And yet when I am extra good ... [_here I omit the transfusion
of Riley_]
My bottle spreads a rainbow mist, and from the vapor fine
Ten thousand troops from fairyland come riding in a line.

I suppose it is the mark of a trifling mind, yet I like to hear of the
little particulars that surrounded those whose pens struck sparks. It
is Boswell that leads us into that habit of thought. I like to know what
the author wore, how he sat, what the furniture of his desk and chamber,
who cooked his meals for him, and with what appetite he approached them.
"The mind soars by an effort to the grand and lofty" (so dipped Hazlitt
in some favored ink-bottle)--"it is at home in the groveling, the
disagreeable, and the little."

I like to think, as I look along book shelves, that every one of these
favorites was born out of an ink-well. I imagine the hopes and visions
that thronged the author's mind as he filled his pot and sliced the
quill. What various fruits have flowed from those ink-wells of the past:
for some, comfort and honor, quiet homes and plenteousness; for others,
bitterness and disappointment. I have seen a copy of Poe's poems,
published in 1845 by Putnam, inscribed by the author. The volume had
been bought for $2,500. Think what that would have meant to Poe himself.

Some such thoughts as these twinkled in my head as I held up the Pierian
bottle against the light, admired the deep blue of it, and filled my
ink-well. And then I took up my pen, which wrote:

A GRACE BEFORE WRITING

On Filling an Ink-well