WHIMS OF NOTED AUTHORS.

Evening Post, Volume LX, Issue 18, 21 July 1900, Page 2 (Supplement)

WHIMS OF NOTED AUTHORS.

Habits and fancies of famous authors are a fruitful source of investigation for the student of literary curiosities. Balzac affected a monkish habit when writing. This robe was necessary before he could settle down to continuous work, and then he laboured with tremendous energy. Dickens was uneasy and incapable of satisfactosy composition unless he was seated at a- certain table. When he was in Paris and Boulogne in 1855 and 1856 engaged in writing "Little Dorrit," he carried his table with him, having been compelled to abandon the attempt to work at the noveil until his favourite piece of furniture was sent from England. The prolific Southey had also a favourite desk, and though author of many books and innumerable articles and reviews, he could not write a sentence unl&i3 lie was seated at that particular desk with his beloved books and familiar articles of library' furniture around him. But a singular fancy, stranger than the foregoing, was that of Bacon, who drew inspiration -from the fumes of a bottle