REPOSE, OR SLEEP. 101 



taneously through the mind, but which were 

 yet remembered. " A gentleman dreamed that 

 he had enlisted as a soldier, joined his regiment, 

 deserted, was apprehended, tried, condemned 

 to be shot, and at last led out for execution. 

 After all the usual preparations, a gun was 

 fired, he awoke with the report, and found that 

 a noise in an adjoining room had both pro- 

 duced the dream and awakened him." Dr. 

 Abercrombie relates this instance. Thus, then, 

 the measure of time in dreams does not coin- 

 cide with that adopted by the mind in a waking 

 state. 



It would appear that, of the external senses, 

 touch is the most excitable during sleep, and 

 next to it hearing. Sight is far less excitable, 

 still less so taste, and smell again still less. 

 An unpleasant taste in the mouth, accompanied 

 as it generally is by a deranged state of the 

 stomach, will induce dreams of viands, the 

 imaginary sight of which produces loathing or 

 nausea. In a state of fever, when the mouth 

 is parched, visions of cooling drinks, or grateful 

 fruits, which place the patient in the position 

 of Tantalus, by being ever beyond his reach, 

 are very commonly experienced. 



From these remarks, then, by which it seems 

 plain that the periodical repose of the organs of 

 the senses, of the intellectual faculties, and of 

 voluntary motion, is not complete, and that it 

 differs in profoundness in different persons, and 

 in the same person under different circum- 

 stances. Sometimes, indeed, during dreams, 



