COINCIDENCES.
[TO THE EDITOE OF THE " SPECTATOR:1 SIE,It may be worth considering whether the instances of so-called "second-sight" mentioned by your correspondents, Mr. F. Balfour and Herr Jaeger, are not the merest accidents. Every night millions of people dream dreams; reason ceases to guide, imagination runs riot, time and space are annihilated. Nothing surprises ; the dreamer is not the least amazed by the entrance of those long dead, of friends at the Antipodes, of Wellington or Napoleon taking their share of conversation at the family dinner-table. But here and there comes a startling vision which remains imaged on the brain. One such happened to me last year. A son and his wife were on a homeward voyage. On a certain day and hour, noted in my diary as Friday, July 3rd, 4.45 a.m., I had the most distinct sight of them both, of him lying dead in his berth, of her entering the cabin with a terrified face. It was a real horror, so vivid that, reason as one might, it seemed there must be reality in the background, and with this I was haunted, com- municating it to no one, but carefully putting down the time and circumstances as above. To a believer in this kind of " second-sight " there might have been much in favour of its truth. There was the hour at which it occurred, just at dawn, when Dante tells us (Parg. ix. 13) :— "La mente nostra pellegrina
PRI della carne, e men dai pensier press, Alle sue vision quasi 6 divina."
There were ill-health and the possible effects of bad climate. And it was only after receiving a letter dated after my dream that the effect wore off. Now, supposing the facts had corresponded with the vision, this might have appeared a revelation. Yet among the myriads of dreams a fraction must be coincident with the truth, and some of these are treated as if due to second-sight instead of taking their proper place in the catalogue of chances.—I am, Sir, &c.,
Soaaio.
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