* In Dr Fitzpatrick’s biography only a scant account of thenovelist’s life during this period is furnished; but anumber of Lever’s letters to Mr John Blackwood are given inMrs Blackwood Porter’s Life of her father. I am indebted toMrs Porter for permission to include some of these with theothers, and also several letters from Mr John Blackwood toLever.
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Hôtel d’Odessa, Spezzia,May2, 1863.
“I hasten to answer and thank you for your letter. I am glad you like the line I have taken on Italy. I believe it to be the true one, and I know that it is, so far, new.
“As to my story, I’d give you my whole plan in detail at once but for this reason, which you will acknowledge to be good—that the very moment I revealed it I should be obliged to invent another! To such an extent do I labour under this unfortunate disability, that in my own family no one ever questions me as to the issue of any tale I am engaged on, well knowing that once I have discussed, I should be obliged to change it.
“You ask me how I write. My reply is, just as I live—from hand to mouth! I can do nothing continuously—that is, without seeing the printed part close behind me. This has been my practice for five-and-twenty years, and I don’t think I could change it. At least, I would deem it a rash experiment to try.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Hôtel d’Odessa, Spezzia,May8, 1863.
“You will have had my note about my story, and all that I have to say on that score is already said. Only that I have not written any more, nor can I, without either a proof in print or a look at my MS.; for, as I had to own to you, most ignominiously, I have only one way of writing! And like the gentleman mentioned by Locke, who, having learned to dance in a room where there was an old hairbrush, never could accomplish a step without that accompaniment, so I must stick to my poor traditions, of which an old coat and an old ink-bottle, and a craving impatience to see how my characters look in type, are chief; and I seriously believe, if you cut me off from these—there’s an end of me!
“I think there is material for a pleasant half-gossiping sort of paper on social Italy—‘Life in Italian Cities,’—those strange wildernesses where rare plants and weeds live together on a pleasant equality, and where you may find the cowslip under a glass and the cactus on a dunghill. Is it not strange, there is nothing so graphic about Italy as the sketches in Byron’s letters? Perhaps it was the very blending of Dirt and Deity in himself led him into the exact appreciation.
“My hand o’ write is none of the clearest, but I’ll do my best to be legibleToyou andbyyou; and with my hearty thanks for your very cordial note.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Hôtel d’Odessa, Spezzia,May16, 1863.
“Thanks for your note and its enclosure, which reached me this morning.
“I am glad you have understood what, after I had sent it off, appeared to me a very unintelligible note, being in fact an attempt to explain what even to myself is not explicable—the [only] mode in which I can write a story.
“You are perfectly right as to looking at the thing in proof: it is the same test as the artists’ one of seeing their drawing in a looking-glass,—all that is good is confirmed, and all that is out of drawing or wrong in perspective is just as sure of being displayed strongly.
“If your opinion be favourable, the point which will most interest me to know is the time of publishing; for, seeing that I want some material which I can only obtain by personal intercourse, the longer the interval, moderately speaking, the better for me.
“Secondly. Should we travel this road together, I want to beg that you will be as free to tell me what you think of what I send as though I was the rawest recruit in literature. I never write with the same spirit as under such criticism—given when not too late to amend; and if anything reaches you that you think ill of, do not hesitate to say so at once. I can change—in fact, it is the one compensation for all the inartistic demerits of my way of work—I can change as easily as I can talk of changing. These are all that I want to stipulate for on my part; the rest is with you. I am so eager to get on, that when you send me a proof (I cannot till then) I’ll have at it at once. Meanwhile I lie in the sun and suck oranges.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Hôtel d’Odessa, Spezzia,May28, 1863.
“Though I have been, not without some anxiety, waiting for a proof of my story, or some tidings of it,—for I cannot go on without a clue,—I now write to send you a paper on ‘Why Italy has not Done More,’ knowing from my own experiences the benefit of being early in Mag. ‘make up.’
“I hope much you will like it. If you think that any addition to it would be necessary, or in fact, if you have any changes to suggest, pray let me know.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Hôtel d’Odessa, Spezzia,June25, 1863.
“I have just received your pleasant note and its enclosure. How your promptitude tells of a long intimacy with Grub Street!
