d study, readers
know, but nobody, not even the author's wife, ever saw him in the act of
writing. He had to be alone."

Burns usually composed while walking in the open air, influenced,
perhaps, Dr. Currie suggests, by habits formed in early life. Until he
was completely master of a tune, he never could write words for it; so
his way was to consider the poetic sentiment corresponding to his idea
of the musical expression; then choose his theme; begin one stanza; when
that was composed,--which was generally the most difficult part of the
task,--to walk out, sit down now and then, look out for objects in
nature around him, such as harmonized with the cogitations of his fancy,
humming occasionally the air, with the verses already framed. When he
felt his "muse beginning to jade," he retired to the solitary fireside
of his study, and there committed his thoughts to paper; swinging at
intervals on the hind leg of his elbow-chair, "by way," he says, "of
calling forth my own critical strictures as my pen goes on." Sometimes,
and more than once too often, he composed, to use his own expression,
"by the leeside of a bowl of punch, which had overset every mortal in
company, except the hautbois and the muse."

Whether in town or country, Landor reflected and composed habitually
while walking, and, therefore, preferred at all times to walk alone. So
did Buckle. Wordsworth was accustomed to compose his verse in his
solitary walks, carry it in his memory, and get wife or daughter to
write it down on his return. He used to compose aloud while walking in
the fields and woods. Sometimes he would use a slate pencil and the
smooth side of a rock to jot down his lines. His excursions and peculiar
habits gave rise to some anxious beliefs among the ignorant peasantry.
Even his sanity was questioned. The peasantry of Rydal thought him "not
quite hissel," because he always walked alone, and was met at odd times
in odd places. Some poets have been in the habit of humming or repeating
their verses aloud as they composed them. Southey, for instance, boomed
his verses so as to be mistaken by Wilson, who was a keen sportsman, for
a bittern booming. If this is true, Southey's voice must not have been
very harmonious, for the bittern's cry is Shakespeare's "night-raven's
dismal voice."

Douglas Jerrold worked at a desk without a speck upon it, using an
ink-stand in a marble shell clear of all litter, his little dog at his
feet. If a comedy was in