Preface*

The chronicles which I am about to present to the reader are not
the result of any conscious effort of the imagination. They are,
as the title-page indicates, records of dreams, occurring at intervals
during the last ten years, and transcribed, pretty nearly in the
order of their occurrence, from my Diary. Written down as soon as
possible after awaking from the slumber during which they presented
themselves, these narratives, necessarily unstudied in style and
wanting in elegance of diction, have at least the merit of fresh
and vivid color, for they were committed to paper at a moment when
the effect and impress of each successive vision were strong and
forceful in the mind, and before the illusion of reality conveyed
by the scenes witnessed and the sounds heard in sleep had had time
to pass away.

I do not know whether these experiences of mine are unique. So far,
I have not yet met with any one in whom the dreaming faculty appears
to be either so strongly or so strangely developed as in myself.
Most dreams, even when of unusual vividness and lucidity, betray
a want of coherence in their action, and an incongruity of detail
and dramatis personae, that stamp

---------------
* Written in 1886. Some of the experiences in this volume were