“....Except the most miserable piece of depressing twaddle, yclept ‘Horace Templeton,’ the fruit of gloomy reveries and dreary brain-wanderings, I have nothing sur le tapis, but I’ll try to set to work once that our affair Curry is settled.”
To Mr Alexander Spencer.
“Palazzo Standish, Florence, Feb. 4, 1848.
“I have this day received yours of the 25th asking respecting the insertion of ‘Hinton’ in ‘The Dublin University Magazine.’ This was done with my permission though manifestly against my interest, as the sale was thus rendered by so much less than we might reasonably have looked for in the No. form. Of course, however, we cannot now complain that we made a bad bargain; and as for the Currys, they will never allude to a matter whose discussion would tell against themselves. The Magazine history is this: When I was living in Brussels I received a letter from M’Glashan saying that if I liked to come to Ireland to take the editorship of the Magazine (which I had already expressed a strong wish to do), they would guarantee me at least £2000 for the first year, and after such a rate of remuneration as increased sales, &c, might warrant. I came, and then, to my great disappointment, discovered that they included the whole sum I had already contracted to receive for ‘Jack Hinton’ in that same £2000 (viz., £1300), leaving me not £2000 but £700 for the editorship and authorship of the papers I wrote for ‘The Dublin University Magazine.’ It was, however, too late to retract. I had given up my profession, my station as attaché to the Embassy; my friends had ceased to regard me as a doctor, and so I was in for it. If I bore up tolerably well against this piece of trickery, it was really because I had resolved, come what would, not to lose courage,—and so I did continue for the very miserable three years I stayed in Ireland. I tell this now—I believe I never did tell it to you before,—not that it may in any way be of use or influence in the present conjuncture, but simply as a circumstance to show that I have never been exigeant or exacting in my dealings with other folks. Nor when I had (as I still have) a written pledge in my hands did I think its enforcement a matter of legal redress.
“I hope, ardently, that in the end the books may find themselves in Chapman’s hands; but I feel so assured that Curry is a trickster, and that when his own narrow intelligence fails him he is always ready to avail himself of any counselled iniquity, that I still fear the termination of the affair.
“Do you see anything of M’Glashan, or hear of his doings? You are aware that he never replied to me, and consequently all intercourse has ceased between us. Is he like to weather the storm, or do you think that he is outstaggering under the gale?
“The weather here is and has been delicious. I have never worn an upper coat, and never been one day without several hours on horseback. Such a climate I never believed to exist before.”
To Mr Alexander Spencer.
“Bagni di Lucca, Feb. 26, 1848.
“I have just returned from a most interesting but somewhat precarious journey—to carry despatches from our Ambassador here to the general late in command of the Tuscan forces.* It was full of adventure and strange incident, and although the revolutionary [? movement] has been too rapid to make us more successful, the result has shown (which was a great object) the disposition of the government of England towards the fallen Grand Duke.