“As to quantity, 18 sheets of the D. U. M. used to suffice for a 3-vol. novel; but it shall be more—20 if you like. I always feel with the hostess in ‘The Honeymoon.‘When reproached for her liquor, she excused herself by saying that as she knew it was bad, she gave short measure.
“Onecontretempsor another has knocked me out of work latterly; but when the proof reaches me I’ll get into harness and pull away.
“Is it amongst the possible things to see you ever—this side o’ the Alps? It would be a great pleasure to me to hear it was, not to say thepositive advantageof having a gossip with you.
“The Mag. arrives most regularly and is a great pleasure to me. There is (to me) a memory of school-days in the grim old face on the cover, that brings back more flitting thoughts of long ago than I believed could have been evoked by anything.”
To Mr John Blackwood
[Undated.]
“First of all, I thank you for your kind note, and say with what real pride I shall see myself in your columns. ‘Ebony’ has been an ambition of mine since my boyhood. I send you all that I know about Italy in an article I have boiled down from an ox to a basin of broth, and only hope it may suit your palate. I send you the opening of the Garibaldi romance. To give all the realism so necessary for a story of adventure, I was obliged to set out very quietly. Let me have your opinion as soon as conveniently you can. I quite agree with you about the mystery as to the authorship, and will answer for my part. Don’t forget to send me ‘Maga’ when out.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Spezzia,June26, 1863.
“It has happened to me more than once, when particularly anxious to do well, to make a fiasco of it. I have the same anxiety now; and to put me at my ease, if there be anything you like in these, say so, for, like most of my countrymen, I thrive better on kindnesses than on kicks.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Spezzia,July26,1863.
“I send by this post one sheet and half—or nearly—of ‘Tony’ corrected for the Nov. No., being, I suspect, as much as your readers would swallow at a time. Let chap. ix. end where I have marked, and I’ll try, if I can, to put in the missing link, which, as you observe, occurs at that place.
“Of course M’Casky ‘is extravagant,’ but I’ll swear to you not more so than scores of real flesh-and-blood men in the land he came from.
“My home critics say that all that political part at Naples is dull and heavy. I don’t think it so; besides, I have endeavoured to assure them that there is in novel-writing a principle, analogous to what chemists find in active medicinal substances, and which they profanely called ‘inert matte,’ but which, if our knowledge were greater, would doubtless display some marvellous property of either enhancing some other gift or restraining some latent power of mischief. Are you of my mind?—because if, unhappily, you side withthem, you are at full liberty to cut away as much about Maitland’s politics as you like or dislike.
“My hope is that, with the portion now in print by me and that already sent, you will have enough for December and January too. I say this, for I start to-day for a yachting ramble down the coast, and am in for idleness till the hot weather is over. It is 90 something in what represents shade; and what with the smell of oranges and the glow, I feel as if I were sitting in a pot of hot marmalade.
“At all events send me proof; be as critical, but as merciful, as you can.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Hotel d’Odessa, Spezzia,Aug. 3, 1863.
“I send you herewith a short paper on Italian affairs. Call it ‘Italian Letters’ or ‘Glances at Italy.’ or anything you like better.
“The adventure with De Langier was my own. I accepted the mission at the request of Sir G. Hamilton, and very narrowly escaped the cross of Saint Joseph from the Grand Duke.
“I hope you will like the paper, but I reckon implicitly on your frankness. I have got what, if I wasn’t so poor, I’d own to be gout in one knuckle, and cannot hold a pen without trembling. I’m off to sea to-night, but send me an early proof.”
To Dr Burbidge.*
“Casa Capponi, Florence,Aug. 13, 1863
* English chaplain at Spezzia.
“I have been looking for a quiet ten minutes to write to you, but it has not come yet, and so I send this offin petto.
“We got up here safely, and met my wife suffering far less than I apprehended, and not materially the worse for all the fatigue.
“It reconciled her, besides, to much that she could reach her own quiet old house here, which has for fifteen years been our home, so that though I proposed remaining a day to rest at Pisa, she would not hear of it, but pushed on bravely to the end.
“It is a wonderful relief to us all to have escaped from the Bagni di Basseti, the coarse food, coarse linen, and coarser language of its vile occupants. Sixteen months of such servitude at the cost of above a thousand pounds have eaten deep into me, and it will require almost as many more to blow off the steam of my indignation.
