No. 54.—From MRS. HARRISON.
"February 7th, 1891.
"I reside with my husband at 15 Lupton Street, N.W. This afternoon I was lying on the sofa, sound asleep, when I suddenly awoke, thinking I heard my husband sigh as if in pain. I arose immediately, expecting to find him in the room. He was not there, and looking at my watch I found it was half-past three. At six o'clock my husband came in. He called my attention to a bruise on his forehead, which was caused by his having knocked it against the stone steps in a Turkish bath. I said to him, 'I know when it happened—it was at half-past three, for I heard you sigh as if in pain at that time.' He replied, 'Yes, that was the exact time, for I remember noticing the clock directly after.'
"The gentleman who appends his name as witness was present when this conversation took place.
"LOUISA E. HARRISON."Witness: Henry Hooton, 23 Bunhill Row, E.C."
This account was sent to the S.P.R. by Mr. Harrison on the day of the occurrence described. In an accompanying letter he writes: "Everything happened exactly as stated."
In the cases which follow, with one exception, the dream impression was of a well-marked visual nature. In the first three narratives the dream had reference to the death of the person represented. The mode of representation, however, it will be seen, differed in each case. In the first, the associated imagery was in part of a fantastic nature, and the dream, though sufficiently exceptional to leave a feeling of fatigue on the following morning, and to induce the percipient to write an account of it to his friends, resembled in other respects the motley crowd which throng through the gate of ivory. In the second case the surroundings of the central figure were such as the waking imagination of the dreamer would naturally have conjured up in picturing the deathbed of his friend.
No. 55.—From MR. J. T.
This case is recorded at some length in the Proceedings of the Am. S.P.R. (pp. 394-397) by Professor Royce. Professor Royce explains that Mr. E., the agent, died after a short illness in New York City, on Tuesday, February 23rd, 1886. Mr. J. T., who, though an acquaintance of Mr. E., had heard nothing of him for some time, and, as indeed appears from the letters quoted, knew of no special cause for anxiety, was on the day of the death, and for some time afterwards, in St. John, New Brunswick. In consequence of severe snowstorms, no mails had been received in St. John from the South for some days, and at the time when the letter, an extract from which we give below, was written, it was not possible for the writer to have known of Mr. E.'s death. The original letter, written by Mr. J. T. to his wife, and dated Wednesday, March 3rd, 1886, on paper headed Hotel Dufferin, St. John, N.B., has been seen by Professor Royce:—
"I have not heard of you for an age. The train that should have been here on Friday last has not arrived yet. I had a very strange dream on Tuesday night. I have never been in Ottawa in my life, and yet I was there, in Mr. E.'s house. Mrs. E., Miss E., and the little girls were in great trouble because Mr. E. was ill. I had to go and tell my brother [Mr. E.'s son-in-law], and, strange to say, he was down a coal-mine.
"When I got down to him I told him that Mr. E. was dead. But in trying to get out we could not do it. We climbed and climbed, but always fell back. I felt tired out when I awoke next morning, and I cannot account for the dream in any way."
Though the letter leaves it doubtful whether the dream actually occurred on the night of the death, or a week later, it appears from further correspondence that the percipient believes the dream to have taken place on the night of the 23rd February, the night of the death, and this is the most natural interpretation of the letter.[90] In any case, the dream preceded the news of the death.