The stopped watch and a brother

Two ladies, sisters, had been for several days in attendance upon their brother, who was ill of a common sore throat, severe and protracted, but not considered as attended with danger. At the same time one of them had borrowed a watch from a female friend, in consequence of her own being under repair. This watch was one to which particular value was attached on account of some family associations, and some anxiety was expressed that it might not meet with any injury. The sisters were sleeping together in a room communicating with that of their brother, when the elder of them awoke in a state of great agitation, and having roused the other, told her that she had had a frightful dream. ‘I dreamed,’ she said, ‘that Mary’s watch stopped, and that when I told you of the circumstance, you replied, much worse than that has happened, for —’s breath has stopped also,’ naming their brother who was ill. To quiet her agitation the younger sister immediately got up, and found the brother sleeping quietly, and the watch, which had been carefully put by in a drawer, going correctly. The following night the very same dream occurred, followed by a similar agitation, which was again composed in the same manner, the brother being again found in a quiet sleep, and the watch going well. On the following morning, soon after the family had breakfasted, one of the sisters was sitting by her brother, while the other was writing a note in the adjoining room. When her note was ready for being sealed, she was proceeding to take out for this purpose the watch alluded to, which had been put by in her writing-desk; she was astonished to find it had stopped. At the same instant she heard a scream of intense distress from her sister in the other room: their brother, who had still been considered as going on favourably, had been seized with a sudden fit of suffocation, and had just breathed his last.