“I have cast my eye over the latter part of ‘Tony,’ and for the life of me I cannot see what some of the crosses refer to. If I send a proof down will you make the corrections bodily for me?
“Blackwood has written a most kind letter, and incidentally tells me ‘Tony’ is liked and well spoken of.”
To Mr Alexander Spencer.
“Spezzia, Sept. 10, 1863.
“It is not very easy to write amidst the anxieties which money occasions—I mean the want of money; but probably I ought to be grateful that my occupation, being one which only employs imagination, necessarily withdraws me, whether I will or no, from the daily thought of difficulties which certainly reflecting over never diminishes.
“I am writing a new story—‘Luttrell of Arran’—as sad-coloured as my own reveries; but how is a man to paint a good picture who has nothing but blacks or browns on his palette?
“As to work generally, I have, thank God, health and strength for it. I never was better, nor ever found it easier to apply myself. It is in the precariousness of a life of literature is its real deterrent; but for that defect it is unquestionably the pleasantest possible. At all events it has kept us hitherto, and, I trust, will do so to the end.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Hôtel d’Odessa, Spezzia,Sept. 19, 1863.
“By my last short note you will have seen how eagerly I accepted the opportunity of idleness and threw the blame of it on you,—though I say not altogether idle, having to look over again the story I have been writing for Chapman called ‘Luttrell,’ and which he has been desiring to publish some months back.
“I am glad to get back to my old den, Casa Cap., where I write more at ease and am freer from intrusions than here. Pray let me have No. 2 ‘Tony’ to look over again, and send me No. 3 in theform and quantityit will appear in the Magazine. Above all, let your people be sure to send me ‘Maga.’
“These Italians are making immense warlike preparations. This week the king reviews 360 pieces of artillery,—more than half the number rifled guns. By the end of the month the fleet—now a very respectable squadron—will manouvre before him. Whatever wars France may engage in these poor devils are sure to partake of. Nice and Savoy are only instalments of the price they are to pay for Solferino.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Casa Capponi, Florence,Oct. 1, 1863.
“I was called here by telegraph too late to see my only son alive. He died of a ruptured bloodvessel on Wednesday last.
“I have for some years back had many misfortunes; this one fills the cup. I am as bereaved as one can be. My wife is dying, and this shock may be her last. I have no right to obtrude upon you with these, but I think you will pity me. Pity is indeed my portion, for one more broken there cannot be. If I had not begun with you, I would not now, in justice to you, continue. You will serve us both by drawing out what I have written to a fifth number if possible. If not, I will do my utmost to be ready; four parts there are.
“Pray forgive me in all this affliction that I mix you up with what should not touch you.
“My poor boy was twenty-six,—the finest, boldest, and cleverest fellow you ever saw, and one of the handsomest.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Casa Capponi, Florence,Oct. 12,1863.
“I can never forget your kind and feeling note.* Broken and crushed as I am, I am not yet insensible to such kindness. If you only knew how we lived with our children, how much we mingled in their lives and they in ours! It was but the other day my poor boy came back from India after seven years’ absence, and the feeling that we were all together again had but just dawned on us.
*From Mr John Blackwood to Mr Charles Lever.“Oct. 5,1868.“I am truly distressed to hear of the sad affliction thathas come upon you in the death of your only son. God comfortyou, and grant that your poor wife may be supported underthis heavy blow. Do not disturb yourself about your tale. Iwill make arrangements to suit a man suffering under sorrowsuch as yours. We can either shorten the parts or suspendpublication at the end of the fourth part for a month if youare not ready. All the opinions I hear of the first part arehighly favourable, and would, under other circumstances, behighly gratifying to you. If I see any comments in the presslikely to interest you, I shall send them to you. All yournovels bespeak the writer a warm-hearted man, and I thinkmuch of you in your affliction. I showed your affecting noteto my wife, who, although like myself personally a strangerto you, joins me in warm sympathy.”
“My poor wife, too,—for two years a great sufferer from an internal inflammation,—was happier than I had seen her for many a day, and when I repined or complained about something, said to me, ‘Well, never grumble about such disasters; remember all that we have to be thankful for, and that death has never come amongst us hitherto.’ It was but one week after that we lost him.
