on which you acted as my amanuensis-how frequently, the sleepless wife of a "Sleepless Man," you have watched and worked by me-these things are known only to me. In all that I have done, you have had so large a share that I may say, "Quod spiro, et placeo, si placeo" (which, alas! is an open question), “ tuum est.”

Even Mr. Bagnet, though he was properly anxious to maintain discipline, would sometimes confess how much he owed to Mrs. Bagnet, and it is with love and gratitude that I follow his example.

21st August, 1875.'

FRANK IVES SCUDAMORE.

THE DAY DREAMS

OF

A SLEEPLESS MAN.

CHAPTER I.

SO EARLY IN THE MORNING.

BURCKHARDT, the Arabian traveller, tells us that when he asked the Arab physicians how they treated the cases of those who could not sleep, they replied that the remedy was very simple, for that when a man could not sleep they set him to watch the camels. The remedy was never known to fail. As soon as the sleepless man found that it was his duty to keep awake, the perversity of his nature weighed upon his eyelids, and he slept the sleep of the just.

I have been a sleepless man from my youth up. I have perpetually asked myself with the poet,—

"How sleep the brave, who sink to rest,

By all their country's wishes blest ?"

But I have never got a satisfactory answer to the

B

question. I can only hope that the brave sleep better than I do. I have become learned in all the ways of the sleepless, and from my experience I can confirm the dictum of the Arabs. If you want to go to sleep you should try to keep awake. Meditate on some improving theme, such as "the man and dog fight at Hanley," or the constant sparring between Mr. Gladstone and Sir William Harcourt, "the spread of phylloxera in the wine districts," or "the progress of Sir Wilfrid Lawson's Permissive Bill," "the proposed decorations of St. Paul's," or "the legality of the Exeter reredos." If you meditate these themes strictly sleep may come. You may also try an improving book. For this purpose I can recommend the Journal of the Society of Arts. I do not know the writers in this excellent periodical, but I figure them to myself as wreathed in amaranth and moly, and lying all day long by rivers "to whose falls melodious birds sing madrigals." Probably they fall asleep by the rivers, for they never put the madrigals into their periodicals. But the effect of their writings is charming. When I want "the sober certainty of 'sleeping bliss "" I turn to the Society of Arts Journal, and read the reports of the discussions at the weekly meetings

"And they in pleasing slumber lull the sense."

As for the ordinary base and mechanical devices