Historical dream account · English · published source text
Four or six inches of candle
Horace G. Hutchinson
Dreams and Their Meanings (1901) · Original 1901 edition, printed pp. 199, 200; chapter VI; PDF pages 211, 212
Dreamer identified by the source: Mrs. Venn (as named in the1901 source)
Read in your language or share a constellation ↗
I think the oddest experience I ever had with him was one night at Bournemouth, when he slept in my room. I dreamed a dream and woke with it, and he immediately (asleep still) in his sleep began to talk about it, proving that he was dreaming the same thing. It was a very queer dream, and involved the question of how many inches (of a row of candles) should be cut off each candle. He gravely begged me to ' cut off six inches, do, mamma ' ; when I was feeling four would be enough. It was a fête in our dream, and we were lighting up some room. No real thing had happened to suggest it to us, but we both dreamt it together apparently.
Source & context
Mrs. Venn recounts her own sleep dream and her son’s subsequent sleep talk. The apparent shared-dream inference is hers and the historical compiler’s; it is not independently demonstrated. One reported occurrence is counted once, and the source’s “apparently” remains in the narrative.
Mrs. Venn (as named in the1901 source), reported in Horace G. Hutchinson, Dreams and Their Meanings (Longmans, Green and Co.,1901), Original 1901 edition, printed pp. 199, 200; chapter VI; PDF pages 211, 212. Earlier reporter: Mrs. Venn, first-person correspondent; reports her son’s sleep talk. Chapters VI–VII were prepared by an unnamed collaborator. The book author/compiler, dreamer and earlier reporter are credited separately. Editorial title and navigation themes added; no generated narrative or new translation.
The publication year1901 and letter datelines are not assigned as the dream date. Dates/relative dates in original prose remain unchanged.
Public domain in the United States (1901 edition) ↗
The original English 1901 edition is public domain in the United States by expired publication term; Archive metadata reports NOT_IN_COPYRIGHT. No new Archive license or Public Domain Mark grant is asserted. The linked NoC-US statement describes the US-only rights basis; blanket worldwide clearance is not asserted. These are named, initialled or anonymous published-correspondent accounts reproduced by an unnamed collaborator in Hutchinson’s book. The dreamer and earlier reporter are credited separately; no contributor is assigned the compiler’s death date. No modern translation is used.
Source locator and text provenance
Original 1901 edition, printed pp. 199, 200; chapter VI; PDF pages 211, 212
The original text and redactions are preserved. The page title is an editorial navigation label.
Descriptive editorial title only; no generated dream prose or translation. Book repeated paragraph-opening quotation marks and trailing presentation quote excluded through exact source-span boundaries. Literal internal dialogue retained. Whitespace/line wraps normalized; only explicitly listed scan-confirmed corrections/dehyphenations. Complete qualification spans retained separately as attributed source context. Addresses/signatures/letter headers outside dream prose are boundary furniture, not silent dream omissions.
- Account text SHA-256
- c9ef02eea20c175608963a7c651ec3cf425f0028be5a12d7263d6b2d4913973d
- Source file SHA-256
- 40a41bb112104c3680401c260e060fde498bfe84e41f4394ee28e47f7e827b5f
Connections in the Loom
Titles, theme labels, illustrations and map connections are editorial navigation aids. They are separate from the account’s words and do not establish connections between real people.