. Basil; and so does S. Thomas Aquinas, who discusses the subject with singular breadth, fulness, and system, arriving at the conclusion that it is unreasonable to deny anything--the truth of which is affirmed by general experience; and he adds that general experience affirms that dreams very frequently give indications of coming events; and therefore, concludes that it is lawful to interpret and endeavour to comprehend them.[117] But at this point, he goes on to maintain that only those dreams which are suggested by angels may be investigated and interpreted, those suggested by demons and evil spirits being left alone. But unfortunately he provides no criterion by which the one class may be safely and truly distinguished from the other; nor is it easy to supply the deficiency.

From another point of view, a thoughtful modern writer[118] has remarked that “dreams are uniformly the resuscitation or re-embodiment of thoughts which have formerly, in some shape or other, occupied the mind. They are old ideas revived, either in an entire state, or heterogeneously mingled together. I doubt if it be possible,” he continues, “for a person to have in a dream, any idea whose elements did not, in some form, strike him at a previous period. If these break loose from their connecting chain, and become jumbled together incoherently, as is often the case, they give rise to absurd combinations; but the elements still subsist, and only manifest themselves in a new and unconnected shape.”

This, and such as this, may be quite true; but yet whatever theories the scientific may propound which seem to oppose the facts of man’s experience, will not in the long run command that adhesion which for awhile they may possibly obtain. And now for examples:

The Dream of the so-called “Swaffham Tinker”[119] is singular, and may well be here reproduced, because it represents an example of the practical results of dreaming, which is quite worthy of consideration:--

“This Tinker, a hard-working, industrious man, one night dreamed that if he took a journey to London, and placed himself at a certain spot on London Bridge, he should meet one who would tell him something of great importance to his future prospects. The Tinker, on whom the dream made a deep impression, related it fully to his wife in the morning; who, however, half-laughed at him and half-scolded him for his folly in heeding such idle fancies. Next night he is said to have re-dreamed the dream; and again on the third night, when the impression was so powerful on his mind that he determined, in spite of the remonstrances of his wife and the ridicule of his neighbours, to go to London and see the upshot of it. Accordingly he set off for the metropolis on foot, reached it late on the third day (the distance was ninety miles), and, after the refreshment of a night’s rest, took his station next day on a part of the Bridge answering to the description in his dream. There he stood all day, and all the next, and all the third, without any communication as to the purpose of his journey; so that towards night, on the third day, he began to lose patience and confidence in his dream, inwardly cursed his folly in disregarding his wife’s counsel, and resolved next day to make the best of his way home. He still kept his station, however, till late in the evening, when, just as he was about to depart, a stranger who had noticed him standing stedfastly and with anxious look on the same spot for some days, accosted him, and asked him what he waited there for. After a little hesitation, the Tinker told his errand, though without acquainting him with the name of the place whence he came. The stranger enjoyed a smile at the rustic’s simplicity, and advised him to go home and for the future to pay no attention to dreams. ‘I myself,’ said he, ‘if I were disposed to put faith in such things, might now go a hundred miles into the country upon a similar errand. I dreamed three nights this week that if I went to a place called Swaffham in Norfolk, and dug under an apple-tree in a certain garden on the north side of the town I should find a box of money; but I have something else to do than run after such idle fancies! No, no, my friend; go home, and work well at your calling, and you will find there the riches you are seeking here.’ The astonished Tinker did not doubt that this was the communication he had been sent to London to receive, but he merely thanked the stranger for his advice, and went away avowing his intention to follow it. Next day he set out for home, and on his arrival there said little to his wife touching his journey; but next morning he rose betimes and began to dig on the spot he supposed to be pointed out by the stranger. When he had got a few feet down, the spade struck upon something hard, which turned out to be an iron chest. This he quickly carried to his house, and when he had with difficulty wrenched open the lid, found it, to his great joy, to be full of money. After securing his treasure, he observed on the lid of the box an inscription, which, unlearned as he was, he could not decipher. But by a stratagem he got the description read without any suspicion on the part of his neighbours by some of the Grammar School lads, and found it to be--

‘Where this stood
Is another twice as good.’

And in truth on digging again the lucky Tinker disinterred, below the place where the first chest had lain, a second twice as large, also full of gold and silver coin. It is stated that, become thus a wealthy man, the Tinker showed his thankfulness to Providence by building a new chancel to the church, the old one being out of repair. And whatever fiction the marvellous taste of those ages may have mixed up with the tale, certain it is that there is shown to this day a monument in Swaffham Church, having an effigy in marble, said to be that of the Tinker with his Dog at his side and his tools and implements of trade lying about him.”

