ABSTRACT
The past is all of one texture—whether feigned or suffered—whether acted out in three dimensions, or only witnessed in that small theatre of the brain which the people keep brightly lighted all night long, after the jets are down and darkness and sleep reign undisturbed in the remainder of the body. Well, in his dream-life, he passed a long day in the surgical theatre, his heart in his mouth. Time went quicker in the life of dreams, some seven hours to one; and it went, besides, more intensely, so that the gloom of these fancied experiences clouded the day. The poor gentleman has since been troubled by nothing of the sort; indeed, his nights were for some while like other men's, now blank, now checkered with dreams, and these sometimes charming, sometimes appalling, but except for an occasional vividness, of no extraordinary kind.
