The fantastic absurdities of the pantomimes probably affected my imagination in the night, which I dosed away between London and Brighton; for I had the strangest visions in my carriage. At first I was mounted on my beautiful gray, whom for once I could not manage: he constantly resisted my will; and when at last I mastered him, shook his head with such fury, that it broke from his neck and flew to a distance of twenty paces, while I plunged down a precipice on the headless body.--I was next sitting on a bench in my park, and watching the devastations made by a frightful hurricane, which tore up the old trees far and near, and threw them together like faggots.--At last I quarrelled with you, dear Julia, and in despair went for a soldier. I forgot you (which is possible only in sleep,) and found myself in my new sphere, once more young and brilliant, full of fresh spirit, and not less full of wanton pride. It was the day of battle. The thunder of the cannon rolled magnificently; noble martial music accompanied it, and animated our spirits; while, with the prerogative of a dream, we sat quietly breakfasting on a 'pâté aux truffes et champagne,' in the midst of a fire of musketry. A spent cannon-ball now came 'en ricochet' towards us; and before I could spring aside, carried off the head of my comrade, who was sitting on the ground by my side, and both my legs, so that I fell groaning with pain and horror. When I recovered my senses, the storm was roaring around me, and the sea howled in my ears. I thought myself on the voyage, when, behold my carriage stopped at the door of the inn on the Marine Parade at Brighton! To-morrow perhaps I shall dream out the rest. But are the waking fancies of life much less confused? Castles in the air, for good and for evil;--nothing but castles in the air. Some stand for minutes, some for years, some for tens[48] of years; but they all fall at last, and palace, just as easily as a miserable hut, a grave or a dungeon. But you are ever by, my Julia, either sharing the palace, adorning the hut, weeping over the grave, or consoling me in bonds. At this moment I am floating midway, without any determinate abode: I am, however, all the more ethereal and light-hearted for that; but, I must confess, with a very sleepy 'physique,' for it is three in the morning: and so I kiss your hand, and bid you good-night. But I beg you to look in your dream-book what these adventures of mine portend.