There was a period in my experience, now happily passed, thank heaven, when day or night I need only shut my eyes to see groups of enormous sea-monsters and serpents, with frightful heads, coiling and intercoiling about one another. You may, dear reader, whoever you are, rest assured that I indulged this privilege as seldom as possible. During that season, too, I suffered acutely from horrible dreams at night, waking in depths of gloom so appalling, so overpowered and undone, that I could not have borne it to have remained alone. Indeed, I became so afflicted with these nightmares (night horrors being the products of opium), that my wife was charged to turn me clear over and wake me up on the least evidence that I was suffering from one of them. This evidence, she said, came from me in the character of low, painful moans; I, conscious of my predicament when at the worst, always struggled with all my strength, and strained every nerve to cry out at the top of my voice:--I was perfectly powerless. I have always thought it the acme of the ridiculous to attribute to the peculiar formation of De Quincey's brain a special aptitude for dreaming magnificent dreams. Let any one, bold enough to undertake so costly an experiment, try the virtues of opium in the capacity of producing dreams, and, my word for it, he will either claim a special aptitude for dreaming himself, or, with me, give all the credit to the subtle and mighty powers of opium. CHAPTER XII. THE ADDRESS OF THE OPIUM EATER.--HOW HE OCCUPIES HIS TIME.--THE REFUGE OF SOLITUDE AND SILENCE.--INDIFFERENCE TO SOCIETY OR COMPANY.--DISPOSITION, PREDILECTIONS, AND GENERAL CONDUCT.