…— so beautiful” that I thought I should never tire looking at her. Pooh! Lil, you needn’t be jealous, old girl! She is none of my sort, anyhow.”Now!” she exclaimed with a queer kind of snarl, as she took off the glove of her left hand so as to show me the tell-tale band of gold on the third finger — ” now, Mr. Bailey, are you satisfied ? There is nothing of the missionary about me, is there?” And when I saw the long, pointed nails, pink and polished like sea-shells, just as I’ve always been told they do them at the lady-barber’s, I coughed. Observe my astuteness, Lil. I saw now that she was no prig from a church or chapel, but a member of what folks call “The Smart Set.” Yet how did she know Mr. Towell, and what brought her here? Was she one of us…

…— I hurried on, urged whither I knew not. It seemed to me that I was seeking some familiar spot — some known harbour of refuge against a vague, unimagined danger that pursued me; and, as I pressed forward, the air grew more and more oppressive. Then I met things — horrible things with clammy hands that tried to keep me back; and as I felt their loathsome touch and foetid breath a great weakness filled my limbs.”God of mercy!” I cried, ”Help me, and keep me from these.”Then in some inexplicable manner a new strength came into my body. Taking courage, I leaped forward; I hurled aside my assailants, and I could hear them mocking and cursing as I broke through them.Just as the haven I longed-for came in sight — and I know not what it was or how I knew it — I saw a beautiful maiden…

…the ground, and was about to stamp on him when he awoke.Of a pleasanter nature, was a dream I once had, prior to receiving the welcome tidings of the sale of a manuscript. I dreamed I was toiling pain- fully along a dusty road, when a beautiful grey horse suddenly trotted up to me, and, with the gentlest expression imaginable in its fine dark eyes, bid me mount. Not in the slightest degree surprised at hearing it speak, I climbed on its back, and the next moment found myself flying through the air. I forget exactly how the dream terminated, but I fancy it was in some remarkably pleasant manner, and that the horse landed me in a floralElysium, where I fell head over ears in love with a gorgeously apparelled woman.Then, too, I have dreamed of a roan horse; of seeing it struggling desperately to extricate itself from a…