Among the various histories of singular dreams and corresponding events, the following, which occurred in the early part of the eighteenth century, seems to merit being here placed on record. Its authenticity will appear from the relation; and it may surely be maintained that a more extraordinary concurrence of fortuitous and accidental circumstances can scarcely be produced or paralleled:--

“One Adam Rogers, a creditable and decent man of good sense and repute, who kept an inn at Portlaw, a small hamlet nine or ten miles from Waterford, in Ireland, dreamed one night that he saw two men at a particular green spot on the adjoining mountain; one of them a small, sickly-looking man, the other remarkably strong and large. He then saw the latter man murder the other, upon which he awoke in great agitation.

“The circumstances of the dream were so distinct and forcible that he continued much affected by them. He related them to his wife, and also to several neighbours next morning.

“In some time he went out coursing with greyhounds, accompanied amongst others by one Mr. Browne, the Roman Catholic priest of the parish. He soon stopped at the above-mentioned particular green spot on the mountain, and calling Mr. Browne, pointed it out to him, and told him what had happened there. During the remainder of the day he thought little more about it.

“Next morning he was extremely startled at seeing two strangers enter his house at about eleven o’clock in the forenoon. He immediately went into an inner room, and desired his wife to take particular notice, for they were precisely the two men he had seen in his dream.

“After the strangers had taken some refreshment, and were about to depart in order to prosecute their journey, Rogers earnestly entreated the little man at once to quit his fellow-traveller. He assured him that if he would remain with him that day he would accompany him to Carrick the next morning--that being the town to which the travellers were proceeding. He was unwilling and ashamed to tell the cause of his being so solicitous to separate him from his companion. But as he observed that Hickey (which was the name of the little man) seemed to be quiet and gentle in his deportment, and had money about him, and that the other had a ferocious, bad countenance, the dream still recurred to him. He dreaded that something fatal would happen, and wished at all events to keep them asunder.

“However, the humane precautions of Rogers proved ineffectual, for Caulfield (such was the other’s name) prevailed upon Hickey to continue with him on their way to Carrick, declaring that as they had long travelled together, they should not part, but remain together until he should see Hickey safely arrived at the habitation of his friends. The wife of Rogers was much dissatisfied when she heard they were gone, and blamed her husband exceedingly for not being absolutely peremptory in detaining Hickey.

“About an hour after they left Portlaw, in a lonely part of the mountain, just near the place observed by Rogers in his dream, Caulfield took the opportunity of murdering his companion. It appeared afterwards from his own account of the horrid transaction, that as they were getting over a ditch he struck Hickey on the back part of the head with a stone, and when he fell down into the trench in consequence of the blow, Caulfield gave him several stabs with a knife, and cut his throat so deeply that the head was observed to be almost severed from his body. He then rifled Hickey’s pockets of all the money in them, took part of his clothes and everything else of value about him, and afterwards proceeded on his way to Carrick. He had not been long gone when the body, still warm, was discovered by some labourers who were returning to their work from dinner.

“The report of the murder soon reached Portlaw. Rogers and his wife went to the place and instantly knew the body of him whom they had in vain endeavoured to dissuade from going on with his treacherous companion. They at once spoke out their suspicions that the murder was perpetrated by the fellow-traveller of the deceased. An immediate search was made, and Caulfield was apprehended at Waterford the second day after.

“He was brought to trial at the ensuing assizes and convicted of the fact. It appeared amongst other circumstances that when he went to Carrick he hired a horse and a boy to conduct him--not by the usual road, but by that which runs on the north side of the river Suir--to Waterford, intending to take his passage in the first ship from thence to Newfoundland. The boy took notice of some blood on his shirt, and Caulfield gave him a half-crown to promise not to speak of it.

“Rogers proved not only that Hickey was last seen in company with Caulfield, but that a pair of new shoes which Hickey wore had been found on the feet of Caulfield when he was apprehended; and that a pair of old shoes which he had on at Rogers’s house were upon Hickey’s feet when the body was found. He described with great exactness every article of their clothes. Caulfield on the cross-examination, shrewdly asked him from the dock whether it was not very extraordinary that he, who kept a public-house, should take such particular notice of the dress of a stranger accidentally calling there? Rogers in his answer said he had a very particular reason, but he was ashamed to mention it. The court and the prisoner insisted on his declaring it. He gave a circumstantial narrative of his dream, called upon Mr. Browne, the priest, then in court, to corroborate his testimony, and said that his wife had severely reproached him for permitting Hickey to leave their house, when he knew that in the short footway to Carrick they must necessarily pass by the green spot in the mountain which had appeared in his dream.

