clutch empty air, and then I fall downward, and
still downward, and in the midst of the fall I dissolve into the
atmosphere upon which I have been floating so precariously.

Some of my dreams seem to be traced one within another like a series of
concentric circles. In sleep I think I cannot sleep. I toss about in the
toils of tasks unfinished. I decide to get up and read for a while. I
know the shelf in my library where I keep the book I want. The book has
no name, but I find it without difficulty. I settle myself comfortably
in the morris-chair, the great book open on my knee. Not a word can I
make out, the pages are utterly blank. I am not surprised, but keenly
disappointed. I finger the pages, I bend over them lovingly, the tears
fall on my hands. I shut the book quickly as the thought passes through
my mind, "The print will be all rubbed out if I get it wet." Yet there
is no print tangible on the page!

This morning I thought that I awoke. I was certain that I had overslept.
I seized my watch, and sure enough, it pointed to an hour after my
rising time. I sprang up in the greatest hurry, knowing that breakfast
was ready. I called my mother, who declared that my watch must be
wrong. She was positive it could not be so late. I looked at my watch
again, and lo! the hands wiggled, whirled, buzzed and disappeared. I
awoke more fully as my dismay grew, until I was at the antipodes of
sleep. Finally my eyes opened actually, and I knew that I had been
dreaming. I had only waked into sleep. What is still more bewildering,
there is no difference between the consciousness of the sham waking and
that of the real one.

It is fearful to think that all that we have ever seen, felt, read, and
done may suddenly rise to our dream-vision, as the sea casts up objects
it has swallowed. I have held a little child in my arms in the midst of
a riot and spoken vehemently, imploring the Russian soldiers not to
massacre the Jews. I have re-lived the agonizing scenes of the Sepoy
Rebellion and the French Revolution. Cities have burned before my eyes,
and I have fought the flames until I fell exhausted. Holocausts overtake
the world, and I struggle in vain to save my friends.

Once in a dream a message came speeding over land and sea that winter
was descending upon the world from the North Pole, that the Arctic zone
was shifting to our mild climate. Far and wide the message flew. The
ocean was congealed in midsummer. Ships were held fast in