is very possible,' pursued the vision, 'that Mr. --- may have
forgotten a matter which is now of a very old date; but you may call
it to his recollection by this token, that when I came to pay his
account there was difficulty in getting change for a Portugal piece of
gold and we were forced to drink out the balance at a tavern.'

"Mr. Rutherford awoke in the morning with all the words of the vision
imprinted on his mind, and thought it worth while to walk across the
country to Inveresk instead of going straight to Edinburgh. When he
came there he waited on the gentleman mentioned in the dream--a very
old man. Without saying anything of the vision he inquired whether he
ever remembered having conducted such a matter for his deceased
father. The old gentleman could not at first bring the circumstance
to his recollection, but on mention of the Portugal piece of gold the
whole returned upon his memory. He made an immediate search for the
papers and recovered them, so that Mr. Rutherford carried to Edinburgh
the documents necessary to gain the cause which he was on the verge of
losing."

The story is reproduced because it is clearly one of the tales which
come round in cycles, either because events repeat themselves or
because people will unconsciously localise old legends in new places
and assign old occurrences or fables to new persons. Thus every one
has heard how Lord Westbury called a certain man in the Herald's
office "a foolish old fellow who did not even know his own foolish old
business". Lord Westbury may very well have said this, but long
before his time the remark was attributed to the famous Lord
Chesterfield. Lord Westbury may have quoted it from Chesterfield or
hit on it by accident, or the old story may have been assigned to him.
In the same way Mr. Rutherford may have had his dream or the following