I had occasionally done so when a child, and had suddenly woke up.

Yes, surely I had been asleep and had woken up; but, no! alas, no! I had not been asleep--at least not in the old church--if I had been asleep I had been walking in my sleep, struggling, striving, learning, and unlearning in my sleep.

Years had rolled away whilst I had been asleep--ripe fruit had fallen, green fruit had come on whilst I had been asleep--how circumstances had altered, and above all myself, whilst I had been asleep.

No, I had not been asleep in the old church! I was in a pew it is true, but not the pew of black leather, in which I sometimes fell asleep in days of yore, but in a strange pew; and then my companions, they were no longer those of days of yore.

I was no longer with my respectable father and mother, and my dear brother, but with the gypsy cral and his wife, and the gigantic Tawno, the Antinous of the dusky people.