The Swan of Vilamorta by Emilia Pardo Bazán

It was late before the Swan blew out the tallow candle which Aunt Gáspara placed every day, always with much grumbling, in his brass candlestick. Seated at the little table littered with books, he had before him a sheet of paper half covered with lines of unequal length, variegated with blots and corrections, little heaps of sand, and here and there a flourish. Segundo would not have slept all night if he had not first written down the poem which, from the moment he had left the cross, had been running through his brain. Only that, before taking up the pen, he seemed to have the poem already composed in his head, so that all he had to do was to turn the spigot and it would flow out in a stream, and when he took the pen in his hand the verses, instead of rushing forth, hid themselves or vanished.

A few strophes fell on the paper, rounded, fluent, finished, with harmonious and opportune rhymes, with a certain sweetness and sonorousness extremely delightful to the author himself, who scribbled them down hastily before they should take flight.