“A number of witnesses came forward, and the proofs were so strong that the jury without hesitation found the prisoner guilty.

“It was remarked as a singularity that he happened to be tried and sentenced by his namesake, Sir George Caulfeild, at that time Lord Chief Justice of the King’s Bench, which office he resigned in the summer of the year 1760.

“After sentence Caulfield confessed the fact. It came that Hickey had been in the West Indies two and twenty years, but falling into a bad state of health, he was returning to his native country (Ireland) bringing with him some money his industry had acquired. The vessel on board which he took his passage was, by stress of weather, driven into Minehead. He there met with Frederick Caulfield, an Irish sailor, who was poor and much distressed for clothes and common necessaries. Hickey compassionating his poverty, and finding he was his countryman, relieved his wants, and an intimacy commenced between them. They agreed to go to Ireland together; and it was remarked on their passage that Caulfield spoke contemptuously, and often said it was a pity that such a puny fellow as Hickey should have money, and he himself without a shilling. They landed at Waterford, at which place they stayed some days, Caulfield being all the time supported by Hickey, who bought some clothes for him. The assizes being held in the town during that time, it was afterwards recollected that they were both at the Court-house, and attended the whole of a trial of a shoemaker who was convicted of the murder of his wife. But this made no impression on the hardened mind of Caulfield, for the very next day he perpetrated the same crime on the road between Waterford and Carrick-on-Suir, near which town Hickey’s relations lived.

“He walked to the gallows with firm step and undaunted countenance. He spoke to the multitude who surrounded him, and in the course of his address mentioned that he had been bred at a charter-school, from which he was taken as an apprenticed servant by William Izod, Esq., of the county of Kilkenny. From this position he ran away on being corrected for some faults, and had been absent from Ireland six years. He confessed also that he had several times intended to murder Hickey on the road from Waterford to Portlaw, which, though in general not a road much frequented, yet people at that time continually coming in sight, prevented him.

“Being frustrated in all his schemes, the sudden and total disappointment threw him probably into an indifference for life. Some tempers are so stubborn and rugged that nothing can affect them, but immediate sensation. If to this be united the darkest ignorance, death to such characters will hardly seem terrible, because they can form no conception of what it is, and still less of the consequences that may follow.”

The record of the following dream is certainly curious and interesting, and is perfectly well authenticated, coming as it does from the pen of the gentleman’s son more immediately concerned, who testified as to its literal fulfilment:--

“In the year 1768 my father, Matthew Talbot, Esq., of Castle Talbot, in the county of Wexford, was much surprised at the recurrence of a dream three several times during the same night, which caused him to repeat the whole circumstance to his lady the following morning. He dreamed that he had arisen as usual and descended to his library, the morning being hazy. He then seated himself at his _secrétaire_ to write; when, happening to look up a long avenue of trees opposite the window, he perceived a man in a blue jacket mounted on a white horse coming towards the house. My father arose and opened the window. The man advancing, presented him with a roll of papers, and told him they were invoices of a vessel which had been wrecked and had drifted in during the night on his son-in-law’s, Lord Mountmorris’s, estate close by, and signed ‘_Bell and Stephenson_.’ My father’s attention was only called to the dream from its frequent recurrence: but, when he found himself seated at his desk on the misty morning, and beheld the identical person whom he had seen in his dream in the blue coat riding on the grey horse, he felt surprised, and opening the window waited the man’s approach. He immediately rode up, and drawing from his pocket a packet of papers, gave them to my father, stating they were invoices belonging to an American vessel which had been wrecked, and drifted in upon his lordship’s estate; that there was no person on board to lay claim to the wreck, but that the invoices were signed ‘_Stephenson and Bell_.’ I assure you that the above is most faithfully given by me as it actually occurred; but it is not more extraordinary than other examples of the prophetic powers of the mind or soul in sleep which I have frequently heard related.”[120]

Another remarkable dream, exceedingly well authenticated by an aunt of the Editor of this volume, is now set forth in detail and at some length:--

“On the night of the 11th of May, 1812, Mr. Williams, of Scorrier House, near Redruth, in Cornwall, awoke his wife, and exceedingly agitated, told her that he had dreamed that he was in the lobby of the House of Commons, and saw a man shoot with a pistol a gentleman who had just entered the lobby, who was said to be the Chancellor, to which Mrs. Williams naturally replied that it was only a dream, and recommended him to be composed, and go to sleep as soon as he could.

