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 these 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 offence 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.