The Argosy — page 268: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The Shapes that Dreams may take. 251 two days later a letter with the postmark “St. Louis” was put into his hand, and proved to be from the missing relative himself! It appeared that on his first arrival in the new country he had mislaid his sister's address, and then, amid the struggle for existence and the novelty of his surroundings, had, as too often happens, allowed his old ties to slip out of mind—though he was now glad enough to | renew them. _ One would like to ask many questions about this story. Was there / any reason for this dream occurring after the lapse of twenty-five _ years? Had there been any change or death in the family P—or any - conversation about the lost brother, or other stirring of dormant _feelings? Had the brother in St. Louis had any occasion for | specially remembering and yearning after the relatives he had so long left unsought for? Further information on these points might shed some more light on the narrative. Again, might not many | mysteries be cleared up if more people took the ‘‘ foolish” course of | plain John Eiswirth, when he sent his ‘“‘test” letter to St. Louis ?P We will conclude our paper with two incidents selected from a | great mass of similar narratives related in the huge volumes issued a short time ago by the Society for Psychical Research. We may | premise that all these narratives and their evidences were carefully sifted and weighed before their publication, and that in their original form names, places and dates are given with punctilious | accuracy. As these can be found there by those who desire to see \them, it is best, for manifold reasons to exclude them from an jarticle intended only to interest the general reader and rather to jincite him to scientific inquiry than to satisfy that searching spirit. | In a simple, straightforward letter, written in 1885, a homely | Quakeress thus gives the particulars of her remarkable experience :— | “In my dream I saw two respectably-dressed females driving alone & a vehicle like a mineral-water cart. Their horse stopped at a -|water dam to drink, but as there was no footing he lost his balance, and in trying to recover it, he plunged right in. With the shock the = stood up and shouted for help, and their hats ane off their neads, and as all were going down, I turned away, crying ‘was there . no one at all to help them?’ upon which I awoke and my husband asked me what was the matter. I related the above dream to him, | and he asked me if I knew them. I said I did not, and thought I ee —————<— a — -.- <a | had never seen either of them. The impression of the dream and the trouble it brought was over me all day. I remarked to my son it Was the anniversary of his birthday—and my own also—the tenth of i month (Quaker term for January), and this is why I remember e date, “The following third month (March) I got a letter and newspaper -/rom my brother in Australia, letting me know the sad trouble which nad befallen him in the loss, by drowning, of one of his daughters and jer companion. Thou wilt see by the description given of it in the | | COMIC OOO S (CO)