To Dr Burbidge.
“Florence, Thursday, [? June] 1864.
“I have taken a villa—a cottage in reality, but dear enough,—the only advantage being that it looks modest; and just as some folk carry a silver snuff-box made to look like tin, I may hope to be deemed a millionaire affecting simplicity.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Villa Morelli, June 14, 1864.
“I looked forward eagerly to your promised letter about O’Dowd. No one could do an imaginary portrait of a foreignised Irishman—all drollery about the eyes, and bearded like a pard—better than Hablot Browne (Phiz), and I think he could also do all that we need for illustration, which would be little occasional bits on the page and tailpieces. If he would take the trouble to read the book (which he is not much given to), and if he would really interest himself in it (not so unlikely now, as he is threatened with a rival in Marcus Stone), he could fully answer all our requirements. I would not advise any regular ‘plates,’ mere woodcuts in the page, and an occasional rambling one crawling over the page. What do you think?”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Villa Morelli, June 16,1864.
“I am delighted with all your plans about ‘O’Dowd,’ and though I do not believe there will be much to alter, I will go carefully over the sheets when I get them. My notion always was that it would take some time to make a public for a kind of writing more really French in its character than English, but that if we could only once get ‘our hook in,’ we’d have good fishing for many a day.
“If my reader will only stand it, I’ll promise to go on as long as he likes, since it is simply putting on paper what goes on in my head all day long, even (and unluckily for me) when I am at work on other things.