ace when I was told. Still, being, as I say,
tired of the usual 'digs,' I determined to try it, and accordingly
found myself landed in a nice-sized bedroom on the second floor. The
first three nights passed, and nothing happened, saving that I had the
most diabolical nightmares--a very unusual thing for me. 'It was the
cheese,' I said to myself, when I got out of bed the first morning; 'I
will take very good care I don't touch cheese to-night.' I kept this
resolution, but I had the nightmare again, and even, if anything,
worse than before. Then I fancied it must be cocoa--I was at that time
a teetotaller--so I took hot milk instead; but I had nightmare all the
same, and my dreams terrified me to such an extent that I did not dare
get out of bed in the morning (it was then winter) till it was broad
daylight. It was now becoming a serious matter with me. As you know,
an actor more than most people needs sleep, and it soon became as much
as I could do to maintain my usual standard of acting. On the fourth
night, determining to get rest at all costs, I took a stiff glass of
hot brandy just before getting into bed. I slept,--I could scarcely
help sleeping,--but not for long, for I was rudely awakened from my
slumbers by a loud crash. I sat up in bed, thinking the whole house
was falling about my ears. The sound was not repeated, and all was
profoundly silent. Wondering what on earth the noise could have been,
and feeling very thirsty, I got out of bed to get a drink of
lime-juice. To my annoyance, however, though I groped about
everywhere, knocking an ash tray off the mantelpiece and smashing the
lid of the soap-dish, I could find neither the lime-juice nor matches.
At length, giving it up as a bad job, I decided to get into bed again.
With that end in view, I groped my way through the darkness, steering
myself by the furniture, the position of which was, of course, quite
familiar to me--at least I imagined it was. Judge, then, of my
astonishment when I could not find the bed! At first I regarded it as
a huge joke, and laughed--how rich! Ha! ha! ha! Fancy not being able
to find one's way back to bed in a room of this dimension! Good enough
for _Punch_! Too good, perhaps, now. Ha! ha! ha! But it soon grew past
a joke. I had been round the room, completely round the room, twice,
and still no bed! I became seriously alarmed! Could I be ill? Was I
going mad? But no, my forehead was cool, my pulse normal. For some
seconds I stood