Dreams usually take place in a single instant, notwithstanding the
length of time they seem to occupy. They are, in fact, slight mental
sensations, unregulated by consciousness; these sensations being less
or more intense, painful or agreeable, according to certain physical
conditions. On this subject, the following observations occur in Dr
Winslow's _Psychological Journal_:--'We have in dreams no true
perception of the lapse of time--a strange property of mind! for if
such be also its property when entered into the eternal disembodied
state, time will appear to us eternity. The relations of space, as
well as of time, are also annihilated; so that while almost an
eternity is compressed into a moment, infinite space is traversed more
swiftly than by real thought. There are numerous illustrations of this
principle on record. A gentleman dreamed that he had enlisted as a
soldier, joined his regiment, deserted, was apprehended, carried back,
tried, condemned to be shot, and at last led out for execution. After
all the usual preparations, a gun was fired; he awoke with the report,
and found that a noise in the adjoining room had, at the same moment,
produced the dream, and awakened him. A friend of Dr Abercrombie
dreamed that he had crossed the Atlantic, and spent a fortnight in
America. In embarking, on his return, he fell into the sea, and
awakening in the fright, found that he had not been asleep ten
minutes.'