able to take him
unawares; and neither sleep nor old age always come unawares upon a man.
People frequently feel themselves going to sleep and feel old age
stealing upon them; though there can be no doubt that sleep and old age
sometimes come unawares--old age came unawares upon me; it was only the
other day that I was aware that I was old, though I had long been old,
and sleep came unawares upon me in that chair in which I had sat down
without the slightest thought of sleeping. And there as I sat I had a
dream--what did I dream about? the sermon, musing upon which I had been
overcome by sleep? not a bit! I dreamt about a widely-different matter.
Methought I was in Llangollen fair in the place where the pigs were sold,
in the midst of Welsh drovers, immense hogs and immense men whom I took
to be the gents of Wolverhampton. What huge fellows they were! almost as
huge as the hogs for which they higgled; the generality of them dressed
in brown sporting coats, drab breeches, yellow-topped boots, splashed all
over with mud, and with low-crowned broad-brimmed hats. One enormous
fellow particularly caught my notice. I guessed he must have weighed
eleven score, he had a half-ruddy, half-tallowy face, brown hair, and
rather thin whiskers. He was higgling with the proprietor of an immense
hog, and as he higgled he wheezed as if he had a difficulty of
respiration, and frequently wiped off, with a dirty-white
pocket-handkerchief, drops of perspiration which stood upon his face. At
last methought he bought the hog for nine pounds, and had no sooner
concluded his bargain than turning round to me, who was standing close by
staring at him, he slapped me on the shoulder with a hand of immense
weight, crying with a half-piping, half-wheezing voice, "Coom, neighbour,
coom, I and thou have often dealt; gi' me noo a poond for my bargain, and
it shall be all thy own." I felt in a great rage at his unceremonious
behaviour, and, owing to the flutter of my spirits, whilst I was thinking
whether or not I should try and knock him down, I awoke and found the
fire nearly out and the ecclesiastical cat seated on my shoulders. The
creature had not been turned out, as it ought to have been, before my
wife and daughter retired, and feeling cold had got upon the table and
thence had sprung upon my back for the sake of the warmth which it knew
was to be found there; and no doubt the springing on my shoulders by the
ecclesiastical cat was what I t