“From my heart. I thank you for your sympathy, all the more, too, that you associated your wife in your sorrow for us.
“P.S.—It will be better for me, I believe, that I must work, and work hard; the tired head may help the heavy heart after all.”
To Mr Alexander Spencer.
“Casa Capponi, Florence,Oct. 17, 1863.
“Your kindest of notes was very dear to me at this, the saddest day of my life. My poor boy was taken away almost in a moment. Some internal rupture, followed by great haemorrhage, overcame him, and he sank at once and never rallied even to consciousness.
“The great struggle of my life was his advancement,—to place him in a high and honourable position; and to maintain him there was an effort for which I toiled and laboured till I had parted with the little my years of industry had gathered, sold my copyrights, and left myself penniless, even to the poverty that I could scarcely collect enough to pay the expenses of the churchyard where I laid him. So much for human foresight! All my love and all my tact to be under the small mound of the churchyard!
“They who speak of religious consolation in great calamity often forget that these consolations only appeal to those whose lives have been invariably directed by a religious standard, and that worldly-minded men like myself can no more obtain the benefit of these remedies than they could of any internal medicament which required a course of long persistence. I say this to show that while not insensible to the truthfulness of these counsels, yet that personally they do not apply.
“It is now left me to labour on with broken spirits and a faded heart. To try and cheat the weariness of others I must strain head and nerves, and stifle true feeling to portray its mockery.
“I suppose I only re-echo what thousands have said, that I wish from my heart the race was run, and that I could lie down beside my poor Charley.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Casa Capponi, Florence,Oct. 20, 1863.
“It was very neglectful of me not to acknowledge your cheque. It was the more so, since I had not any other money in my possession.
“My wife is a little better. She thanks you deeply and gratefully for your words of kindness and sympathy to us both.
“I have not been able to work yet, but in a day or two I’ll try. The poor fisherman in ‘The Antiquary’ cobbled at the boat of his drowned son the day after,—but it’s harder to task the head when the heart is so heavy.
“It is very kind of you to tell me good tidings of my story. Believe me, I am far more anxious for you than for myself.”
To Dr Burbidge.
“Wednesday,Oct. 21,1863.
“I only send you so much of my proof as will make the eighth part in publication (la suite en prochain numéro). I detained it to make certain corrections, by which you will see I am less an ass than a first reading might have persuaded you to believe.
“Blackwood writes to me very favourably; he holds much to the secrecy as to the authorship, and has not even told Aytoun, his most intimate friend.
“With all thebonne volontéin the world, I cannot work. I can no more do it than I could walk with a broken leg. It is not that the thing is difficult, it is impossible.
“I am right well pleased with our success at Church matters—that is, that we have done all that so narrow an atmosphere admits of, and will conquer fresh worlds when they are discovered.
“Are there any English ships in the Gulf? or is there anything consular asked for or wished for?”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Casa Capponi, Florence,Nov. 7, 1863.
“‘Tony’ looks better in Magazine than in proof. I hope your readers like it, and sincerely more on your account than on my own.
“I write now to ask would you like a paper on Turkey, on which Bulwer has been cramming me, but of whichI myselfknow nothing? First of all, are you Turk or anti-Turk in Magazine? for B. is outrageously Moslem, and, of course, so will be his article.
“From what I hear from him, the subject might be treated popularly and readably.
“What clever papers those are in this month’s Magazine, Hawthorne and the Americans! They are wonderfully well written, and I am amazed at the good temper of the first, for the theme was a very strong temptation for sharp reprisals.
“Up to this I have done nothing. I have a very aguish headache that takes me on alternate days, and for which I am ordered change of air, which, of course, in my wife’s present state of health, is impossible. I am very peevish and dissatisfied at my forced idleness; but I suspect if I were to write in my present mood you would be even less pleased with my industry.”
To Dr Burbidge.
“Casa Càpponi, Florence,Nov. 11, 1863.
“If the grapes are sour here, it is simply because the fox is too lazy to stand on his hind legs and take them.
