er a long and perplexed
pause, did at last say, "I have seen a dreadful vision since I saw you:
I have seen my dear wife pass twice by me through this room, with her
hair hanging about her shoulders, and a dead child in her arms: this I
have seen since I saw you." To which Sir Robert replied, "Sure, sir, you
have slept since I saw you; and this is the result of some melancholy
dream, which I desire you to forget, for you are now awake." To which
Mr. Donne's reply was: "I cannot be surer that I now live than that I
have not slept since I saw you: and am as sure that at her second
appearing she stopped and looked me in the face, and vanished." Rest and
sleep had not altered Mr. Donne's opinion the next day: for he then
affirmed this vision with a more deliberate, and so confirmed a
confidence, that he inclined Sir Robert to a faint belief that the
vision was true. It is truly said that desire and doubt have no rest;
and it proved so with Sir Robert; for he immediately sent a servant to
Drewry House, with a charge to hasten back and bring him word whether
Mrs. Donne were alive; and, if alive, in what condition she was as to
her health. The twelfth day the messenger returned with this
account:--That he found and left Mrs. Donne very sad and sick in her
bed; and that, after a long and dangerous labour, she had been delivered
of a dead child. And, upon examination, the abortion proved to be the
same day, and about the very hour, that Mr. Donne affirmed he saw her
pass by him in his chamber.

This is a relation that will beget some wonder, and it well may; for
most of our world are at present possessed with an opinion that visions
and miracles are ceased. And, though it is most certain that two lutes,
being both strung and tuned to an equal pitch, and then one played upon,
the other that is not touched, being laid upon a table at a fit
distance, will--like an echo to a trumpet--warble a faint audible
harmony in answer to the same tune; yet many will not believe there is
any such thing as a sympathy of souls; and I am well pleased that every
reader do enjoy his own opinion. But if the unbelieving will not allow
the believing reader of this story, a liberty to believe that it may be
true, then I wish him to consider many wise men have believed that the
ghost of Julius Caesar did appear to Brutus, and that both St. Austin,
and Monica his mother, had visions in order to his conversion. And
though these and many others--too many to