The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1870-07-30
Dreaming.

When full third part of life is consumed
in sleep, it is wonderful how little has been
written, and how little known, about this
halfway state between life and DEATH
Not even the means Of procuring this cov-
eted repose, of securing as much as is ne
cessary to sanity, of preventing the night
watches from being perverted into 4 curse,
are commonly understood. People toss
about restlessly on their beds after green
tea OF coffee, after midnight feastine, the
study of embarrassed accounts, or some
narrowing news, and wonder what it all
means. A long walk just before retiring.
the hearing of a monotonous discourse, the
nearness of falling water, even bowl
of chocolate, and sometimes sponge bath
will change all these relations, and secure
that rest which his pillow of hops gave to
George III. A cane bolster is said to be a
great help to somnolency. One eminent
missionary used to repeat the Lords prayer
TILL as he said, the devil of restlessness
was cast out" Erskine knew man cured
Of sleeplessness by dressing him as watch
man, and putting him in sentry-box.-
Brodie, the great surgeon, used to tell of a
friend of his reduced by poverty to picking
stone on English roads, who refused every
offer of change of circumstances because
of the splendid nights sleep he now enjoy
ed. Boerhave procured this blessing for a .
patient by keeping wafer dropping at his
bedside. Generally, a rood digestion, and
plenty of open air exeEise will save one
from ever realizing anything like what
Coleridge described to tottle "Night is
my hell sleep my tormehing angel Three
nights out Of four fall sleep struggling
to be awake, and frequet night-screams
have made me nuisanc, Dreams with
me are no shadows, but til very calamities
of my life
The cause of sleep was imagined to be
the swelling Of the blootvessels of the
brain but woman who Chad her head
broken proved the revers, During pro-
found sleep her brain was ,und to be per-
fectly motionless and in DER animals if
has been discovered that iEleep the veins
cease to be swollen, and theurface of the
brain becomes pale whemhe animal is
the blood is seen cotsine rapidly
through full veins.
But, we would speak nowf disturbed
sleep. DR.. Rush said a dreambas a trans.
lent paroxysm of delirium. ie cause of
such vagaries Of the imaginson is often
detected easily, having frequeIy some re-
lation to our waking thoughts or. taking
the hint from surrounding cirmstances.
Immediately after reading lrchas' ac-
count of the palace of Kubla Ian, Cole ,
ridge dreamed poem of tw hundred .
lines, beginning with t
"In Panda did Kubla Khan {
stately pleasure dome Gree,
Where Alp the sacred river n I
Through caverns measureleso man
Down to sunless sea-
So DR.. Gregory dreamed of viking up
Mount Etna, because of a bot of hot
water in his feet, and another tinof being
frozen at Hudsen's Bay because e bed :
cover had fallen off. DR.. Reidelieyed |,
himself scalped by Indians beca, of a
blister on his head. Professor -pham
gives the case of an officer in the Lisbure J
expedition of 1853, who was proned by
whispers during slumber to belle lust 9
what the people around him CHI: now :,
that he was fighting duel, now at he !,
was entering into fearful battle, v that
a shark was close upon him in ttyater. "
Baron Trenck, we remember, was ,nent-
ed in his starved dungeon by drean,f the :"
luxurious tables of Berlin. An Edi,roh y
gentleman and his wife had been cited -
about French invasion, and thewere '.
interested in military drill beft the
castle; it was not strange that the ling ",
Of a pair of tongs made both Dire an u,
alarm was given, troops were maino
and fighting had begun. '
A curious experience of Col. Knahce h,
a theatre critic of renown, and thoro,lv IN
brave man, rises to my memory in lila CT
ton of this point. Col. Knapp visi a 81,
New England village, where he wah-
quainted with but single family, in Ne is
Of laying ghost which was reporte5 no
visit the village graveyard every midni, W.
Placing himself on tomb, the Cole w,
gradually fell asleep; at once he Sc emet w;
be sinking into the grave, a sensation caui ~.
by the dampncss of the stone on which IN
reclined. By-and-by he became sensible an
female in white standing over him, wi be
i'en.e Pi'y' liz ioso up sh
retreated, and he followed her to the We nc
door of his friends house. The next d,, ~
he called upon the family. The surviviI 90;
sister wept when she saw their friend, bs E
cause of dream the previous night of BE-.