Charles Lever, His Life in His Letters, Vol. I

by Charles James Lever

During the summer, however, the sick man rallied. His spirits rose as he observed the little watering-place filling up once more. In August his report to Dublin was that Portstewart was fast becoming a paradise for the lodging-house keepers,—cottages fetching £15 to £20 a-month. He goes on to say that “about four thousand strangers are here—glad to get any accommodation—living in hovels and sleeping on the ground. There is a great deal of company-seeing—but all heavy dinners. No music, nor any pleasant people to chat to. I have been gradually getting more illegible,” he continues, “till I find the last of this letter resembling a Chaldean MS. I am ready to shout from the pain of my right elbow,—my horse fell and rolled over me, and in the endeavour to rise fell back upon me. Those who saw the occurrence thought I was killed on the spot.”

Presently he formed one of the most important acquaintanceships of his life. Amongst the many visitors to Portstewart was William Hamilton Maxwell, Rector of Balla, near Castlebar. Maxwell had published his ‘Stories of Waterloo, in 1829, and his ‘Wild Sports of the West’ in 1830. To Lever at this period Maxwell was a literary demigod. The two men exchanged views about Irish life and character, and Maxwell fired the dispensary doctor with a desire to beget a novel of adventure.

If ever a writer was handsomely equipped for the creating of tales of romantic adventure or boisterous Irish humour, that writer was assuredly Charles Lever. He had spent his early days in an atmosphere charged with recollections of a brilliant era and a mettlesome, laughter-loving people. As a mere youth he had displayed a love for good books, a faculty of improvisation, and a facility in the art of composition. Endowed with an excellent education in his own country, he had enlarged his knowledge of life and literature by travel, observation, and study in foreign countries. He was a member of a profession whose duties bring one into close touch with all sorts and conditions of men. His imagination was lively and fertile, his vision kaleidoscopic, his power of observation quick and true. He had a high sense of honour and an unaffected admiration for noble and valorous deeds: his appreciation of wit and humour was keen and sound, his love of fun and frolic ebullient.*

* Edgar Allan Poe pronounced Lever’s humour to be the humour
of memory and not of the imagination,—a criticism which is
only a half truth.

He had been indulging, in a desultory fashion, in literary vagaries during the dull months of his Portstewart life,* but he had not put much heart into his literary work since the death of ‘The National Magazine.’

* A cousin of Lever, Mr Harry Innes, told Dr Fitzpatrick
that Lever, during his Portstewart days, had written a
considerable portion of a work on Medical Jurisprudence.—E.
D.

Maxwell, however, had reanimated him; and when the author of ‘Stories of Waterloo’ returned to the West of Ireland (in the autumn of 1835), Lever got into communication with editors of various publications. He was especially anxious to get a hearing at the office of ‘The Dublin University Magazine’ (launched in January 1833). The earliest story of his which appeared in this interesting periodical was “The Black Mask.” There is a somewhat curious history concerning this tale. In 1833 Lever had entrusted the manuscript of the story to a Dublin acquaintance, instructing him to deliver it to a certain publisher in London. No acknowledgment came from this publisher—who, possibly, was not in the habit of corresponding with unsolicited contributors—and at length, failing to obtain any reply to his letters of inquiry, Lever rashly concluded that the manuscript had been lost. He re-wrote the story and sent it, in 1836, to Dublin. When “The Black Mask” appeared in the May number of ‘The Dublin University Magazine,’ William Carleton, the novelist, informed the editor that not only was the tale a translation, but that it was a flagrantly pirated version of a translation which had appeared in an English publication called ‘The Story-Teller,’ Lever was furious at being charged with a literary fraud, but he hardly knew how to answer the charge. Fortunately young Mrs Lever had seen her husband writing the first version of the story, but even this did not explain everything satisfactorily. Eventually it was discovered that the envoy to whom Lever had entrusted the MS. of “The Black Mask” in 1833 had surreptitiously disposed of it to ‘The Story-Teller.’

Throughout the year 1836 Dr Lever continued to supply ‘The Dublin University Magazine, with contributions—short stories and reviews. He had quickly established pleasant relations with James M’Glashan, the publisher of the magazine.*

* James M’Glashan’s early history is not very clear. He
migrated to Dublin, probably in the Twenties. About 1830 he
was secretary of the Dublin Booksellers’ Association. He was
with Messrs Curry from 1840 to 1846 at 9 Upper Sackville
Street In 1846 he went to D’Olier Street, and was in
business there with Mr M. H. Gill until 1856, when Mr Gill
bought him out of the firm of M’Glashan and Gill. The
foregoing facts have been communicated to me by Mr Michael
Gill, B.A., Director of Messrs M. H. Gill & Son, Ltd., and a
grandson of the M. H. Gill who was M’Glashan’s partner
—E. D.

A letter written in May to M’Glashan has been preserved:—