New-York tribune., 1905-10-26
WORK DONE IN DREAMS.
Stories Of the Sublime Poetry Lost
IN WakiRg.
from The London Globe.

From The London Globe.
In the latest series of Sir Mountstuart Duff s
Notes from a Diary" It is related that the late
Lord Lytton. when Viceroy of India, had re-
peated to his guests on one occasion poem
asleep:
There boating and sailing
And dish fishing g for srsyllns .,u,.,u a,.n c,,..
But sweeter the places
Where aldernen's braces
Are sold for bootlaces IN Bonnie Dundee
The diarist ventured to doubt whether the
Viceroy was not trying to impose on the ere
duIity OF his friends suspicion which will be
shared by most readers.
But whether these lines were dreamed or not,
there can be no doubt that one of the most
work is that which relates TO the comparative
value of work done imagined In sleep. No
experience is more general than the waking from
q particularly vivid dream only to ma that in
the very process of waking the whole vision,
apparently real and strong for a brief mo-
ment vanishes beyond recall This dissovtng
touch of psychical or dream life is like the
contact of the air with long entombed, well
preserved human body suddenly exposed to the
light OF day. While the tomb openers gaze upon
the features so strangely preserved from a long
pest dav the touch of the air does its work and
the reiIc of humanity crumbles TO dust
A strange point about the Difficulty IN keep
ing in mental grip of a dream is that although
10 detail be remembered an impression
remains which, in cases that have been tested
has often turned out to be quite incorrect. It
is related by Mickle. the Scottish poet best
known as the translator of the Portuguese epic
gretted he could not remember the poetry which
he composed in his sleep. 1t was. he said, so In
finitely superior to anything he could produce
in his waking hours. One morning on waking
he was lamenting us he had so often done be-
fore, that he should be conscious of having com
recall word of It. What said his wife who
happened to be awake. Were you writing
roetry?" Yes he replied and such poetry
that I would give the world to remember it.
We'll, then" said she. "I did luckily hear the
last lines. and I sure remembered them
exactly: they
by Heaven I'll my
Upon the cowslp and the pale primrose!
Mr. Mickle probably cured of his habit Of
lamentation
The late Lewis Carroll" noted in his diary"
that he once heard Tennyson relate that he had
often dreamed long passages Aof poetry. and be-
lieved them to be good at the time, but could
never remember any of them on waking, ex-
cept four lines which he dreamed al ten years
old, and these were the moving verses:
Write to a barrow?
Nv INF infantie NTH - muse.
This. the diarlst remarks, unpub-
lished fragment OF the late Laureate, may be
promise OF his after powers" On the same oc-
casion Tennyson told his hearers that he once
dreamed enormously long poem about fairies,
which began with very long lines that gradu-
ally got shorter and ended with fifty sixty
lines of two syllables each!
On the other hand, poets have occasionally
letter TO his brother, says 81 forget my
dreams, and have Daniel to help out my
recollection: and if by chance I do remember
them, unless they instantly written down
the impression passes away almost as lightly as
the dream itself But he goes on to say that
one or two of his dreams noted at the
time and were afterward Incorporated in
scenes of his little read poen The Curse
OF kehama. And then, of course, there is the
familiar story of Coeridge falling asleep one
summer afternoon In a quiet farmhouse, after
reading about the Khan Kubla In Purchas s
"Pigrimes," composing several hundred lines in
the course of three hours sleep, waking, and
at once beginning write them down, only to
be interrupted at the fifty-fourth line by a
visitor-that person from Porlock whose
memory Is execrated by all lovers Of poetry
with the result that returning to his desk an
hour later the poet found that the rest of his
dream had faded from his memory.
'kubla Khan" remains a. melod;ous fragment;
but II the person from Porlocl" had only lost
his way, or had come to grief sufficient to cause
a delay of an hour or two, might have had a
completely beautiful poem.