FOIBLES OF GENIUS.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 5217, 16 December 1927, Page 3

FOIBLES OF GENIUS.

PECULIAR IDEAS* Persons of genius sometimes, possess peculiar ideas and superstitions unknown to average people. The lives of certain famous authors testify to this fact. Dickens was fond of wearing flashy je.wellery. Walter S. Landor threw the dishes around to relieve his mind. Edgar Allan Poe was very proud of his feet. Joaquin Miller nailed all the chairs to the wall. Keats liked red pepper on his toast. Victor Hugo spoke very little, and his remarks were usually questions. Robert Louis Stevenson played the flute for the purpose of tuning up -his ideas. Robert Browning could not sit still, and by the constant shuffling of his feet holes were worn in the carpet. Longfellow said his sublimest moods came upon him when walking at sunrise or sunset. Washington Irving never mentioned the name of his fiancee after her death, and if anybody else did so, he immediately left the room. Thackeray used to lift his hat whenever he pa£L.!d the house in which he wrote “Vanity Fa-r.” Alexandre Dumas the younger bought a new painting every time he had a new book published. Sardpu imagined he had a perpetual cold. Hawthorne delighted in poring over old advertisements in the newspaper files. D’sraeli wore corsets; he, always wanted to appear a young man, and had a pen stuck behind each ear when :he w*as writing.

Darwin had very little respect for books; he would cut a large volume in two for convenience in handling, and would tear out the pages he wanted for reference. For weeks, at a time Zola believed himself to be an idiot. In this state of mind he did his best work.

Bret Harte would hire a cab for the night and drive through the dark until his struggle for ideas was over, so that he could write. He enjoyed being taken for an Englishman. Oliver Wendell Holmes used to carry a horse-chestnut in one pocket and a potato in another to ward off rheumatism.

It is said that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle never wears an overcoat. He spends a great deal of time on the golf links. F. Marion Crawford used the same penrolder in writing every word of his novels. He never wrote with any other paper, pen, or ink than his own, which he carried with him.

Macaulay was fond of embroidered waistcoats, and had quite a collection of them. Voltaire would sharpen a dozen lead pencils before beginning his day’s work. Bjornson kept his pockets filled with the seeds of trees, and, would scatter them in his daily walks, often trying to persuade His friends to do the same.