346 THE SLEEPLESS MAN. CHAP. xx. 



" O waft me o'er ! O waft me o'er ! 



Yon ship is strong ; the sea is still ; 

 Nor care I though a tempest roar, 



And every billow rolls a hill ! 

 Let swelling sea-waves roar their fill, 



And dash till crested white with foam, 

 "Tis sweet as murmuring mountain rill, 



To soothe a weary spirit Home." 



During his troubles Dick was a sleepless man. He 

 wandered up and down the little town at night, looking 

 in at the little burying-ground of St. Peter's, where the 

 fathers of Thurso lay buried. The town was asleep. 

 Not a footstep was to be heard, save those of the sleep- 

 less man plodding round the graveyard, and from thence 

 to his neighbouring bakehouse in Wilson's Lane. Night 

 was always a time of thought for Dick. " It is so 

 pleasant," he says in one of his letters, " getting up at 

 nights to see the stars. Last night was beautiful, and 

 the moon was a great pleasure. It is impossible, when 

 looking at it, to prevent oneself falling into a dream of 

 a far better world than ours." 



"Do you know," he said to his brother-in-law, 

 " that I am a firm believer in the unseen world ? Mil- 

 lions of spiritual creatures walk the earth unseen, both 

 when we wake and when we sleep. I have no doubt 

 that they exercise a watching care over us, and often 

 warn us of coming evil. Since my sister Jane died, I 

 never dreamt of this but once. What people think 

 often about, they commonly dream of. On that occa- 

 sion, my sister, I thought, came to me, clothed from 

 head to foot with roses ! I smiled when I saw her, with 



