FOIBLES OF LITERARY MEN-

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIII, Issue 13289, 22 September 1906, Page 5 (Supplement)

FOIBLES OF LITERARY MEN-

Keats liked red pepper on his toast. • Dickons was fond of wearing jewellery. .. Joaquin Miller nailed all his chairs to the wall. Edgar Allan Toe slept, with his cat, and was inordinately proud of his feet. Baudot wore his eyeglasses when asleep. Thackeray used to lift his hat whenever lie missed 'the house in .vliich he wrote "Vanity Fair." Alexandre Dumas the younger bought a new painting every time he had a new book published. Robert Louis Stevenson's favourite recreation was playing the flute, in order, as he, said, to tune'up his ideas. Robert Browning; could not sit still. With the constant shuffling of his feet holes were worn in the carpet. Longfellow enjoyed walking only at sunrise or sunset, and he said his sublimest moods came upon him at these times. Hawthorne always washed his hands before reading a letter from his wife. He delighted in poring over old advertisements in the newspaper files. . Darwin had no respect for books as books,' and would cut a big volume in two, for convenience in handling, or he. would tear out the leaves he required for reference. Oliver Wendell Holmes used to carry a horse-chestnut in one pocket and a potato in another to ward off rheumatism.