“He did so, but shortly after again woke her; and said that he had the second time had the same dream; whereupon she observed that he had been so much agitated with his former dream that she supposed it had dwelt on his mind, and begged of him to try to compose himself and go to sleep, which he did. A third time the same vision was repeated, on which, notwithstanding her entreaties that he would be quiet, and endeavour to forget it, he arose, being then between one and two o’clock, and dressed himself.

“At breakfast the dreams were the sole subject of conversation, and in the forenoon Mr. Williams went to Falmouth, where he related the particulars of them to all his acquaintance that he met.

“On the following day, Mr. Tucker, of Trematon Castle, accompanied by his wife, a daughter of Mr. Williams, went to Scorrier House about dusk. Immediately after the first salutation, on their entering the parlour, where were Mr., Mrs., and Miss Williams, Mr. Williams began to relate to Mr. Tucker the circumstances of his dream; and Mrs. Williams observed to her daughter, Mrs. Tucker, laughingly, that her father could not even suffer Mr. Tucker to be seated before he told him of his nocturnal visitation; on the statement of which Mr. Tucker observed that it would do very well for a dream to have the Chancellor in the lobby of the House of Commons, but that he would not be found there in reality; and Mr. Tucker then asked what sort of man he appeared to be, when Mr. Williams minutely described him; to which Mr. Tucker replied: ‘Your description is not at all that of the Chancellor, but is certainly very exactly that of Mr. Perceval, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and although he has been to me the greatest enemy I ever met with through life, for a supposed cause which had no foundation in truth (or words to that effect), I should be exceedingly sorry, indeed, to hear of his being assassinated, or of any injury of the kind happening to him.’

“Mr. Tucker then inquired of Mr. Williams if he had ever seen Mr. Perceval, and was told that he never had seen him, nor had ever even written to him, either on public or private business; in short, that he never had had anything to do with him, nor had he ever been in the lobby of the House of Commons in his life.

“At this moment, whilst Mr. Williams and Mr. Tucker were still standing, they heard a horse gallop to the door of the House, and immediately after, Mr. Michael Williams of Trevince (son of Mr. Williams of Scorrier), entered the room and said that he had galloped out from Truro (from which Scorrier House is distant seven miles), having seen a gentleman there, who had come by that evening’s mail from London, who said that he was in the lobby of the House of Commons, on the evening of the 11th, when a man called Bellingham had shot Mr. Perceval, and that, as it might occasion some great ministerial changes, and might affect Mr. Tucker’s political friends, he had come out as fast as he could to make him acquainted with it, having heard at Truro that he had passed through that place in the afternoon on his way to Scorrier.

“After the astonishment which this intelligence had created had a little subsided, Mr. Williams described most particularly the appearance and dress of the man whom he had seen in his dream fire the pistol, as he had before done of Mr. Perceval.

“About six weeks after, Mr. Williams, having business in town, went accompanied by a friend to the House of Commons, where (as has been already observed) he had never before been. Immediately that he came to the steps at the entrance of the lobby, he said: ‘This place is as distinctly within my recollection in my dream, as any room in my house,’ and he made the same observation when he entered the lobby.

“He then pointed out the exact spot where Bellingham stood when he fired, and where Mr. Perceval had reached when he was struck by the ball, and where and how he fell. The dress, both of Mr. Perceval and Bellingham, agreed with the descriptions given by Mr. Williams, even to the most minute particular.”[121]

The number of records in which it is believed that dreams have been the means by which murder has been discovered are so considerable; and some are so well authenticated, that it is impossible, as it certainly would be presumptuous, to endeavour to set them aside. The murder of Maria Marten of Polstead in Suffolk, by William Corder, a farmer, in May of the year 1827, is a remarkable example:--

This unfortunate woman was induced to leave her home, and having accompanied the man who, under the promise of marriage, had betrayed her, to a certain barn, was there cruelly murdered and buried under the floor. For nearly twelve months the murder was undiscovered; for Corder, who remained away, but still communicated with her parents, maintained that she had married him; that circumstances prevented his bringing her back to his father’s home: but that in due course they would both come, though it was implied that they were both on the Continent.

