whole, when they form but a part. Thus will ever be proved the futility of worldly ambition-it is never satisfied. But the desires of religion are not a phantom or an incubus. True devotion, which aspires to heaven, as the hart panteth for the waterbrooks, will never fail. Its fervent hopes and devout prayers, we believe, will be blessed by their accomplishment.

CAST. Then the visitations of the incomparable Mab are naught but the infliction of the nightmare? Gentle Master Evelyn, how I should be aweary your philosophy, but that I am half won over to believe it true? In good faith,

of

"The Gordian knot of it you do unloose
Familiar as your garter."

Ev. Then, I pray you, let me counsel you not to court such visits, dear Castaly. There is some peril in the touch both of Mab and Mara; for, although rare and transient cases of nightmare excite no alarm, yet its repetition, in a severe form, is not to be slighted. It sometimes has been the forerunner of epilepsy; its immediate cause being obstruction to the course of the blood by which the brain especially is surcharged, and the action of the lungs and heart impeded, as we prove by the extreme labour of breathing at the time we awake.

I believe that there is usually a fulness of blood, also, in the vessels of the spinal marrow; as, although nightmare may occur in the sitting, it is far more frequent in the recumbent position. Thus the marrow is oppressed, and there is then no force transmitted by the nerves to put the muscles into

action.

Distention of the stomach should be prevented, as the diaphragm is thus pushed up against the lungs, and the gas is accumulated in the cavity. All these conditions often occur in our waking

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moods, but then our judgment tells us how to relieve them speedily; whereas, in slecp, the load accumulates. All indigestible substances, therefore, should be avoided, as nuts, cucumbers, shell-fish, &c. Early and light suppers we advise to those whom Madame Mara so unmercifully overlies. A mattress should be our couch, and we should endeavour to compose ourselves on one side, having, previous to our rest, taken gentle exercise.

SOMNILOQUENCE.-SOMNAMBULISM.

"It is a sleepy language; and thou speak'st
Out of thy sleep."- Tempest.

"Doct. You see her eyes are open.
Gent. Ay, but their sense is shut."

"A great perturbation in nature. To receive at once the benefit of sleep, and do the effect of watching."-Macbeth.

Ev. In the common dream, ideas float through the mind, but the body is passive. When the power of expressing these ideas by speech is added, it is somniloquence. When there is the conscious, yet powerless will to move, it is incubus. When the unconscious power of moving in accordance with the ideas or wishes of the dream exists, it is somnambulism.

The common dreams of sleep are not unfolded to us until the waking recollections of the dreamer relate them; but the matter of a dream may be half developed during its existence, by the curious propensity to unconscious talking and walking in the sleep.

Sleep-talking is the slightest of these phenomena, and, indeed, closely resembles the speaking reveries of some absent people, and the raving of a maniac. The sleep is, at this time, little deeper than a revery. The voice of the somniloquist is usually natural,

but as again, in the cases of mania and of delirious excitement, a common voice may become sweetly melodious, and there will be an imparted fluency allied to the inspiration of the improvisatore.

Indeed, in some young ladies subject to hysteria, I have known, at certain periods, as it were, a new accomplishment, a style of singing which was far beyond their power in waking moments.

Dr.

Dewar relates a case of a girl who, when awake, discovered no knowledge of astronomy or the sciences in any way, but when she was asleep she would define the rotations of the seasons, using expressions the most apt to the subject, such as "the globe is now set agee." It is probable that this was the memory in slumber of some geographical lesson which she had heard, but did not remember while her senses were active, that is, in her waking moments. And an American lady, during a fever, commenced a course of nocturnal prating, composing most eloquent sermons, chiefly made up, however, of remembered texts of Scripture.

I am informed, too, that a lady of Edinburgh, during her somnolent attacks, recited somewhat lengthy poems; and it was curious to notice that each line commenced with the final letter of the preceding.

These sleep-talkings are sometimes the mere lispings of an idiot; although Astrophel, perchance, may contend that the following, written down from the lips of a servant maid, is a proof of special inspiration, converting a rustic girl into an improvis

atrice.

"You may go home and wash your hose,
And wipe the dew-drops from your nose,
And mock no maiden here.

For you tread down grass, and need not;
Wear your shoes, and speed not,

And clout leather's very dear;

But I need not care, for my sweetheart

Is a cobbler."

I have heard this trash cited as a proof of facility of composition in slumber. You do not believe it such; like other specimens, it was a ruse of a wanton girl to excite admiration. In the magnetic somnambulism of Elizabeth Okey, that cunning little wench, who was the prima buffa of the magnetic farces enacted at the North London Hospital, would often skip about and sing snatches of equal elegance:

"I went into a tailor's shop
To buy a suit of clothes,

But where the money came from,
G-Almighty knows."

These are, indeed, the very burlesque of somniloquence; and yet Okey was an invalid, and presumed on the credulity of those who ministered to her.

True somniloquence is often preceded by a cataleptic state; and in girls like this, the senses are often so dull that the firing of a pistol close to the ear does not rouse them until the poetic fit is over.

CAST. Were sleep-talking more common, it would, indeed, be a very dangerous propensity. If the confessor were to prate in his sleep of the peccadilloes of the fair penitents that kneel at his confessional, if the minister on his couch were to divulge his state secrets or his fine political schemes, where would be the tranquillity of domestic or national society? Yet the lips of the love-sick maiden have not seldom whispered in sleep her bosom's secret; and sometimes the unconscious tongue has awfully betrayed even the blood stain on the hand. Thus did the ill-mated Parisina of Byron :

"Fever'd in her sleep she seems,

And red her cheek with troubled dreams;

And mutters she, in her unrest,

A name she dare not breathe by day."

The fate of Eugene Aram, I believe, may be imputed to such an unfortunate propensity; and in

Lady Macbeth's "Out, damned spot!" was confessed her participation in the murder of Duncan and the grooms.

Somewhat like this, too, was the half-sleeping exclamation of Jarvis Matcham after he had committed the murder of the drummer boy. Starting from his bed when roused by the waiter, his first words were, "My God! I did not kill him."

Ev. A dream will sometimes half wake even a child to a state of terror, although children are with difficulty completely roused. I have known instances in which children would sit up in bed, with their eyes open, sobbing, and talking, and staring in a sort of trance; nay, they will sometimes start from bed, but still asleep, and, after a time becoming calm, they have again composed themselves to slumber.

I have known sleep-talkers who have not remembered one iota of their wanderings when awake; and even the ecstatic somnambulist, who pretends to prophesy wisdom, recollects nothing when the ecstasy is over. It is clear, also, that the mind varies in sleep and waking in regard to its memory; for it has been proved that persons who often talk in their sleep have renewed the exact points of a subject which terminated their last sleeptalking, although, in the waking interval, it was to them oblivion.

Somnambulism is the most perfect paradox among the phenomena of sleep, as it exhibits actions without a consciousness of them; indeed, so complete a suspension of sensibility, that contact, nay, intense inflictions, do not produce that mental consciousness which is calculated to excite alarm, or even attention.

There is a somewhat remote analogy to this in the want of balance between the judgment and voC c 2

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