Lord Brougham's Dream

1917

Lord Brougham was one of the stubborn believers to the "common sense" explanation of ghostly appearances as dreams. At Edinburgh university he and an intimate friend drew up an agreement written with their blood that whichever of them died first should appear to the survivor.

Years passed; the friend was in India, and Brougham had almost forgotten his existence. Arriving late one night at an inn in Sweden, Brougham had a hot bath and was going to get out of it when he looked toward the chair on which he had left his clothes and saw his friend sitting on it. Brougham seems then to have fainted.

On getting home be received a letter announcing that the other had died in India at the very time. Yet this incident, which most people would put down to telepathy at least, was dismissed by Brougham as a mere dream and pure coincidence.