There may be something in this supposed influence of temperature and
seasons; but there certainly is no general law observable in the
matter. Shakspeare asks--

'Oh who can take a fire in his hand
By thinking of the frosty Caucasus?
Or wallow naked in December's snows
By bare remembrance of the summer's heat?'

He might have been answered by Moore, who shut himself up in the
wintry wilds of Derbyshire to write _Lalla Rookh_--a poem breathing of
the perfumes, and glowing in the sunlight of the golden East; and by
Scott, who, in Jermyn Street, St James's, with miles of brick houses
round him, produced his famous introductions to _Marmion_, some of
which may rank with the finest descriptions of natural scenery in the
language. But the way in which people are influenced seems utterly
capricious. We know a writer who is always unfavourably affected by a
dull, still atmosphere, and whose faculties are as invariably
exhilarated by a high wind. Cloudy weather does not influence him
disagreeably if it be stormy, but calm, leaden November glooms oppress
him with a feeling bordering upon stupor. These are altogether
unproductive days with him. If authors, however, are subject in their
moods to atmospheric and other circumstantial influences, it may be
expected that readers also are to some extent possessed of a like
tendency. Mr Willmott has, accordingly, a suitable suggestive word or
two to guide them in their reading. He says:--

'A classification of authors to suit all hours and weathers might be
amusing. Ariosto spans a wet afternoon like a rainbow. North winds and
sleet agree with Junius. The visionary tombs of Dante glimmer into
awfuller perspective by moonlight. Crabbe is never so pleasing as on
the hot shingle, when we look up from his verses at the sleepy sea,
and count the

"Crimson weeds, which spreading slow,
Or lie like pictures on the sand below:
With all those bright red pebbles, that the sun
Through the small waves so softly shines upon."

'Some books come in with lamps and curtains, and fresh logs. An
evening in late autumn, when there is no moon, and the boughs toss
like foam raking its way back down a pebbly shore, is just the time
for _Undine_. A voyage is read with deepest interest in winter, while
the hail dashes against the window. Southey speaks of this delight--

"'Tis pleasant by the cheerful hearth to hear
Of tempests and the dangers of the deep,