the altar, and going out of view behind the altar,
into some dark vault which I seemed to know
was there.  Now the train grew thin.  There
were but two or three to come. There was
my sister—the last of the procession but two—
pale, sad, and fixed as the rest, casting no glance
upon me, and yet I saw her full face.  Let me
try to explain how this seemed to be.  Because
of the position, and because of the white shrouding
hood over the head, and because of my own
fixedness, and absorption, and strong vision, it
appeared as if I could not recognise any one of
the persons in the procession, until that person
was exactly in front of me.  Then, and not till
then, the face, by some imperceptible motion
(which was, in fact, no motion), seemed turned
full towards me, and, for one ineffable moment,
I saw who it was that passed.  There was one
glimpse, no more; but that glimpse was wonderfully
enough to show me the whole countenance
of the dead one, daguerreotyped, as it were, upon
my sight with awful distinctness.  Passionless,
and not looking at me, they went on.  Of the
procession, there were only two figures now, to pass.
The last but one was my father's dearest friend
and ancient schoolfellow: a man of infinite
kindness and genial mirth, who had died a year before,
leaving a sad gap in our family circle, deeply
regretted by my father. He was a large stout
man. The figure had still this character,
but the clay-like, sodden look of the face,
made me shudder!  And now a new awe, and
strange, fearful anticipation fell upon me.
Who was the last in the procession? I seemed
to know before I saw him, it was my father.
Never can I forget how he looked!
Different from the others!  There was more
meaning in his eye, and he looked certainly
at me.  But he, too, was waxy pale—horrible
to behold.  Then came over me the doubt,
the struggle, "Is he alive or dead?"  In
that struggle I awoke, as if throwing off a
frightful nightmare.  The vision, for a moment,
seemed present to my real eye.  Cold perspiration
was streaming from me.  Never had any
dream made me suffer half so much.

This dream, however, did not make me anxious
next day, about my father.  I know we were all
talking and laughing that evening, when a chaise
drove up to the door, and out of it stepped a
cousin of mine (since famous in the war of the
Crimea).  The sight of him at first excited no
apprehension, until the gravity of his looks
alarmed us. They were but a sad preface to the
words, "I am come from Hillford to fetch you.
Your father has been taken awfully ill!"

I never heard my father's voice again.  But
as I looked at him, lying speechless on his deathbed,
I recognised the countenance I had beheld
in my dream. My father's last words had been
a call for me.

In the life of Ben Jonson, it is related, that
when the plague was raging in London, where
Jonson had left his family behind him, "he
dreamed one night that his eldest boy, then
seven years of age, appeared to him with a
bloody cross (the mark set on the doors of
those stricken by the plague) on his forehead;
'that he appeared of a manly stature, and of such
growth as he thought he would be at the
resurrection.'  This alarmed Jonson.  He
communicated his fear to Camden, and it is strange
that on the very next day came from his wife
the sad tidings that his little son was dead."*
*Lives of the Poets Laureate.  Bentley. 1853.

The late Lieutenant M., R.N., brother to the
present possessor of L. (where the L. papers
were found), told me, after he had arrived at
home and found his little sister Caroline dead,
the following pre-impression of the event,
in a dream: "I was," said he, "in my cot and
fast asleep—our ship being in the Mediterranean,
somewhere between Sicily and Malta—
when I dreamed, in the most vivid manner, that
I was arriving at home.  All the family seemed
assembled there to welcome me, and all looked
well; but, amongst them, the youngest, poor
little Caroline, was borne along between two
persons, and had a pale and dying appearance.
She stretched out her hand to me, with the words,
'Good-bye, Harry!  I shall never see you again
in this world!'  I took her hand, and it felt
cold, and as heavy as lead.  With the shock of
that chilling contact, I started out of my
hammock, wide awake, in an instant.  Coming up
on deck, I sang out, 'What watch is it?'
Having received the answer, I noted down in my
log-book the night and the hour when I had
this horrid dream.  I will show you the entry.
The date in my journal proves that my sister
Caroline died at the moment when, in my dream,
I seemed to touch her cold hand."

The Physician now fades away into dim air,
leaving his broad, bare, and solid facts before
the reader's judgment.  Nothing has been set
down that is not strictly true.  If any other and
better theory than the Physician's can meet the
cases that he has recorded, he will modestly
withdraw the hypothesis, which, at present, is
the only one satisfactory to his own mind.  And
so he bids you heartily farewell.

Just published, in one vol. demy 8vo, price 9s.,
                                A TALE OF TWO CITIES
                                BY CHARLES DICKENS.
With Sixteen Illustrations by HABLOT K. BROWNE.

                               THE HAUNTED HOUSE;
Being the extra Christmas Number of ALL THE
                  YEAR ROUND, will be published next week.