“Pendleton goes positively on the 17th—so he says. There is no one, nor can there be any one, here to take his place in permanence. If really, then, you do not actually prefer the hard peas of Spezzia, there is a reasonable chance of success by a little effort. Just in the same ratio that I have always bedevilled my own fortunes, I have a certain luck when I deal with those of others; so if you care to make a move here, say so now, or hold your peace during all next summer.
“I was told yesterday—by so great a swell that he was almost unintelligible, and so high and mighty as not to bear being conquered of by me—that there was a lady now here who was the wife of a gentleman who once was H. M. of Rugby before Arnold, and who, hearing of your vicinity, expressed a lively desire to see you here as chaplain. You would doubtless know who she is, and if she be a valuable constituent. At all events, think of the thing, andthink fast.
“Sir Bulwer Lytton is graciously pleased to be pleased with ‘Tony,’ and condescends to ask Blackwood, Who writes it? Some compensation this, for a friend now here told me he turned it over, but though it wasn’t positivelybad, it was not ‘tempting.’ Happily it takes all sorts of folk to make a public—as well as a world.
“I believe Julia sent you down a book of mine this morning. If ‘The Times’ does not reach regularly, it is because it misses here at least every second day.
“Write to me. Tell me that you are well and the Hôtel d’Odessa empty, that the climate agrees with Mrs Burbidge, and that Bassetti has the ague.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Casa Capponi, Florence,November.
“Do not cut down T. B.,—it would certainly damage him, and I’ll not fail you, so far at least as time is concerned. What you tell me of the opinions of him cheers me much.
“I wrote you a line about Turkey, and now it seems to be that a droll series of short papers might be well devised—Mr Kenny Dodd upon ‘Men and Things in General,’—a light [survey] taken from an Irish point of view, and consequently as oftenwrongas right. Next year will be a stirring one here—that is, over the Continent, and afford plenty of passing events when one wanted them.
“I wonder Bulwer Lytton did not guess me, and I wonder even more that he liked T. B.; but I am well pleased all the same.
“So you are coming round to M’Caskey. I half thought you would, and said little in his defence. It certainly is not easy for any one not ‘bog-born’ to understand that composite animal which Ireland produces, and has so much of the gentleman through a regularly demoralised scampish nature: thepoint d’honneurpreserved after honour itself was gone, and the tradition of being respectable maintained after years of a sponging-house and the police-courts. Believe me, I know full fifty M’Caskeys, and one of them became a Chief Justice, though I don’t mean mine to end that way.
“My very warmest thanks for yours and Mrs Blackwood’s inquiries about my wife. She is a little better,—at least she says so, and that is something,—and she was very grateful about your interest for her.”
To Dr Burbidge.
“Casa Capponi, Florence,Nov. 1863.
“I like the notion you suggest of my cancelling. Did you ever see an Irishman throw out a pint of his chalk mixture because he saw a bluebottle in the measure? Or, rather, didn’t he daintily pick out the beastie, aye, if it was a cockroach, with finger and thumb, and serve his customer? I tell you I couldn’t afford to be careful. I’m not rich enough, to write creditably,—e poi?I never could bring myself yet, nor do I hope to arrive at the point hereafter, to respect my Public; and I often hug myself, in the not very profitable consolation, that they never thought meaner of me nor do I of them. Iknowthat the very worst things I ever did were instant successes, and some one or two—as ‘The Dodds,’ for instance, which had a certain stamp of originality—were total and lamentable failures. Now, mind, I do not say this in any spirit of misanthropic invective. I do not want, like poor Haydn, to slang the world that refuses to appreciate me—and, for this reason, that they have taken carrion from me and eaten it for good wholesome ox beef; but I say that for such consumers the trouble of selection is clean thrown away, and I feel that if I were to write for Fame, I might finish my book in the Fleet.
“My wife is certainly better; the change is not so great as to alter her habits of rest and seclusion, but she is better, and looks better. Ju and Syd well, and, like all of us, very much yours.
“Your notes are a great pleasure, and I think the postman a scoundrel when he doesn’t bring one.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Casa Capponi, Florence,Nov., 23,1863.
