The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1838-08-17 00:00:00

THE DRUNKARD'S DREAM-A SKETCH.

Amongst other articles of distinguished merit, the Dublin
University Magazine for the present month contains a sketch
of surpassing power under the title of "The Drunkard's
Dream," being a fourth extract from the late F. Purcell,
P.P. of Drumcoolagh. The writer is supposed to have been
sent for to administer the last rites of the Roman Catholic
Church to Pat. Connell, a drunken carpenter, who was sup-
posed to have been dying, if not actually dead, in a fit of
intoxication. _ . .

The appearance of the corpse is represented as having
been almost supernaturally horrible, when it suddenly began
to move, and, to the astonishment of the spectators, it was
found that a lancet wound in the arm bad unexpectedly
yielded a copious flow of blood, and had thus restored the
patient to animation. The writer proceeds with his narra-
tive in the following terms:—
" I left the patient with leeches upon his temples, and
bleeding freely—apparently with little of the drowsiness
which accompanies apoplexy; indeed, Doctor D— told
me that he had never before witnessed a seizure which
seemed to combine the symptoms of so many kinds, and
which vet belonged to none of the recognised classes; it
certainly was not apoplexy, catalepsy, nor delirium tremens,
and yet it seemed to partake of the properties of all—it was
strange, but stranger things are coming. During two or
three days Dr. D— would not allow his patient to converse
in a manner which could excite or exhaust him, with any
one ; he suffered him merely, as briefly as possible, to express
his immediate wants, and it was not until the fourth day
after my early visit, the particulars of which I have just de-
tailed, that it was thought expedient that should see him,
and then only because it appeared that his extreme importu-
nity and impatience were likely to retard his recovery more
than the mere exhaustion attendant upon a short conversa-
tion could possibly do; perhaps, too, my friend entertained
some hope that if by holy confession his patient's bosom were
eased of the perilous stuff, which no doubt oppressed it, his
recovery would be more assured and rapid. It was, then,
as I have said, upon the fourth day after my first professional
call, that I found myself once more in the dreary chamber
of want and sickness. The man was in bed, and appeared
low and restless. On my entering the room he raised
himself in the bed, and muttered twice or thrice—' Thank
God ! thank God.' I signed to those of his family who
stood by to leave the room, and took a chair beside
the bed. So soon as we were alone, he said, rather
doggedly—' There 's no use now in telling me of the
sinfulness of bad ways—l know it all—l know where they
lead to-1 see every thing about it with my own eye-
sight, as plain as I see you.' He rolled himself in the bed,
as if to hide his face in the clothes, and then suddenly raising
himself, he exclaimed with startling vehemence—' Look, sir,
there is no use in mincing the matter; I'm blasted with the
fires of hell; I have been in hell; what do you think of
that?—in hell—l'm lost for ever—l have not a chance—l
am damned already—damned—damned—.' The end of
this sentence he actually shouted; his vehemence was per-
fectly terrific; he threw himself back, and laughed and
sobbed hysterically. I poured some water into a tea cup,
and gave it to him. After he had swallowed it, I told him
that if be had any filing to communicate, to do it as briefly
as he could, and in a manner as little agitating to himself as
possible, threatening at the same time, though I had no in-
tention of doing so, to leave him at once, in case he gave
way to such passionate excitement. 'lt's only foolishness,'
he continued, for me to try to thank you for coming to such
a villain as myself at all ; it's no use for me to wish good to
you or to bless you; for such as me has no blessing to give.'
I told him that I had but done my duty, and urged him to
proceed to the matter which weighed upon- his mind ; he
then spoke nearly as follows :-1 came in drunk on Friday
night last, and got to my bed here, I don't remember how ;
sometime in the night it seemed to me, I wakened, and feel-
ing uneasy in myself, I got up out of bed. I wanted the
fresh air, but I would not makes noise to open the window,
for fear I'd waken the crathurs. It was very dark, and trou-
blesome to find the door; but at last I did get it, and I
groped my way out, and went down as easy as I could. I
felt quite sober, and I counted the steps one after another,
as I was going down, that I might not stumble at the bottom
When I came to the first landing place, God be about us
