I. The dreamer sees three lions in a desert, one of which is laughing, but she is not afraid of them. Then, however, she must have fled from them, for she is trying to climb a tree, but she finds that her cousin, who is a teacher of French, is already up in the tree, &c.
The analysis gives us the following material for this dream: A sentence in the dreamer’s English lesson had become the indifferent occasion for it: “The lion’s greatest beauty is his mane.” Her father wore a beard which surrounded his face like a mane. The name of her English teacher was Miss Lyons. An acquaintance of hers had sent her the ballads of Loewe (German, Loewe—lion). These, then, are the three lions; why should she have been afraid of them? She has read a story in which a negro who has incited his fellows to revolt is hunted with bloodhounds and climbs a tree to save himself. Then follow fragments in wanton mood, like the following. Directions for catching lions from Die Fliegende Blaetter: “Take a desert and strain it; the lions will remain.” Also a very amusing, but not very proper anecdote about an official who is asked why he does not take greater pains to win the favour of his superior officer, and who answers that he has been trying to insinuate himself, but that the man ahead of him is already up. The whole matter becomes intelligible as soon as one learns that on the day of the dream the lady had received a visit from her husband’s superior. He was very polite to her, kissed her hand, and she was not afraid of him at all, although he is a “big bug” (German—Grosses Tier = “big animal”) and plays the part of a “social lion” in the capital of her country. This lion is, therefore, like the lion in the Midsummer Night’s Dream, who unmasks as Snug, the joiner, and of such stuff are all dream lions made when one is not afraid.
II. As my second example, I cite the dream of the girl who saw her sister’s little son lying dead in a coffin, but who, I may now add, felt no pain or sorrow thereat. We know from analysis why not. The dream only concealed her wish to see the man she loved again; the affect must be attuned to the wish, and not to its concealment. There was no occasion for sorrow at all.
In a number of dreams the emotion at least remains connected with that presentation content which has replaced the one really belonging to it. In others the breaking up of the complex is carried further. The affect seems to be entirely separated from the idea belonging to it, and finds a place somewhere else in the dream where it fits into the new arrangement of the dream elements. This is similar to what we have learned of acts of judgment of the dream. If there is a significant inference in the dream thoughts, the dream also contains one; but in the dream the inference may be shifted to entirely different material. Not infrequently this shifting takes place according to the principle of antithesis.
I illustrate the latter possibility by the following dream, which I have subjected to the most exhaustive analysis.
III. A castle by the sea; afterwards it lies not directly on the sea, but on a narrow canal that leads to the sea. A certain Mr. P. is the governor of it. I stand with him in a large salon with three windows, in front of which rise the projections of a wall, like battlements of a fort. I belong to the garrison, perhaps as a volunteer marine officer. We fear the arrival of hostile warships, for we are in a state of war. Mr. P. has the intention of leaving; he gives me instructions as to what must be done in case the dreaded event happens. His sick wife is in the threatened castle with her children. As soon as the bombardment begins the large hall should be cleared. He breathes heavily, and tries to get away; I hold him back, and ask him in what way I should send him news in case of need. He says something else, and then all at once falls over dead. I have probably taxed him unnecessarily with my questions. After his death, which makes no further impression upon me, I think whether the widow is to remain in the castle, whether I should give notice of the death to the commander-in-chief, and whether I should take over the direction of the castle as the next in command. I now stand at the window, and muster the ships as they pass by; they are merchantmen that dart past upon the dark water, several of them with more than one smokestack, others with bulging decks (that are quite similar to the railway stations in the preliminary dream which has not been told). Then my brother stands next to me, and both of us look out of the window on to the canal. At the sight of a ship we are frightened, and call out: “Here comes the warship!” It turns out, however, that it is only the same ships which I have already known that are returning. Now comes a little ship, strangely cut off, so that it ends in the middle of its breadth; curious things like cups or salt-cellars are seen on the deck. We call as though with one voice: “That is the breakfast-ship.”
The rapid motion of the ships, the deep blue of the water, the brown smoke of the funnels, all this together makes a highly tense, sombre impression.
The localities in this dream are put together from several journeys to the Adriatic Sea (Miramare, Duino, Venice, Aquileja). A short but enjoyable Easter trip to Aquileja with my brother, a few weeks before the dream, was still fresh in my memory. Besides, the naval war between America and Spain, and the worry connected with it about my relatives living in America, play a part. Manifestations of emotion appear at two places in this dream. In one place an emotion that would be expected is lacking—it is expressly emphasized that the death of the governor makes no impression upon me; at another point, where I see the warships I am frightened, and experience all the sensations of fright while I sleep. The distribution of affects in this well-constructed dream has been made in such a way that every obvious contradiction is avoided. For there is no reason why I should be frightened at the governor’s death, and it is fitting that as the commander of the castle I should be alarmed by the sight of the warship. Now analysis shows that Mr. P. is nothing but a substitute for my own Ego (in the dream I am his substitute). I am the governor who suddenly dies. The dream thoughts deal with the future of those dear to me after my premature death. No other disagreeable thought is to be found among the dream thoughts. The fright which is attached to the sight of the warship must be transferred from it to this disagreeable thought. Inversely, the analysis shows that the region of the dream thoughts from which the warship comes is filled with most joyous reminiscences. It was at Venice a year before, one charmingly beautiful day, that we stood at the windows of our room on the Riva Schiavoni and looked upon the blue lagoon, in which more activity could be seen that day than usually. English ships were being expected, they were to be festively received; and suddenly my wife called out, happy as a child: “There come the English warships!” In the dream I am frightened at the very same words; we see again that speeches in the dream originate from speeches in life. I shall soon show that even the element “English” in this speech has not been lost for the dream activity. I thus convert joy into fright on the way from the dream thoughts to the dream content, and I need only intimate that by means of this very transformation I give expression to a part of the latent dream content. The example shows, however, that the dream activity is at liberty to detach the occasion for an affect from its context in the dream thoughts, and to insert it at any other place it chooses in the dream content.
I seize the opportunity which is incidentally offered, of subjecting to closer analysis the “breakfast ship,” whose appearance in the dream so nonsensically concludes a situation that has been rationally adhered to. If I take a closer view of this object in the dream, I am now struck by the fact that it was black, and that on account of its being cut off at its greatest breadth it closely resembled, at the end where it was cut off, an object which had aroused our interest in the museums of the Etruscan cities. This object was a rectangular cup of black clay with two handles, upon which stood things like coffee cups, or tea cups, very similar to our modern breakfast table service. Upon inquiring, we learned that this was the toilet set of an Etruscan lady, with little boxes for rouge and powder; and we said jokingly to each other that it would not be a bad idea to take a thing like that home to the lady of the house. The dream object, therefore, signifies “black toilet” (German, toilette—dress)—mourning—and has direct reference to a death. The other end of the dream object reminds us of the “boat” (German, Nachen), from the root νέχυς, as a philological friend has told me, upon which corpses were laid in prehistoric times and were left to be buried by the sea. With this circumstance is connected the reason for the return of the ships in the dream.
“Quietly the old man on his rescued boat drifts into the harbour.”