The original / by the late Thomas Walker, edited and arranged under distinct heads; with additions by William A. Guy.

  • Thomas Walker
Date:
1875
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The original / by the late Thomas Walker, edited and arranged under distinct heads; with additions by William A. Guy. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.

    24/422 page 10
    HABITS OP COMPOSITION. posing I apprehend to be very different from what could he supposed, and from the usual mode. I write in a bed-room at an hotel, sitting upon a cane chair, in the same dress 1 go out in, and with no books to refer to but the New Testament, Shakspeare, and a pocket-dictionary. Now and then, when much pressed for time, and without premedita- tion, and with my eye upon the clock, I have written some of the short moral pieces above mentioned at the Athenaeum, at the same table where others have been writing notes and letters; and sometimes I snatch an interval at my office. -Moreover, most of these short pieces have been written by measure to fill up certain spaces. I write down a title, and then wait for the first sentence; then for another, and so on, without any plan, till I have got as many lines as I want, and I have generally found that the more unsatisfactory the process has been to myself, the more satisfaction I have given to others. I can only attribute my succeeding under such circumstances to the extent I am told I have done, to my formerly having read with great attention, not crammed, many of the best authors, and to my habitual cultivation for many years of the pure truth, unmixed with party feeling, or any bias whatever. The disposition and the hidden materials seem to bring me through my emergencies. I shall conclude with a tribute which I feel to be due. In former times, printers appear to have been the torment of authors; but mine are to me the reverse, for they render me every assistance, and in each individual in the office with whom I have to do, I find so complete an understanding of his business, such punctu- ality in execution, so much intelligence, and such a desire to accom- modate me, as make what might be very irksome very agreeable. With my publisher, to whom I applied without any previous know- ledge, from his contiguity to the printing-office, my business is less frequent and less urgent, but I can speak of him with equal praise; so that with readers, printers, and publisher, I consider myself altogether most fortunate. In my first address to you I expressed a hope that we should soon be on intimate terms. In what I have just written I have assumed that we are so, and have let my pen talk as if I were talking in person to a familiar acquaintance. [In the same number in which this address appears, the author calls our attention to a “ Case of Distress,” which proves to be his own. He confesses to a failure of ideas. He has gone to bed late, and risen early; but it is of no use. The reader must accept further extracts from his “ Pamphlet on Pauperism” in lieu of new matter :—] I am in a state of great perplexity at this moment. It is half-past four in the morning, and by twelve o’clock I want six pages in order to complete this number. All yesterday I was racking my brain upon
    digitised image 1
    digitised image 2
    digitised image 3