Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 67.djvu/505

Rh blowing of a whistle, suddenly thinks of the high school which he had attended and is able to trace the connection in that the school stood next to the engine-house that announced all fires by a similar whistle. B., while listening to a certain aria, finds himself visualizing a face that becomes definite and recognizable, and proves to be that of the friend who frequently played this air. C. awakens from a nap and, in the brief languor before rising from his couch, is able to arrest the association of the moment's waking reverie: his eyes rested upon the outlines of the window panes which presented a series of oblongs with the long side horizontal; he appreciated that the panes were really higher than broad, and that the effect was due to the crossing of the bars of the one sash with those of the other; reflected that the effect was pleasing, that he had seen it in old houses and in new ones built on old models; then visualized a window containing these broad panes; then thought how easily in ordering window panes of such shape, a carpenter might make a mistake and set them with the long side vertical instead of horizontal; speculated whether such an error would require the job to be done over again; then visualized a fireplace showing the color and design and setting, in a house which he had built fourteen years before, in which the faulty drawing of the architect had resulted in a badly proportioned opening, an irreparable mistake; then visualized the face of the culprit architect; and at this stage entered a wide-awake condition wondering why this face should be present, and was just able to resurrect by a reverse memory the aforesaid series of uncontrolled subconscious associations. D. emerges from a brown study, vaguely aware of a misty medley of flitting faces, is able to revitalize but one of them which, much to his surprise, proves to be his own reflection as he sees it in his glass while shaving; and is able to trace the appearance (a probable but not demonstrable source for others of the faces as well) to the series of illustrations scattered among the advertisements in a popular magazine which he had been perusing, one of them, on the open page before him, setting forth the excellence of a certain make of soap by picturing the foamy lather on the shaven cheek. And ail of us meet with such unexpected sequences in trains of uncontrolled thought, of which we recall only the more striking and accountable. Towards the great majority of these we do not, and could not if we would, assume a successful introspective attitude; they are far too elusive to be caught in the resurrecting process that attempts to draw them from their submerged retreat. Depending, as such instances do, for their record upon favoring circumstances coupled with a somewhat skilled introspection, it is not surprising that my casual collection contains few of them. When, however, the elaborative processes are carried on, not in momentary lowering of attention, but in the vivid projection of a dream, we obtain a different though equally convincing