The mother of the murdered woman, however, about ten months after her daughter’s death, dreamed that her daughter had been murdered, and buried under the floor of the barn. So strong and deep an impression did this make both on her relations and the people of the village, that the girl’s father and others on April 19, 1828, took up the floor of the barn, where they discovered the body of the murdered woman in a sack; and not so much decayed but that obvious marks of violence were perceptible. The body was successfully identified by the want of two teeth--one on the left side of the upper jaw, and the other on the right side of the lower. In the meantime Corder had married, and had gone to live in Essex, where he was apprehended, tried, and condemned on the strongest circumstantial evidence. He made a full confession of the murder when in prison, under sentence of death, and was executed in August, 1828.

The following sets forth how an impressive, vivid, and twice-repeated dream induced a sailor to go to the place dreamed of, and rescue three suffering fellow-creatures from a horrible death. It was related to a Cornish friend, as a matter of fact, by a native of the island of Alderney, and is quite worthy of being here recorded:--

“Some few years before the erection of those well-known lighthouses called the Caskets, near that island, an islander dreamed that a ship had been wrecked near those rocks, and that some part of the crew had saved themselves upon them. This dream he related on the quay; but the sailors (although the most superstitious people in the world) treated it as an idle fancy. Yet the next night produced the same dream, and the man would no longer be laughed out of it; so he prevailed upon a companion the next morning to take a boat and go with him to the rock, where they found three poor wretches half-starved with cold and hunger, and brought them on shore. This circumstance, and the supposed loss of the ‘Victory’ on this rock, the islanders give as a reason for erecting three lighthouses there.”

Still more remarkable perhaps is the following, which, telling its own story, and abundantly illustrating the reality of the Supernatural, needs no comment:--

“The Rev. Mr. Perring, Vicar of a parish which is now a component part of London, though, about forty-five years ago it had the appearance of a village at the outskirts, had to encounter the sad affliction of losing his eldest Son at an age when parents are encouraged to believe their children are to become their survivors; the youth dying in his seventeenth year. He was buried in the vaults of the church.

“Two nights subsequently to that interment, the father dreamed[122] that he saw his Son habited in a shroud spotted with blood, the expression of his countenance being that of a person enduring some paroxysm of acute pain: ‘Father, father! come and defend me!’ were the words he distinctly heard, as he gazed on this awe-inspiring apparition; ‘they will not let me rest quiet in my coffin.’

“The venerable man awoke with terror and trembling; but after a brief interval of painful reflection concluded himself to be labouring under the influence of his sad day-thoughts, and the depression of past sufferings; and with these rational assurances commended himself to the All-Merciful, and slumbered again and slept.

“He saw his Son again beseeching him to protect his remains from outrage, ‘For,’ said the apparently surviving dead one, ‘they are mangling my body at this moment.’ The unhappy Father rose at once, being now unable to banish the fearful image from his mind, and determined when day should dawn to satisfy himself of the delusiveness or verity of the revelation conveyed through this seeming voice from the grave.

“At an early hour, accordingly, he repaired to the Clerk’s house, where the keys of the church and of the vaults were kept. The Clerk after considerable delay, came down-stairs, saying it was very unfortunate he should want them just on that very day, as his son over the way had taken them to the smith’s for repair,--one of the largest of the bunch of keys having been broken off short in the main door of the vault, so as to render it impracticable for anybody to enter till the lock had been picked and taken off.

“Impelled by the worst misgivings, the Vicar loudly insisted on the Clerk’s accompanying him to the blacksmith’s--not for a key but for a crowbar, it being his resolute determination to enter the vault and see his Son’s coffin without a moment’s delay.

“The recollections of the dream were now becoming more and more vivid, and the scrutiny about to be made assumed a solemnity mingled with awe, which the agitation of the father rendered terrible to the agents in this forcible interruption into the resting-place of the dead. But the hinges were speedily wrenched asunder--the bar and bolts were beaten in and bent beneath the heavy hammer of the smith,--and at length with tottering and outstretched hands, the maddened parent stumbled and fell: his son’s coffin had been lifted from the recess at the vault’s side and deposited on the brick floor; the lid, released from every screw, lay loose at top, and the body, enveloped in its shroud, on which were several dark spots below the chin, lay exposed to view; the head had been raised, the broad riband had been removed from under the jaw, which now hung down with the most ghastly horror of expression, as if to tell with more terrific certainty the truth of the preceding night’s vision. _Every tooth in the head had been drawn._

“The young man had when living a beautiful set of sound teeth. The Clerk’s Son, who was a barber, cupper, and dentist, had possessed himself of the keys, and eventually of the teeth, for the purpose of profitable employment of so excellent a set in his line of business. The feelings of the Rev. Mr. Perring can be easily conceived. The event affected his mind through the remaining term of his existence; but what became of the delinquent whose sacrilegious hand had thus rifled the tomb was never afterwards correctly ascertained. He decamped the same day, and was supposed to have enlisted as a soldier. The Clerk was ignominiously displaced, and did not long survive the transaction. Some years afterwards, his house was pulled down to afford room for extensive improvements and new buildings in the village.