“The sight of your handwriting is very comforting to me. I tell you frankly I get no letters that cheer me like yours now. I quite agree with you about Turkey, and our policy has no other defence than that it is better to leave open to contingencies what, if we were to deal with summarily, we should finish at once. In not negotiating with Nicholas England was simply giving way to one of those intermittent attacks of morality which seize her after some aggressive paroxysm—a Caffre war or the annexation of [?Oude] We have done scores of things—and if we live and prosper will do them again—far more reprehensible than a partition of Turkey. I believe the Crimean war was a signal blunder, and the peace that followed it worse than the war.
“As to Turkey as a question for a paper, I can only say as Lord Plunkett did of acrim. con. case: ‘I’d like to have a hundred pounds to argue it either way.’
“How glad I am you like ‘The Dodds.’ I know I have never done, nor ever shall do, anything one half so good, because it is original. I decanted, through all the absurdities of Dodd’s nature, whatever I really knew of life and mankind, and it is that very admixture of shrewd sense and intense blundering that makes an Irishman. The perception and theenjoymentof the very domestic absurdities that overwhelm him with shame would in any other nature mean insanity, but they only make an Irishman very true to his national characteristics, and rather a pleasant fellow to talk to.
“I’ll send you soon a sketch of my intentions as to ‘The Dodd’ papers; perhaps you are right in keeping the name back.
“Your brother was quite right. My compliments to him, and say he shall not be bored with any more Italian politics. I suppose my old medical instincts led me into the mess, and made me fancy that an ‘occasional bitter’ was always useful I’ll send you a batch of MSS. in a day or two, andwhen you send me the proofs I’ll go ahead vigorously.
“I am reading Kinglake, and delighted with him. I go with every line of him.”
To Dr Burbidge.
“Casa Capponi, Florence,Dec, 1,1863.
“I have at last bullied my attack, though a severe rheumatism has seized on me and brought me to my knees in more senses than one. I am truly sorry to hear you are out of sorts. Let me prescribe. Go up to the V. Consulate, extremity of the Casa Falconi, and make Freddy (Sanders, F.) search out from among the bottles there one of brandy—it is wonderfully old and good—and take it home, and give yourself a stiffish glass of the same, cold, without water, a short time before bed-hour, and follow it each day by ten grains quinine in two separate doses—five grains each, [?C’est]la grande cure.
“I am not yet sure whether I have lost MSS. as well as proof, the last, certainly, as you may know to your cost some fine day when you see No. 2 walk in once more to have his face washed, for indeed I could not make the corrections you did, and I know they ought to be made. By the way, neither of us remarked that I gave the same maid—Honoré—to Sir William Wardle and the Vyners.
“I cannot get to work as I ought. I have a good many anxieties, and I bear them less well than I used. Strange dispensation, that one’s load should grow heavier as the back to bear it grows weaker!
“I am making a shocking mull of ‘Luttrell,’ I feel and know, and can’t help it. I suppose I shall go down to Spezzia in a few days—that is, next week, but I don’t like leaving home with my wife so nervous and suffering.
“The Church here at a dead-lock. Pendleton threatening, the vestry coaxing, the parson putting forth each Sunday all his most attractive graces, but still, to be sure, asking for more; and the public, most of whom are in the migratory state, declare that they belong to another parish, and are deaf to the charmer.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Florence,Saturday, [Dec]5, [1863.]
“I got a fright at finding that your letter of the 30th does not acknowledge the receipt of ‘Tony.’ part five, and I hope it has reached you and will soon reach me. I was wrong about seeing Staffa,—that is, I have seen it, but only twice or thrice in as many years,—a mere chance effect of atmosphere which ought not to have been set down as a common occurrence. Bulwer Lytton amused me about the Colonial habits, but what would he say if the Sec. (as in Duke of Newcastle case) was in the Lords, and never went to the House of Lords at all? His other remark is of more consequence—about Maitland’s connection with Neapolitan politics; and I am sorry that he dislikes it, sorry because he is a consummately good critic, and if he with his reflective habits thought my politics a bore, Heaven help me with the genuine novel-reader!
“But, as you truly say (and with more truth in my particular case than in most men’s), I must only do the best I can in myownway, not meaning that I do not desire to be told when I am wrong, and feel thankful to any one who will take that trouble with me, and endeavour, moreover, so far as I can, to benefit by the counsel I would not tell him of the author. It will, besides, enable him to be more free in stating his opinion, which the oftener you can obtain for me the better.