always ! the floor of it sunk under me, and I went down,
down, till the sense almost left me. Ido not know how long
I was falling, but it seemed to me a great while. When I
came rightly to myself at last, I was sitting on a great table,
near the top of it; and I could not see the end of it, if it bad
any, it was so far off; and there was men beyond reckoning.
sitting down, all along by it, at each side, as far as I could
see at all. I did not know at first it was in the open air;
but there was a close smothering feel in it, that was not
natural, and there was a kind of light that my eyesight
never saw before, red and unsteady, and I did not see for a
long time where it was coining from, until I looked
straight up, and then I seen that it came from great balls of
blood-coloured fire, that were rolling high over head with a
sort of rushing trembling sound, and I perceived that they
shone on the ribs of a great roof of rock that was arched over-
head instead of he sky. When I seen this, scarce knowing
what I did, I got up, and said, 'I have no right to be here, I
must go,' and the man that was sitting at my left hand, only
smiled, and said 'sit down again, you can never leave this
place," and his voice was weaker that any child's voice I ever
heard, and when he had done speaking he smiled again. Then
I spoke out very loud and bold, and said—' in the name of
God let me out of this bad place,' And there was a great man,
that I did not see before, sitting at the end of the table that I
was near, and he was taller than twelve men, and his face
was very proud and terrible to look at, and he stood up, and
stretched out his hand before him, and when be stood up, all
that was there, both great and small, bowed down with a sigh-
ing sound. and a dread came on my heart, and he looked at
me, and I could not speak. I felt I was his own, to do what
he liked with, for I knew at once who be was, and he said, `if
you promise to return you may depart for a season ;' and the
voice he spoke with was terrible and mournful, and the echoes
of it went rolling and swelling down the endless cave, and
mixing with the trembling.of the fire overhead; so that, when
he sat down, there was a sound after him, all through the
place, like the roaring of a furnace, and I said, with all the
strength I had, I promise to come back; in God's name let
me go,' and with that I lost the sight and the hearing of all
that was there, and when my senses came to me again, I was
sitting in the bed, with the blood allover me, and you and the
rest praying around the room." Here he paused, and wiped
away the chill drops of horror which hung upon his forehead.
I remained silent for some moments. 'rhe vision which he
had just described struck my imagination not a little, for this
was long before Vatheck and the " Hall of Ebles" had de-
lighted the world; and the description which he gave had, as
1 received it, all the attractions of novelty, beside the impres-
siveness which always belongs to the narration of an eye wit-
ness, whether in the body or in the spirit, of the scenes which
he describes. There was something, too, in the stern horror
with which the man related these things, and in the incon-
gruity of his description, with the vulgarly received notions
of the great place of punishment, and of its presiding spirit,
which struck my mind with awe, almost with fear. At length
he said, with an expression of horrible, imploring earnestness,
which I shall never forget—" Well, sir, is there any hope ; is
there any chance at all ? or is my soul pledged and
away for ever? is it gone out of my power ? must I go back
to the place?"
In answering him I bad no easy task to perform; for how-
ever clear might be my internal conviction of the groundless-
ness of his fears, and however strong my scepticism respect-
ing the reality of what he had described, I nevertheless felt
that his impression to the contrary, and his humility and
terror -resulting from it, might be made available as no mean
engines in the work of his conversion from profligacy, and of
his restoration to decent habits, and to religious feeling. I
therefore told him that he was to regard his dream rather in
the light of a warning than in that of a prophecy ; that our
salvation depended not upon the word or deed of a moment,
but upon the habits of a life; that, in floe, if he at once dis-
carded his idle companions and evil habits, and firmly ad-
hered to a sober, industrious, and religious course of life, the
powers of darkness might claim his soul in vain, for that
there were higher and firmer pledges than human tongue
could utter, which promised salvation to him who should
repent and lead a new life.

