The San Francisco call., 1904-08-12
Special Correspondence.


GARDEN. LONDON, July 2S.-Al-
though, when Rider Haggard wrote to
the Times the other day about his
queer dream concerning a dog and the
dream s surprising sequel. he said that
he rather expected 10 be ridlculed
about it, little disposition has been
shown TO treat the novelist's narrative
lightly. nor 10 deride his somewhat
startling suggestion that it tends TO
prove that animals survive after death
snd may then communicate with hu-
man beings. Indeed. the account has
been accepted generally as opening up
an interesting field for scientific inves-
rigation which may lead to an entire
reversal Of the popular view which
denies a future life to dumb animals.
Briefly this is Mr. Haggard's story.
He went TO bed at 1890 one Saturday
night recently and suffered from what
he took TO be a nightmare. from which
ne was awakened by his wife.
AS I awOke," he says, the night
mare itself, which had been long and
vivid. faded from my brain. All could
remember of it was a sense Of awful
oppression and of desperate and terri
fed struggling for life such as the act
Of drowning would probably involve.
But between the time that L heard
my wife's voice and the time that my
Consciousness answered TO it, or so it
seemed 10 me, I had another dream.
4 dreamed that a black retriever
dog, a most amiable and intelligent
beast named Bob. which was the prop
erty Of my eldest daughter, was lying
on its side among brushwood, or rough
growth Of some kind, by water.
My own personality in some myste-
rious way seemed TO me TO be arising
from the body Of the dog. which 1
knew quite surely TO be Bob and no
other. so much so that my head was
against its head. which was lifted up
al an unnatural angle.
In my vision the dog was trying to
speak 10 me in words and, failing,
transmitted to my mind in an unde-
fined fashion the knowledge that il
was dying Then everything vanished
and / awOke to hear my wife asking
me why on earth I was making those
horrible noises. I replied that 1 had
had a nightmare about a fearful
struggle and that I had dreamed that
old Bob was in a dreadful way and
was trying TO talk to me and tell me
about il"
Mr.. Haggard told other members Of
his family Of his dream at breakfast
next morning. but it was not until
that Sunday night he discovered the
dog was missing. Inquiries were set
on foot Monday morning to ascer-
tain what had become Of him. The
results Mr.. Haggard sets forth at great
length in the form of signed state
ments by various witnesses. They
seem 10 prove conclusively that the
dog. while on an openwOrk railway
bridge near the house was run over
by a train, either at 1925 or shortly
after IL o'clock on the Saturday night
that the dream occurred and fell from
the bridge to the brink of the water
where the reeds grow.
Here" continues Mr.. Haggard in
his narrative. Ii IL were still living
and, although the veterinary thinks
that death was practically instantane-
Gus, it's life may perhaps have fingered
for a few minutes, it must have suffo-
Gated and sunk. undergoing, imagine,
much the same sensations as I did in
my dream and in very similar sur
roundings to those that I saw therein
namely. among q scrubby growth at
the edge OF the water.
Both IN q judicial and q private
capacity have been accustomed all
my life to the investigation OF evi-
dence and, IL we may put aside our
familiar friend the long arm Of coin
cidenOs,' which in this case would
surely be strained TO dislocstion, 1
confess that that available upon this
matter forces me to the following con-
clusions:
The dog Bob, between whom and
myself there existed a mutual attach
ment, either at the moment of his
death, IL his existence can cOnceivably
have been prolonged TIL after 1 o'clock
in the morning, or, as il seems more
probable, about three hours after that
event, did succeed in calling my atten-
tion TO its actual or recent plight by
placing whatever portion Of my being
is capable Of receiving such impulses
when enchained by sleep into its own
terrible position. That subsequently
as that chain Of sleep was being broken
by the voice Of my wife calling me
hack to a normal condition of our
human existence with some last de-
spairing effort, while that indefnable
part Of me was being withdrawn from
i 0t viii be remembered that in the
dream I seemed to rise from the dosl
il spoke to me. first trying to make use
Of my own tongue, and falling therein.
by some subtle means Of communica-
ton whereof / have no knowledge tell
ing me that it was dying for I saw no
blood or wounds which would suggest
this to my mind.
L recognized further that if its dis
solution took place at the moment when
j dreamed, this communication must
have been a form of that teIepathy
" hich is now very generally acknowl-
edged to occur between human beings
from time to time and under special
circumstances. but which I had never
heard Of as occurring between a human
being and one Of the lower animals.
II. on the other hand, that dissolu-