Engaged in reflections such as these, every delightful vision vanished, the tumultuous beatings of each pulse subsided; and, under the sobering, yet soporific influence of sadness, he at length fell asleep--a long and tremulous sigh, as his eye-lids closed, breaking, for the last time, the regulated breathing which nature was endeavouring to establish. His dreams, however, by an extraordinary contradiction, took their colour from his first feelings. Julia seemed to be before him; to smile sweetly upon him; to raise her full eyes to his. Their expression carried absolute conviction to his heart that he was beloved: the impression was irresistible: he thought he declared his own mad passion; he thought he saw her covered with blushes indeed, but there was no reproof in her manner, and all his own scruples, too, had somehow vanished! He thought he held her soft hand; (for he remembered, particularly when he awoke, how soft it had felt;) she did not withdraw it; nay, it seemed to return the pressure of his! Then he thought, with all the strange and sudden inconsistency of dreams, that he had actually been married to Julia for some time, though he could not remember how or where the ceremony had taken place; yet he saw her so distinctly that he was sure he was awake. Her appearance was what it had been the evening before at the supper table; but her manners, what they had used to be in childhood: the same endearing, enthusiastic, unreserved affection; manifesting itself, with all the happy confidence of mutual and habitual fondness.