I left him much comforted, and with a promise to return
upon the next day. I did so, and found him much more
cheerful, and without any remains of the dogged sullenness
which I suppose had arisen from his despair. His promises
of amendment were given in that tone of deliberate ear-
nestess which belongs to deep and solemn determination;
and it was with no small delight that I observed, after re-
peated visits, that his good resolutions, so far from failing, did
but gather strength by time; and when I saw that man shake
off the idle and debauched companions, whose society had for
years formed alike his amusement and his ruin, and revive
his long-discarded habits of industry and sobriety, I said
within myself there is something more in all this than
the operation of an idle dream. One day, some time after
his restoration to health, I was surprised on ascending the
stairs, for the purpose of visiting this man, to find him busily
employed in nailing some planks upon the landing-place,
through which, at the commencement of his mysterious vi-
sion, it seemed to him he had sunk. I perceived at once he
was securing the floor with a view of securing himself against
such a catastrophe, and could scarce forbear a smile when I
bid God bless his work.'

" He perceived my thoughts, I suppose, for he immediate-
ly said,
" I can never pass over that floor without trembling. I'd
leave this house if I could, hut I can't find another lodging
in the town so cheap, and I'll not take a better till I've paid
off all my debts, please God; but I could not be easy in my
mind till I made it as safe as I could. You'll hardly believe
rue, your honour, that while I'm working, maybe a mile
away, my heart is in a flutter all the way back, with the bare
thoughts of those two little steps I have to walk upon this
bit of a floor. So it's no wonder, I'd they to make it sound
and firm with any idle timber I have.'
" I applauded his resolution to pay off his debts, and the
steadiness with which he pursued his plan of conscientious
economy, and passed on.
Many months elapsed, and still there appeared no altera-
tion in his resolutions of amendment. He was a good work-
man, and with his better habits he recovered his former ex-
tensive and profitable employment. Every thing seemed to
promise comfort and respectability. I have little more to
add, and that shall be told quickly. I had one evening
met Pat Connell, as he returned from his work, and, as usual,
after a mutual, and, on his side, respectful salutation, I
spoke a few words of encouragementand approval. I left him
industrious, active, healthy—when next I saw him, not three
days after, he was a corpse. The circumstances which marked
the event of his death were somewhat strange—l might say
fearful. Tha'unfortunate man bad accidentally met with a❑
early friend, just returned, after a long absence, and in a
moment of excitement, forgetting everything in the warmth
of his joy, he yielded to his urgent invitation to accompany
him into a public-house, which lay close to the spot where
the encounter had taken place. Connell, however, previ-
ously to his entering the room, had announced his determi-
nation to take nothing more than the strictest temperance
would warrant. But oh ! who can describe the inveterate
tenacity with which a drunkard's'habits cling to him through
life. He may repent—he may reform—he may look with
actual abhorrence upon his past profligacy ; but amid all
this reformation and compunction, who can tell the moment
in which the base and ruinous propensity may not recur, tri-
umphing over resolution, remorse, shame, everything, and
prostrating its victim once more in all that is destructive and
revolting in that fatal vice!
" The wretched man left the place in a state of utter in-
toxication. He was brought home nearly insensible, and
placed in his bed, where he lay in the deep, calm lethargy of
drunkenness. The younger part of the family retired to rest
much after their usual hour; but the poor wife remained up
sitting by the fire, too much grieved and shocked at the re-
currence of what she had so little expected, to settle to rest;
fatigue, however, at length overcame her, and she sunk gra-
dually into an uneasy slumber. She could not tell how long
she had remained in this state, when she awakened, and
immediately on opening► her eyes, she perceived by the faint
red light of the mouldering turf embers, two persons, one of
whom she recognized as her husband, steal noiselessly out of
the room.

" ' 1);.1, darling, where are you going ?' said she. There
was no answer—the door closed after them ; but in a mo-
ment she was startled and terrified by a heavy crash, as if
some ponderous body had been hurled down the stair. Much
alarmed, she started up, and going to the head of the stair-
case,, she called repeatedly on her husband, but in vain.—
She returned to the room, and with the assistance of her
daughter, whom I had occasion to mention before, she suc-
ceeded in finding and lighting a candle, with which she hur-
ried again to the head of the staircase. At the bottom lay
what teemed to he a bundle of clothes, heaped together, mo-
tionless. lifeless—lt was her husband. In going down the
stair,,, for what purpose can never now be known, he had
fallen helplessly and violently to the bottom, and, coming
head formost, the spine at the neck bad been dislocated by
the shock, and instant death mutt have ensued. The body
1 sy upon that landing-place to which his dream had referred.
It is scarcely worth endeavouring to clear up a single point
in a narrative where all is mystery; vet I could nut help
suspecting that the second figure whirl, had been seen in the
room by Connell's wife on the night of his death, might have
been no other than his own shadow. I suggested this Bolt'.