Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1898-02-20
, A Woman's Dream. { BY CHARLES B. LEWIS.
 Copyright ls9sl .-ee-e.-ee1ae-.a.Ss-e-<.-.a-s-.-s.
 Copyright. 1S9S.l

l ham manufacturers and man famous in his day for his good deeds, his wife l Emeline became engaged to a gentle man named Welby. He was a gentle man by birth us well as title, and, asfar as humble man like me could find out, was in every way worthy, though poorly off in this worlds goods. His health was also failing him, and soon after it was publicly known that they were betrothed he was ordered by his physicians to make voyage to Callao and return, on a sailing ship. In pur- snance of this, he selected the Me teor, fine new ship on her second voyage, and had a cabin specially pre- pared and was the only passenger aboard.
 The Meteor sailed away from Liver pool on a certain date, and was spoken here and there until she was fairly off Cape Horn. Then the last news of her came, and weeks and months dragged away and she was posted as lost and given 1lp by every body. Being nobody but sailor man with first mates certificate, l can only tell you what read in the papers and heard talked among my own class. That was to the effect that the rich widow was nearly heart-broken over the loss of her lover, and that her life was despaired of for many weeks IL wasn't much use to figure on how the Meteor was lost. She struck the regions of the cape in winter time, and that meant snow, and sIeet, and fog, and gale, and ice. Lost she was, however it had happened, and as many ! good ship has been before her, and by and by everybody but the widow had forgotten the circumstance. At least the name of the Meteor no longer ap- peared in the public prints, and sailors had ceased to talk of her. l think it had been three years since the disaster, and l had made several voyages here and there, when 1 took run down to Margate one summers day. It so chanced that a woman walking ahead of me on the pier would have lost her hat by puff of wind had I not been at hand to pick it up, and her thank you, sir" led to other words, and directly she found out that 1 was sailor. Then she asked me to sit down, and began questioning me about the loss of the Meteor. Until then I did not suspect hel identity. She proved to be Mrs. Farleigh, and for fear you may think her over=bold in conversing with q stranger. let me add that the loss of her lover outweighed all the rest of the world in her mindL She had, as 1 afterwards learned, talked with ship owners, captains and mates whenever she had an opportunity and always cherished q hope that her lover still survived. As a man l pitied her. but as a sailor l offered no grain of comfort. If the Meteor had been wrecked aloft, and then swept by seas, there would have been no chance for small boats. If she had crashed into the ice it was barely possible that some of her people had taken to foe or berg, but with no chance of living be- yond day or two. When asked to give an honest opinion 1 did so, and though ] could see that the woman was hoping against hope, she was not greatly cast down. Her fixed idea was that her lover and some of the others escaped on the ice, and it was plain enough that she could surrender it to no argument.
 Three months later, as I sat in the office of Messrs. Graves & Hargreaves, shipowners, Liverpool, the firm received note from Mrs. Farleigh, whom they knew quite well, asking them to send captain or mate to hotel which she named. It was doubtless about the old matter, and after ascertaining that I had talked with her once it was sug- gested that I respond to the note. l did so, and was by no means prepared for what followed. She had sea chart, sailing directions, a narrative of exploration, etc, and had evidently been posting herself up good bit. She was positively sure that Mir. Wellby and four men had escaped to an ice berg, been driven far to the south, and were even then living among the ice and hoping for rescue. When l looked at her for an explanation of her earnestness she told me she had had a dream to that effect. One night, two or three weeks before, she had fallen asleep to dream that she was aboard the Meteor in storm and darkness. She first discovered herself in the cabin. Then she went on deck and among the crew. As she wandered over the ship it crashed into an ice berg and the masts went by the board. In the wreck and confusion four men got away, one of whom was her lover. They found Judgment on shelf on the berg, but were without food or extra clothing. Mrs. Farleigh had never been aboard the Meteor or any other sailing ship, and my surprise was great when she told me of things she saw in her dream. She drew a correct plan of the cabin, gave the exact loca- ton of the clock, barometer and other l things, and her account of things on deck could hardly have been better told by q sailor. But for these particulars I should have ridiculed her dream. One of the things she mentioned in par l ticnlar was the captain's night glass,