The Findlay Jeffersonian. [volume] (Findlay, Hancock County, Ohio) 1870-1881, 1876-02-25
WHAT 1T COSTS TO WRITE WELL.

Excellence is not matured in a day,
and the cost of it is an old story. The
be btginning of Plato's "Republie,," il is
said, was found in his tablets written
over and over in a variety Of ways. Ad-
olson, we are told, wore out the patience
of his printer; frequently, when nearly
a whole impression of Spectator was
worked off, he would stop the press to
insert new proposition. Lambs most
sportive essays were the result of most
intense brain labor; he used to spend a
week at time in celebrating single
humorous letter to friend. TennysoB
is reported to have written "Come into
the Garden Maud, more than fifty times
over before it pleased him, and Locks
ley Hail." the first draught of which was
written in two days, he spent the better
part of six weeks, for eight hours day.
in altering and polishing. Dickens, when
he intended to write Christmas story,
shut himself up for six weeks, lived the
life of a hermit, and came out looking
as haggard as murderer. Balzac, after
he had thought out thoroughly one of
his philosophical romances, and amassed
his materials in most laborious manner,
retired TO his study, and from that time
until his book had gone to press, society
saw him no more. When he appeared
again among his friends he looked, said
his publisher, in the popular phrase, like
his own ghost. The manuscript was
afterward altered and copied, when it
passed into the hands of the printer.
from whose slips the book was rewritten
for third time. Again it went into the
hands Of the printer-two, three, and
sometimes four separate proofs being
required before the authors leave could
be got to send the perpetualIy rewritten
book to press at last, and so have done
with it. He was literally the terror of
all printers and editors. Moore thought
it quick work If he wrote seventy lines
of ''Lalla Rookh" in week. Xinglake's
"Eothen," we are told, was rewritten
five or six times, and was kept In the
authors writing desk almost as long as
Wordsworth kept the "Wh;te Doe Of
Rylstone," and kept, like that, to be
taken out for review and correction al
most every day. Buttons ''Studies of
Nature" cost him fifty years of labor,
and he recopied it eighteen times before
he sent it to the printer. ''He composed
in singular manner, writing on large
sized paper, in which, as in ledger. five
distinct columns were ruled. In the first
columns he wrote down the first
thoughts; in the second, he corrected,
enlarged, and pruned it; and SO ON, until
he had reached the fifth column, within
which he finally wrote the result of his
labor, But even after this he would
recompose a sentence twenty times, and
once devoted fourteen hours to finding
the proper word with which to round OF
a period" John Foster often spent
hours upon a single sentence. Ten yesrs
elapsed between the first sketch OF
Goldsmith's Traveller and its compile
ton. La Rochsfoacauld spent fifteen
years in prepsriDg his little book OF
maxims, altering some of them, Segrais
says, nearly thirty times. We all know
how Sheridan polished bis wit and I'm
ished his jokes, the same things being
found on different bits of paper, differ
emily expressed. Rogers showed Crabb
Robinson note to bis 'sitaly," which,
he said, took him two weeks to write. IL
consists of very few lines-A. p RusseH.