“As regards the occurrence itself, few persons were apprised of it; as the Vicar--shunning public talk and excitement on the subject of any member of his family--exerted himself in concealing the circumstances as much as possible. The above facts, however, may be strictly relied on as accurate.”

A somewhat similar dream is recorded in the following statement, copied from the public prints, the fact of which has been authenticated by a correspondent in Scotland, who furnished the Editor with it. The paragraph, now to be quoted, appeared some years ago in the “Scotsman” newspaper, and was quoted in the “Times” of Tuesday, April 25, 1865:--

“The legal proceedings which lately took place in the Sheriff Court of Clackmannanshire, with regard to the violation of a grave in the churchyard at Alloa, and the unwarrantable exhumation of the body of James Quin, had their origin, it is stated, in a remarkable dream of the mother of the deceased. Young Quin died in September, 1863, and was buried in a lair in the churchyard, which was purchased by his father from William Donaldson, the Kirk Treasurer, it being agreed that the price was to be paid by instalments. About six months afterwards, Robert Blair, the sexton or grave-digger, took upon himself (without the authority, it would appear, of Donaldson) to sell the same lair to another person, and to inter therein a relative of the new purchaser, without, however, at the time exhuming the body of Quin, the former tenant. Some considerable time after this the mother of Quin being desirous of erecting a head-stone on the grave of her son, made some inquiries with that view, in the course of which she heard something of another person having been buried in his grave, this having, as she stated, been ‘cast up’ by Blair’s nephew to a younger son of hers on their way from Sunday-school. But the grave-digger denied the truth of this story, and managed to pacify her. Feeling, however, that he had got into a scrape by the lair having been resold, he, some weeks after Mrs. Quin had interrogated him on the subject, dug up the body of her son during the night of Thursday, the 23rd of March last, and reinterred it in the other ground. Now, on that very Thursday night, as sworn to by Mrs. Quin, at the trial, she had this remarkable dream:--

“She dreamt that her boy stood in his nightgown, at her bedside, and said to her, ‘Oh, mother, put me back to my own bed.’ She then awoke her husband, and forgetting in her half-dreaming state that her son was dead, said to him, ‘Jemmie is out of his bed; put him back into it;’ after which she fell asleep, and again had the same dream.

“A third time, during the same night, she dreamt that her son was standing beside her bed; but on this occasion remembering that he was dead, the figure of the grave-digger was mixed up with that of the boy, and he appeared to be shoving his spade into the body. Awakening in great trepidation, and feeling certain that her boy had been taken out of his grave, she went to the grave-digger and vehemently accused him of having dug up the body, which, after prevarication, he at last admitted. Hence arose the action of damages against Donaldson, the Kirk Treasurer, and Blair, the grave-digger, which being restricted to twelve pounds was brought in the Small Debt Court. The Sheriff, after a long proof, assoilzied Donaldson, and found Blair liable in damages, which, the parties not having settled the same extrajudicially, have since been assessed at five pounds.”

Another dream, equally remarkable, by which a warning was given, and in a measure attended to by the dreamer, now follows; although not so weirdly tragic as that relating to the Perring Family, yet it efficiently serves to shadow forth the proximity of the spiritual world; and, it may be, in this example, the direct intervention of a guardian-angel:--

