But it is mostly my own dreams I talk of, and that will somewhat excuse
me for talking of dreams at all. Everyone knows how delightful the
dreams are that one dreams one's self, and how insipid the dreams of
others are. I had an illustration of the fact, not many evenings ago,
when a company of us got telling dreams. I had by far the best dreams of
any; to be quite frank, mine were the only dreams worth listening to;
they were richly imaginative, delicately fantastic, exquisitely
whimsical, and humorous in the last degree; and I wondered that when the
rest could have listened to them they were always eager to cut in with
some silly, senseless, tasteless thing that made me sorry and ashamed
for them. I shall not be going too far if I say that it was on their
part the grossest betrayal of vanity that I ever witnessed.
But the egotism of some people concerning their dreams is almost
incredible. They will come down to breakfast and bore everybody with a
recital of the nonsense that has passed through their brains in sleep,
as if they were not bad enough when they were awake; they will not spare
the slightest detail; and if, by the mercy of Heaven, they have
forgotten something, they will be sure to recollect it, and go back and
give it all over again with added circumstance. Such people do not
reflect that there is something so purely and intensely personal in
dreams that they can rarely interest anyone but the dreamer, and that to
the dearest friend, the closest relation or connection, they can seldom
be otherwise than tedious and impertinent. The habit husbands and wives
have of making each other listen to their dreams is especially cruel.
They have each other quite helpless, and for this reason they should all
the more carefully guard themselves from abusing their advantage.
Parents should not afflict their offspring with the rehearsal of their
mental maunderings in sleep, and children should learn that one of the
first duties a child owes its parents is to spare them the anguish of
hearing what it has dreamed about overnight. A like forbearance in
regard to the community at large should be taught as the first trait of
good manners in the public schools, if we ever come to teach good
manners there.
I
Certain exceptional dreams, however, are so imperatively significant, so
vitally important, that it would be wrong to withhold them from the
knowledge of those who happened not to dream them, and I feel some such
quality in my own dreams so strongly that I could scarcely forgive
myself if I did not, however briefly, impart them. It was only the last
week, for instance, that I found myself one night in the company of the
Duke of Wellington, the great Duke, the Iron one, in fact; and after a
few moments of agreeable conversation on topics of interest among
gentlemen, his Grace said that now, if I pleased, he would like a couple
of those towels. We had not been speaking of towels, that I remember,
but it seemed the most natural thing in the world that he should mention
them in the connection, whatever it was, and I went at once to get them
for him. At the place where they gave out towels, and where I found some
very civil people, they told me that what I wanted was not towels, and
they gave me instead two bath-gowns, of rather scanty measure,
butternut in color and Turkish in texture. The garments made somehow a
very strong impression upon me, so that I could draw them now, if I
could draw anything, as they looked when they were held up to me. At the
same moment, for no reason that I can allege, I passed from a social to
a menial relation to the Duke, and foresaw that when I went back to him
with those bath-gowns he would not thank me as one gentleman would
another, but would offer me a tip as if I were a servant. This gave me
no trouble, for I at once dramatized a little scene between myself and
the Duke, in which I should bring him the bath-gowns, and he should
offer me the tip, and I should refuse it with a low bow, and say that I
was an American. What I did not dramatize, or what seemed to enter into
the dialogue quite without my agency, was the Duke's reply to my proud
speech. It was foreshown me that he would say, He did not see why that
should make any difference. I suppose it was in the hurt I felt at this
wound to our national dignity that I now instantly invented the society
of some ladies, whom I told of my business with those bath-gowns (I
still had them in my hands), and urged them to go with me and call upon
the Duke. They expressed, somehow, that they would rather not, and then
I urged that the Duke was very handsome. This seemed to end the whole
affair, and I passed on to other visions, which I cannot recall.
I have not often had a dream of such international import, in the
offense offered through me to the American character and its well-known
superiority to tips, but I have had others quite as humiliating to me
personally. In fact, I am rather in the habit of having such dreams, and
I think I may not unjustly attribute to them the disciplined modesty
which the reader will hardly fail to detect in the present essay. It has
more than once been my fate to find myself during sleep in battle,
where I behave with so little courage as to bring discredit upon our
flag and shame upon myself. In these circumstances I am not anxious to
make even a showing of courage; my one thought is to get away as rapidly
and safely as possible. It is said that this is really the wish of all
novices under fire, and that the difference between a hero and a coward
is that the hero hides it, with a duplicity which finally does him
honor, and that the coward frankly runs away. I have never really been
in battle, and if it is anything like a battle in dreams I would not
willingly qualify myself to speak by the card on this point. Neither
have I ever really been upon the stage, but in dreams I have often been
there, and always in a great trouble of mind at not knowing my part. It
seems a little odd that I should not sometimes be prepared, but I never
am, and I feel that when the curtain rises I shall be disgraced beyond
all reprieve. I dare say it is the suffering from this that awakens me
in time, or changes the current of my dreams so that I have never yet
been actually hooted from the stage.