ower
was brought into sight again.

Kant's old tower recalls Buffon's incapability of thinking to good
purpose except in full dress, and with his hair in such elaborate order
that, by way of external stimulus to his brain, he had a hairdresser to
interrupt his work twice, or, when very busy, thrice a day. To Aubrey we
owe this account of Prynne's method of study: "He wore a long quilt cap,
which came two or three inches at least over his eyes, and served him
as an umbrella to defend his eyes from the light. About every three
hours his man was to bring him a roll and a pot of ale, to refocillate
his wasted spirits; so he studied and drank and munched some bread; and
this maintained him till night, and then he made a good supper."
Refocillation is a favorite resource--whatever the word may be--with
authors not a few. Addison, with his bottle of wine at each end of the
long gallery at Holland House,--and Schiller, with his flask of old
Rhenish and his coffee laced with old Cognac, at three in the
morning,--occur to the memory at once. Shelley attempted to ruin his
digestion by way of exciting the brain by continually munching bread
while composing.

The venerable Leopold von Ranke, one of the most eminent historians of
the age, composed in the night as well as in the daytime, and even when
more than ninety years of age sometimes worked till midnight. He had two
secretaries. He was a late riser, as most night-workers are. After
getting up late, he worked with his first amanuensis from ten in the
morning until three in the afternoon. Thereupon, if the weather was
fine, he took a walk in the public promenades, always accompanied by a
servant. He dined at five P. M., and then dictated to his second
secretary from six in the evening until, occasionally, one or two
o'clock in the morning. He neither took stimulants nor smoked. He never
worked when disinclined; in fact, the disinclination to write was
foreign to his nature. He always felt like writing.

J. T. Trowbridge, the author of "The Vagabonds," always prefers daytime
to night for literary work, but sometimes can compose verse only at
night. He always sets out with a tolerably distinct outline in his
mind--rarely on paper--of what he intends to write. But the filling in
he leaves to the suggestions of thought in the hour of composition, and
often gets on to currents which carry him into unexpected by-ways. He
seldom begins a story that he would not like to make twice as