“Some years ago a clergyman named W---- was visiting an old college friend, Canon Hutchinson of Blurton Vicarage, near Trentham, and being a good pedestrian, proposed to accomplish his journey home again from Trentham to Birmingham, which place he desired to reach by ten o’clock one morning, on foot. In order to do this he intended to leave Blurton at four o’clock a.m. on a certain day; and so retired to rest the previous evening at an unusually early hour. During the night he had a vivid and remarkable dream, which deeply impressed him. He dreamt that whilst he was on his walking journey between Tamworth and Sutton, upon a very lonely road enclosed by tall hedges, he heard a rough voice cry out, ‘Ah, Jack, are you there?’ and looking round saw two exceedingly ill-looking men jumping down from an elevated part of the bank under the hedge, and alighting close to him on the path below. Their countenances and suspicious bearing seemed to bespeak their evil intentions. Presently one of them all of a sudden presented a pistol at him. The clergyman imagined that he had only a moment or two in which to commend his soul to God, which he did with earnestness, when the pistol was fired and his life thus taken away. Here the dream ended and he awoke. It left an uneasy impression on his mind, but being naturally of an undaunted spirit, and a firm believer in the protection of Almighty God, he did not hesitate to leave his friend’s house at the early period determined on. After walking for about an hour and a half, and when a few miles from Sutton Coldfield, where all of a sudden, as regards locality, he realized the minutest details of the dream, two men coming through the hedge suddenly overtook him. One addressed the other in the words already set forth. They were in every particular, even to features, dress, and demeanour, identical with those whom he had seen in the dream. They accompanied him, keeping close to his side, and watched him with very mysterious looks. He was deeply startled and alarmed, but lifted up his heart to God for guidance, direction, and protection. Soon they all reached a broad and dreary common, upon the extreme distant edge of which stood a small inn, whither he resolved to go for refreshment in the hope of shaking off his companions. Here for awhile they separated; but, on entering the house and asking to be supplied with tea, he found that the two men had followed him, and were asking for refreshments likewise. After waiting for some time, he determined on leaving the inn by a path at its back entrance, which, from knowing something of the locality, he believed would take him by a nearer way to Sutton Coldfield. This turned out to be the case; for by his action he successfully avoided the two tramps, who were afterwards taken up and imprisoned for some marked offence against the laws of the land.”[123]

A warning of a very similar character may now be narrated, in which the curious point seems to be that it was given so many years before it was needed, though its efficiency was fully made manifest when the actual danger threatened:--

“The Housekeeper of a county family in Oxfordshire dreamt one night that she had been left alone in the house upon a Sunday evening, and that hearing a knock at the door of the chief entrance, she went to it, and there found an ill-looking tramp armed with a bludgeon, who insisted on forcing himself into the house. She thought that she struggled for some time to prevent him so doing, but quite ineffectually; and that being struck down by him and rendered insensible, he thereupon gained ingress to the mansion. On this she awoke.

“She at once mentioned her dream to some of her fellow-servants, and also, a few days later, to the Master of the House. The latter, smiling, pooh-poohed it; but remarked that ‘all the greater care should be taken by the servants to see that the fastenings were secure.’

“As nothing happened for a considerable period, the circumstance of the dream was soon forgotten; and, as she herself asserts, had altogether passed away from her mind. However, many years afterwards, this same Housekeeper was left with two other servants to take charge of an isolated mansion at Kensington (subsequently the town residence of the family), when, on a certain Sunday evening, her fellow-servants having gone out and left her alone, she was suddenly startled by a loud knock at the front door.

“All of a sudden the remembrance of her former dream returned to her with singular vividness and remarkable force, and she felt her lonely isolation greatly. Accordingly, having at once lighted a lamp on the hall table--during which act the loud knock was repeated with vigour--she took the precaution to go up to a landing on the stair, throw up the window, and there, to her intense terror, she saw in the flesh the very man whom years previously she had seen in her dream, armed with a bludgeon and demanding an entrance. With great presence of mind she went down to the chief entrance, made that and other doors and windows more secure, and then rang the various bells of the house violently, and placed lights in the upper rooms. It was concluded that by these acts the intruder was scared away. It turned out afterwards that the lodge-keeper, having left two children to guard the entrance, they had been terrified into admitting the tramp into the garden; and that the latter had fastened them into the lodge, where they were found in a considerable state of alarm by the two servants on their return home.”[124]

Another example of a warning attended to, which had been given in a dream, and acted upon immediately afterwards, comes to the Editor on conclusive evidence of its undoubted truth and authenticity:

A Scotch lady, a relation of the late J. R. Hope Scott, Esq., of Abbotsford, dreamt that her nephew, a promising young student of the University of Edinburgh, had been drowned with two companions with whom he had made an engagement to take an excursion by boat on the Frith of Forth. So much impressed was she by this dream, that she rose two hours earlier than usual in the morning, and sent off her man-servant at once to prevail upon her nephew to give up his engagement. On being pressed he did so. His companions (who had also been warned not to go,) went without him, and alone, that is, without an experienced sailor. The boat was capsized and they were both drowned.