“I so fully agreed with you in not reviving Kenny Dodd, that I have created a new man, Cornelius O’Dowd, whose letter to you is enclosed herewith—the third chapter, being ‘The Friend of Gioberti,’ which caused a laugh from those who have little mirth in their hearts of late. I’m not sure you’ll like the thing (though I do), but you will never disconcert me by frankness, backed up, as I now find it to be, by a very kindly feeling towards me. There will very soon be events stirring enough to record here. These people are bent on war, and the secret agent of the Government left this yesterday for Caprera to confer with Garibaldi.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Casa Capponi, Florence,Dec, 19, 1863.
“There’s a common belief here that no letters with a photograph can pass through the Florence post office, as some amateur official is certain to secure it. If this (a copy for a bust that had a year ago some likeness to me) reaches you it will be perhaps lucky, and if it fail there will be no great misfortune to you. The sight of me, either in the flesh or cardboard, has long ceased to make any one more light-hearted. I am shaking away, and if I try to write in my present condition you’d shake too.Speriamo—the weather will change soon, and, though I’m not given to be over-sanguine of late, I hope to be again at work in a few days, and send you a new relay of ‘Tony.’
“I wish you’d throw your eye over ‘Luttrell,’ and tell me what you think of it.
“A happy Xmas to you and yours.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Casa Capponi, Florence, Dec 23, 1863.
“I send you herewith four chapters, to make at least part of No. 6, ‘Tony.’ Read and comment, and let me soon see the proof, for this is my one busy consular moment and I can do nothing ‘fictionally’ for some time, though Heaven knows, I know nothing of bottomry, nothing of weight, Nothing of cargo, demurrage, or freight. And such a maze are my faculties wrapt in,
‘I never could sayTo this blessed dayIs it the Consul should pay or the Captain?’
“Addio, and a pleasanter and happier Christmas than is the lot of yours faithfully.”
To Dr Burbidge.
“Casa Capponi, Dec. 26, 1863,
“Will you kindly post the enclosed for me to imply that I am a resident of Spezzia, and still enjoy the graceful hospitalities of the Hôtel d’Odessa?
“I am glad you take the view which, though I did not word before, I myself entertained of the ‘Athenaeum’ criticism. I believe I can guess the secret spring which set the attack in motion, and the whole is not worth thinking of, and I can dismiss it from my thoughts without even an effort.
“Still, I do not believe ‘Luttrell’ will do, and my conviction is that the despair that attaches to Ireland, from Parliament down to ‘Punch,’ acts injuriously on all who would try to invest her scenes with interest or endow her people with other qualities than are mentioned in police courts.
“Tell me, and the theme is a pleasanter one, do you take or give yourself a holiday at this season? You surely do not treat the old age and last moments of the year so disparagingly as to make working days of them! Well, then, come up and give us three or four of them here. I make no excuse for a dull house, probably you wouldn’t come if it were a gay one, but such as it is you will be a very welcome guest, and I am sure that a little new venue and new witnesses in the box would be of service to you.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
[Undated.]
“My present plan is of such a book as would make an ordinary 3-vol. novel, for which I have, I believe, sufficient material for a good story, and a stirring one. I have not, however, written one line beyond what I have sent you, so that to trust me you must take my own security.
“Serial-writing not alone adapts itself to my habits, but actually chimes in with a certain mixture of indecision and facility which marks whatever I do in this way—that the success or failure of any character before the world has always guided me, whether to work out the creation more fully and perfectly, or to abandon it quietly. To give an instance,—I could give over fifty,—Micky Free was never intended to figure in more than a passing scene in ‘Charles O’Malley’; but the public took to him, and so I gave him to them freely.
“All these ‘Confessions of Harry Lorrequer’ will neither exhibit my artistic or constructive power in a very high light.N’importe!if you take me, you must take me as they do the two-year-olds—with all my engagements, which are to write in the only way I have hitherto done, or I honestly believe I could do at all.
“As to money, a post bill, or your cheque, quite as negotiable, will suit me perfectly. I hope I am legible, but I have my fears, for I jammed my fingers in a block on board my boat t’other day, and have not used a pen since till now.”
Late Portrait (85K)
END OF THE FIRST VOLUME. PRINTED BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS