my life--then you must do something further, ... you must find, or
teach me how to find, the living Reality of my Dream!"

Heliobas surveyed him with some wonder and commiseration.

"A moment ago and you yourself declared your DREAM was true!" he
observed. "This," and he pointed to the manuscript on the table,
"seemed to you sufficient to prove it. Now you have altered you
opinion: . . Why? I have worked no spells upon you, and I am
entirely ignorant as to what your recent experience has been.
Moreover, what do you mean by a 'living Reality'? The flesh and
blood, bone and substance that perishes in a brief seventy years
or so and crumbles into indistinguishable dust? Surely, ... if, as
I conjecture from your words, you have seen one of the fair
inhabitants of higher spheres than ours, . . you would not drag her
spiritual and death unconscious brightness down to the level of
the 'reality of a merely human life? Nay, if you would, you could
not!"

Alwyn looked at him inquiringly and with a perplexed air.

"You speak in enigmas," he said somewhat vexedly. "However, the
whole thing is an enigma and would puzzle the most sagacious head.
That the physicial workings of the brain, in a site of trance,
should arouse in me a passion of love for an imaginary being, and,
at the same time, enable to write a poem such as must make the
fame of any man, is certainly a remarkable and noteworthy result
of scientific mesmerism!"

"Now, my dear sir," interrupted Heliobas in a tone of good-natured