You left strict orders, overnight, to be called at half-past four, and you have done nothing all night but doze for five minutes at a time, and start up suddenly from a terrific dream of a large church-clock with the small hand running round, with astonishing rapidity, to every figure on the dial-plate.

At last, completely exhausted, you fall gradually into a refreshing sleep--your thoughts grow confused--the stage-coaches, which have been 'going off' before your eyes all night, become less and less distinct, until they go off altogether; one moment you are driving with all the skill and smartness of an experienced whip--the next you are exhibiting _a la_ Ducrow, on the off-leader; anon you are closely muffled up, inside, and have just recognised in the person of the guard an old schoolfellow, whose funeral, even in your dream, you remember to have attended eighteen years ago.

At last you fall into a state of complete oblivion, from which you are aroused, as if into a new state of existence, by a singular illusion.

You are apprenticed to a trunk-maker; how, or why, or when, or wherefore, you don't take the trouble to inquire; but there you are, pasting the lining in the lid of a portmanteau.

Confound that other apprentice in the back shop, how he is hammering!--rap, rap, rap--what an industrious fellow he must be! you have heard him at work for half an hour past, and he has been hammering incessantly the whole time.