"Mr. Rutherford, of Bowland, a gentleman of landed property in theVale of Gala, was prosecuted for a very considerable sum, theaccumulated arrears of teind (or tithe) for which he was said to beindebted to a noble family, the titulars (lay impropriators of thetithes). Mr. Rutherford was strongly impressed with the belief thathis father had, by a form of process peculiar to the law of Scotland,purchased these teinds from the titular, and, therefore, that thepresent prosecution was groundless. But, after an industrious searchamong his father's papers, an investigation among the public recordsand a careful inquiry among all persons who had transacted lawbusiness for his father, no evidence could be recovered to support hisdefence. The period was now near at hand, when he conceived the lossof his law-suit to be inevitable; and he had formed the determinationto ride to Edinburgh next day and make the best bargain he could inthe way of compromise. He went to bed with this resolution, and, withall the circumstances of the case floating upon his mind, had a dreamto the following purpose. His father, who had been many years dead,appeared to him, he thought, and asked him why he was disturbed in hismind. In dreams men are not surprised at such apparitions. Mr.Rutherford thought that he informed his father of the cause of hisdistress, adding that the payment of a considerable sum of money wasthe more unpleasant to him because he had a strong consciousness thatit was not due, though he was unable to recover any evidence insupport of his belief. 'You are right, my son,' replied the paternalshade. 'I did acquire right to these teinds for payment of which youare now prosecuted. The papers relating to the transaction are in thehands of Mr. ---, a writer (or attorney), who is now retired fromprofessional business and resides at Inveresk, near Edinburgh. He wasa person whom I employed on that occasion for a particular reason, butwho never on any other occasion transacted business on my account. Itis very possible,' pursued the vision, 'that Mr. --- may haveforgotten a matter which is now of a very old date; but you may callit to his recollection by this token, that when I came to pay hisaccount there was difficulty in getting change for a Portugal piece ofgold and we were forced to drink out the balance at a tavern.'"Mr. Rutherford awoke in the morning with all the words of the visionimprinted on his mind, and thought it worth while to walk across thecountry to Inveresk instead of going straight to Edinburgh. When hecame there he waited on the gentleman mentioned in the dream--a veryold man. Without saying anything of the vision he inquired whether heever remembered having conducted such a matter for his deceasedfather. The old gentleman could not at first bring the circumstanceto his recollection, but on mention of the Portugal piece of gold thewhole returned upon his memory. He made an immediate search for thepapers and recovered them, so that Mr. Rutherford carried to Edinburghthe documents necessary to gain the cause which he was on the verge oflosing."The story is reproduced because it is clearly one of the tales whichcome round in cycles, either because events repeat themselves orbecause people will unconsciously localise old legends in new placesand assign old occurrences or fables to new persons. Thus every onehas heard how Lord Westbury called a certain man in the Herald'soffice "a foolish old fellow who did not even know his own foolish oldbusiness". Lord Westbury may very well have said this, but longbefore his time the remark was attributed to the famous LordChesterfield. Lord Westbury may have quoted it from Chesterfield orhit on it by accident, or the old story may have been assigned to him.In the same way Mr. Rutherford may have had his dream or the followingtale of St. Augustine's (also cited by Scott) may have been attributedto him, with the picturesque addition about the piece of Portuguesegold. Except for the piece of Portuguese gold St. Augustinepractically tells the anecdote in his De Cura pro Mortuis Habenda,adding the acute reflection which follows. {16}"Of a surety, when we were at Milan, we heard tell of a certain personof whom was demanded payment of a debt, with production of hisdeceased father's acknowledgment, which debt, unknown to the son, thefather had paid, whereupon the man began to be very sorrowful, and tomarvel that his father while dying did not tell him what he owed whenhe also made his will. Then in this exceeding anxiousness of his, hissaid father appeared to him in a dream, and made known to him wherewas the counter acknowledgment by which that acknowledgment wascancelled. Which when the young man had found and showed, he not onlyrebutted the wrongful claim of a false debt, but also got back hisfather's note of hand, which the father had not got back when themoney was paid."Here then the soul of a man is supposed to have had care for his son,and to have come to him in his sleep, that, teaching him what he didnot know, he might relieve him of a great trouble. But about the verysame time as we heard this, it chanced at Carthage that therhetorician Eulogius, who had been my disciple in that art, being (ashe himself, after our return to Africa, told us the story) in courseof lecturing to his disciples on Cicero's rhetorical books, as helooked over the portion of reading which he was to deliver on thefollowing day, fell upon a certain passage, and not being able tounderstand it, was scarce able to sleep for the trouble of his mind:in which night, as he dreamed, I expounded to him that which he didnot understand; nay, not I, but my likeness, while I was unconsciousof the thing and far away beyond sea, it might be doing, or it mightbe dreaming, some other thing, and not in the least caring for hiscares. In what way these things come about I know not; but in whatway soever they come, why do we not believe it comes in the same wayfor a person in a dream to see a dead man, as it comes that he sees aliving man? both, no doubt, neither knowing nor caring who dreams oftheir images, or where or when."Like dreams, moreover, are some visions of persons awake, who havehad their senses troubled, such as phrenetic persons, or those who aremad in any way, for they, too, talk to themselves just as though theywere speaking to people verily present, and as well with absent men aswith present, whose images they perceive whether persons living ordead. But just as they who live are unconscious that they are seen ofthem and talk with them (for indeed they are not really themselvespresent, or themselves make speeches, but through troubled sensesthese persons are wrought upon by such like imaginary visions), justso they also who have departed this life, to persons thus affectedappear as present while they be absent, and are themselves utterlyunconscious whether any man sees them in regard of their image." {18}St. Augustine adds a similar story of a trance.
