This section is from the book "Dreams And Their Meanings", by Horace G. Hutchinson. Also available from Amazon: Dreams and Their Meanings 1901<.
A man's own death has occasionally been prophesied to him in a dream, but we may gather that this is not so frequent as the premonition of another's death.
I will cite two cases of the former, which are most interesting from whatever point of view we look at them: -1
"Valparaiso, Ind., 2nd February, 1894."
" Dear Sir,
"Yours of the 29th received. As regards Mr. Thomas Pratt's dream of nth January, Mr. Pratt was a merchant here. I went to the store on the morning of the 12th January. He related to me the circumstances of his dream. He said that he died last night I said, 'Well, you are alive yet'. Then he told me about his dream. He said that he dreamt that he died and chose his pall - bearers, and was taken to the grave, and then lowered down. When they began to put the dirt on the coffin he woke up. When
1 Vol. xi., part xxix. of Proceedings S. P. R.
I went down the next morning he was dead. He died at 2 a.m. on the 13th January. The same pall-bearers officiated him to the grave.
"1 was the first one that he related his dream to. He laughed at it the same day that he died, and said that he was good for forty years longer. When he died he was seventy-one years old.
"George Herrington."
From the Rev. E. D. Banister. Whitechapel Vicarage, Preston, Lancashire:-
"12th November, 1885.
"My father, whilst a schoolboy (probably from 1808 - 1815), had a dream relating to his future, which I and my sister have often heard him relate. In the dream he saw a tablet in the parish church of his native place, on which was inscribed his name in full, the date of his birth, and the day and month, but not the year of his death. But there seemed to him to be something uncertain about the month in the date of his death.
"The date as inscribed on the tablet was 9th Jun But as June is seldom, if ever, abbreviated as Jun., he was somewhat inclined to think that it might be 9th January.
"Many years elapsed after the dream, and nothing occurred to recall the circumstance until on 9th June, 1835, my eldest brother died at the age of two years and ten months. My father at the time was very deeply affected by the loss of the child. The date of the child's death called to his mind the date on the tablet, and though in his dream he distinctly saw his own name, he ever afterwards favoured the idea that the date he had seen was 9th June.
"On 9th January, 1883, my father died.
Mr. Banister's sister confirms as follows:-
"I have seen my brothers letter respecting the dream of which I have heard my father speak, and can only say that the facts are as my brother has stated,
"Ac;nes Banister'
Let us pass to premonitions of another's death. The following most interesting case happened to a lady well known to the writer. She has kindly written it out for publication:-
"On the night of------1 had a very vivid dream.
I saw some one lying dead in our dining - room, Some thing prevented me recognising who it was but I saw that, to my great surprise, the flesh was quite: pink, although I knew that it was a dead person, I told my sisters of this dream the next day, On my sister M. L. died suddenly in the dining room,
I will now close with yet a few more instances taken from that inexhaustible receptacle of well authenticated cases of man's communication with another world, the Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research. Space does not permit of giving more than a very limited number of each class of dream, which yet may suffice as illustrations of what seem like dream possibilities, probably waiting to be developed until we know more of the great land on the "other side ".
The following are striking instances of dream premonitions of death: -1
From the Hon. Mrs. M., A. Adjutant-General's House, Royal Barracks, Dublin.
"1884.
"My sister was in the habit of getting up at 5 a.m. and of going to my fathers room (who was not well at the time) to give him tea, and then reading to him until about 7. I asked her one day if she would call me sometimes, that I should like to get up at 5. She refused, saying she thought 'I did quite enough in the day and had better be in bed'. The next morning, however, Thursday, to my surprise I awoke and saw her standing at the foot of my bed, looking very bright indeed, and I fancied in a white dressing - gown. The curtains were drawn over the windows and the light seemed somehow only to strike her figure. She said, 'Remember I have called you, it is 5 o'clock, and now I am going away; I am going away, remember' I fell asleep and did not wake until eight At break fast I said to my sister, 'so you did come and call me after all'! She looked astonished and said, ' No, I did not'. I said, 'Do you mean that you did not come at 5 o'clock and say, "Remember I have called you, and now I am going away"?' 'No,' she said, '1 never came near your room'. She, however, questioned me in rather an agitated way, and to my surprise said, 'I don't like those sort of dreams'. I never heard her say anything of the sort before, and was rather surprised at her thinking twice about it
1 Vol. xi., part xxix. of Proceedings S. P. R.
"The next day, Friday, having been in perfect health and spirits up to that morning, she was taken ill whilst sitting by my father's side, at about 6 o'clock, and she died at 5 o'clock the next day week, Thursday, of my dream or vision; and a curious coincidence was that she had on a white muslin dressing-gown in which she had sat up during part of the night I do not recollect that during the fluctuation of this short illness, from which at first no danger was apprehended, this strange incident occurred to my memory, but as the clock struck five on that sad morning I remembered.
"There is another dream connected with that sad short illness.
"My father, the second night before my sister was taken ill, dreamed that he asked her to go on with the Life of Charles James Fox, the second volume of which was not then in the house. He dreamed that she said 'Oh, there is no more for me to read, that is the end,' and she held up the volume she had read to him, open at the last page, across the half of which he saw printed in very large black, thick letters, filling the page quite across. The End.
 
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