In the case which is now to follow, the warning given, not having been acted upon at once, came too late. It was narrated to the Editor, _vivâ voce_, in 1866, by the late Dr. J. M. Neale:--

“In the autumn of the year 1845, one of the maid-servants of the then rector of Shepperton, a village on the Thames, near Chertsey, dreamed that her brother, a respectable and steady youth belonging to that place, was drowned. The dream was singularly vivid. In it she further imagined that she actually went to search for her brother’s body, and that, after seeking for some time, she found it at a certain part of the river, which she knew well, near the brink, and in a particular position. This dream took place on a Saturday night. When she awoke on the Sunday morning, she at once acquainted her fellow-servant (who saw how deep an impression the dream had evidently made), and remarked that she ought at once to obtain her master’s leave to go home on the morrow, and warn her brother, who was unable to swim, not to go out on to the river. The leave was given, and her home was soon reached, but alas! the warning had come too late. Her brother had gone rowing on the Sunday evening, the boat was accidentally upset, and he was drowned. The body was not recovered for some time; nor was it found near the spot where the accident had happened. But it was found by the poor youth’s sister, lower down the river, and exactly in the same place and position as had been so forcibly and clearly prefigured in her impressive dream.”

The following example of a dream which occurred about twenty years ago, by which the fact of a murder was made known, being likewise well authenticated and of considerable interest, is now set forth:--

“On Saturday, the 30th of July, 1853, the dead body of a young woman was discovered in a field at Littleport, in the isle of Ely. The body has not yet been identified, and there can be little doubt that the young woman was murdered. At the adjourned inquest, held on the 29th August before Mr. William Marshall, one of the coroners for the Isle, the following extraordinary evidence was given:--

“James Jessop, an elderly, respectable-looking labourer, with a face of the most perfect stolidity, and who possessed a most curiously-shaped skull, broad and flat on the top, and projecting greatly on each side over the ears, deposed--‘I live about a furlong and a half from where the body was found. I have seen the body of the deceased. I have never seen her before her death. On the night of Friday, the 29th of July, I dreamt three successive times that I heard the cry of murder issuing from near the bottom of a close called Little Ditchment Close (the place where the body was found). The first time I dreamt I heard the cry it awoke me. I fell asleep again and dreamt the same thing. I then awoke again and told my wife I could not rest, but I dreamt it again after that. I got up between four and five o’clock, but I did not go down to the close, the wheat and barley in which has been since cut.

“‘I dreamt once about twenty years ago that I saw a woman hanging in a barn, and on passing the next morning the barn which had appeared to me in my dream, I entered and did find a woman there hanging, and cut her down in time to save her life. I never told my wife that I heard cries of “murder,” but I have mentioned it to several persons since. I saw the body on the Saturday it was found. I did not mention my dream to any one till a day or two after that. I saw the field distinctly in my dream and the trees therein, but I saw no person in it. On the night of the murder the wind lay from that spot to my house.’

“Rhoda Jessop, wife of the last witness, stated that her husband related his dreams to her on the evening of the day that the body was found.”[125]

Another case, deeply interesting, and certainly more dramatic in the nature and importance of the very practical results which followed from the action taken upon it, than even that already recorded of the Perring family (for it greatly benefited the living), is now narrated. The interesting account, which, with the greatest simplicity, and in the actual words of the persons advantaged, records the plain facts, tells its own story with considerable power. Frivolous and pointless as are so many dreams, without intelligible purpose or sequence of action, this is one which it may be reasonably held can only be explained by a firm belief in a superintending Providence, in other words in Almighty God, Who, as an old writer asserts, “sometimes warneth and instructeth in dreams,” and Who mercifully uses the ministry both of angels and men for carrying out His Divine purpose:--

“A Gloucestershire gentleman in good circumstances, who for many years had lived a retired life, quite apart from his relations, some of whom in a previous year had been cast in a lawsuit with him for the recovery of certain properties, suddenly died, and, as was supposed, died intestate.

“He had long intended, at the advice of the Rector of the village in which he dwelt, and with whom alone he was on terms of intimacy, to make certain provisions by will on behalf of the relations in question, who had lost much by his successful lawsuit. However, this (as was believed by his family lawyer, residing in an adjacent country town, who proceeded to settle his affairs) had not been done; and the whole of his property consequently seemed likely to go to his heir-at-law, a man of property, almost unknown to him.

“Five months after his death, however, the Rector of the parish in which he had lived, had what he termed ‘a waking dream,’ in which he imagined that the deceased gentleman came to him in sorrow, and solemnly conjured him to obtain possession of a Will, which had been duly made by him in London a few months before his decease, and which was in the custody of a firm of attorneys there, which Will was so drawn as that the relations in question should greatly benefit by the just and righteous disposition therein of his property. Imagining the dream to be only a dream and nothing more, he took no notice of it, and regarded it as the mere result of his own imagination.